Newly declassified British documents show that Queen Elizabeth II wasn’t told details of her long-time art adviser's double life as a Soviet spy because palace officials didn’t want to add to her worries.

Queen Elizabeth II was not officially informed for nearly a decade that Anthony Blunt was a Soviet spy, newly declassified documents reveal.

Sir Anthony Blunt, the surveyor of the Queen's pictures and distinguished art historian, finally confessed he had been a Soviet agent since the 1930s.

Queen Elizabeth II was not officially informed for almost a decade that one of her most senior courtiers had confessed to being a Soviet spy, according to newly released MI5 files.

Newly declassified files reveal the late Queen's very unexpected reaction to the art historian's shocking secret.

The identity of a Russian spy among Queen Elizabeth II's courtiers was kept from the monarch for almost a decade, but she took the news with her typically calm demeanour

Anthony Blunt, who worked at Buckingham Palace as Surveyor of the Queen’s Pictures, was secretly a Soviet spy during WWII.

Queen Elizabeth II was not officially informed for nearly a decade that Anthony Blunt was a Soviet spy, newly declassified documents reveal.

Sir Anthony Blunt, the surveyor of the Queen's pictures, confessed in 1964 that he had been a Russian agent since the 1930s, when he was recruited into the Cambridge spy ring