October 27, 2022 • 36 mins
Virginia Hall joins the UK's spy agency, the Special Operations Executive. The SOE was created to "set Europe ablaze" and wreak havoc on the battlefield: sabotage plus a little espionage, paramilitary operations, make things blow up.
After spy training, Virginia heads into the field in Lyon, France, a strategic location for the Allies. They're planting the seeds of a Resistance there and it's a hotspot for Nazi activity. Virginia hooks into the Resistance network but the walls around her begin to push in. The USA, which had remained neutral in the War up to this point, makes broader shows of support for the Allies. And it means Virginia Hall will soon lose her open status—and her cover—as an American newspaper reporter working in France.
In her first operation to save a downed British pilot, Virginia has a chilling encounter with Gestapo officers that has fateful consequences for her larger mission.
This episode contain interviews with:
• Chris Costa: Executive Director of the International Spy Museum, a 34-year veteran of the Department of Defense, and he served 25 years in the United States Army working in counterintelligence, human intelligence and with special operations forces in Central America, Europe, and the Middle East
• Judith Pearson: author of The Wolves at the Door: The True Story of America’s Greatest Female Spy, the first biography to tell the story of the amazing Virginia Hall
• Brad Catling: great nephew of Virginia Hall
• Andrew Orr: a professor in the Department of History at Kansas State University, a specialist in modern military history, intelligence operations in the Middle East, imperialism, civil-military relations, and the history of French Communist Party identity; author of Women and the French Army
Learn more at diversionaudio.com/good-assassins
“Good Assassins” is a production of Diversion Audio, in association with iHeartPodcasts. Featuring the voices of Matthew Amendt, Orlagh Cassidy, Raphael Corkhill, Manoel Felciano, Sean Gormley, Mikaela Izquierdo, Lenne Klingaman, Andrew Polk, John Pirkis, Steve Routman.
This season is hosted by Stephan Talty and written by C.D. Carpenter. Produced and directed by Kevin Thomsen for Real Jetpacks Productions. Story Editing by Jacob Bronstein with editorial direction from Scott Waxman. Additional research and reporting by Sophie McNulty. Theme music by Tyler Cash. Sound Design, Mixing, and Mastering by Paul Goodrich. Sound Editing by Justin Kilpatrick. Executive Producers: Jacob Bronstein, Mark Francis and Scott Waxman for Diversion Audio.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Diversion audio. A note this episode contains descriptions of violence
that may be disturbing for some audiences. Please take care
in listening. This series is based on historical characters and
real events. Some dialogue has been imagined for dramatic purposes
(00:30):
when no primary source material is available. No I know.
The first time Virginia Hall met Vera Atkins in February,
she believed the woman was nothing more than another airheaded socialite.
Vera had been hosting a party, decked out in lavish clothes,
(00:52):
relaxing on expensive furniture, and doing her best to entertain
her guests. But now, two weeks after the party, as
Virginia sat across from Vera in a high end restaurant
in central London, the woman's demeanor seemed very different. The
day before, she'd asked Virginia to meet her in a
phone call with hushed tones. She carried with her a
(01:15):
sense of urgency. Virginia didn't associate with the airy, lavish
lifestyles of the ridge. Vera. I don't want to give
you the wrong idea, but there's no way I'll be
able to afford anything on this menu. I know it
will be taken care of you made quite a scene
(01:39):
at my policy, Virginia. Suddenly, Virginia remembered her appearance at
Vera's home. After a few too many glasses of wine.
She granted loudly about her distaste for the Nazis, without
considering that somebody at the party might have been sympathetic
to the Germans. Ah, I'm sorry, I just think be
(02:03):
I'm merely curious. How far are you willing to go?
Virginia Bristle did this, not entirely sure what Vera meant,
but annoyed nevertheless at the obvious challenge. But as Vera continued,
Virginia couldn't help but be fascinated by what she was
telling her. Vera explained that she was an intelligence officer
(02:26):
with a Special Operations Executive, the s o E. The
year before, in Winston Churchill became Britain's Prime Minister and
months later created the s o E for the purpose
of surveying overseas operations and coordinating action against agents who
meant harm to British interests. So they have an intelligence service,
(02:50):
the equivalent to the CIA that existed pre World War Two.
It was called the Secret Intelligence Service or m I six.
That's Chris Costa from previous episodes. He's the executive director
of the International Spy Museum m I six ran agents,
meaning they recruited, as I said, individuals that could provide intelligence.
(03:13):
But that wasn't good enough for Churchill when Britain went
to war, so he said. Churchill said, we need somebody
to set Europe ablaze, and that was the mandate of
this Special Operations executive. Churchill wanted somebody to wreak havoc
(03:34):
on the battlefield. So sabotage plus a little espionage paramilitary
operations make things blow up. Apparently, the s OE needed
feet on the ground in France who could facilitate British
operatives with safe houses, information and escape routes out of
the country. You're offering me a post. I don't exactly
(03:58):
have an elegant hiring history with intelligence agencies. Virginia was
referring to her ten years in various American embassies, where
all her efforts for promotion were rejected by her various superiors,
all of them men. Of course, what do we need
(04:18):
our passionate, intelligent agents, people who know France, the country
and the language. According to our research, you have knowledge
of both and we need more young people. A lot
of our current connections are a bit mature, shall we say.
You could hear her taking a drag and her cigarette,
(04:41):
but she was extremely shrewd. That's Judith Pearson, who wrote
the first biography of Virginia Hall, The Wolves at the Door.
She's describing Vera Atkins. She was extremely well thought of
by the s o E, and they were desperate for
(05:02):
people who could speak French, who knew their way around France,
who had a bit of an attitude, and Virginia had
all those. The job would be difficult and Virginia's responsibilities numerous.
She wouldn't only shelter multiple spies in various safe houses
at any given time, but would be subject to the
(05:22):
gestapos interrogations at any moment. If any Virginia's compatriots found
themselves with their covers blown or sought out by the Nazis,
it would be her responsibility to keep them hidden in
the safe houses and navigate their way out of the
country and back to London. Virginia did have one key
advantage the s OE could leverage. She was American and
(05:45):
in the USA was still ostensibly neutral in World War Two.
