Awesome - After Being Married For More Than A Decade, Wife Discovers Husband's Real Identity
Audrey Phillips lost her husband and found herself trapped in grief. Without him, she had no idea what to do next. When she got around to cleaning out his things, a mystery was unearthed. Among her husband's personal belongings, Audrey learned that her husband's life wasn't as it seemed. Audrey thought she and her husband had an honest marriage, but what she discovered proved how wrong she was.
In Mourning
In 2015, Audrey Phillips faced an uncertain future. Her husband, Glyn, passed away after sixty-four years of marriage. With children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren running around, Glyn had left behind quite the legacy. But during her grieving, Audrey learned that Glyn had left behind an even bigger part of himself.
Best Kind of Husband
Glyn Phillips was a civil engineer who always made time for his family. Parkinson's disease ultimately took his life when he was 83. Despite the pain and heartbreak that came with his death, Audrey never regretted marrying him. But with his death came the chores of cleaning up. What to keep? What to toss away?
Unlimited Grief
Glyn's personal artifacts needed to be looked over. But it didn't happen right away. In fact, Audrey found it so difficult to even attempt to erase little pieces of her husband from her life that it took three years for her to start. And it was during this cleaning that Audrey discovered secretive paperwork.
Intrigue
Audrey knew her husband liked to relax in his study and write, but the documents she found weren't penned by her husband's hand. They were written by a man she'd never heard of before. One discussed the results of a memory test for the mysterious individual. Whoever it was apparently had a photographic memory. Why would her husband have kept this?
Double Life
Glyn wasn't someone who held onto secrets. He had been private, but that didn't explain the paperwork. She looked through it more and more. What sounded like the plot of a government thriller was apparently very real moments in Glyn's life. Audrey realized Glyn's life had been in danger far earlier than his Parkinson's diagnosis.
More Questions
Another document was a letter about an individual with an unknown name. By reading it through, Audrey learned that a young boy had been pulled out of school. But how this boy and her husband were connected, she had no clue. Maybe the boy was an old friend of Glyn's from his youth...though Audrey didn't really believe that.
Confusion
Audrey Phillips found a final document that left her puzzled. A note with a telephone number was attached to it. At the top of the paper was: "Operation XX." Audrey was stumped. Glyn had never shared this information or anything related to it with her before his death. His secret was only getting bigger.
No Turning Back
Audrey turned to the telephone number. She attempted to dial the number but no one answered. It wasn't that much of a surprise. From the age of the documents, the line was probably too old to be used anymore. But then she received a call back.
On Arrival
A man spoke on the other end. He revealed he had a connection to her husband. But what he had to say, he insisted, had to be said in person. By the next day, Audrey found herself in the company of the older stranger. He told the widow that Glyn had lived a double life, one she knew nothing about.
Childhood Discovery
The strange name on the documents — the young boy in the letters — was actually Glyn Phillips himself. As a child, he was gifted with a photographic memory. So, along with twenty other boys from across the country of Britain, Glyn was selected for "Operation XX," an espionage project during World War 2.
Dark Spaces
Created by MI5, "Operation XX" brought in young boys to be trained into becoming spies for the British Intelligence Force. Their goal was to help give misinformation over to the Nazis. How they did this shocked Audrey even more. The boys were trained to carefully crawl through pipes in prisons. They were to gain the trust of German POWs being housed there.
Better than Bond
The training for the operation was a strenuous undertaking for the young recruits. Attendance at a gym was mandatory in the beginning. Glyn Phillips needed to learn life-saving self-defense techniques. As he would face something similar, Glyn and the other boys were also trained to crawl into a concrete pipe, entering it forward and leaving it backward.
Lying Game
But before returning to the pipes for an escape, the boys needed to secure secrets from the prisoners. The risk of danger was high, but with many of the boys bored of school, they sought out these kinds of adventures. Glyn Phillips didn't get to become a recruit all of a sudden. Audrey learned he needed permission.
For Your Eyes Only
Glyn Phillips' father knew of the clandestine operation, as he was the one who needed to give MI5 permission. Once he did, Glyn was officially part of Operation XX. The old stranger had been one of her husband's fellow recruits. And the story he told sounded like something from out of an old spy movie.
Hidden in the Shadows
The head of "Operation XX" was a British Intelligence Forces captain. A name was never given, but it was his job to describe the next mission. Once WWll ended, the captain had a new assignment for Glyn. By this time, Audrey's husband had grown up into a young adult.
Shifting Gears
Crawling through pipes was child's play. This time, Glyn and his fellow agents had to capture two spies. It needed to be an incredibly careful mission. The right individuals had to be apprehended and their locations needed to be noted. All of this would have bewildered any one of Glyn's future children, grandchildren, and so on. How did Audrey handle this?
Hear No Evil
Not so surprisingly, Audrey felt slightly hurt from the double life her husband hid from her. Though keeping it from her was actually Glyn's way of protecting her, she felt it should have been him who told this secret. Especially when Audrey learned that her husband's clandestine spy work continued into the early years of their marriage.
Survival
A few weeks after they wed, Audrey remembered how he disappeared for a weekend. Her husband had been on one of his final missions, and it was a dangerous one. Glyn and another spy carried out an operation to save an Intelligence Forces man on an incoming gunboat. It was a success in the end, but there was one last surprise in store for Audrey.
Last Message
The visiting stranger gifted Audrey with a handwritten note by her husband. It was to be given to her upon his death. He wrote of his regrets about lying but also of his faithful love for her. Despite living a simple life together, Glyn left behind a check with all the money he secured while as a spy. It was more than Audrey knew what to do with!
The Spy Who Loved Me
Audrey Phillips took the money and donated it all to a veteran's relief charity. From the paperwork she discovered, she published her husband's memoir. In the memoir, titled Operation XX and Me: Did I Have a Choice?, Audrey raises the question: Is spying for your country worth risking your family's trust?
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