Women: Special Operations Executive

Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe Excerpts

Monday 6th June 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe]

My Lords, I, too, thank my noble friend for initiating this debate. I add my support to the growing band of voices urging greater recognition for the female agents of the Special Operations Executive. That small number of extraordinary young women gave everything at an extraordinary time in our island history. Besides their bravery, their language skills and ability to pass unremarked in enemy-occupied countries, many female SOE agents also had in common their extreme youth. Many were in their early 20s when they volunteered to carry out SOE’s work of reconnaissance and sabotage behind enemy lines. Their youth and their bravery have echoes today. I think of my god-daughter, whose ship, HMS “Liverpool”, was engaged in a fierce gun battle earlier last month, six miles off the coast of Gadaffi-held territory in Libya. Thankfully, the attack was quashed with no casualties or damage to the ship.

Further afield, of course, Britain has women serving alongside men in Afghanistan and Iraq, risking their lives in the service of their country. We do not take for granted their willingness to do a difficult and dangerous job on our behalf, and we must not forget those who did so during previous conflicts.

The contributions of some SOE female agents—notably Violette Szabo and Odette Sansom—were recognised posthumously with the George Cross. Their stories, inevitably romanticised, became widely known through films and books in the decades immediately after the war. Of those women who survived the war, many maintained a long silence about what they did, as is borne out by the case of Eileen Nearne, already referred to, whose service in occupied France was known only on her death. As time goes on, more stories are revealed and deserve wider recognition among younger generations.

Like other noble Lords, I think of women such as Noor Inayat Khan, the first female SOE agent to be airdropped into occupied France. She sent back vital information from Paris for three months—far longer than the expected lifespan—but was eventually captured, tortured and executed in 1944 aged just 29. While she, too, received a posthumous George Cross and memorials exist to her in Paris and Dachau, there is no dedicated memorial to her in England, her adopted country. Campaigners are hoping to raise sufficient funds to unveil a statue to her in Gordon Square in London, near her childhood home. A public commemoration of the contribution to this country’s history by a young Asian Muslim woman would be a tremendously positive signal at the current time and I hope that the Government will give some public support to this campaign.

At a time when women in the Armed Forces were restricted to a non-combatant role in warfare, the women of the SOE trained and served alongside men, risking their lives, often on a daily basis. Greater recognition is long overdue for their unique contribution.