Gill Bennett was Chief Historian of the Foreign & Commonwealth Office from 1995-2005, and Senior Editor of the UK's official history of British foreign policy, Documents on British Policy Overseas. As a historian in Whitehall for over thirty years, she provided historical advice to twelve Foreign Secretaries under six Prime Ministers, from Edward Heath to Tony Blair. A specialist in the history of secret intelligence, she published a ground-breaking biography, Churchill’s Man of Mystery: Desmond Morton and the World of Intelligence, in 2006. She was also part of the research team working on the official history of the Secret Intelligence Service by Professor Keith Jeffery, published in 2010.
Gill Bennett is now involved in a range of research projects for various government departments. Her most recent book, Six Moments of Crisis: Inside British Foreign Policy, was published by Oxford University Press in February 2013.
