Major Roy Alexander Farran DSO, MC & Two Bars (2 January 1921 – 2 June 2006) was a British-Canadian soldier, politician, farmer, author and journalist.

Farran became widely known after his court-martial on a charge of murdering an unarmed 17-year-old member of the Jewish underground militant group Lehi during his command of an undercover Palestine Police special squad.

After his brother was killed in a revenge attack, Farran emigrated to Canada where he forged a successful business and political career, holding a seat in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1971 to 1979 sitting with the Progressive Conservative caucus.

Farran later wrote of his guilt at allowing the dangerous lead position to be taken by a subordinate -"I did not care for orders when it suited me, but this time I had chosen to obey them because I knew that I would be killed if I did not.

Moved between a series of houses, he was eventually able to link up with a number of friendly Greek civilians and three other escaped Australian and British prisoners, and was lent money to hire a caïque to sail from the port of Piraeus to British-held Egypt.

[1][2] In January 1942, Farran was appointed as the Aide-de-camp for Major General John "Jock" Campbell, the newly promoted commander of the 7th Armoured Division and recipient of the Victoria Cross (for actions in November 1941).

The car overturned, throwing Farran out but killing Campbell in the process and knocking the other occupants unconscious; he later admitted that while he awaited rescue, he had contemplated suicide.

[1][2] He commanded it during Operation Husky, the invasion of Sicily, and despite suffering from malaria led the squadron in an assault against a lighthouse at Cape Passero which was believed to hold a machine gun position.

[2][4] During September 1943, a composite squadron from 2 SAS landed at the Italian port of Taranto with orders to conduct reconnaissance patrols and attack targets of opportunity ahead of the general Allied advance.

[6] Farran, with a detachment of 20 men from 'D' Squadron of 2 SAS, came ashore with the rest of 1 SRS with orders to create a base for future raids behind enemy lines.

The seaborne landings soon became stalemated against fierce Axis resistance, and Farran and his men joined the rest of 1 SRS in an attempt to repel a German counterattack supported by armour.

With the German forces opposing them worn down by months of airstrikes and mass artillery bombardments, unaided by the Luftwaffe, Allied commanders expected to be able to achieve a decisive breakout in Normandy.

His jeeps were to advance some 200 miles (320 km) behind German lines and link up with 50 SAS troopers who had previously established a base camp near Châtillon, to the north of the city of Dijon.

Under the command of Captain Grant-Hibbert, the troopers had spent the three weeks prior to Farran's arrival ambushing German convoys and blowing up a stretch of railway between Dijon and Langres.

[13] Now left with only seven of his original jeeps, Farran pressed on, the remainder of the troopers strafing a passing goods train, puncturing the boiler on its engine and forcing it to come to a halt.

Farran took command of the combined group, which consisted of a composite squadron of 60 troopers, 10 jeeps and a civilian truck, and ordered it to move to another base to avoid further German scrutiny.

The squadron came under the command of General Mark Clark's 15th Army Group, and between December 1944 and February 1945 conducted several small-scale operations in La Spezia and the Brenner Pass.

Italian partisan brigades operated in each department, controlled by a headquarters or Comando Unico, and supported by an Allied liaison officer who supervised supply drops and encouraged them to fight the German forces in their area.

[23] After a series of raids, on 20 April, Farran was informed that Fifth Army had broken through German lines, and he decided to have the battalion assault the city of Reggio Emilia, which straddled Route 12.

The howitzer was used to bombard the main square of the town, and Farran later discovered that the local German and Italian Fascist garrison believed the attack to be coming from the vanguard of an American armoured division.

[24] During its time operating, the battalion had killed an estimated 300 German soldiers and destroyed twenty vehicles, as well as taking 158 prisoners of war, and had suffered 24 casualties in return.

[4] When the Second World War in Europe came to an end, Farran accompanied 2 SAS to Norway, where the unit aided in the process of disarming the German troops stationed there.

Shortly after this, Farran transferred back to Britain to serve as an instructor at Sandhurst, but then volunteered to be seconded to the Palestine Police Force, which maintained order in the Mandate.

[27] Political violence by Jewish paramilitary groups began when the war came to an end, and by early 1947 Palestine had experienced a large number of attacks against British targets.

On 2 March 1947, martial law was declared throughout Tel Aviv and the Jewish sector of Jerusalem, with the intended aim of differentiating the paramilitary members from the civilian population and ending the attacks.

have seen Farran as an odd choice for the assignment given his propensity to contravene direct orders, lack of experience in security or police work, and (by his own later account) drinking problem.

Subsequently, Fergusson said the concept was to provoke contact and give insurgents a 'bloody nose', while Sir Henry Gurney insisted that the squads had never been authorized to use anything outside normal police methods.

Farran did not have any fluent Hebrew speakers, but didn't liaise with the Criminal Investigation Department out of security concerns, and his unit (2001) lacked accurate intelligence on insurgents.

[36][38][39] Notes made by Farran while in custody and found after his escape reportedly contained a confession but were judged to be preparation for his defence and thus inadmissible under the rules of lawyer-client privilege.

[41] In an episode of the BBC2 television documentary series Empire Warriors first broadcast on 19 November 2004, Knesset member and former Lehi operative Geulah Cohen claimed that the letter had been addressed to "R. Farran", without knowledge of the younger brother.