Harry Noel Havelock Wild | |
|---|---|
| Born | 10 November 1903 |
| Died | 1995 |
| Service | British Army |
| Years of service | 1924–1950 |
| Rank | Colonel |
| Battles / wars | Second World War |
| Awards | Officer of the Order of the British Empire, 1943 Order of Orange-Nassau (Netherlands), 1945 |
Colonel Harry Noel Havelock Wild OBE (born 10 November 1903;[1] usually referred to as Noel Wild) was a British Army officer during the Second World War. He is notable for being second in command of the deception organisation 'A' Force as well as head of Ops. B (the department responsible for part of the Operation Bodyguard planning). He was educated at Eton College.[2]
Wild joined the Territorial Army in 1924 and obtained a transfer, via the influence of his uncle at the War Office, to the 11th Hussars the following year. He served with the 11th in England and Egypt (from 1933) before being posted home - first for training and then to teach at Bovington camp.
Wild spent some time trying to return to his regiment, but was unsuccessful. Upon his eventual return to Egypt (where the 11th Hussars were still based) he was posted as a staff officer at GHQ Middle East Command. Whilst in Cairo, disheartened by his situation, Wild ran into Dudley Clarke, an old friend. Clarke was head of 'A' Force, the department in charge of deception for the entire region. After renewing their acquaintance Clarke, in April 1942, asked Wild to join him at 'A' Force as his deputy and head of the "Operations" section.
Wild spent around eighteen months at 'A' Force, and was appointed an OBE for his work, before Clarke volunteered him to head a similar department in England. Ops (B) was a section of Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force charged with deception along the Western Front. Wild accepted the position in December 1943 and was briefed on Operation Bodyguard, the cover plan for the impending Allied invasion of Europe. Theoretically Wild held a lot of power in this new role, but a combination of his own limitations and clashes with David Strangeways (head of 'R' Force and also widely influential) made his contribution smaller than it could have been.
Following the end of the Second World War, deception was scaled back. However, Wild remained involved in secret work until the 1970s (he retired from the Army in 1950). In 1971 he became embroiled in a plagiarism dispute between Roger Fleetwood-Hesketh and Sefton Delmer, Wild appears to have provided the former's report on Operation Bodyguard to Delmer whilst the latter was writing a book about deception during the war. Wild died in 1995.