Sidney Robey Leibbrandt (25 January 1913 – 1 August 1966) was a South African Olympian sportsman, who during World War II acted as an Abwehr agent for the Third Reich against the British Empire in South Africa. He was convicted of High Treason in 1943 in a South African court and imprisoned for 5 years. Early life and sports career Leibbrandt was born on 25 January 1913 in Potchefstroom, in the Transvaal, the third of six children of Meyder (Meider) Johannes Leibbrandt. His father was of German descent, and his mother was Irish. Leibbrandt's father had fought with the Afrikaner forces in the Second Boer War, and was subsequently a Sergeant-Major in the South African Army, but in 1914 on the outbreak of World War I, he had objected to an order to invade German South-West Africa in a military campaign against the imperial German forces there, stating that it was his belief that "Germans should not war against Germans". In the late 1920s Robey Leibbrandt established himself as an accomplished pugilist. Leibbrandt represented South Africa at the 1934 Empire Games and won the light heavyweight bronze medal. He also represented South Africa at the Berlin Olympics in 1936, competing in the light heavyweight class. He was not able to fight the bronze medal bout to Francisco Risiglione and finished fourth. He became South African heavyweight champion on 31 July 1937 in Johannesburg, beating Jim Pentz. German military service Following his stay in Germany for the 1936 Berlin Olympics, during which he had been deeply impressed with Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany, Leibbrandt returned to Berlin in 1938 to study at the Reich Academy for Gymnastics, and remained when World War II began in 1939. He subsequently volunteered with the Wehrmacht, with which he became the first South African to be trained as a Fallschirmjäger, and a glider pilot. Leibbrand was subsequently seconded to the Brandenburgers sabotage training course for irregular warfare agents at Abwehr II (Abwehrschool "Quenzgut") near Brandenburg an der Havel, west of Berlin. Abwehr agent After Leibbrandt had completed his irregular warfare training he was assigned by the Abwehr to take part in 'Operation Weissdorn' (Operation Hawthorn), a plan for a coup d'état against the Government of South Africa led by Prime Minister Jan Smuts, which had taken South Africa into the war as a part of the British Empire. Leibbrandt left Germany on 5 April 1941