British intelligence employee and Russian spy.
Member of the [Cambridge Spy Ring]? with [Donald Maclean]?, [Guy Burgess]? and [Anthony Blunt]?. Philby was nicknamed Kim after a fictional spy.
Born in Ambala?, India the son of the British explorer and Arabist [Harry St. John Philby]?.
After leaving Westminster school in 1928, Philby went on to [Trinity College]?, Cambridge. While a student there Philby came to admire the ideals of Communism. He was recruited by Blunt in 1933 or by Edith Tudor-Hart and Arnold Deutsch in 1934.
After working as a journalist Philby was recruited into the British Secret Intelligence Service (the so-called M.I.6) in 1940, later joining SOE and coming into contact with OSS agents.
After the war Philby went first to Istanbul. He later became first secretary at the British embassy in Washington. He returned to England in 1950 and in 1951 managed to tip off Burgess and Maclean to an internal British intelligence probe, this warning allowed them time to escape to Russia. He was not uncovered until 1963 (with the defection of Anatoli Golytsin) but Philby also escaped to Russia before any arrest could be made.
He died in 1988 and was given a hero's funeral by the Soviet government.
Tim Powers based the book Declare on his unusual life story, providing a supernatural explanation for his behavior ("Tradecraft meets Lovecraft").
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