He was assigned to Washington in 1949, and put in charge of liaison between British intelligence and the C.I.A. Kim Philby ran the entire counterespionage service of M.I.6., the British Secret Intelligence Service, and set up the section that spied on the Soviet Union. When Philby died in Moscow in 1988 at the age of 76, he was buried with full military honors. Long after the Soviet Union they spied for collapsed in 1991, Philby remains a hero in Russia. His study is crammed with books by his good friend Graham Greene, detective novels, the spy novels of le Carre, as well as dozens of books about his betrayal. His vast collection of Russian classics line the living room shelf. She sold off many of his papers, books and mementos like a silver cocktail shaker at Sotheby's in 1994 for about $200,000 (her pension today is $82 a month), but the rooms are a well-polished shrine to a hero of the Soviet Union. Philby, 65, still lives in the comfortable apartment that Philby was assigned after his defection. The sheer breadth of their betrayal - of colleagues, class and country - inspired an entire generation of spy fiction, most notably the novels of John le Carre. She wrote, ''He answered in high style, unnatural to him: 'We Communists should be patient, strong and not give in to weakness.' ''Ĭharming and gifted, Kim Philby was the shining star of the so-called Cambridge spies, a group of privileged young Englishmen who were recruited to spy for the Soviet Union in the 1930's, and who over the decades wormed their way into the highest echelons of British intelligence. She said that Philby, well on his third whisky, refused to discuss it then or ever. She once felt deep scars on his wrist, and asked him about them. According to her book, ''I Went My Own Way,'' which was released today, Philby attempted suicide in the 1960's.
His Russian widow, Rufina Philby, has added one startling new detail. Philby's loneliness, depression and heavy drinking after his defection are well documented. The fourth and last wife of the British master spy Kim Philby has written her memoirs of life with the most famous mole in the history of espionage.Īnd his life in Russia, at least initially, was grim.
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