As FDR said in late ninety there is no amm
forss sending an American expeditionary FOSS outside our border. There
is no intentiontion by and a member of your government
(06:06):
who send such a thought. At the time, Americans like
Virginia still had the latitude to live freely in France.
She would be tasked with transmitting German intelligence back to
the UK through wire transmissions and secret radio broadcasts, as
well as coordinating the pickup of pilots and weaponry that
(06:29):
fell out of British planes. All of this information over
single dinner could have been overwhelming. You know about my
leg If it doesn't bother you, it doesn't bother us.
Virginia couldn't deny how much the job seemed too good
to be true. For nearly a decade, she had been
rejected from promotions and positions of authority in the American government.
(06:53):
She'd wanted to serve all this time, and yet was
dismissed for every reason under the sun. She was a
one it, she was handicapped, she didn't have the right attitude,
and suddenly here she was in the presence of a
real life spy offering her responsibilities. She had only ever
dreamed of. Her response was succinct. When do I start,
(07:27):
I'm Stephen Talty and from diversion, this is good Assassin's
Season two. Being killed would be the easy part. Being
tortured would be the hard part. Our intel suggests she
is behind many of the prison bricks all over the country.
She's dangerous, so sabotage plus a little espionage paramilitary operations
(07:51):
make things blow up. The message for Captain Bobby and
I believe I have found the nest of the limb
being Lady Episode four Spy Games. All right, man much.
(08:17):
When Virginia arrived in Guildford in the UK in March
of for s o E training, she was given a nickname. Really,
the nickname was meant for her prosthetic leg. It was
dubbed Cuthbert as some of the other recruits joked she
could use the limb as a sword in a pinch.
They confused the word with cutlass, but Virginia felt like
(08:40):
correcting them would give her a reputation as a know
it all. It was a cross introduction, but Virginia knew
she'd have to expect worse from the Nazis. She never
told anybody that's Brad Catling, Virginia's great nephew. Apparently Virginia
never told the family this story, and in fact Katling
(09:03):
has a different theory on why Virginia culture pathetic. Cuthbert
Cuthbert was St. Cuthbert who lived in the eight hundreds,
and he lived on the northeastern coast of England, right
on the coast. But today if you go there, it's
a bird sanctuary and you know they're gazillion nesting birds
(09:27):
that are there all the time. But St. Cuthbert was
actually given credit for saving all of these birds or
protecting all of these birds. And he also had an
injured knee that had given him trouble, but it ended
up being cured through a miracle. That's the story anyway.
(09:53):
So Cuthbert fits on a number of different levels. First
of all, in Turkey, she was hunting for birds, and
so if St. Cuthbert is the protector of the birds,
then he saved the bird that she was trying to shoot.
And choosing Cuthbert is also aspirational for her because he
(10:14):
was eventually healed, the next few weeks would test her metal.
She didn't have to worry about oral examinations or office politics. Anymore. Instead,
she was training for combat, demolition, and survival. Keep your
(10:36):
aunts up, Cuthbert, heads up, for you'll get knocked down.
The camp was full of volunteers. Trainees were dropping like flies,
getting cut for different reasons. Some were too slow, others
(10:59):
were too hockey. Some couldn't keep their mouth shut and
were deemed incapable of protecting valuable intel. The s O
couldn't risk their agents cracking, and the Nazis were brutal interrogators.
Virginia's reality began to set in when she noticed the
number of her compatriots was whittling down every day. The
(11:20):
exercises were merciless. She was put through hours and hours
of mock interrogations that involved splashing cold water over her
head until her lips turned blue. Her memory was challenged.
Could she walk into a room with fifteen people and then,
after twenty seconds, accurately described the facial features, clothing, and
(11:41):
demeanor of every person. Virginia was trained in Morse code
and tasks with transmitting it over a secret radio. The
volunteers deemed not up to snuff were sent up north
to an isolated estate, where they were kept for a
few weeks until the intel they were already privy to
was no longer of use to the British or the enemy.
(12:03):
The prospect of being sent up North began to haunt
Virginia's nightmares. She had come this far and now she
was terrified of failing. Virginia, wake up, what you're moving on?
Moving on? Wait? Please don't hand me up North North.
(12:27):
We're not sending you up North? Is your next session?
Performance training? Get dressed. After she had proven herself physically,
Virginia was placed in the next tier manners. As the
Bridge saw it, Virginia was a shoot from the hip, outspoken,
highly opinionated, independent woman. She would stick out like a
(12:48):
sore thumb in France and attract lots of unnecessary attention.
They'd have to change her, train her to hide her
American accent, to not look around like a tourist, to
blend in without suspicion, and that was easier said than done.
As her three week training session began to wind down,
(13:09):
she left behind etiquette and leveled up to the final
tier of weapons training. Here she received a tip she
didn't expect. Her weapons instructor informed her that have given
a choice between wounding and Nazi and killing him. She
should always wound him. If you kill him, they'll just
leave the body behind. If you put him in the
(13:30):
infirm right, his higher ups get paperwack. Keep them busy
and distracted. The best Nazi is a dead Nazi. But
let's win the war first, shall I. Following eight weeks
of lifestyle training and then mastery of weapons and close
(13:51):
combat tactics, Virginia was left with a final trial, to
be dropped off in the nearby village of wine Borough
and given a list of duties she had to complete
in one week. She had a fine safe house, receive
and transmit sensitive information via Morse code, and then ship
a package out of town. All of this had to
(14:13):
be done while several other volunteers sought her out. If
she was discovered or if any of her information confiscated,
she'd have to start her entire training process over, and
she failed twice, she would in fact be sent up north.
At the end of the week, Virginia had successfully evaded
her searchers and completed all of her tasks. The sa
(14:35):
we decided she was ready. So what Virginia Hall, what
have learned is how to set up a safe house,
how to recruit support agents, meaning people to be a
part of her network to collect intelligence. That's Chris Costa again.
(14:57):
She would have learned how to shoot, she would have
learned hand to hand combat. She would have gone through
various obstacle courses. You learn about dead drops. Some people
in paramilitary operations special operations learn how to set up
pickup zones for aircraft or drop zones for night parachute operations.
