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Speaker 2: Depends on how you interpret it. The French spy and
triple agent knowns Less Shots marked Matilda Carre. She was
born in Chateaurou, France, in nineteen oh eight. She joined
the Army Army Nurse Corps start of World War Two
became leading member of the Interay spy network. She was
a interrogated by the Germans in nineteen forty one and
turned against her former comrades and began working for the Gestapo.
We're going to learn the rest of this story in
a minute, so let's start off She's known as the cat,
despised by her former comrades and the French resistan moved
because of her treachery. Matilda Carey lived in pre war
existence that was almost dull in his conventional contours. As
many of the spies that we have read about, she
earned a law degree at Sarbonne. After graduation, she married
Maurice Carey, a school teacher, and moved with him to Olron, Algeria.
They divorced after just six years and she returned to
France on the evil World War Two. During the brief
struggle to hold back the German onslaught, resulting in a
catastrophic defeat for the French, Mattilda Carey served as a
member of the French Army's and nurse Corps. After the defeat,
she was evacuated to the southern southern city of Tulau,
where she met a Polish military intelligence officer by the
name of Captain Roman Sisnarski cze rna w Ski. He
remained who remained in France as part of a network
to spy on the Germans and transmit the data to
the Polish embassy in Madrid. Garbie Ssnarski had been recruited
by the overall chief of Polish intelligence in France, Colonel Zarevensky,
the man responsible for brilliantly improvising the creation of an
anti German spy operation using the papers of a Frenchman
killed in the fighting. Sarzinsky went under the code name Valentine,
who was a bold operative who quickly organized an effective
network of agents that called itself it There it was
a combination of French and Polish intelligence. From his headquarters
Imparisey masterminded a rapidly growing organization and by the time
wireless contact was established, the ring consisted of agents operating
in almost all of the German occupied zone in France.
He and until the Karree had become lovers, and she
quickly emerges one of their most valuable members, cool headed
and capable of inspiring confidence in her fellow spy. That's
how she earned her the code name the Cat. By
late summer nineteen forty one, the Interire network was operating
at a maximum effectiveness when it had operative operatives working
in fourteen districts of German controlled France. It had over
one hundred agents strategically located. Unfortunately, the luck ran out
in November nineteen forty one. This was part due to
the arrival in Paris of Sergeant Hugo Bleicher or Bliker Blicchr,
a former Geschappo agent who had been assigned to work
for the ABO ABWHR that's the German or the Nazi
intelligence service. Back thenists especially chosen to wipe out interirea
Bliker possessed talents as an intelligence agent, the guaranteed doom
for the Allies by network. The fatal blow came after
a major lapse of security in Charbou in early November
nineteen forty one, which provided the Germans with crucial information
about the ring and enabled them to round up most
of the members. Harsh interrogation methods, including physical torture, provided
Blacker's men with major pieces of information, and a few
hours later Blaker arrested and unsuspecting Matilda Carey when Valentine
codenamed Valentine refused to reveal any useful information to his
German interrogators. Despite many hours of torture, Blacker decided to
concentrate on Carey. The strategy, which is very different in
her case, emphasized a psychological offensive against the prisoner rather
than the affliction of pain. First, he initiated a dramatic
change in surroundings, having he moved from a blaque prison
cell to a place of startling contrast, the five star hotel.
The hotel also happened to be abbwere headquarters in Paris.
Over a wonderful meal, Blaker was able to convince Cary
that by working for him, she would only save herself
from torture and probable death, but also save the lives
of her comrades, with whom he would protect from execution.
All that was required as a Carey now began working
for the abwear become a double agent, helping them to
deceive the British by feeding them false information. And her
memoirs written at the end of her life, care would
later admit that within hours of being interrogated by Bliker,
she would commit the greatest act of cowardice in her life.
Within days of turning, care was working to assist Bliker
and rounding up the remaining members of Interorey who still
remained at large. Now operating as a double agent, the
cat led Bliker to the homes and meeting places of
a number of women and men who only days before
have been her trusted comrades. She identified one of them,
Claude Joufrey, by greeting him with a kiss at the
cafe at Little fourteenth. Blaker's agencies the four radio transmitters
of the Interra network moving to a Paris suburbs so
as to continue sending messages to London as if nothing
had happened. Since Care provided the Auboy with all necessary codes,
transmission schedules, and pre arranged security checks, that was little
that might arouse the suspicion of British intelligence. However, one
of the few members of Vorey who still remained free,
Pierre Devo Moncau vome Coort, began to suspect that Care
was in some way acting suspiciously To test her loyalty.
In January nineteen forty two, he asked her to procure
some forged identity documents. She showed up the next day,
bringing with her a perfect set of papers, complete with
authentic German stamps. On top of this, she produced a
photograph with an air of studied conage. Casualness asked Devo
Moccoy if he recognized the man in the photo who
was an agent of British Special Operations Executive SOE, British's
former intelligence service, especially created for the Nazis in World
War Two. His suspicious confirmed Devo mokayheedually accused Carey of
treachery and working for the Nazis. Confronted by the facts,
she broke down in tears and confessed. Within the rules
governing the precarious world of espionage, it would not have
been unreasonable for Devo Mocco to kill Correy, warned the
remaining members, and flee himself off. But his plans were
much more complex. You see, he persuaded care to once
more work for the Allies, making her now a triple agent.
Soon after this dramatic change in her loyalty, she informed
Bliker that Drumbar Deavia Morcaux was planned to go to
England for an important meeting with British intelligence, and that
she was being considered for inclusion. Though she convinced Bliker,
he in turn had considerable difficulty convincing his superiors of
the value to the abware of allowing kra to make
a secret trip to Britain. Eventually, though Blaker received permission
for care and Devamrcaux to leave France after two failed
attempts by British intelligence agents to locate the two key
agents on an isolated beach. They were finally picked up
and taken to London. Safely aggrived across the Channel. At Dartmouth,
Carey was debriefed by British intelligence. She broke down almost immediately,
admitting her capitulation under Bliker's interrogations and her work for
the Abware. She also explained her return to the entirea
fold under Deva Morcau's leadership several months previously. Her January
nineteen forty nine trial. The lasted four days and resulted
in a death sentence, but upon appeal it was reduced
to a life imprisonment. Her defense attorney did not dispute
her treasonous behavior, but argue that the judge should consider
that this woman was faced with a choice of life
or death. Do not forget that from the beginning of
the resistance she was a heroine. Would you put to
death those who at the beginning sow the seed of
faith and later overestimated their own strengths to the defense attorney.
Caray was eventually released in nineteen fifty four and attempted
to resume her life with a new identity. By the
early sixties she published her memoirs. Her health had begun
to fail and she was rapidly losing her eyesight. Caray
died in total obscurity in the early nineteen seventies. So
there is the story of the cat