Five Fearless Female Spies of the Special Operations Executive (SOE)

 

Winston Churchill established the Special Operations Executive (SOE) on July 22, 1940, to
conduct espionage, subversion, sabotage, and reconnaissance. SOE recruited agents from all
classes, backgrounds, and occupations. It provided rigorous training, including map reading,
demolitions, weapons, Morse code, fieldcraft, and close combat. In 1942, realizing that women
might be better positioned to hide in plain sight, SOE began recruiting women as field agents.
They trained alongside men, (often being used as an example to spur the men on) and were
deployed behind enemy lines as wireless operators, couriers, and organizers.
Thirty-nine of these extraordinary women were deployed in France. All but thirteen came back
alive. Several of these women made significant contributions, three of whom are discussed here:
Krystyna Skarbek, Pearl Witherington, and Noor Inyat Khan.
Daughter of a count and runner-up for Miss Poland, Krystyna Skarbek was Britain’s first and
longest-serving female special agent during the war. When her native Poland was overrun at the
outbreak of the war, Krystyna and her husband sailed for London. She offered her services to the
British against the Nazis, and the Secret Intelligence Service was happy to recruit this “flaming
Polish patriot, expert skier, and great adventuress.” Churchill called her his “favorite spy.” Some
of her exploits include the following:
 Skiing over the Tatra Mountains into Nazi-occupied Poland in -30°C temperatures to set
up an intelligence network, passing information to the Allies through Budapest and
exfiltrating military personnel and armaments.
 Smuggling microfilm across Nazi-sympathizing Europe that documented the German
military build-up near the border with the Soviet Union, proof of Hitler’s intention to
invade.

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 Parachuting into Vichy as a courier for a network aimed at arming and organizing the
local resistance on either side of the French-Italian border. Upon coming across a German
garrison of about 150 men at a strategic pass in the Alps, Krystyna managed to subvert 63
Polish conscripts. When attacked, the Poles defected to the French, and the German
commander was forced to surrender.
 Days before the Allied invasion of southern France, three of her colleagues were arrested
by the Gestapo. Krystyna engaged with the Germans and engineered their release.
Strong-willed but practical, 29-year-old Pearl Witherington volunteered for SOE. She excelled in
training, gravitating toward sabotage and weapons. Her training report notes that she “is
probably the best shot (male or female) we have yet had.” She was also one of the most
successful SOE organizers, male or female.
Pearl dropped into France in September 1943 as a courier for a resistance network. Heavy winds
buffeted her plane, and her suitcases were lost. Without sufficient clothing and unable to find
lodgings, she carried messages by night on freezing trains.
In May of 1944, the Germans arrested the circuit leader, so Pearl stepped up as the leader of a
ragtag group of ill-equipped farmers. A month later, days after the Normandy landings, 2,000

Germans attacked her small circuit of about 40 men, along with a slightly larger neighboring
circuit. After 14 hours, the Germans lost 86 men, the Resistance, 24. For the next four months,
she organized more than twenty air drops to supply her growing group and sabotage German
communication links. She organized and armed the resistance, commanding troops who killed
1,000 German soldiers and saw to the surrender of 18,000 more.
The Germans viewed her as enough of a threat to levy a one-million-franc reward on her head.
Despite her nomination for a military honor she, as a woman, was ineligible. When she was
offered the civilian award, she refused it. “There was nothing civil about what I did,” said Pearl.
“The work which I undertook was of a purely military nature in enemy occupied country. I
personally was responsible for the training and organization of nearly 3,000 men for sabotage
and guerrilla warfare.”
From a privileged background, Noor Inyat Khan started life as a shy, sensitive girl influenced by
pacificist ideals. But she wanted to help defeat the Nazis, so she joined the Women's Auxiliary
Air Force (WAAF) and trained as a wireless operator. By 1943, the life expectancy of a wireless
operator (or “pianist”) was only six weeks. She then applied for a commission and was later
recruited by SOE. Fluent in French and a harp player, she excelled at signaling and became the
first female wireless operator in occupied France. As the link between the field and London, she
coordinated supply drops and planning operations.
Within days of her landing in France, her network was betrayed. Although the Germans began
round up people, Noor remained in radio contact with London, defying orders to return home.
Three months later, Noor was arrested and interrogated. She tried to escape–twice–and gave up
no information under interrogation. In November 1943, Noor escaped but was recaptured and
sent to Germany. As a “highly dangerous” prisoner, she was subjected to solitary confinement,
shackled at her hands and feet. For ten months, Noor remained uncooperative, after which she
was transferred to Dachau concentration camp and executed. Her last word, reportedly, was
“Liberté.” She became the first woman of South Asian descent to have a blue plaque honoring
her in London in August 2020.
In addition to these three female heroes, add Virginia Hall, “the Most Dangerous Spy” and
Nancy Wake, the “White Mouse.” These two women are discussed in previous Dispatches,
which can be found elsewhere on this web page.
Finally, all of these women were handled by Vera Atkins, the right hand of Col. Maurice
Buckmaster, the head of SOE’s French Section, Vera recruited and trained and deployed SOE
operatives into France. Despite working 18-hour days, she personally saw off each agent. When,
at the end of the war, 118 SOE agents were still missing, she resolved to find out what happened
to them, following leads and eyewitness reports, interviewing survivors and war criminals,
investigating the concentration camps, and sitting on war crimes tribunals. In the end, she
uncovered the fates of all but one.