Library of Ian Fleming 007 novels owned by Sir Fitzroy MacLean up for auction

He was the school friend of the writer Ian Fleming who would go on to become a suave diplomat and a man of action; an upright Conservative MP who was also a founder member of the SAS. So it seems only natural that many James Bond enthusiasts should assume that Sir Fitzroy MacLean was the model for 007 - reports The Times.

Now in the most timely of sales — it is Fleming's centenary year — a full set of Bond novels and short stories from Sir Fitzroy's library is to be auctioned in Edinburgh by his son, Sir Charles MacLean. Valued together at £20,000, many are first editions and some are inscribed by Sir Fitzroy.

There was no sentimentality about the sale, said Sir Charles. His father had always maintained that he had never been a spy and, despite his friendship with the author, the Bond books had not been the most treasured of Sir Fitzroy's possessions at his former home in Argyllshire.

Whatever the truth about Fitzroy MacLean's supposed espionage career, his affinity with Fleming dated back to their schooldays at Eton.

Sir Charles admitted that his father's exploits provided some material for Bond, but said that Fleming drew on many sources. Another inspiration was Commander Wilfred Dunderdale, the postmaster at the British embassy in Paris, where Sir Fitzroy was third secretary. At the time, Fleming was a young journalist in the city, with the Reuters news agency. “My father couldn't understand how Dunderdale, in an apparently lowly job, could have a magnificent flat in Paris and gave amazing champagne and caviar parties all on the salary of a postmaster. But Dunderdale was a spy,” said Sir Charles.

“Fleming, Fitzroy and Dunderdale. That mix was probably quite close to the Bond character: a writer, a man of action and a spy with a love for the finer things — there were a lot of beautiful émigré Russian ladies in Paris at that moment.”

By the early 1940s Fleming had moved into a relatively sedentary job in Naval intelligence, while Sir Fitzroy embarked on a far more active life. He distinguished himself by kidnapping the German consul from territory in what is now Iraq, and was personally selected by Churchill to lead a mission to Yugoslavia, parachuting into the Balkans to support Tito's partisans.

Such episodes had accentuated the Bond myth, said Sir Charles. His father was fluent in Russian and travelled extensively in the Soviet Union, where many people — including his communist hosts — assumed that he was a spy.

This was not the case, said Sir Charles. “He tended to regard the intelligence world as a place for ‘overgrown boy scouts' — that was his phrase — but there were incidents.”

One episode occurred in the 1950s, when Sir Fitzroy and Lady MacLean took a holiday in Persia, now Iran. Before departure they were asked by Stewart Menzies, the head of SIS — “in other words 'M',” said Sir Charles — to gather information about a possible Soviet invasion of Turkey.

“This was classed as an informal mission, not a spying job, but as my father later discovered, he was already compromised. He said to me, 'I dread to think how the affair would have ended had such a situation developed, because the man who briefed me was the defector, Kim Philby.' I thought that was quite amusing,” said Sir Charles.

Sir Fitzroy himself neither denied nor admitted his resemblance to Bond, but enjoyed the comparison. That was his style, according to his son, whose thriller Home After Dark was published this year.

“He once described himself to me. He said, ‘Your mother's a blurter, and I am by nature a dissimulator.' My mother just said. 'Oh, that's his Foreign Office training.'”

“Bond wasn't top drawer, he wasn't a posh kid. He was minor league in the social stakes. Quite interesting, that slightly thuggish element, the smooth thug. Sean definitely had that,” said Sir Charles.

The books will be auctioned by Lyon and Turnbull, 33 Broughton Place, Edinburgh, on September 3.

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