"The Gestapo was there." Excerpt from Code Name Pauline: Memoirs of a WWII Special Agent

Henri could feel trouble brewing. He had arrived from Paris the evening before -- the night of April 30-May 1, 1944 -- to the Lhospitalier's house in rue de Rimard. We all sensed D-Day was about to happen.

That night Maurice went to meet John Farmer and Nancy Wake, a team parachuted to join the Auvergne Maquis. On his return from this meeting, where he had received information and money...he forgot to look behind him when he arrived at the Lhospitaliers, because he was very tired...

There was a front-wheel-drive Citroën, the car used mainly by the Gestapo, hidden further down the street...

The Gestapo was there.

When they saw the radio, the money, the list of landing spots for parachute drops, they must have thought there were other people in the network. They encircled the town the next day.

 

Excerpt from Code Name Pauline: Memoirs of a WWII Special Agent.

"Courage was their common badge." Maurice Buckmaster on the abilities of female SOE agents.

Maurice Buckmaster, head of the Special Operations Executive's French Section, came under heated post-war criticism for allowing female agents to fight behind enemy lines in German-occupied France. He wrote two books about the SOE's F-Section, often getting his facts wrong but brilliantly painting SOE heroines in deservedly glowing terms. Below is an excerpt:

"It has been suggested that women agents should never have been sent, that they were forced to undertake missions to which both by temperament and by nature they were unsuited and in physique and spirit inadequate.  The dead cannot be revived by such accusations, they can only be dishonoured.  Those of us who know of the work done by women like Violette Szabo, Norah Inayat-Khan, Denise Bloch, among those who died, and by Lise de Baissac, the sisters, Jacqueline and Eileen Nearne, and Nancy Wake among those who survived, can only feel anger and contempt for those who try to denigrate Baker Street by questioning the ability of women to fight alongside men and who impugn the efficiency of Headquarters by doubting the readiness of brave women to face perils and, if necessary, to die for their countries.  These women did an invaluable job and one for which, whatever people may say, they were admirably suited.  Coolness and judgment were vital qualities; none lacked them.  Courage was their common badge."

Excerpt from They Fought Alone: The Story of British Agents in France by Maurice Buckmaster.

After D-Day, the Germans attack the Resistance during the Battle of Les Souches

A few days after D-day a man arrived at Les Souches by bicycle. The men at the guard post at the end of the lane, on the main road, stopped him and brought him to me. When I asked him where he had come from he said from Paris. I asked him if he had seen barricades en route, and when he said no, I was flabbergasted. It meant that none of the networks between Paris and Les Souches had obeyed London’s orders to block the roads. We were the only ones to have done so, by felling trees across the main road. I immediately thought, Heavens, we’re the bridge-head.

Sure enough, two or three days later we were attacked. The snooper plane had spotted the trees we had felled. For a time, the Germans used the snooper, a small plane they flew to examine the land if they didn’t know it very well. They must have concluded there were quite a number of us hiding in the Taille de Ruine woods. I have never understood why ours was the only team to have obeyed orders...

My lieutenant, Raymond Billard, or “Gaspard,” a discharged sailor and member of the Wrestler circuit, told me that the day after the snooper had flown over, he and four others were driving in a Citroën front-wheel drive from the château to Monsieur Sabassier’s house when they came face-to-face with the Germans. Both parties were very surprised to see each other! The Germans got out and machine-gunned them, but none of them were hurt.

When more German soldiers appeared, the lads on the main road blew the bugle—but obviously not loudly enough. It was our danger signal but I was the only person to hear it. I told Henri, “We’re under attack.” He replied, “No, it’s Sunday, we can’t be attacked on a Sunday.” Father Valuche was celebrating mass nearby in the château. Monsieur Sabassier and the rest of us tried to see who was coming, but it was a long way; we couldn’t see very well. Then Henri had an idea: “We’ll fire into the air and we’ll know straightaway if they’re Germans or other Maquis members.” Sure enough, we found out immediately.

