A NEW book by Haddington author Hannah Robinson has revealed some hidden gems in and around East Lothian, with some fascinating tales to go with them – including how a group of Nazis "slipped into the community" of Haddington after the Second World War.

Secret Edinburgh – An Unusual Guide may sound as if it is all about the Capital’s rich history but it has a wealth of tales from the county as well.

And even a look at iconic Edinburgh building Central Hall, Tollcross, comes with an extraordinary tale from Hannah’s hometown and how it became a recruitment base for MI6 targeting former SS soldiers.

The story goes that in 1948, at the start of the Cold War, MI6 was in desperate need of spies to smuggle through the Iron Curtain.

Their eyes turned to prisoners of war and, in particular, a POW camp in Italy where the Ukrainian inmates were all SS soldiers, many of them high-ranking.

MI6 brought the prisoners to Britain and housed up to 1,000 in Nissen huts on Amisfield golf course, in Haddington, under the ruse of claiming they were peaceful Ukrainians brought here to rebuild post-war Britain.

The map below shows a layout of the camp in question and lists 1,026 prisoner of war encamped there, with 234 soldiers overseen by 16 sergeants.

It even reveals a compound set aside for ‘turbulent prisoners’.

But while it may have looked like a simple base for displaced soldiers, the reality is that the spy agency wanted to sift through the men and see how many they could recruit to their cause.

In order to provide a cover for their work, MI6 set up a charity, the Scottish League for European Freedom (SLEF), which was to help impoverished refugees from Eastern Europe.

The unsuspecting Kitty Stewart-Murray, Duchess of Atholl, took on the role of chairperson and worked tirelessly to persuade Edinburgh’s ‘Ladies who Lunch’ to help fundraise.

Unaware of the reality of what they were funding, they held coffee mornings and jumble sales.

One of the biggest events financed by the funds raised was a conference in Central Hall, where the Ukrainian prisoners were given a chance to make their case for freedom.

As author Hannah writes: “It was a great success – but unbeknown to the ladies, they had filled the grand venue with one of the biggest crowds of Nazis since Leni Riefenstahl filmed Triumph of the Will.”

Despite MI6’s grand plans to infiltrate the East with their turned soldiers, it eventually had to be abandoned. Notorious double agent Kim Philby was already in place in the spy agency and able to tip off Moscow to each Ukrainian spy being sent back.

As the project ground to a halt, the remaining SS soldiers in the Haddington camp reportedly melted away.

Hannah writes: “It would have been churlish to expose the gullibility of their generous Scottish hosts just for the sake of a few war crime trials. So they just packed up the Nissen huts and let their former residents slip into the community...”

Secret Edinburgh – An Unusual Guide is available online and in good book shops, including Kesley’s of Haddington.