By Larry Loftis
Reviewed by: Carol Rollie Flynn, Cipher Brief Expert and Former Assoc. Deputy Director, National Counterterrorism Center, CIA. Currently CEO & Managing Director, Singa Consulting
Code Name: LISE: The True Story of the Woman Who Became WWII’s Most Decorated Spy, Gallery Books, January 15, 2019
Early in Larry Loftis' fascinating new book, we learn that Odette Samson was a sickly child with no extraordinary ambitions, a surprising beginning for the woman who would go on to become Britain's most decorated WWII spy. Recruited by the Special Operations Executive (SOE), Britain's WWII secret intelligence and sabotage organization, Odette operated as a courier inside German occupied France, a perilous occupation with a 42 percent fatality rate, exceeded on the Allied side only by the Bomber Command's death rate of 45 percent.
Odette was an unlikely SOE recruit. A French woman residing in England with her three young daughters after her British husband had deployed with the British Army, Odette responded to a Royal Navy solicitation on the radio seeking photographs of the French coastline. Her package of photographs accidentally ended up with the War Office who referred her to the French Section of SOE. In desperate need of Britons who could operate undetected inside France, SOE quickly identified Odette's potential utility not only as a native French speaker, but as a determined and fearless young woman. The SOE officials observed something unique in Odette, not unlike the nuns from her childhood who commented on her "volatile and petulant streak." The SOE recruiters were unsure, however, whether she was too impetuous for this work but ultimately decided to give her a chance.
Inspired by the father she had never known who was killed by a mortar in WWI thirteen days before the Armistice, Odette had also recently learned that her mother and brother, both of whom still resided in France, had suffered at the hands of the German occupiers who had confiscated her mother's house and belongings. Her brother, recently wounded, was in a military hospital in Paris. Odette made final preparations for her departure, including boarding her daughters in a convent school in England and leaving a carefully prepared a stack of undated letters addressed to her daughters to be sent once a week by an SOE colleague. Odette anguished over leaving her daughters and knew it was possible, even likely, that she would not return.
This is not Odette's story alone, however. Loftis' remarkable account also touches on some of Odette's SOE colleagues, most notably her boss, Captain Peter Churchill, who ran the SPINDLE network in southern France and ultimately became her lover and future husband. Peter and Odette were arrested in 1943 and initially incarcerated in the German-operated Fresnes Prison near Paris, where Odette endured brutal interrogations and physical torture, but never revealed the identities or whereabouts of her SOE comrades. Peter fared somewhat better in large part because Odette encouraged a rumor that she and Peter were married and that her husband was a relative of Winston Churchill. In fact, Peter was not a relative of the British Prime Minister, but the ruse worked and their German captors viewed Peter as a potential bargaining chip.
Some of the most interesting passages in the book deal with the enigmatic German Abwehr officer Hugo Bleicher, a brilliant intelligence tactician whose ingenious recruitment schemes led to the downfall of the largest Allied network INTERALLIÉ and the ultimate arrest of Odette, Peter, and many others. Although Bleicher knew that those arrested would be turned over to the Gestapo to be tortured and in many cases executed, there is no record that he ever participated in the torture and in many instances, he went out of his way to show kindness to the prisoners whose arrests he had orchestrated, often at potential peril to himself.
Loftis' book is a page-turner, especially the final third of the book which provides a riveting account of the mayhem of the final days of WWII as Odette and Peter, incarcerated in separate concentration camps, have no idea whether the other is still alive or whether they will survive. The only negative is Loftis' occasionally cheesy prose, for example, when he describes Odette's thoughts about their nascent romance: "They were at the bridge of the river of love, she thought...if Peter took her hand and they crossed, there would be no turning back."
Loftis' meticulous research is evident throughout, but the final Appendix and Notes are particularly interesting and provide context for the events described in the book. In the decades following WWII, for instance, there were several publications which questioned the effectiveness of the SOE and whether the accounts of Odette's heroism and torture were true. At least one of the accusations against Odette appears to have been motivated by disapproval of her love affair with Peter Churchill while still married to her first husband. The veracity of Peter's memoirs was also questioned, and one account alleged that Odette and Peter lived a life of luxury on the Riviera and contributed little to the military mission during their time in France. None of the accusations against Odette and Peter were ever proven, however. Peter also sued for libel and won, resulting in the recall of thousands of copies of one particular book, SOE in France, and the deletion of the offending language in subsequent editions.
Code Name: LISE: The True Story of the Woman Who Became WWII’s Most Decorated Spy
This book earns a solid rating of 3.5 our of four trench coats.
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