During World War II he was Managing Director of the armaments firm British Manufacture and Research Co (BMARC), and from 1942-1950, he was the Member of Parliament for Grantham.
When he was fourteen, he ran away to sea and made £5,000—a huge sum at the time—helping police raid opium dens along China's Yangtze River before running a waterfront cabaret in Shanghai.
Kendall attracted the notice of the British security service for his Fascist sympathies, his suspected German links, his possible involvement in arms trafficking and his notorious indiscretion.
As the Managing Director for the British Manufacture and Research Company in Grantham, Kendall had controversial views on war production, which he took every opportunity to publicise.
He failed to secure adequate finance, despite the promise of funds from the Jamsahib of Nawanagar, India, and the company went into liquidation.
Shortly after his election, a reporter visiting his office saw that he had letters pinned up from Winston Churchill, King George VI and Lord Beaverbrook commending him for his part in the rescue of four people from a bombed house.
However, the security files also showed how Beaverbrook, then Minister for Aircraft Production, had raised concerns about Kendall's activities.
She despaired of his lavish lifestyle; and in one letter to a US friend, wrote: "...[he] has completely lost his head... has one woman friend after another... spends thousands on silver and diamonds... some day the British people will want to know what is happening".The Security Service MI5, continued to watch his activities, and expressed concerns that he was carelessly revealing wartime production figures in his election hustings speeches in a way that breached the Official Secrets and the Defence of the Realm Acts.
A file minute of 14 September 1944 summarises the low opinion in which the Service held him "The not very satisfactory Member of Parliament is said to boast that he can get his own way on everything."
The files go on to record speculation about his presumed post-war gun running and smuggling activities in India, the Netherlands and Palestine, involving Kendall's boat, which had a double hull for concealing illicit items.
The security files also disclose that MI5 also kept close eyes on another company, Russian Oil Products, which was suspected of being a cover for Soviet espionage though Kendall's involvement, if any, is unclear.
The website also publishes a report headed "British MARCo military history of the second world war as seen by William Denis Kendall" (undated but presumably post-war) with the following quote:[...] "About this time the Ministry of Aircraft Production came into being headed by Lord Beaverbrook with Lord Brownlow being his Parliamentary Private Secretary.
Virginia was a tall, lithe redhead with very large, expressive blue eyes, charming and with the grace of a dancer.
It was on such an occasion, during which they merely stayed the required minimum time in a hotel in New York, that I met Denis when I was about 10 or 11, let's say 1938 or 9, possibly as late as 1940.
I recall his telling me a long involved story about capturing a German U-boat single-handedly by surrounding it on his white horse!