André Dewavrin DSO, MC (9 June 1911 – 20 December 1998) (colonel ''Passy)'' was a French officer who served with Free French Forces intelligence services during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

Biography

He was born in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

, the son of a businessman. He graduated as an army engineer and in 1938 began to teach as a professor in Saint Cyr military academy. After the outbreak of

, Dewavrin was assigned to Norway in 1940 before he joined General

Charles de Gaulle Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle (22 November 18909 November 1970) was a French general and statesman who led the Free France, Free French Forces against Nazi Germany in World War II and chaired the Provisional Government of the French Re ...

in Britain. He received the rank of major, took charge of the Free French military intelligence unit Bureau Central de Renseignements et d'Action (BCRA) and took the codename "Colonel Passy". He began to help organise the

French Resistance The French Resistance ( ) was a collection of groups that fought the German military administration in occupied France during World War II, Nazi occupation and the Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy#France, collaborationist Vic ...

movement and co-operated with the SOE. Some of Dewavrin's closest colleagues (Captain Fourcaud and Lieutenant Duclos) were Cagoulards (a right-wing group), but Dewavrin always denied being one and insisted that he had supported the

Republic A republic, based on the Latin phrase ''res publica'' ('public affair' or 'people's affair'), is a State (polity), state in which Power (social and political), political power rests with the public (people), typically through their Representat ...

during the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...

and had opposed the

Munich Agreement The Munich Agreement was reached in Munich on 30 September 1938, by Nazi Germany, the United Kingdom, the French Third Republic, French Republic, and the Kingdom of Italy. The agreement provided for the Occupation of Czechoslovakia (1938–194 ...

.Lacouture 1991, pp. 254–255 Dewavrin collated information from the French Resistance and planned operations for 350 agents who were parachuted to France to work with them. He secretly traveled to France on occasion to meet with the Resistance and coordinate intelligence gathering and

sabotage Sabotage is a deliberate action aimed at weakening a polity, government, effort, or organization through subversion, obstruction, demoralization (warfare), demoralization, destabilization, divide and rule, division, social disruption, disrupti ...

. On 23 February 1943 Dewavrin parachuted to France alongside Pierre Brossolette to meet with Jean Moulin. Later in 1943, Dewavrin's organization was merged with the conventional secret service of the Free French Forces to form DGSS under Jacques Soustelle. Dewavrin served as Soustelle's technical advisor before he took the lead of the organisation in October 1944. After the Normandy Invasion, Dewavrin became Chief of Staff to General Marie Pierre Koenig, the Commander of the French Forces of the Interior. After the war, Dewavrin was head of intelligence for de Gaulle's

provisional government A provisional government, also called an interim government, an emergency government, a transitional government or provisional leadership, is a temporary government formed to manage a period of transition, often following state collapse, revoluti ...

until de Gaulle resigned in January 1946. His successor accused Dewavrin of embezzling Free French money for his own purposes. Dewavrin was jailed for four months in Vincennes. He was eventually acquitted for lack of evidence. The British historian Antony Beevor suspects that Dewavrin might have tried to collect money to work against a possible communist takeover attempt. Dewavrin published three volumes of memoirs in 1947, 1949 and 1951 and eventually retired from the army to become a businessman. He portrayed himself in Jean Pierre Melville's film '' L'Armée des ombres''. According to ''The Secret War'' by Max Hastings, a

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

spy made a claim in a report to Moscow that Dewavrin had been recruited by Wilhelm Canaris to work for the Germans. Hastings stated that report was false but supplied no reference to support his statement.

References

External links

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Books

* Lacouture, Jean. ''De Gaulle: The Rebel 1890–1944'' (1984; English ed. 1991), 640 pp, W W Norton & Co, London. {{DEFAULTSORT:Dewavrin, André 1911 births 1998 deaths Military personnel from Paris French Resistance members Companions of the Liberation Members of the Bureau Central de Renseignements et d'Action Burials at Neuilly-sur-Seine community cemetery French military personnel of World War II