Poldark lover’s grandad & plot to poison Castro

Dark family secrets of star who’s won Aidan’s heart

THE girlfriend of Poldark’s Aidan Turner must be no stranger to keeping things under wraps, as her grandad was a CIA chief who tried to assassinate Fidel Castro.

American actress Caitlin Fitzgerald, 35, was outed as the star’s mystery lover during a romantic trip to Paris over the weekend.

But, unbeknown to Poldark fans, Desmond Fitzgerald visited the French capital 55 years earlier with a plot to kill the Cuban dictator.

Over dinner, the CIA deputy director of plans gave Cuban defector Rolando Cubela a fountain pen fitted with a hidden needle and an ink cartridge full of the toxin Blackleaf 40.

Cubela’s mission was to stab and inject the Communist leader.

Desmond had previously planned to kill Castro by hiding a seashell stuffed with explosives on the sea bed where he loved to dive, then to give the dictator a box of poisoned cigars.

But both plots were shelved as CIA officials could not guarantee he would be the only victim.

Thomas Powers, a US intelligence expert and author said: “Like many CIA people, Fitzgerald was fascinated by gadgets and resented sceptics who suggested they would cost too much or would fail to work, or weren’t even needed at all. He was downright petulant at times.”

Eventually Desmond, a friend of Senator Robert Kennedy, chose the poison pen plot and met Cubela on November 22, 1963. But within hours he was dealt a blow by the assassination of President John F Kennedy.

All plans to kill Castro were then scrapped, lacking the support of new President Lyndon B. Johnson.

Desmond lamented to CIA agents the following year: “If Kennedy had lived, I can assure you we would have gotten rid of Castro by Christmas.” Grandchild Caitlin has made her name as an on-screen lover, not a fighter. Like Aidan, 34, famed for topless scenes as Ross Poldark, she has flashed the flesh on TV.

She stripped for raunchy scenes as Libby on the hit US show Masters of Sex, but has said: “There’s never enough time to prepare for a naked scene.”

If Kennedy had lived, I can assure you we’d have gotten rid of Castro by Christmas DESMOND FITZGERALD LAMENTS IMPACT OF JFK DEATH ON PLOT

RACY Caitlin Fitzgerald in Masters of Sex on US TV COVER UP Aidan Turner keeps top on HEAVY PAST Caitlin is grandchild of EX-CIA chief TARGET Castro, with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, in Moscow, 1963 PLAN CIA deputy Desmond Fitzgerald