I threw on my clothes, picked up my bag and the cocoa tin where the money was kept. As I climbed down the ladder from the attic, German bullets were whizzing past my ears. At the bottom, I jumped on my bike and cycled to the château’s outhouses where the weapons we had just received were stocked. They hadn’t even been cleaned yet and were still covered in protective grease. I hastily loaded the guns anyway and put detonators in the hand grenades. Then one of the chaps rushed up to me and told me to leave as quickly as possible: the Germans were approaching...

Excerpt from "The Battle of Les Souches" from Code Name Pauline: Memoirs of a WWII Special Agent.

Excerpt from "Escape from Paris."
From Code Name Pauline: Memoirs of a WWII Special Agent.

I went to Commes, near Port-en-Bessin [on the Normandy coast] with my mother and sisters. The Germans arrived soon afterward. We were completely panicked. I had an argument with my mother, because I didn’t want to leave before my instructions arrived. But the Germans got there first. The ambassador had instructed all his staff to leave Paris. The ambassador and his attachés managed to sail from Saint-Jean-de-Luz. I was a local employee, so I had nowhere to go in England. We were blocked, there was no petrol, no trains running, and we had no money. That was such an intense period in our lives that I still have difficulty talking about it. Even after all these years, it gets stuck in my throat.

http://secretfire.wordpress.com/pearl-cornioley/
This blog post, the result of an interview that took place nine months before Pearl's death, is a very good one but its chief appeal in my opinion is the actual clip of Pearl's voice.

A Dangerous Encounter . . . with the Resistance

One day Maurice said to me, “Some parachutists have just arrived; they have money for the network, go and collect it. Go to La Châtre, there’s no password, we don’t know anybody there and nobody knows you. Just in case there’s a problem, you can say that Robert sent you. Sort it out.”

I arrived at the address he had given me in La Châtre, it was a grocer’s shop and bistro. There was a lady behind the counter. I said,

“Good morning, is Monsieur Langlois in?”

“No, my husband’s away today.”

“I really need to see him. Money has arrived, on behalf of Robert I’ve come to collect it for our network.”

“Well he’s not here. I don’t know anything about it.”

“Can I come back later?”

“You can come back tomorrow.”

“No, I can’t come back tomorrow because I have to come by train from Montluçon.”  There were only three trains a week, so I couldn’t return until the day after.

Two days later, I returned to La Châtre from Montluçon. When I entered the bistro, I saw Madame Langlois’s expression and thought, “Oh dear, I’m in for trouble.” I sensed it immediately.  A man whom I had never seen before entered through a side door.

“Good morning, Madame.”

“Good morning, Monsieur.”

“I’m Robert, I don’t know you.”

“Indeed, well I don’t know you either.”

“Follow me.”

He led me up a spiral staircase into a room where I noticed a door ajar. He asked me to sit down and started interrogating me. We didn’t work for the same network, so he didn’t know any of the people I knew and vice versa. After a number of other questions I could not answer, I started to panic . . .

Excerpt from the English translation of Pearl Witherington's memoir, Code Name Pauline: Memoirs of a World War II Special Agent. Pearl's wartime exploits -- including the incident described above -- are also included in the British section of Women Heroes of World War II: 26 Stories of Espionage, Sabotage, Resistance, and Rescue.

"Expecting a man, not a woman."

"There wasn’t much I could do during those three weeks while waiting for my luggage but during that time Maurice introduced me to the young courier for the Auvergne network. Something quite funny happened when we met. I’m sure Maurice did it on purpose. He must have told him, “Tomorrow morning we have a meeting with an agent who has just arrived.” We met in Clermont-Ferrand park. You should have seen his expression when he saw me! On the spur of the moment I didn’t understand why. Later, when I was wondering why he looked so surprised to see me there, the penny dropped -- he must have been expecting a man, not a woman!"

Excerpt from Code Name Pauline: The Memoirs of a WWII Special Agent. Pearl is also featured in the British section of Women Heroes of World War II: 26 Stories of Espionage, Sabotage, Resistance, and Rescue.