Good Reads / Community Library Notes
A Woman of No Importance
Sonia Purnell
Review by Priscilla Comen
A Woman of No Importance
Sonia Purnell
Review by Priscilla Comen
A Woman of No Importance, by Sonia Purnell, is the story of Virginia Hall, born into a wealthy Baltimore family in 1906. Her mother wanted her to marry a successful man in order to remake the family fortune. But Virginia wanted adventure and freedom. She tried going to college but found it boring. She went to Paris and loved the freedom on the Left Bank. She learned several languages and studied culture, geography, and politics.
Virginia accidentally shot herself in the foot at a hunting event. Because gangrene set in, her leg was amputated at the knee. Author Purnell shows how this disaster caused the rest of Virginia’s life to have its ups and down. After being rejected from several job openings, she finally found her role as an ambulance driver in France, and eventually crossed all of France under the eyes of the Nazis. She found her way to Britain. Bellows, an under-cover British agent met Virginia and thought she was the perfect person to help the French fight the Nazis. He gave her a phone number to call in Paris that would change her life forever. But to her dismay, she became a secretary again.
Later she met Nicholas Bodington, and impressed him with stories of her sneaky travels. He put her through the process quickly and she became the first secret liaison officer of F section, for recruiting other agents. Virginia trained, learned how to hide, how to spot a follower, and how to shoot a revolver. She also learned how to make secret inks and to conceal her personality with disguises. Once deployed, she wrote and sent articles to the NY Post, thus establishing her cover as a journalist. In Lyon, she roomed in a convent and the nuns were her first recruits. When a room became available at a hotel, the patron there was her second recruit. After all recruits, the radio operator and his radio were captured in Lyon at a mass meeting, by French police, Virginia was the only secret agent remaining. Instinct had told her not to attend the meeting.
Fewer people in Britain wanted to risk their lives to help France. But Germaine, the owner of a successful brothel in Lyon became a recruit. They both loved flirting with danger, were courageous and daring, and helped escaping Jews and Poles heading for Spain. Germaine’s prostitutes lured their German clients into giving them information and hooked them on heroin. Eventually, Germaine became the best ambassador for Britain and the Resistance. Virginia planned the fabulous escape of twelve men from a heavily fortified prison in France. It took months to plan, to make special keys and a fake door, and bribing of guards. Because of this, many of Virginia’s best resistance fighters and her best friend Germaine, were captured and tortured in hidden cells.
Author Purnell did a great job of research with official records and personal interviews to follow Virginia to the end of her career working for the CIA until her death in 1982 at age 76. Find this fascinating story on the new non-fiction shelf of your Mendocino Community Library.
Virginia accidentally shot herself in the foot at a hunting event. Because gangrene set in, her leg was amputated at the knee. Author Purnell shows how this disaster caused the rest of Virginia’s life to have its ups and down. After being rejected from several job openings, she finally found her role as an ambulance driver in France, and eventually crossed all of France under the eyes of the Nazis. She found her way to Britain. Bellows, an under-cover British agent met Virginia and thought she was the perfect person to help the French fight the Nazis. He gave her a phone number to call in Paris that would change her life forever. But to her dismay, she became a secretary again.
Later she met Nicholas Bodington, and impressed him with stories of her sneaky travels. He put her through the process quickly and she became the first secret liaison officer of F section, for recruiting other agents. Virginia trained, learned how to hide, how to spot a follower, and how to shoot a revolver. She also learned how to make secret inks and to conceal her personality with disguises. Once deployed, she wrote and sent articles to the NY Post, thus establishing her cover as a journalist. In Lyon, she roomed in a convent and the nuns were her first recruits. When a room became available at a hotel, the patron there was her second recruit. After all recruits, the radio operator and his radio were captured in Lyon at a mass meeting, by French police, Virginia was the only secret agent remaining. Instinct had told her not to attend the meeting.
Fewer people in Britain wanted to risk their lives to help France. But Germaine, the owner of a successful brothel in Lyon became a recruit. They both loved flirting with danger, were courageous and daring, and helped escaping Jews and Poles heading for Spain. Germaine’s prostitutes lured their German clients into giving them information and hooked them on heroin. Eventually, Germaine became the best ambassador for Britain and the Resistance. Virginia planned the fabulous escape of twelve men from a heavily fortified prison in France. It took months to plan, to make special keys and a fake door, and bribing of guards. Because of this, many of Virginia’s best resistance fighters and her best friend Germaine, were captured and tortured in hidden cells.
Author Purnell did a great job of research with official records and personal interviews to follow Virginia to the end of her career working for the CIA until her death in 1982 at age 76. Find this fascinating story on the new non-fiction shelf of your Mendocino Community Library.