Mansfield Smith-Cumming

Captain Sir Mansfield George Smith-Cumming (1 April 1859 – 14 June 1923) was a British naval officer who served as the first chief of the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS). Origins He was a great-great-grandson of the prominent merchant John Smith, a director of both the South Sea Company and the East India Company, the second son of Abel Smith (d. 1756), the Nottingham banker who founded a banking dynasty and whose business much later became National Westminster Bank, now one of the largest banks in the United Kingdom. His father was Colonel John Thomas Smith of the Madras Royal Engineers who became Master of the Madras and Calcutta Mints and designed a machine for minting coins that was displayed at the Great Exhibition in 1851. Early naval career Smith joined the Royal Navy and underwent training at Dartmouth from the age of twelve and was appointed...