Desmond de Renzy was a young man in his late teens living in Auckland during the period leading up to WWII.
He worked as a clerk for a shipping agency and had access to Auckland Wharf. De Renzy was fascinated with the world of espionage and spying. Seized documents showed him to be a fantasist who had created a world of intrigue that would rival Ian Fleming’s imagination. This fascination evolved into an obsession which led to him offering his services to the German government.
The intent was not to betray New Zealand but to act as a double agent providing intelligence to the British on German intelligence priorities and modus operandi. Despite his youth it seems as though de Renzy did succeed in spiking the interest of the German intelligence services, who responded to him. The Police were concerned when they became aware of de Renzy’s activities and their investigations took up a considerable amount of time. Nevertheless, they treated his case with a degree of sensitivity convincing de Renzy to give up his activities and kept in occasional contact with him.
In 1940/41 de Renzy admitted to police that he had in fact continued contact with the Germans. He did so, he said, because he was frightened of what the Germans would do if he did not cooperate. He passed details of shipping movements to them via visiting Japanese merchant vessels. The information he passed was innocuous and apart from removing his access to the wharf, no further action was taken. De Renzy was monitored by the Police for some time and while it continued to be a challenge to separate fact from fiction when dealing with him, his days as an imperial James Bond were over.
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