Well educated, with secretarial skills and multi-lingual, Vera became a spy for British Intelligence in the mid and late 1930’s on the continent and was an obvious choice to be a key organiser of the Special Operations Executive (SOE) French or ‘F ‘Section in the early war years. She was the Personal Assistant and Intelligence Officer to its commander, Col. Maurice Buckmaster, from the beginning. Her role, among other things, was to help recruit and interview potential male and female agents to be inserted into France to work with the French Resistance. She arranged for their training in the many secret great houses and other locations around Britain, saw to their needs when on leave and maintained contact with their families. She accompanied them to their ‘start points’ en route to France, whether secret aerodromes like Tempsford or from British ports if insertion was to be by submarine or boat. She security checked their clothing and pockets before departure and later assisted in their debriefs on return.
At war’s end she was deeply concerned by ‘her agents’ whose fate was unknown and had not returned, but about whom nothing was being done as SOE was secretly shut down. So in British Women’s Army uniform, and using her many contacts, she went at first secretly and unofficially on her own initiative to Europe to find out. Soon attached to the War Crimes Investigations Teams, she spent almost 2 years finding and interviewing former agents, Resistance fighters, and especially Nazi war criminals in prisons awaiting trial or even execution. She succeeded beyond expectation and so was able to bring full recognition to the victims, and some closure and comfort to the families of those who had died or been murdered. Her work was recognised only many years later with a CBE from Britain and the Croix de Guerre and Legion d’Honneur from France .
Post war among other things Vera worked for UNESCO and was an honoured member of the Special Forces Club in Knightsbridge and Chair for many years of its highly regarded and secretive Historical Sub Committee. Her ‘character’ was portrayed in many films , TV dramas, WW2 documentaries and books, and she was even said to be the model for ‘Miss Moneypenny’ in Ian Fleming’s Bond novels and films. The biography of her by Sarah Helm was published after she died and was aptly called ‘A Life in Secrets’ as Vera rarely gave interviews until much later in her retirement.
As Archivist of the Association of Jewish Ex-Servicemen and Women of the UK – AJEX - I was permitted to meet her at her home in Winchelsea on the south coast in 1998 to ask what she knew of the two Jewish women agents who had died, of the twelve women of F section who never made it home (Muriel Byck and Denise Bloch). I was writing about them for my book, ‘Fighting Back’ and a paper for the Journal of the Jewish Historical Society of England. She was then about to turn 90 years old but was very feisty and refused to have her voice recorded – notes only! Her home was a meeting place for reunions of surviving agents and the locals knew who she was but helped her keep a low profile. She told me firmly I only had a certain amount of interview time, stating boldly, ‘You are not the only one , you know!”. Her attitude softened considerably later on as I took her to lunch nearby. Later that week, they held a big but discrete 90th birthday party for her in the village, and I spoke to her several times by telephone to clarify parts of her testimony.
Even though I made it very clear about my Jewish angle, she never once let on what her real name was and that she herself was Jewish, and I never discovered it until her obituaries appeared soon after. Why she did this I do not know. However, she was known to feel very insecure about her status in Britain in the early years, being both Jewish and foreign born, and thus with suspect loyalties, all untrue of course. Neither was I ever able to discover why she wished her ashes to be buried at Zennor churchyard in Cornwall, except that her brother Guy was also buried there. Nor why the vicar told me - when I visited some years after - that she and her relatives never wanted a Jewish Star on her headstone in the cemetery. Whatever the reasons , she remains a great Jewish war time heroine for the Jewish community and when she died in June 2000, I was sorry not to have known her better. She never married.
(The plaque was financed by Jerry Klinger of the Jewish American Society for Historic Preservation and organised by Martin Sugarman of AJEX UK)
Martin Sugarman
