A Very Principled Boy: The Life of Duncan Lee, Red Spy and Cold Warrior

Duncan Lee descended from the Lees of Virginia, two of whom (Richard Henry and Francis Lightfoot Lee) signed the Declaration of Independence. Another, Henry “Light Horse Harry” Lee III, was one of George Washington's leading cavalry officers. Most famous of all was Robert E. Lee, who led the Confederacy's Army of Northern Virginia. Duncan in the 1930s attended Yale, became a Rhodes Scholar, and in 1939 joined the prestigious Wall Street law firm headed by William J. Donovan. After the United States entered World War II, President Franklin Roosevelt chose Donovan to head the country's first comprehensive intelligence agency, the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). Lee followed Donovan to the OSS and was soon one of its rising officers, serving as assistant chief of the OSS Secretariat, which coordinated all OSS activities, and as secretary of the OSS's executive committee. He also served as chief of the Japan-China Section and...