(15:21):
So all of those combinations of skills gave Virginia Hall
a suite of tools that she can use. But it
was all iterative. It She never was fully prepared to
execute all the possible tasks that she could get to
survive on the battlefield. So that's where she relied on
(15:45):
her senses and her instincts and just her acumen. Uh,
you wanted to see me. You're shipping out, Custbert. We've
got a fly by in a month. But seeing as
(16:08):
how that leg of yours would kill you in a jump,
we're not parachuting you in. By the grace of God,
you were born an American, so you'll enter the country
legally and your cover will be that of an American journalist.
Sound good, I can make the jump, sir, and I
could make a soufle, but I wouldn't serve it to Churchill.
(16:29):
You'll go in legally. Where in France will I be stationed,
Sir Leon in the East. It's the Free Zone. It's
a strategic location for us. We've begun planting the seeds
of the resistance there, but it's also becoming a hotspot
for German activity. You'll be very busy both aiding our
(16:49):
men and gathering intel from the Nazis. Virginia heads into
the field after the break. Virginia Hall landed in Leone,
(17:12):
near France's eastern border, in August. Now she was on
her own. Her public alias was Brigitte le Contra, a
name picked out by Vera Atkins would become something of
a friend and her unofficial handler and the special operations
executive for the British government. Virginia's code name was to
(17:33):
be German. Now she had to get used to responding
to Brigitte, which was easier said than done. She found
cheap boarding in Leone, but needed her cover. She called
on an old family friend who worked at the New
York Post newspaper, and pitched herself as a culture and
politics reporter stationed in France. Weeks of interrogation training made
(17:55):
the job interview fly by well, Michel. If you can
do the job safely, it's yours. Virginia was employed by
the New York Post, so she had her cover and
was ready for action. Now she'd have to bury all
her s OE training under the guise of an American
leading a normal expatriate life in France, she had to
(18:17):
blend in. It didn't take long for Virginia to hook
into the resistance network and leone. The s O had
given her a number of British and French contacts she
could lean on in the pinch, and under the guise
of a neutral American reporting lifestyle pieces, she was able
to travel the region with relative ease. Her first article
(18:40):
for the Post, dated September four, detail the reality of
living under German food rations. The country's food was prioritized
for the Germans, a flexive power that matched with the
Statute des Wife, a law passed in v She, France
the previous year in October ninety that had to aired
all Jews second class citizens and strip them of their
(19:03):
human rights. Virginia had to be careful about her writing
as it pertained to choose. Even if it was published
across the ocean in America, the word could get back
to France and compromise her position. She was critical of
the Nazi occupation, but always wrote in a way where
she could maintain plausible deniability. She had a right facts
(19:25):
not commentary. OUI. I was told to me that doctor
Roussett here, have you treated the cats on the roof? Yes?
But they won't take Brandy. It is wonderful to meet you, Brigitte.
(19:46):
If we are still calling you that until I come
up with something catchy. After a few weeks exploring the
city of Leon, Virginia, was introduced to doctor Jean Bussey,
a gynecologist and major support system for the resistance. So
you are the newest addition to the resistance. I was curious,
(20:11):
when we get a woman. That's not going to be
a problem, is it not. If you can shoot straight
and run a mile, just give me something to shoot
and a place to go, we are going to get
on just fine. Now to business. There is a pilot
who's playing was shut down last week. He has been
(20:32):
holed up in a safe house and claims to a
valuable information. We need you to get him out of
the country and back to London. Just like that. This
job doesn't come with a lot of preamble. You're hoping
to do some good, aren't you? So yes, just like that? Okay,
then tell me where he is. Virginia's instructions were simple.
(20:57):
At the edge of town, she left a letter in
the mailbox of a small farmhouse and returned home to
a layman's eye. The note described happy birthday wishes, but
actually functioned as code. The down British pilot inside the
farmhouse was to meet her in a nearby cafe the
next evening. There the two would discuss his escape road.
(21:22):
The pilot was a nervous wreck. He detailed his harrowing
mission to Virginia anxiously forgetting they were in public. A
week earlier, during an aerial dog fight somewhere in the
skies above southern France, a barrage of Nazi gunfire blew
through his left wing, and he had bailed later than
he would have liked. The first thing to realize is
(21:46):
that this is World War two. Nobody can eject that's
a modern concept that requires an adjective seat, a rocket
powered seat that shoots out of the plane. They don't
have those in World War Two aircraft. That's Andrew or
the professor of military history from Kansas State University. You've
(22:07):
heard him in earlier episodes. If your plane is damaged,
there are two ways to escape. One is to crash,
land the plane right, to find an open place and
land the land your damage plane. The other option is
to bail out. You have to hold the plane steady,
open a door if it's a big plane, or open
(22:31):
the canopy and manually if it's a small plane, and
climb out of the airplane at speed. It's a heroine
and very dangerous experience. As the pilot floated to Earth,
he assumed the enemy plane would fire through his parachute.
It was only by the grace of God, he said
(22:52):
that the German didn't come back and finish the job.
But landing safely wasn't the end of his problems. When
you hit the ground, you're in a lot of trouble
because the enemy knows about your aircraft. They know it
got shot down because they did the shooting. They've already
(23:13):
alerted local security forces. Eventually, you're gonna need food, you're
gonna need help. You usually end up knocking on a
door or approaching somebody when they're by themselves, and it
has to be by themselves because the more people who
see you, the more likely one of them is loyal
(23:35):
to v she and will turn you in. So you're
basically playing Russian roulette. You're gambling that the person you
find will be sympathetic and hook you up with the Resistance,
or at least feed you and not rack you out
to the Germans. Dog fights above Leone have become commonplace
(23:57):
since the Nazis realized the British will dropping valuable weapons, food,
and medicine to specific drop zones in the countryside. It
was a fast and easy way for the s o
E to supply the resistance. Fighter planes dog fight to
try and stop German aircraft from attacking the larger, slower
(24:19):
bulk transports. So German fighters didn't want to dog fight
British or later American fighter planes. They wanted to get
at the transport planes, which were easy killed full of agents,
knock them down and win or described with These dog
fights looked like and a World War two. Fighter planes
(24:43):
could only shoot an enemy in front of them, so
getting behind or to the side of an enemy, but
with your plane facing your enemy was how you won
and also how you survived, because most of the time,
if a pilot could see and shoot at his end,
to me, that enemy couldn't shoot at him because of
(25:03):
the way physics worked. And so you had these fairly
compact battles, those which really almost looked like a ball
of string, with multiple aircraft turning and turning repeatedly trying
to get an enemy to lose its line of fire
on them while they bring another enemy into their own
(25:24):
line of fire. Unique the pilot's tale rattled Virginia. He
quickly realized this wasn't training anymore. This was a man
would come shockingly close to death in the most dramatic way,
and he couldn't help it, wear it on his face.
