The never-before-told story of Virginia Hall, the American spy who changed the course of World War II, from the author of Clementine: the life of Mrs. Winston Churchill
in 1942, the Gestapo sent out an urgent transmission:
"She is the most dangerous of all Allied spies. We must find and destroy
her." The target in their sights was Virginia Hall, a Baltimore
socialite who talked her way into Special Operations Executive, the spy
organization dubbed Winston Churchill's "Ministry of Ungentlemanly
Warfare." She became the first Allied woman deployed behind enemy lines
and--despite her prosthetic leg--helped to light the flame of the French
Resistance, revolutionizing secret warfare as we know it.
Virginia
established vast spy networks throughout France, called weapons and
explosives down from the skies, and became a linchpin for the
Resistance. Even as her face covered wanted posters and a bounty was
placed on her head, Virginia refused order after order to evacuate. She
finally escaped through a death-defying hike over the Pyrenees into
Spain, her cover blown. But she plunged back in, adamant that she had
more lives to save, and led a victorious guerilla campaign, liberating
swathes of France from the Nazis after D-Day.
Based on new and
extensive research, Sonia Purnell has for the first time uncovered the
full secret life of Virginia Hall--an astounding and inspiring story of
heroism, spycraft, resistance, and personal triumph over shocking
adversity. A Woman of No Importance is the breathtaking story of how one woman's fierce persistence helped win the war.
