These pilots have signed all the prints.
SOE Lysander Pilots
Flight Lieutenant Peter
Arkell OBE, USAF Medal of Distinction
Flew Mustangs and Spitfires with 26 Squadron
on intruder and low-level photographic sorties over France. In 1944
joined 161 Squadron at Tempsford, then accompanied the Lysanders
to Burma where he flew 35 successful and dangerous missions supplying
Force 136 behind the Japanese lines.
Flight Lieutenant Murray
Anderson DFC*, US Air Medal
Operated Spitfires with No. 1 PRU, then
moved to No. 4 PRU in Algiers and then to 542 PR Squadron at Benson.
In 1943/44 flew 9 operations in Lysanders over occupied France,
6 being double pick-ups, mostly with Leslie Whittaker who moved
to Tempsford with him. In June 1944 he then flew Mustangs with 2nd
TAF.
Flight Lieutenant R.
G. (Bob) Large DFC, Legion d'Honneur
In 1941 served with 616 Squadron as part
of the Tangmere Wing with Douglas Bader on Fighter and Bomber sweeps
over Northern France. Shot down over the sea 10 miles from his present
home. Later joined the Lysander Flight of 161 Squadron where he
flew many clandestine operations involving SOE agents. (Bob's
dog, Patrick, became the first dog in the Allied Forces to fly in
a jet which took place in a Meteor 3 on 11th May 1946 and is now
recorded in the Guinness Book of Records)
 Air
Chief Marshal Sir Lewis Hodges KCB, CBE, DSO, DFC, Legion d'Honneur, Croix De Guerre
Flew Hampdens with 76 and 49 Squadrons,
crash landed in occupied France in September 1940, evaded capture
and returned via Spain and Nancy Wake's escape route. In 1942 flew
with, and later commanded, 161 Squadron flying Lysanders, Halifaxes
and Hudsons on SOE operations to France. After the Normandy Landings
he went to India to command 357 Squadron (Liberators and Dakotas)
parachuting combat teams into the Japanese occupied territory for
Force 136.
Learn about the sacrifices of
Secret Agent Violette Szabo, G.C.
Violette Szabo, G.C.
Museum
Secret
Agent, Violette
Szabo G.C.,
Croix de Guerre, was one of Britain's
most daring Secret Agents, and is remembered with a great pride in
a quiet, rural part of the beautiful county of Herefordshire.
A Museum and Millennium Green has been dedicated
to honoring her memory and Memorabilia on display illustrates her
bravery and fortitude behind enemy lines during the Second World
War.
Violette Szabo (nee Bushnell) was the daughter
of an English father and a French mother, the family consisting
of four sons and one daughter. From an early age, she was outstandingly
beautiful; her beauty was matched by her complete fearlessness,
and she surpassed her brothers and cousins at all their sports.
Vi, as she was known, left school at fourteen
and during the next few years worked in various shops in the Brixton
area where the family lived.
She had an independent nature and joined the
Land Army for a while, but in July 1940 when in London looking for
a French soldier on Bastille Day (to whom her mother wished to offer
hospitality), Violette met Etienne Szabo, a 30-year old officer
of the French Foreign Legion, serving with the newly formed forces
of General de Gaulle. In a short time, they had fallen in love and
married at Aldershot a month later. Violette then joined the A.T.S.
and served with great competence in an anti-aircraft unit until
just before June 1942, when a few days before her twenty-first birthday
she gave birth to a daughter, Tania. By that time, her husband was
with General Koenig's French Force at Bir Hakeim; he never saw his
daughter for he was killed at El Alamein in October 1942.
After this terrible
loss, Violette was contacted by authorities in London responsible
for the selection, training and employment of British Secret Agents
in occupied countries. Taking up the offer with great determination,
she became skilled and competent and on her second mission into France,
parachuted into the Limoges area barely twenty-four hours after D-Day
for a very special assignment.
She was entrusted with the dangerous and responsible
task of passing messages to units of Maquis, whom once coordinates
and instructed, were to be effective in holding back a Panzer Division
which was being rushed from the south of France to Normandy to strengthen
the German resistance to the allied landings. In saving a key agent,
she had to use, single-handed a sten gun, and was finally captured
by overwhelming numbers.