(25:45):
Virginia got the impression that if he was this shaken,
he would attract attention, and she urged him to settle
down and accompany her out of the cafe. But the
pilot was adamant on remaining in public. For all he
knew Virginia could be a double agent and going somewhere
alone with her could be dangerous. Virginia tried to make
(26:05):
sense of this. Why meet with her at all? If
there was a possibility. She wasn't who she said she was.
She chalked it up to paranoia, and paranoia made sense.
Virginia was so lost in thought she almost didn't notice
a waiter approached their table. Bonjou, What would you like?
(26:25):
Just the water would be fine. I'd like a beer. Ok,
we don't sell beer water. He's just come from America.
It's his first time back in a while. Just t waters,
I will be back. The pilot had made a bad mistake.
(26:50):
Beer was no longer served in the occupied country, and
this would be something anyone who had been a citizen
of France for the past two years would know. The
entire restaurant was staring at them, but if they left,
it would be obvious they were hiding something. This was
the kind of thing that had tripped up Virginia in
her training. Now she was responsible for another agent's mistake.
(27:14):
That's when Virginia noticed them, two men dressed almost entirely
in black, getting up from their table and walking towards them.
They smirked with cold, dead eyes. There was no mistaking them. Gestapo,
good evening, Hello, gentlemen, I enjoy beer as fed. May
(27:37):
we see your papers? And that's a good place to
take a quick break stay with us. Virginia was sweating.
The Gestapo officer's hand was outstretched to her, beckoning for
(28:01):
their identification. She knew that hers would pass a smell test,
but she worried about the pilots. It was likely that
his was a rushed job, as the Brits needed men
in planes, and they didn't give much thought to the
likelihood of their survival if they were shot down. Their
thought process was understandable. Why make fake I das for
(28:23):
dead men? Uh, surely here you are m hmm, grigit
leucum American Huh on his he left them at home?
At home. Virginia had to think fast. Her lie was
(28:45):
the same one that everybody used, and it was clear
it wasn't playing with the Nazis. Uh. He's been forgetful
ever since he got back. He suffered an injury in
the States, and he hasn't been old there since. His
family is taking him to the doctor next week. An injury.
They couldn't take care of him overseas. It's not like
(29:07):
American doctors are busy. Then the answer came to Virginia.
She was sharp and quick, and these talents would prove
valuable in her career as a spy. That's exactly what
I am interviewing him about. Interviewing him you can see
in my paper some a reporter for the New York Post.
(29:28):
It's an American paper. I'm interviewing him to understand why
he would come back to France Fouquier instead of staying
over there. So tell me, I don't cost the Americans.
You don't trust them. The smartest things they've done in
(29:51):
Ages is stay out of this war. Let's the Germans
get a job done, get Europe back in shape. The
pilot's acting was good, but Virginia couldn't help but WinCE
at any ground given to the Nazis, even if it
was going to save their lives. Virginia was watching the
Germans closely. Their faces had relaxed. These were men of ego,
(30:15):
and seeing there as appropriately stroked meant they could drop
their guard I hope to read this interview soon. Hopefully
it will make its surrounds here. If it is apploading
our efforts here in Europe, I'll see that it does
hail Hitler. Before leaving, the Germans made a quick note
(30:41):
of their encounter. Brigitte Le contres. French was excellent, but
her accent was difficult to place. It seemed more Canadian
than American. They couldn't quite shake the idea that the
woman didn't totally fit the picture before them, but for
reasons we don't know, they decided not to interrogate her further.
(31:01):
The pilot must have sensed this hesitation as he asked
Virginia permission to leave the cafe, but she thought it
would signal they had something to hide, so they waited
another hour, eating bread and drinking water before heading out.
The next evening, Virginia forged travel papers for the pilot
and got him on a train out of France. She
(31:23):
had been given the necessary tools by Dr. Rous Say,
and as long as the pilot didn't draw any suspicion,
there was no real reason my border agents would look
too hard at his paperwork. As he set off, Virginia relaxed.
She successfully saved her first operative, and it was the
first of many. As the months rolled on to the
(31:44):
fall of Virginia, Spear headed numerous campaigns. His sabotaged Nazi machinery,
as well as giving fugitives and Allied spies scape routes
to Spain in Britain, including an infamous prison break at Mozac.
She deciphered and transmitted code via radio that helped the
resistance circumvent Nazi plots, and slowly she began making a
(32:08):
name for herself. It was a name bored on at
the fact that on that first night at the cafe
with the pilot, the Gestapo officers noticed something. As Virginia
and the pilot finally left the cafe, a small hobble
in her left leg gave them pause. She has a lymph. Yeah,
(32:30):
interesting indeed, and limp And so the legend of the
Limping Lady was born, and Virginia quickly disregarded her alias
as Brigitte le Contra. The Nazis had put that name
to her face and she couldn't do her job. She
was noticed in any way. After years of rejection, she
(32:53):
must have felt a sense of pride. She had been
hired as a spy and saved a man's life, and
she was good at it. But the waltz around her
were beginning to push in. The US, which had remained
neutral in the war up to this point, was making
broader shows of support for the Allies, and while that
may have been good for the war effort, it meant
(33:14):
that Virginia Hall would soon lose her open status as
an American working in France. After that first close encounter
with the Nazis, Virginia moved out of her first home
and into another and continued her undercover work for the
s Oe and Leone, not yet realizing the priest Robert
Alesh was on her trail coming up on the next
(33:41):
episode of Good Assassins. The people of Europe who are
defending themselves do not ask us. They don't laugh fighting
A message for Captain Bobby and I believe I have
found the nest of the limping Lady. Confirm her location,
(34:02):
and then return to us. I've seen many terrible sites
in the last five years, but nothing, nothing approaching the
dreadful interior of this hot at Belson. The dead and
the dye lay close together. If you have any questions
(34:29):
for us about Good Assassins, if you're curious about some
aspect of Virginia hall story, or have any comments on
the podcast, we'd love to hear from you. Please email
us at Good Assassins at Diversion audio dot com. Make
sure you spell assassins correctly again. That's good Assassins At
diversion Audio dot com. We'll try to answer your questions
(34:49):
on a future episode. Find us on Twitter, Facebook and
Instagram at Diversion Pots. Good Assassins is a production of
Diversion Audio in a social creation with iHeart Podcasts. This
season is hosted by Steven Talti and written by C. D. Carpenter,
Produced and directed by Kevin Thompson for Real Jet Packs Productions.
