With the failure of Operation Savannah, the special operations executive had serious problems, not only would they have to prove themselves being worth having more public money spent on them, their miscalculation and failure to research the operation properly had fallen right into the hands of the Secret Intelligence Service SIS, who from the start had seen SOE as threat and that they worked against the SIS in operations.
With major changes the SOE moved into new offices within the Inter Services Research Bureau at 64, Baker St, London W1, with a new officer in charge of recruiting the SOE looked for the young, fit and those that spoke a foreign language fluently, the SOE was going to be a new service and the recruits were going to become part soldier and part spy.
Recruits were sent to a large county house, away from the war they were treated as though they were guests at the country house, waited on hand and foot by SOE trained staff who watched and monitored the recruits behaviour while off duty etc. The first part of the training was Psychological testing, how they responded to certain situations, the second part was physical training, fitness being important as they would be expected to parachute into enemy territory, and the third less likely test was that of alcohol, the country house had a well stocked bar and the staff did their up most to get the recruits as drunk as possible and then observe their behaviour under the influence of the drink.
Upon passing this stage the recruits were sent up to Scotland where they were instructed in “Ungentle manly Warfare” how to handle explosives and make bombs to destroy railway lines and other targets.
From Scotland the recruits were taken to Beaulieu when finally they are actually told about the job that they were going to asked to do. They were trained in unarmed combat, how to with stand interrogation and issued with a suicide pill. The pill contained cyanide and would be crushed by the agents teeth and death would follow shortly after wards, this would obviously be the last resort, as you can imagine to use such a thing the agent would have to be in such dire straits that it would be the only way out for them. It is known that at least five special operation executive agents actually used the pill and died of the consequence.
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