About
American spy who coordinated efforts between the British Special Operations Executive and the American Office of Strategic Services, both of which conducted espionage, reconnaissance and sabotage against the Axis powers. In 1941, she became the first female agent to relocate to France. Once there, she formed the Heckler Network out of Lyon. She spent fifteen months in Lyon, organizing resistance efforts. Her recruits included prominent gynecologists and wealthy brothel madams. She supplied weapons, cash and food to agents, as well as offering medical services to downed airmen. By late 1942, she was being hunted by the Gestapo and was forced to flee the country. She returned to France in 1944, largely undeterred. She began training resistance groups again and supplying them with weapons. In Haute-Loire, the resistance groups she trained successfully drove the Germans out before the arrival of the American military. She was later awarded The Distinguished Service Cross, the Croix de Guerre and an MBE. She left no memoirs and granted no interviews about her time overseas.
Before Fame
She attended Barnard College, where she studied French, Italian and German. She later attended George Washington University, where she studied Economics and French. She traveled Europe and eventually took a job as a consular clerk at the American Embassy in Warsaw, Poland. In 1933, she was shot in a hunting accident that resulted in her leg being amputated below the knee. She originally wanted to be a diplomat but women were rarely hired in those roles in the 1930s. She entered World War II as an ambulance driver for the army of France.
Trivia
She was nicknamed "Artemis" by the Germans, and was named as one of the most dangerous Allied spies. After World War II ended, she went on to work in the Special Activities Division of the CIA.
Family Life
She was the daughter of Edwin Lee Hall and Barbara Virginia Hammel. In 1957, she married Paul Goillot, a lieutenant she met while in Haute-Loire. She died in 1982. Her husband outlived her by five years.
Associated With
Adolf Hitler was responsible for the Holocaust and World War II.
