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Odette (1950 Film)
''Odette'' is a 1950 British war film based on the true story of Special Operations Executive French agent, Odette Sansom, living in England, who was captured by the Germans in 1943, condemned to death and sent to Ravensbrück concentration camp to be executed. However, against all odds she survived the war and testified against the prison guards at the Hamburg Ravensbrück trials. She was awarded the George Cross in 1946; the first woman ever to receive the award, and the only woman who has been awarded it while still alive. Anna Neagle plays Odette Sansom and Trevor Howard plays Peter Churchill, the British agent she mainly worked with and married after the war. Peter Ustinov plays their radio operator Alex Rabinovitch. Colonel Maurice Buckmaster, who was head of the SOE's French Section, played himself in the film, as did Paddy Sproule, another FANY female SOE agent. Plot In response to a radio broadcast request for photographs of France, mother of three Odette Sansom s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Herbert Wilcox
Herbert Sydney Wilcox Order of the British Empire, CBE (19 April 1890 – 15 May 1977) was a British film producer and film director, director. He was one of the most successful British filmmakers from the 1920s to the 1950s. He is best known for the films he made with his third wife Anna Neagle. Early life Wilcox's mother was from County Cork, Ireland, and Wilcox considered himself Irish, but he was born in Norwood, south London.7 Dagmar Villas, Gipsy Road. ''Mr Michael Thornton'' re Mr Herbert Wilcox. ''The Times'', Thursday, 19 May 1977; p. 18; Issue 60007; col F His family moved to Brighton when Wilcox was eight years old; he was one of five children. His family were poor and Wilcox had to do a number of part-time jobs, including some work as a chorus boy at the local Hippodrome. His mother died of tuberculosis when she was 42. Wilcox left school before the age of fourteen to find work. Shortly afterwards, his father died at the age of 42. Wilcox began earning money as ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Cross
The George Cross (GC) is the highest award bestowed by the British government for non-operational gallantry or gallantry not in the presence of an enemy. In the British honours system, the George Cross, since its introduction in 1940, has been equal in stature to the Victoria Cross, the highest military gallantry award. It is awarded "for acts of the greatest heroism or for most conspicuous courage in circumstance of extreme danger", not in the presence of the enemy, to members of the British armed forces and to British civilians. Posthumous awards have been allowed since it was instituted. It was previously awarded to residents of Commonwealth countries (and in one case to Malta, a colony that subsequently became a Commonwealth country), most of which have since established their own honours systems and no longer recommend British honours. It may be awarded to a person of any military rank in any service and to civilians including police, emergency services and merchant seamen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alfred Schieske
Alfred Schieske (6 September 1908 – 14 July 1970) was a German actor. Career Schieske was born in Stuttgart, the son of a German father and a French mother. He studied acting with Willy Reichert made his stage debut at the Staatstheater Stuttgart at the age of 19. Afterward, he played in Heidelberg, Esslingen and Bochum. In 1940, he joined the Berlin Staatstheater, led by Gustaf Gründgens.Biography and photo After , Schieske first went to |
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill in the Second World War, during the Second World War, and again from 1951 to 1955. Apart from two years between 1922 and 1924, he was a Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), Member of Parliament (MP) from 1900 to 1964 and represented a total of five UK Parliament constituency, constituencies. Ideologically an Economic liberalism, economic liberal and British Empire, imperialist, he was for most of his career a member of the Conservative Party (UK), Conservative Party, which he led from 1940 to 1955. He was a member of the Liberal Party (UK), Liberal Party from 1904 to 1924. Of mixed English and American parentage, Churchill was born in Oxfordshire to Spencer family, a wealthy, aristocratic family. He joined the British Army in 1895 and saw action in British Raj, Br ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fresnes Prison
Fresnes Prison ('' French Centre pénitentiaire de Fresnes'') is the second largest prison in France, located in the town of Fresnes, Val-de-Marne, south of Paris. It comprises a large men's prison (''maison d'arrêt'') of about 1200 cells, a smaller one for women and a penitentiary hospital. Fresnes is one of the three main prisons of the Paris area, Fleury-Mérogis (Europe's largest prison) and La Santé (located in Paris) being the other two. History The prison was constructed between 1895 and 1898 according to a design devised by architect Henri Poussin. An example of the so-called "telephone-pole design," the facility was radically different from previous prisons. At Fresnes prison, for the first time, cell houses extended crosswise from a central corridor. The design was used extensively in North America for much of the next century. During World War II, Fresnes prison was used by the Germans to house captured British SOE agents and members of the French Resistance. Held ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Maquis (World War II)
The Maquis () were rural guerrilla bands of French and Belgian Resistance fighters, called ''maquisards'', during the Nazi occupation of France in World War II. Initially, they were composed of young, mostly working-class, men who had escaped into the mountains and woods to avoid conscription into Vichy France's ''Service du travail obligatoire'' ("Compulsory Work Service" or ''STO'') to provide forced labor for Germany. To avoid capture and deportation to Germany, they became increasingly organized into active resistance groups. They had an estimated to members in autumn of 1943 and approximately members in June 1944. Meaning Originally the word came from the kind of terrain in which the armed resistance groups hid, high ground in southeastern France covered with scrub growth called ''maquis'' (scrubland). from Dictionary.com Although strictly speaking it means thicket, ''maquis'' could be roughly translated as "the bush"; in Corsica, the saying ''prendre le maquis' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Annecy
