HEROINES OF THE SPECIAL OPERATIONS EXECUTIVE - MADELEINE ZOE DAMERMENT Croix de Guerre, LdH, MdlR

 

Madeleine was born in France

But served as an agent for the SOE

During her training in Scotland

Her cover name was Martine Dussautoy

But  afterwards her Codenames

Were “Solange” and “Dancer”

On the night of February 29^th 1944

A 161 Squadron Halifax landed

In a field near the city of Chartres

But the Germans were waiting for them 

Damerment was transported to Paris

To Gestapo headquarters at Avenue Foch

And held for four months in Karlsruhe prison

Then without warning she was taken

To Dachau concentration camp

Along with three other agents

Yolande Beekman, Noor Inayat Khan

And Eliane Plewman, and at dawn

Of 13th September 1944,

They were shot in the back of the head

Their bodies then immediately

Burned in the crematorium.

As far as the SOE were concerned

They were only missing

And she was mentioned in despatches

It wasn’t until 1949

When she was posthumously awarded

A Kings Commendation for Brave Conduct

A Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur

The Médaille de la Résistance
And a French Croix de Guerre 

She is commemorated on

The Runnymede Memorial

As one of the SOE agents

Who died for the liberation of France,

Her name is also recorded

On the Brookwood Memorial

In Surrey as one of 3,500

“To whom war denied a known and honoured grave”

And on the Valençay SOE Memorial “Roll of Honour”

In the French town of Valençay.