Christopher Hutton
Christopher William Clayton Hutton (1893–1965) a soldier, airman, journalist and inventor, was recruited as an intelligence officer to work for MI9, a branch of the British Military Intelligence, during the Second World War. Known as 'Clutty' to his friends, he was engaged towards the end of 1939 by the War Office to work under Major (later Brigadier) Norman Crockatt, in order to set up and run operations to create and distribute escape and evasion aids for Allied servicemen. Hutton's small team identified suitable manufacturers, ensured supplies and devised methods by which the concealed aids could be sent to prisoner of war camps.
Christopher Hutton
When Hutton began his MI9 duties, escape and evasion activities under Crockatt were based in Room 424 of the Hotel Metropole, Northumberland Avenue, London. However, Hutton himself kept away from the building as much as possible. According to his own account, this was on the instructions of Crockatt. So he found himself a small room in the War Office buildings as his base. As the result of a dispersion policy in October 1940 the whole outfit was removed to Wilton Park, Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire. Hutton records that he was given an office so palatial that it would have satisfied Cecil B. de Mille. He was also granted a woman driver, who admitted that she had been warned that Hutton was mad! Evidently though, according to his own story, they got on together quite well. Later in his service, probably during 1943 when he was showing signs of stress from overwork, he found himself a hideaway in an excavated "bunker" near a graveyard somewhere beyond the grounds of Wilton Park mansion. There he took his equipment and materials to continue working, undisturbed.