▶Date of birth:  29 September 1877        Place of birth:  Throne Cottage, Antrim Road, Belfast, Ireland

▶Father:  John Harding     Mother: Caroline Mary Scott

▶Spouse(s): -     Date(s) of marriage:       Place(s) of marriage:

▶Occupation: Crown Agent, Administrator, Government Intelligence, Interpreter, Naval officer; Clergyman (Anglican)

▶Lifestory: Wyndham John Dorney Harding had an extremely varied career, serving as a Crown Agent before teaching, running a business, and working for the intelligence services; he was ordained in his late forties, and lived for a brief period in Cheltenham. He was born in Belfast in 1877, the son of local merchant John Harding, of Coaley, Gloucestershire, and Rockfield, Monmouthshire, and his wife Caroline Mary (née Scott); at the time of his mother’s marriage in 1876 she lived at East Hayes, Pittville Circus Road, Cheltenham and although born in Ireland he was baptised at St John’s Church.

Harding attended Fettes College in Edinburgh, which he left in 1895 to  attend the University of Edinburgh on a Governors’ Exhibition 1895-8. He was then appointed Crown Agent for the Colonial Office in Whitehall. Extending his interests further abroad, he served  between 1902 and 1905 as Secretary to the Gaekwar of Barodia, in Rajasthan, India.

He then turned back to academic studies, and studied Psychology at the University of Munich. In 1911 he was initiated into the St Stephen’s Lodge of the Freemasons, whilst he was living in Earl’s Court in London, living as a schoolmaster with business interests as a partner in the merchants Harding, Wace, and Co., based as 19 Bishopsgate in the City of London (the company was dissolved in 1913).

In August 1914 he set up, and was Co-Director of, another venture, the Gloucestershire and District Motor Service Company Ltd., from his address in Westbury-on-Severn. Soon after the outbreak of war he joined the Government’s Intelligence staff 1915-19, commissioned initially as an Interpreter at the Censor’s Office at Boulogne, and dividing his time between GHQ, France, and the War Office; this post was gazetted as a “Special appointment”, for pay purposes as Staff Lieutenant, Second class, and as temporary Second Lieutenant.

There was a period in 1915 when his loyalty was questioned by the Government, because of his knowledge of German and his familiarity with Germany, and also because he was said to have been “very hard up at different times”, though suspicions were dropped after his references were taken up.

In October 1916 he left the Field Censor’s office to work at GHQ (Intelligence), becoming Assistant Commandant and Third Class Agent in October 1916, and in late 1917 Assistant Commandant in the Intelligence Corps (he was mentioned in despatches by General Haig in November 1917). In November 1918 he was promoted to Second Class Agent and was attached to MI2 in the War Office, engaged in the preparation of historical and political papers; he also worked at that time for MI6. As a result of his war work he was awarded an MBE (Military) in June 1919, was demobbed at the end of the year, spent some time as a journalist, and obtained a temporary commission in the Royal Marines (Inter-Allied Commission of Control, Germany), as an interpreter.

In 1921 Harding enlisted as a Temporary Honorary Lieutenant in the Royal Navy, involved with the Inter-Allied Naval Commission of Control. At this point his career developed from military intelligence to the Church. By 1925 he was training for the ministry at  King’s College, London, and was ordained Deacon that year, and Priest (both Gloucester) a year later. In 1925 he was licensed Curate of Coleford with Staunton, in the Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire, between 1925 and 1929.

In 1929 he moved to London, where he received permission to officiate, until 1930, when his commercial speculation might have landed him in difficulties when a pig farm belonging to the Little Wadhurst Farm (Preston) Ltd., of which he was a Director, attracted heavy losses during a swine-fever outbreak; he was exonerated. In 1930 he is listed lodging at 12 Clarence Square in Pittville, and this was presumably for a short break before taking up his appointment as Curate-in-Charge of Tresco with Bryher, on the Scilly Isles, from 1930, where he remained until he was appointed Rector of Bredenbury in Herefordshire, a world far away from the intrigue and secrecy of his work during the Great War.

Harding died in 1946 in at Lambeth, at the age of sixty-eight.

▶Moved to Pittville from:  London      Moved from Pittville to: Trteco. Scilly Isles

▶Date of death:   2Q 1946     Place of death: Lambeth

▶Date of burial:         Place of burial:

▶Notes: The account of Harding’s war work is based on a contribution by “Dante” to the website of the Gentleman’s Military Interest Club - https://gmic.co.uk/topic/67448-single-ww1-war-medalhe-did-it-all-and-then-some/       ID: 16622

Contributor(s):  John Simpson/Alan Munden