Brigadier

Brigadier (United Kingdom)

Brigadier is a senior rank in the British Army and the Royal Marines.Brigadier is the superior rank to Colonel, but subordinate to Major-General....

 Vivian Dykes (1898 - 29 January 1943), was the Director of Plans, War Office

War Office

The War Office was a department of the British Government, responsible for the administration of the British Army between the 17th century and 1964, when its functions were transferred to the Ministry of Defence...

 between 1939 and 1941 and became the first Chief Combined Secretary British Joint Staff Mission Washington in 1942. He was described as being 'at the heart of allied military policy making'. In the winter of 1940-41, before the USA had formally entered the war, Dykes was selected for an unusual, but important mission: to escort Colonel William Joseph Donovan

William Joseph Donovan

William Joseph Donovan was a United States soldier, lawyer and intelligence officer, best remembered as the wartime head of the Office of Strategic Services...

, soon to become head of the Office of Strategic Services (forerunner to the CIA) and head of US intelligence, on a fact-finding tour of the Mediterranean.

Dykes died in 1943 on approach to RAF Talbenny

RAF Talbenny

RAF Talbenny was a World War II Royal Air Force airfield in Pembrokeshire operational from 1942 to December 1946. There were 3 concrete runways encircled by a perimeter track and 36 dispersal points....

 on a flight from Casablanca

Casablanca

Casablanca is a city in western Morocco, located on the Atlantic Ocean. It is the capital of the Grand Casablanca region.Casablanca is Morocco's largest city as well as its chief port. It is also the biggest city in the Maghreb. The 2004 census recorded a population of 2,949,805 in the prefecture...

. On hearing the news Winston Churchill

Winston Churchill

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...

  sent a telegram to Air Chief Marshal Sir Charles Portal asking him to send his condolences to his relatives.

His war time diaries were edited by Alex Danchev and published under the title 'Establishing the Anglo-American Alliance: The Second World War Diaries of Brigadier Vivian Dykes' in 1990.

Family

Uncle to Michael Swann

Michael Swann

Michael Meredith Swann, Baron Swann, FRS was a distinguished molecular and cell biologist working on the mechanisms of cell division and fertilisation. He used cell polarisation methods to understand the changes in molecular organisation of the mitotic spindle...

 former chairman of the BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 and Hugh Swann

Hugh Swann

Hugh Sinclair Swann , otherwise known as Tim Swann, became the cabinet maker to Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom. His work was inspired by his admiration for Barnsley, Gimson and Russell...

, cabinet maker to Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom

Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom

Elizabeth II is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,...