Robert Alesch was a Catholic priest and collaborator with Nazi Germany during the Second World War.
14 Facts About Robert Alesch
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Robert Alesch claimed that his father was a Lorraine French patriot, who was tortured by the Germans in 1917.
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Robert Alesch was named vicar at La Varenne-Saint-Hilaire, parish of Saint-Maur, in the Paris region.
4.
Robert Alesch saw the occupation as an opportunity to earn money and offered his service to the Abwehr in 1941.
5.
Robert Alesch became an agent of the Abwehr, German intelligence organization.
6.
Robert Alesch gained entry into resistance circles and won the confidence of the ethnologist Germaine Tillion, who put him in touch with Jacques Legrand, the chief executive of the Reseau Gloria and with Gabrielle Picabia founder and head of the network.
7.
Robert Alesch was paid for his information by the Germans and lived a double life.
8.
Robert Alesch pursued his activities as double agent for the Nazis, encouraging young people to resist then delivering them to the occupiers.
9.
Robert Alesch was paid 12,000 Francs monthly, about the salary of a high-ranking officer at the time, and earned a bonus for each person he informed on.
10.
Robert Alesch's victims included Virginia Hall, an American-born agent of the British intelligence service SOE.
11.
Robert Alesch then made contact with Hall claiming to be an agent of Gloria and offering intelligence of apparently high value.
12.
Robert Alesch had doubts about Alesch, especially when she learned that Gloria had been destroyed, but was persuaded of his bona fides, as was the London headquarters of SOE.
13.
Robert Alesch was able to penetrate Hall's network of contacts, including the capture of wireless operators and the sending of false messages to London in her name.
14.
Robert Alesch was sentenced to death and held in Fresnes prison before being executed by firing squad on 25 January 1949 at Fort de Montrouge in Arcueil.