Fact is he was in the Army (joining in June, 1940) and went AWOL on December 18th, 1940. MI5 had monitored him since 1932 and had placed him on a Special Observation List when he joined the army. His superiors did not like his activities in the army and feared his bad influence on fellow soldiers.

It is hard to believe for me that MI5 had observed him all the time but completely lost track of him after December 1940. In January 1941 a colonel wrote: Pte. miller has been absent from this unit without leave since 18th December, and there would appear to be something fishy concerning his absence, as communications have been received from his wife asking for extensions of leave

After the war there has been no action against MacColl, completely different from the treatment of normal deserters.

One can speculate what has happened. Perhaps, MI5 was quite happy to have him, the communist, no longer in the army and there was a kind of mutual agreement that he needed not to come back and that the AWOL would not be prosecuted in his case.

Wolfgang