After imprisonment, torture, forced labor and
great hardship, she was shot at Ravensbruck Prison on an unknown
date in January 1945. She was posthumously awarded the George Cross
for "a magnificent example of courage and steadfastness".
A couple very much in love and both honored
by their countries.
Etienne Szabo - who was awarded the Legion d'Honneur
and Medaille Militaire and Violette Szabo - the George Cross - and
BOTH awarded the Croix de Guerre with Clasps, along with their respective
War Medals.
 Their
daughter Tania, lives and works in Jersey - and there is a large
display case displaying the Honors of these two special people at
the Exhibition of Jersey's Occupation Experience (The German Underground
Hospital).
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The following people
have signed only the Artist's Proofs and Remarqued prints.
Secret Agents
Major E.
H. Van Maurik OBE Mil.
Trained SOE agents in sabotage, use of
weapons and survival. Accompanied agents to Tangmere for their flights
by Lysander to and from occupied France. In January 1944, parachuted
in to the Maquis de I'Ain to verify their readiness for combat when
the invasion of Europe took place. Smuggled himself into Switzerland
to send his report back to SOE in London, "The longest telegram
ever".
Nancy Wake GM,
Legion d'Honneur, Croix De Guerre, French Resistance Medal, US Medal
of Freedom
The most decorated servicewoman of WWII,
Nancy (Codename - Helene) organized an escape route over the Pyrenees
before she was forced to use it herself. Following training with
SOE, she returned to France to organize her own Resistance Group
in the Auvergne. Involved in many dangerous subversive missions,
she won the everlasting respect of 3500 members of her Maquis.
Captain George
Millar DSO, MC was
parachuted secretly into France as an SOE agent on 1 June 1944.
He was dropped north of Dijon to organize and train local Resistance
groups to harass the enemy in support of the forthcoming D-Day landings
in Normandy.
His incredible book, "Maquis", tells
of their many daring exploits, which included the destruction of
the giant railway turntables on the important rail junction at Besancon.
He vividly describes his day-to-day survival
and the disruptive operations carried out on the German supply lines.
He also depicts with understanding the characters of the ordinary
men and women of the French Resistance who selflessly served with
him to play their heroic part in the final liberation of France.
'Emile" and his Maquis are still remembered in the quiet villages
of the Ognon Valley.
Mail Pick Up Operator
Flying Officer J. A. (Tommy) Thomas Legion d'Honneur
Trained in 1941/42 as a winch operator
on Fairy Battles and Lysanders, target towing for Spitfire OUT.
In 1942 Tommy remustered as Air Gunner and in 1943 he joined 161
Special Duties Squadron at Tempsford on Halifax's B flight. He later
detached to A flight on Hudsons and Lysanders for mail pick-up duties.
His training and quick thinking saved him and Bob Large, when on
one memorable flight Tommy reacted instantly to a tow wire fouling
the elevators of their Lysander. Between July 1943 and July 1945
he completed 33 Ops. Out of Tempsford and Tangmere.
The following poignant
Poem was set to music for the film "Carve Her Name with Pride"'
and has been recorded by Virginia McKenna - "The Love That
I Have" (Violette), Sovereign Records (No. 125) Released in
1974.
Violette Szabo G.C.
26 June 1921 - January 1945
The life that I have is all that I have
And the life that I have is yours
The love that I have of the life that I have
Is yours and yours and yours.
A sleep I shall have, a rest I shall have
Yet death will be but a pause
For the peace of my years in the long green grass
Will be yours and yours and yours.
It is understood that this poem was the
work of Leo Marks, who was Code Master of the S.O.E. (Special
Operations Executive) during the Second World War; he joined in
1942 at the age of 22 years.
In
1998, at a special ceremony, a plaque was unveiled at 'Cartref' to
mark the appreciation of the community for outstanding courage and
in 1994, another plaque was added by the St. Weonards Branch of the
Royal British Legion.
The opening of the Violette Szabo Museum by
Virginia McKenna - who played the part of Violette Szabo in the
1950's film "Carve Her Name With Pride" - took place on
Saturday, 24th June 2000.
This unique Museum has received financial contributions
from the people of Herefordshire and across the world - further
donations to assist with the on-going support of the Museum would
be greatly appreciated.
Rosemary E. Rigby, MBE at 'Cartref' |
