Great Escapes: The story of MI9’s Second World War escape and evasion maps. Barbara Bond

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       Detail showing the sheet identifier from sheet S3 of the Bartholomew series; sheet S2 is printed on the reverse so the identifier S3/S2 has also been included.

      These are the principal variations identified to date: there may well be others yet to be discovered. It is important to describe them in detail since they are only really identifiable when surviving copies of the maps can be compared. The differences do, however, highlight the extent to which individual sheet identification of MI9’s escape and evasion maps needs always to be treated with caution.

      The solution to the challenges posed by MI9’s lack of adherence to usual cartographic identification procedures has been to use the standard cartographic technique of showing in square brackets [ ] any information which does not appear on the printed maps but which helps to identify them. The series number and series title, for example [Series 43] and Series GSGS 3982 [Fabric], have been rendered in this form to aid identification.

      Where the base map used for escape and evasion map production carried no sheet number, MI9 devised an arbitrary sheet numbering system. In the case of their early attempts based on the maps of John Bartholomew & Son Ltd of Edinburgh, the sheets carried an upper case Roman alphabet letter, often in conjunction with an Arabic number, for example C, H2, or S3.

      MI9 caused themselves significant production problems when they decided (for unknown reasons) to cut and panel sheets to produce an escape and evasion map by piecing together up to nine sheet sections of an existing operational series, rather than simply reproducing the operational map sheets on their existing sheet lines. [Series 43] is a good example of this practice. It is clear that this escape and evasion series was produced by panelling together sheets or sections of sheets from the International Map of the World (IMW) series. There are examples of coverage diagrams in the surviving files of the composition of sheets created by this method. There are also indications that the practice caused considerable angst to the regular military mapmakers when they eventually became involved in the escape and evasion production programme. On 3 December 1944, Lieutenant Colonel W. D. C. Wiggins of D.Survey wrote to MI9:

       Your proposed sheet lines do not (I have noticed this on previous layouts of yours) take into consideration existing map series sheet lines, printing sizes or fabric sizes. . . . Production is much simpler if we stick to graticule sheet lines as opposed to your, rather vague, rectangulars.

      He might also have added that the practice must have greatly increased the production costs. The point appears to have been disregarded by MI9 who continued with arbitrary sheet lines and numbering systems, exemplified by [Series 43], [Series 44] and [Series FGS].

      MAPS BASED ON BARTHOLOMEW MAPPING (AND OTHER MAPS WITH SIMILAR SHEET NUMBERS)

      As Christopher Clayton Hutton indicated in his book, Official Secret, MI9 initially worked in isolation from the military map-makers and chose rather to approach commercial map publishing firms directly for help. As previously described, Hutton had contacted the firm of John Bartholomew & Son Ltd in Edinburgh at the suggestion of Geographia in London. It was Ian Bartholomew, the Managing Director, who gave Hutton his first lesson in map-making. Hutton himself indicated that ‘thanks to the assiduities of the managing director and his staff . . . I learned all there was to know about maps’. Hutton was given copies of many of Bartholomew’s own maps of Europe, Africa and the Middle East, which then formed the basis of MI9’s initial escape and evasion map production programme. The waiving of all copyright charges for the duration of the war was a considerable financial gesture from Bartholomew since MI9 went on to produce in excess of 300,000 copies of the maps (details of the print runs are given in Appendix 1).

      The maps are readily identifiable as using Bartholomew mapping since they are identical, in specification, colour and font style, to the company’s maps of the time. They are generally small-scale (1:1,000,000 or smaller), produced in three colours (red, black and grey/green) and without elevation detail. A few of the maps carry confirmation of their source since they clearly show the Bartholomew job order number relating to the original paper map along the neat edge of the silk map. The alpha-numeric code A40 which appears in the northwest corner of some copies of sheet F was very much a Bartholomew practice. The company introduced this code in the early part of the twentieth century, mostly on their half inch-scale mapping. The formula is a letter (either A, for January–June or B, for July–December) followed by a two-digit number representing the year of printing, so A40 indicates that the original paper version of this map was printed between January and June 1940.