(35:12):
Story editing by Jacob Bronstein, with editorial direction from Scott Waxman.
Additional research and reporting by Sophie McNulty. Theme music by
Tyler Cash featuring the voices of mikayla Is Caerdo, Raphael
cork Kill, Lenna Klingerman, John pier Case, Andrew polk or Lock,
Cassidy Manoel Falciano, Sean Gormley, Matthew Amant and Steve Raupman.
(35:37):
Sound design, mixing and mastering by Paul Goodrich. Sound editing
by Justin Kilpatrick. Executive producers Jacob Bronstein, Mark Francis and
Scott Waxman. For Diversion Audio see Secord Diversion Audio
Diversion audio. A note this episode contains descriptions of violence
that may be disturbing for some audiences. Please take care
in listening. This series is based on historical characters and
real events. Some dialogue has been imagined for dramatic purposes
(00:30):
when no primary source material is available. No I know.
The first time Virginia Hall met Vera Atkins in February,
she believed the woman was nothing more than another airheaded socialite.
Vera had been hosting a party, decked out in lavish clothes,
(00:52):
relaxing on expensive furniture, and doing her best to entertain
her guests. But now, two weeks after the party, as
Virginia sat across from Vera in a high end restaurant
in central London, the woman's demeanor seemed very different. The
day before, she'd asked Virginia to meet her in a
phone call with hushed tones. She carried with her a
(01:15):
sense of urgency. Virginia didn't associate with the airy, lavish
lifestyles of the ridge. Vera. I don't want to give
you the wrong idea, but there's no way I'll be
able to afford anything on this menu. I know it
will be taken care of you made quite a scene
(01:39):
at my policy, Virginia. Suddenly, Virginia remembered her appearance at
Vera's home. After a few too many glasses of wine.
She granted loudly about her distaste for the Nazis, without
considering that somebody at the party might have been sympathetic
to the Germans. Ah, I'm sorry, I just think be
(02:03):
I'm merely curious. How far are you willing to go?
Virginia Bristle did this, not entirely sure what Vera meant,
but annoyed nevertheless at the obvious challenge. But as Vera continued,
Virginia couldn't help but be fascinated by what she was
telling her. Vera explained that she was an intelligence officer
(02:26):
with a Special Operations Executive, the s o E. The
year before, in Winston Churchill became Britain's Prime Minister and
months later created the s o E for the purpose
of surveying overseas operations and coordinating action against agents who
meant harm to British interests. So they have an intelligence service,
(02:50):
the equivalent to the CIA that existed pre World War Two.
It was called the Secret Intelligence Service or m I six.
That's Chris Costa from previous episodes. He's the executive director
of the International Spy Museum m I six ran agents,
meaning they recruited, as I said, individuals that could provide intelligence.
(03:13):
But that wasn't good enough for Churchill when Britain went
to war, so he said. Churchill said, we need somebody
to set Europe ablaze, and that was the mandate of
this Special Operations executive. Churchill wanted somebody to wreak havoc
(03:34):
on the battlefield. So sabotage plus a little espionage paramilitary
operations make things blow up. Apparently, the s OE needed
feet on the ground in France who could facilitate British
operatives with safe houses, information and escape routes out of
the country. You're offering me a post. I don't exactly
(03:58):
have an elegant hiring history with intelligence agencies. Virginia was
referring to her ten years in various American embassies, where
all her efforts for promotion were rejected by her various superiors,
all of them men. Of course, what do we need
(04:18):
our passionate, intelligent agents, people who know France, the country
and the language. According to our research, you have knowledge
of both and we need more young people. A lot
of our current connections are a bit mature, shall we say.
You could hear her taking a drag and her cigarette,
(04:41):
but she was extremely shrewd. That's Judith Pearson, who wrote
the first biography of Virginia Hall, The Wolves at the Door.
She's describing Vera Atkins. She was extremely well thought of
by the s o E, and they were desperate for
(05:02):
people who could speak French, who knew their way around France,
who had a bit of an attitude, and Virginia had
all those. The job would be difficult and Virginia's responsibilities numerous.
She wouldn't only shelter multiple spies in various safe houses
at any given time, but would be subject to the
(05:22):
gestapos interrogations at any moment. If any Virginia's compatriots found
themselves with their covers blown or sought out by the Nazis,
it would be her responsibility to keep them hidden in
the safe houses and navigate their way out of the
country and back to London. Virginia did have one key
advantage the s OE could leverage. She was American and
(05:45):
in the USA was still ostensibly neutral in World War Two.
As FDR said in late ninety there is no amm
forss sending an American expeditionary FOSS outside our border. There
is no intentiontion by and a member of your government
(06:06):
who send such a thought. At the time, Americans like
Virginia still had the latitude to live freely in France.
She would be tasked with transmitting German intelligence back to
the UK through wire transmissions and secret radio broadcasts, as
well as coordinating the pickup of pilots and weaponry that
(06:29):
fell out of British planes. All of this information over
single dinner could have been overwhelming. You know about my
leg If it doesn't bother you, it doesn't bother us.
Virginia couldn't deny how much the job seemed too good
to be true. For nearly a decade, she had been
rejected from promotions and positions of authority in the American government.
(06:53):
She'd wanted to serve all this time, and yet was
dismissed for every reason under the sun. She was a
one it, she was handicapped, she didn't have the right attitude,
and suddenly here she was in the presence of a
real life spy offering her responsibilities. She had only ever
dreamed of. Her response was succinct. When do I start,
(07:27):
I'm Stephen Talty and from diversion, this is good Assassin's
Season two. Being killed would be the easy part. Being
tortured would be the hard part. Our intel suggests she
is behind many of the prison bricks all over the country.
