(Hall's first field name, "Germaine Lecontre," may be one of the less subtle spy monikers ever bestowed.)
But amid the SOE chaos, there's also the overarching sense of righteousness that accompanies World War II stories - fighting Nazis is one of the most clearly demarcated moral lines in history - and even a little gallows humor. It was a hasty affair the rush to get undertrained and unsupported operatives into the field led to fatal mistakes, and Hall was often aghast at the ways good-old-boy office politics seemed so often to triumph over on-the-ground realities. But the speedy Nazi takeover of Europe was more alarming than the usual prejudices, and in 1940 she was in France with only the barest brief - build a Resistance, no matter what. She was an unlikely choice for SOE field work she was a woman, she was American, and she had a disability (a hunting accident left her with a wooden leg she called Cuthbert) that made her easy to identify. But Sonia Purnell's A Woman of No Importance is a gripping take, tracing Hall's life in the context of hurdles she faced from allies - as much as from enemies. She isn't totally unknown there have been other biographies, as well as a CIA training hall named in her honor and even a Drunk History sketch. Virginia Hall was one of the earliest Special Operations Executive agents Britain sent into occupied France to stir up resistance against the Nazi/Vichy regime, where she laid critical groundwork for an organized Resistance in southern France - and later led a cell herself. It would be easy to believe the Limping Lady wasn't real. The German secret police couldn't even be sure what country she was from. It sounds like propaganda meant to misdirect WWII Germans: a lone foreigner running riot in occupied France, everywhere at once, unrecognizable despite a trademark gait, able to bewitch information out of anyone, single-handedly stirring up resistance - and then vanishing. Your purchase helps support NPR programming.
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