ABSTRACT
Desmond Morton joined SIS as Head of Production at a salary of £73 14s 4d per month (about £26,000 per annum at current values): the third highest salary after Sir Robert Nathan (£83 6s 8d, about £30,000) and ‘C’ himself (£104 3s 4d, about £37,200). His official starting date was less than a week after returning to England from France with Haig at the beginning of April 1919, and he took a scant two weeks’ leave before beginning a period of handover with his predecessor on 23 April. During these two weeks he presumably returned to his parents’ house at 3 Beaufort Gardens, but no record or correspondence survives to suggest what he did, or how he felt on finally returning home for good after nearly five years. During that time he had experienced a disabling wound, and sustained severe physical and psychological pressure in a military career that had kept him almost incessantly on the move since August 1914. Though neither he nor his family appear to have recorded their experiences, we know from many other accounts that such homecomings were frequently traumatic for all concerned. His parents were, presumably, pleased and relieved that their only son had come home; but for Morton the transition to a domestic environment after the harsh routine of the Western Front, followed by a heady period accompanying Haig to Allied Supreme Council meetings and attending Peace Conference discussions in Paris, must have been at least disorienting.