She's dangerous, so sabotage plus a little espionage paramilitary operations
(07:51):
make things blow up. The message for Captain Bobby and
I believe I have found the nest of the limb
being Lady Episode four Spy Games. All right, man much.
(08:17):
When Virginia arrived in Guildford in the UK in March
of for s o E training, she was given a nickname. Really,
the nickname was meant for her prosthetic leg. It was
dubbed Cuthbert as some of the other recruits joked she
could use the limb as a sword in a pinch.
They confused the word with cutlass, but Virginia felt like
(08:40):
correcting them would give her a reputation as a know
it all. It was a cross introduction, but Virginia knew
she'd have to expect worse from the Nazis. She never
told anybody that's Brad Catling, Virginia's great nephew. Apparently Virginia
never told the family this story, and in fact Katling
(09:03):
has a different theory on why Virginia culture pathetic. Cuthbert
Cuthbert was St. Cuthbert who lived in the eight hundreds,
and he lived on the northeastern coast of England, right
on the coast. But today if you go there, it's
a bird sanctuary and you know they're gazillion nesting birds
(09:27):
that are there all the time. But St. Cuthbert was
actually given credit for saving all of these birds or
protecting all of these birds. And he also had an
injured knee that had given him trouble, but it ended
up being cured through a miracle. That's the story anyway.
(09:53):
So Cuthbert fits on a number of different levels. First
of all, in Turkey, she was hunting for birds, and
so if St. Cuthbert is the protector of the birds,
then he saved the bird that she was trying to shoot.
And choosing Cuthbert is also aspirational for her because he
(10:14):
was eventually healed, the next few weeks would test her metal.
She didn't have to worry about oral examinations or office politics. Anymore. Instead,
she was training for combat, demolition, and survival. Keep your
(10:36):
aunts up, Cuthbert, heads up, for you'll get knocked down.
The camp was full of volunteers. Trainees were dropping like flies,
getting cut for different reasons. Some were too slow, others
(10:59):
were too hockey. Some couldn't keep their mouth shut and
were deemed incapable of protecting valuable intel. The s O
couldn't risk their agents cracking, and the Nazis were brutal interrogators.
Virginia's reality began to set in when she noticed the
number of her compatriots was whittling down every day. The
(11:20):
exercises were merciless. She was put through hours and hours
of mock interrogations that involved splashing cold water over her
head until her lips turned blue. Her memory was challenged.
Could she walk into a room with fifteen people and then,
after twenty seconds, accurately described the facial features, clothing, and
(11:41):
demeanor of every person. Virginia was trained in Morse code
and tasks with transmitting it over a secret radio. The
volunteers deemed not up to snuff were sent up north
to an isolated estate, where they were kept for a
few weeks until the intel they were already privy to
was no longer of use to the British or the enemy.
(12:03):
The prospect of being sent up North began to haunt
Virginia's nightmares. She had come this far and now she
was terrified of failing. Virginia, wake up, what you're moving on?
Moving on? Wait? Please don't hand me up North North.
(12:27):
We're not sending you up North? Is your next session?
Performance training? Get dressed. After she had proven herself physically,
Virginia was placed in the next tier manners. As the
Bridge saw it, Virginia was a shoot from the hip, outspoken,
highly opinionated, independent woman. She would stick out like a
(12:48):
sore thumb in France and attract lots of unnecessary attention.
They'd have to change her, train her to hide her
American accent, to not look around like a tourist, to
blend in without suspicion, and that was easier said than done.
As her three week training session began to wind down,
(13:09):
she left behind etiquette and leveled up to the final
tier of weapons training. Here she received a tip she
didn't expect. Her weapons instructor informed her that have given
a choice between wounding and Nazi and killing him. She
should always wound him. If you kill him, they'll just
leave the body behind. If you put him in the
(13:30):
infirm right, his higher ups get paperwack. Keep them busy
and distracted. The best Nazi is a dead Nazi. But
let's win the war first, shall I. Following eight weeks
of lifestyle training and then mastery of weapons and close
(13:51):
combat tactics, Virginia was left with a final trial, to
be dropped off in the nearby village of wine Borough
and given a list of duties she had to complete
in one week. She had a fine safe house, receive
and transmit sensitive information via Morse code, and then ship
a package out of town. All of this had to
(14:13):
be done while several other volunteers sought her out. If
she was discovered or if any of her information confiscated,
she'd have to start her entire training process over, and
she failed twice, she would in fact be sent up north.
At the end of the week, Virginia had successfully evaded
her searchers and completed all of her tasks. The sa
(14:35):
we decided she was ready. So what Virginia Hall, what
have learned is how to set up a safe house,
how to recruit support agents, meaning people to be a
part of her network to collect intelligence. That's Chris Costa again.
(14:57):
She would have learned how to shoot, she would have
learned hand to hand combat. She would have gone through
various obstacle courses. You learn about dead drops. Some people
in paramilitary operations special operations learn how to set up
pickup zones for aircraft or drop zones for night parachute operations.
(15:21):
So all of those combinations of skills gave Virginia Hall
a suite of tools that she can use. But it
was all iterative. It She never was fully prepared to
execute all the possible tasks that she could get to
survive on the battlefield. So that's where she relied on
(15:45):
her senses and her instincts and just her acumen. Uh,
you wanted to see me. You're shipping out, Custbert. We've
got a fly by in a month. But seeing as
(16:08):
how that leg of yours would kill you in a jump,
we're not parachuting you in. By the grace of God,
you were born an American, so you'll enter the country
legally and your cover will be that of an American journalist.
Sound good, I can make the jump, sir, and I
could make a soufle, but I wouldn't serve it to Churchill.
