Author tells how she was real-life ‘Mrs Wilson’

A woman has told how her life mirrors TV’S Mrs Wilson – who discovered her “spy” husband had three other wives.

Mary Turner Thomson, 53, from Edinburgh, thought she had the perfect marriage until she discovered her husband, who claimed he was a CIA agent, had another wife and at least 13 children with six women.

The acclaimed TV drama Mrs Wilson, which finished last week, was inspired by the true story of war-time “secret agent”, bigamist and serial liar Alexander Wilson.

Just like Alison Wilson, Mary, 53, thought she had found her perfect husband. In reality, American-born William Allen Jordan was a serial liar. He was jailed in the US in 2014, but she says he’s now out and dating multiple women.

“Watching the series has been very like looking at my own story,” said Mary. “I met William online when I was a single mum. After six months of being together I fell pregnant, which was a huge surprise because he told me he was infertile.”

Over the years William manipulated Mary and led her to believe he was a CIA agent. He even persuaded Mary to part with almost £200,000 to pay blackmailers who, he said, had threatened to kidnap their children. After William’s lies began to unravel he was arrested then charged and jailed for bigamy. He served two and a half years of a fiveyear sentence, and was deported to America on his release.