Annecy ( , ; frp, Èneci or ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Haute-Savoie department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of Southeastern France. It lies on the northern tip of Lake Annecy, south of Geneva, Switzerland. Nicknamed the "Pearl of French Alps" in Raoul Blanchard's monograph describing its location between lake and mountains, the city controls the northern entrance to the lake gorge. Due to a lack of available building land between the lake and the protected Semnoz mountain, its population has remained stagnant, around 50,000 inhabitants, since 1950. However, the 2017 merger with several ex-communes extended the city population to 128,199 inhabitants and 177,622 for its urban area, placing Annecy seventh in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region. Switching from the counts of Geneva's dwelling in the 13th century, to the counts of Savoy's in the 14th century, the city became Savoy's capital in 1434 during the Genevois-Nemours prerogative until 1659. Its role ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hugo Bleicher
Hugo Bleicher (1899–1982) was a senior non-commissioned officer of Nazi Germany's Abwehr who worked against French Resistance in German-occupied France. Early life and World War I Hugo Ernst Bleicher was born in Tettnang on 9 August 1899. He served as a private soldier in the First World War in the pioneer gas corps and was captured near the Somme. He was held as a Prisoner of War in 165 POW Camp near Abbeville and succeeded in escaping four times, although he was never able to return to the German lines. He is misreported as having been taken prisoner by the British in Belgium as a spy when wearing a British uniform. After the war he became a businessman. World War II Bleicher was recruited into the Abwehr during the Second World War because of his knowledge of French and Spanish; however, he never rose above the rank of Feldwebel (equivalent to Sergeant). He was ruthless in his pursuit of anyone in France who opposed German domination. He disabled the Franco- Polish ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abwehr
The ''Abwehr'' (German for ''resistance'' or ''defence'', but the word usually means ''counterintelligence'' in a military context; ) was the German military-intelligence service for the ''Reichswehr'' and the ''Wehrmacht'' from 1920 to 1944. Although the 1919 Treaty of Versailles prohibited the Weimar Republic from establishing an intelligence organization of their own, they formed an espionage group in 1920 within the Ministry of Defence, calling it the ''Abwehr''. The initial purpose of the ''Abwehr'' was defence against foreign espionage: an organizational role which later evolved considerably. Under General Kurt von Schleicher (prominent in running the ''Reichswehr'' from 1926 onwards) the individual military services' intelligence units were combined and, in 1929, centralized under Schleicher's ''Ministeramt'' within the Ministry of Defence, forming the foundation for the more commonly understood manifestation of the ''Abwehr''. Each ''Abwehr'' station throughout German ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cannes
Cannes ( , , ; oc, Canas) is a city located on the French Riviera. It is a communes of France, commune located in the Alpes-Maritimes departments of France, department, and host city of the annual Cannes Film Festival, Midem, and Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. The city is known for its association with the rich and famous, its luxury hotels and restaurants, and for several conferences. History By the 2nd century BC, the Ligurian Oxybii established a settlement here known as ''Aegitna'' ( grc, Αἴγιτνα). Historians are unsure what the name means. The area was a fishing village used as a port of call between the Lérins Islands. In 154 Before Christ, BC, it became the scene of violent but quick conflict between the troops of Quintus Opimius and the Oxybii. In the 10th century, the town was known as Canua. The name may derive from "canna", a Reed (plant), reed. Canua was probably the site of a small Ligurian port, and later a Roman outpost on Le Suquet ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
First Aid Nursing Yeomanry
The First Aid Nursing Yeomanry (Princess Royal's Volunteer Corps) (FANY (PRVC)) is a British independent all-female registered charity formed in 1907 and active in both nursing and intelligence work during the World Wars. Its members wear a military-style uniform, but it is not part of the Regular Army or Army Reserve; members do not train at Sandhurst, nor do they hold a commission. Formation It was formed as the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry in 1907 as a first aid link between the field hospitals and the front lines, and was given the 'yeomanry' name as its members were originally mounted on horseback. Unlike nursing organisations, the FANY saw themselves rescuing the wounded and giving first aid, similar to a modern combat medic. Their founder, Sergeant Major, later Captain, Edward Baker, a veteran of the Sudan Campaign and the Second Boer War, felt that a single rider could get to a wounded soldier faster than a horse-drawn ambulance. Each woman was trained not only in first a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
SOE F Section Timeline
The SOE F Section timeline lists the significant events in the history of Section F of the Special Operations Executive. The Special Operations Executive (SOE) was a clandestine organization of the United Kingdom during World War II. The purpose of SOE was to conduct espionage, sabotage, and reconnaissance in countries occupied by the Axis powers. SOE agents allied themselves with resistance groups and supplied them with weapons and equipment parachuted in from England. Section F was responsible for many of SOE's activities in France which was occupied by Nazi Germany. SOE F Section sent about 470 agents to France from 1941 to 1944, of whom about 40 were women. The Valençay SOE Memorial lists 91 men and 13 women agents who were killed, executed, or died in concentration camps during the war. SOE agents in France were organized into networks which usually consisted of an organiser (the leader), a courier, and a wireless operator. 1940 :19 June ::British Prime Minister Winston Chu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