(16:29):
You'll go in legally. Where in France will I be stationed,
Sir Leon in the East. It's the Free Zone. It's
a strategic location for us. We've begun planting the seeds
of the resistance there, but it's also becoming a hotspot
for German activity. You'll be very busy both aiding our
(16:49):
men and gathering intel from the Nazis. Virginia heads into
the field after the break. Virginia Hall landed in Leone,
(17:12):
near France's eastern border, in August. Now she was on
her own. Her public alias was Brigitte le Contra, a
name picked out by Vera Atkins would become something of
a friend and her unofficial handler and the special operations
executive for the British government. Virginia's code name was to
(17:33):
be German. Now she had to get used to responding
to Brigitte, which was easier said than done. She found
cheap boarding in Leone, but needed her cover. She called
on an old family friend who worked at the New
York Post newspaper, and pitched herself as a culture and
politics reporter stationed in France. Weeks of interrogation training made
(17:55):
the job interview fly by well, Michel. If you can
do the job safely, it's yours. Virginia was employed by
the New York Post, so she had her cover and
was ready for action. Now she'd have to bury all
her s OE training under the guise of an American
leading a normal expatriate life in France, she had to
(18:17):
blend in. It didn't take long for Virginia to hook
into the resistance network and leone. The s O had
given her a number of British and French contacts she
could lean on in the pinch, and under the guise
of a neutral American reporting lifestyle pieces, she was able
to travel the region with relative ease. Her first article
(18:40):
for the Post, dated September four, detail the reality of
living under German food rations. The country's food was prioritized
for the Germans, a flexive power that matched with the
Statute des Wife, a law passed in v She, France
the previous year in October ninety that had to aired
all Jews second class citizens and strip them of their
(19:03):
human rights. Virginia had to be careful about her writing
as it pertained to choose. Even if it was published
across the ocean in America, the word could get back
to France and compromise her position. She was critical of
the Nazi occupation, but always wrote in a way where
she could maintain plausible deniability. She had a right facts
(19:25):
not commentary. OUI. I was told to me that doctor
Roussett here, have you treated the cats on the roof? Yes?
But they won't take Brandy. It is wonderful to meet you, Brigitte.
(19:46):
If we are still calling you that until I come
up with something catchy. After a few weeks exploring the
city of Leon, Virginia, was introduced to doctor Jean Bussey,
a gynecologist and major support system for the resistance. So
you are the newest addition to the resistance. I was curious,
(20:11):
when we get a woman. That's not going to be
a problem, is it not. If you can shoot straight
and run a mile, just give me something to shoot
and a place to go, we are going to get
on just fine. Now to business. There is a pilot
who's playing was shut down last week. He has been
(20:32):
holed up in a safe house and claims to a
valuable information. We need you to get him out of
the country and back to London. Just like that. This
job doesn't come with a lot of preamble. You're hoping
to do some good, aren't you? So yes, just like that? Okay,
then tell me where he is. Virginia's instructions were simple.
(20:57):
At the edge of town, she left a letter in
the mailbox of a small farmhouse and returned home to
a layman's eye. The note described happy birthday wishes, but
actually functioned as code. The down British pilot inside the
farmhouse was to meet her in a nearby cafe the
next evening. There the two would discuss his escape road.
(21:22):
The pilot was a nervous wreck. He detailed his harrowing
mission to Virginia anxiously forgetting they were in public. A
week earlier, during an aerial dog fight somewhere in the
skies above southern France, a barrage of Nazi gunfire blew
through his left wing, and he had bailed later than
he would have liked. The first thing to realize is
(21:46):
that this is World War two. Nobody can eject that's
a modern concept that requires an adjective seat, a rocket
powered seat that shoots out of the plane. They don't
have those in World War Two aircraft. That's Andrew or
the professor of military history from Kansas State University. You've
(22:07):
heard him in earlier episodes. If your plane is damaged,
there are two ways to escape. One is to crash,
land the plane right, to find an open place and
land the land your damage plane. The other option is
to bail out. You have to hold the plane steady,
open a door if it's a big plane, or open
(22:31):
the canopy and manually if it's a small plane, and
climb out of the airplane at speed. It's a heroine
and very dangerous experience. As the pilot floated to Earth,
he assumed the enemy plane would fire through his parachute.
It was only by the grace of God, he said
(22:52):
that the German didn't come back and finish the job.
But landing safely wasn't the end of his problems. When
you hit the ground, you're in a lot of trouble
because the enemy knows about your aircraft. They know it
got shot down because they did the shooting. They've already
(23:13):
alerted local security forces. Eventually, you're gonna need food, you're
gonna need help. You usually end up knocking on a
door or approaching somebody when they're by themselves, and it
has to be by themselves because the more people who
see you, the more likely one of them is loyal
(23:35):
to v she and will turn you in. So you're
basically playing Russian roulette. You're gambling that the person you
find will be sympathetic and hook you up with the Resistance,
or at least feed you and not rack you out
to the Germans. Dog fights above Leone have become commonplace
(23:57):
since the Nazis realized the British will dropping valuable weapons, food,
and medicine to specific drop zones in the countryside. It
was a fast and easy way for the s o
E to supply the resistance. Fighter planes dog fight to
try and stop German aircraft from attacking the larger, slower
(24:19):
bulk transports. So German fighters didn't want to dog fight
British or later American fighter planes. They wanted to get
at the transport planes, which were easy killed full of agents,
knock them down and win or described with These dog
fights looked like and a World War two. Fighter planes
(24:43):
could only shoot an enemy in front of them, so
getting behind or to the side of an enemy, but
with your plane facing your enemy was how you won
and also how you survived, because most of the time,
if a pilot could see and shoot at his end,
to me, that enemy couldn't shoot at him because of
(25:03):
the way physics worked. And so you had these fairly
compact battles, those which really almost looked like a ball
of string, with multiple aircraft turning and turning repeatedly trying
to get an enemy to lose its line of fire
on them while they bring another enemy into their own
(25:24):
line of fire. Unique the pilot's tale rattled Virginia. He
quickly realized this wasn't training anymore. This was a man
would come shockingly close to death in the most dramatic way,
and he couldn't help it, wear it on his face.
(25:45):
Virginia got the impression that if he was this shaken,
he would attract attention, and she urged him to settle
down and accompany her out of the cafe. But the
pilot was adamant on remaining in public. For all he
knew Virginia could be a double agent and going somewhere
alone with her could be dangerous. Virginia tried to make
(26:05):
sense of this. Why meet with her at all? If
there was a possibility. She wasn't who she said she was.
She chalked it up to paranoia, and paranoia made sense.
Virginia was so lost in thought she almost didn't notice
a waiter approached their table. Bonjou, What would you like?
(26:25):
Just the water would be fine. I'd like a beer. Ok,
we don't sell beer water. He's just come from America.
It's his first time back in a while. Just t waters,
I will be back. The pilot had made a bad mistake.
