Major Arthur Herbert Birse

1889 — 1981

Major Arthur Birse, a banker in peacetime, was a man of many talents, interests, and capabilities, spanning business, music, and literature. Hugh Lunghi, one of Winston Churchill’s interpreters, once said Birse was “by far the most outstanding, the most brilliant of all the Allied interpreters.” The reason for Birse’s particular skill was the fact that he was born in St. Petersburg and had grown up in Russia. His father was a Scottish merchant whose career took the Birse family to Russia, so Arthur grew up surrounded by not only the Russian language, but also the cultural nuances and colloquialisms that elevated his ability to interpret beyond translation into a form of art. He had served in World War I, where the British military first employed his Russian language skills. He promptly rejoined upon the German invasion of Norway in the spring of 1940 and was soon sent to the British embassy in Moscow. From there, he served as the interpreter for Winston Churchill and Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden during their visits with Stalin in Moscow and for the major wartime conferences. Birse was widely respected by the Soviets for his exemplary skills: in 1944, Soviet President Kalinin awarded Birse the Order of the Red Banner of Labour. After the war, he returned to his career in business, but the British government occasionally turned to him to assist with high level Russian translation.

Photograph: Memoirs of an Interpreter by A.H. Birse