Ian Fleming | Typed letter signed, to Reginald William Thompson, 2 May 1957

Ian Fleming

Typed letter signed, to Reginald William Thompson, "my dear Tommy", thanking him for "an extraordinary kind thought", wishing him success in his writing career, recounting a wartime episode in Belgium, "that bed of roses story", promising that "James Bond must emulate that exploit"

1 page, 4to, on Kemsley house headed paper, 19 May 1957

[with:]

Ian Fleming

A View to Kill. Travelman Short Stories, 1999

A SCARCE LETTER MENTIONING AN ANECDOTE WHICH WAS LATER INCORPORATED INTO A VIEW TO A KILL.

Fleming warmly thanks his friend Reginald William Thompson for a story from the war about a bed of roses. In A View to a Kill, contained in For Your Eyes Only, 1960, Fleming kept to his word.

"...there was a low mound, perhaps a tumulus, covered with brier roses"..."inside the mound, deep down in the earth, was the most professional spy unit that had ever been devised"..."Instead of the periscrope, a rose-stalk aerial would rise up from the bush...deep down under the earth would go the high-speed cipher".

Thompson was an army officer, journalist and author that served in World War II. After the war Thompson worked alongside Fleming at the Kemsley Newspaper Group, attending and reporting on the Nuremberg trials. He also worked extensively as a war correspondent for The Sunday Times.