(26:50):
Beer was no longer served in the occupied country, and
this would be something anyone who had been a citizen
of France for the past two years would know. The
entire restaurant was staring at them, but if they left,
it would be obvious they were hiding something. This was
the kind of thing that had tripped up Virginia in
her training. Now she was responsible for another agent's mistake.
(27:14):
That's when Virginia noticed them, two men dressed almost entirely
in black, getting up from their table and walking towards them.
They smirked with cold, dead eyes. There was no mistaking them. Gestapo,
good evening, Hello, gentlemen, I enjoy beer as fed. May
(27:37):
we see your papers? And that's a good place to
take a quick break stay with us. Virginia was sweating.
The Gestapo officer's hand was outstretched to her, beckoning for
(28:01):
their identification. She knew that hers would pass a smell test,
but she worried about the pilots. It was likely that
his was a rushed job, as the Brits needed men
in planes, and they didn't give much thought to the
likelihood of their survival if they were shot down. Their
thought process was understandable. Why make fake I das for
(28:23):
dead men? Uh, surely here you are m hmm, grigit
leucum American Huh on his he left them at home?
At home. Virginia had to think fast. Her lie was
(28:45):
the same one that everybody used, and it was clear
it wasn't playing with the Nazis. Uh. He's been forgetful
ever since he got back. He suffered an injury in
the States, and he hasn't been old there since. His
family is taking him to the doctor next week. An injury.
They couldn't take care of him overseas. It's not like
(29:07):
American doctors are busy. Then the answer came to Virginia.
She was sharp and quick, and these talents would prove
valuable in her career as a spy. That's exactly what
I am interviewing him about. Interviewing him you can see
in my paper some a reporter for the New York Post.
(29:28):
It's an American paper. I'm interviewing him to understand why
he would come back to France Fouquier instead of staying
over there. So tell me, I don't cost the Americans.
You don't trust them. The smartest things they've done in
(29:51):
Ages is stay out of this war. Let's the Germans
get a job done, get Europe back in shape. The
pilot's acting was good, but Virginia couldn't help but WinCE
at any ground given to the Nazis, even if it
was going to save their lives. Virginia was watching the
Germans closely. Their faces had relaxed. These were men of ego,
(30:15):
and seeing there as appropriately stroked meant they could drop
their guard I hope to read this interview soon. Hopefully
it will make its surrounds here. If it is apploading
our efforts here in Europe, I'll see that it does
hail Hitler. Before leaving, the Germans made a quick note
(30:41):
of their encounter. Brigitte Le contres. French was excellent, but
her accent was difficult to place. It seemed more Canadian
than American. They couldn't quite shake the idea that the
woman didn't totally fit the picture before them, but for
reasons we don't know, they decided not to interrogate her further.
(31:01):
The pilot must have sensed this hesitation as he asked
Virginia permission to leave the cafe, but she thought it
would signal they had something to hide, so they waited
another hour, eating bread and drinking water before heading out.
The next evening, Virginia forged travel papers for the pilot
and got him on a train out of France. She
(31:23):
had been given the necessary tools by Dr. Rous Say,
and as long as the pilot didn't draw any suspicion,
there was no real reason my border agents would look
too hard at his paperwork. As he set off, Virginia relaxed.
She successfully saved her first operative, and it was the
first of many. As the months rolled on to the
(31:44):
fall of Virginia, Spear headed numerous campaigns. His sabotaged Nazi machinery,
as well as giving fugitives and Allied spies scape routes
to Spain in Britain, including an infamous prison break at Mozac.
She deciphered and transmitted code via radio that helped the
resistance circumvent Nazi plots, and slowly she began making a
(32:08):
name for herself. It was a name bored on at
the fact that on that first night at the cafe
with the pilot, the Gestapo officers noticed something. As Virginia
and the pilot finally left the cafe, a small hobble
in her left leg gave them pause. She has a lymph. Yeah,
(32:30):
interesting indeed, and limp And so the legend of the
Limping Lady was born, and Virginia quickly disregarded her alias
as Brigitte le Contra. The Nazis had put that name
to her face and she couldn't do her job. She
was noticed in any way. After years of rejection, she
(32:53):
must have felt a sense of pride. She had been
hired as a spy and saved a man's life, and
she was good at it. But the waltz around her
were beginning to push in. The US, which had remained
neutral in the war up to this point, was making
broader shows of support for the Allies, and while that
may have been good for the war effort, it meant
(33:14):
that Virginia Hall would soon lose her open status as
an American working in France. After that first close encounter
with the Nazis, Virginia moved out of her first home
and into another and continued her undercover work for the
s Oe and Leone, not yet realizing the priest Robert
Alesh was on her trail coming up on the next
(33:41):
episode of Good Assassins. The people of Europe who are
defending themselves do not ask us. They don't laugh fighting
A message for Captain Bobby and I believe I have
found the nest of the limping Lady. Confirm her location,
(34:02):
and then return to us. I've seen many terrible sites
in the last five years, but nothing, nothing approaching the
dreadful interior of this hot at Belson. The dead and
the dye lay close together. If you have any questions
(34:29):
for us about Good Assassins, if you're curious about some
aspect of Virginia hall story, or have any comments on
the podcast, we'd love to hear from you. Please email
us at Good Assassins at Diversion audio dot com. Make
sure you spell assassins correctly again. That's good Assassins At
diversion Audio dot com. We'll try to answer your questions
(34:49):
on a future episode. Find us on Twitter, Facebook and
Instagram at Diversion Pots. Good Assassins is a production of
Diversion Audio in a social creation with iHeart Podcasts. This
season is hosted by Steven Talti and written by C. D. Carpenter,
Produced and directed by Kevin Thompson for Real Jet Packs Productions.
(35:12):
Story editing by Jacob Bronstein, with editorial direction from Scott Waxman.
Additional research and reporting by Sophie McNulty. Theme music by
Tyler Cash featuring the voices of mikayla Is Caerdo, Raphael
cork Kill, Lenna Klingerman, John pier Case, Andrew polk or Lock,
Cassidy Manoel Falciano, Sean Gormley, Matthew Amant and Steve Raupman.
(35:37):
Sound design, mixing and mastering by Paul Goodrich. Sound editing
by Justin Kilpatrick. Executive producers Jacob Bronstein, Mark Francis and
Scott Waxman. For Diversion Audio see Secord Diversion Audio
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