1. Virginia Hall was a pioneering agent for the SOE, arriving in Vichy France on 23 August 1941, the first female agent to take up residence in France.
55 Facts About Virginia Hall
1. 2.
Virginia Hall returned to France as a wireless operator for the OSS in March 1944 as a member of the Saint network.
3.
Virginia Hall was a thirty-five-year-old journalist from Baltimore, conspicuous by reddish hair, a strong American accent, an artificial foot, and an imperturbable temper; she took risks often but intelligently.
4.
Virginia Hall was born in Baltimore, Maryland on April 6,1906, to Edwin "Ned" Lee Hall and his wife, Barbara Virginia Hammel.
5.
Virginia Hall had a brother, John, four years her senior.
6.
Virginia Hall was close to her family members, who affectionately nicknamed her "Dindy".
7.
In 1912, Virginia Hall began attending Roland Park Country School, where during her high school years, she became editor-in-chief of her school's yearbook, Quid Nunc; and became class president in her senior year.
8.
Virginia Hall attended George Washington University, where she studied French and Economics.
9.
Virginia Hall wanted to finish her studies in Europe, so she traveled the Continent and studied in France, Germany, and Austria, eventually landing an appointment as a Consular Service clerk at the Embassy of the United States, Warsaw, Poland in 1931.
10.
Virginia Hall then worked again as a consular clerk in Venice and in Tallinn, Estonia.
11.
Virginia Hall made several attempts to become a diplomat with the United States Foreign Service, but women were rarely hired.
12.
Virginia Hall resigned from the Department of State in March 1939, still a consular clerk.
13.
Early in World War II in February 1940, Virginia Hall became an ambulance driver for the French army.
14.
Virginia Hall joined the SOE in April 1941 and after training arrived in Vichy France, unoccupied by Germany and nominally independent at that time, on August 23,1941.
15.
Virginia Hall was the second female agent to be sent to France by SOE's F Section, and the first to remain there for a lengthy period of time.
16.
Virginia Hall turned away from her "chic Parisian wardrobe" to become inconspicuous and often quickly changed her appearance through make-up and disguise.
17.
Guerin made several safehouses available to Virginia Hall and passed along tidbits of information she and her female employees heard from German officers visiting the brothel.
18.
Virginia Hall continued building contacts in southern France and she assisted in the brief missions of SOE agents Peter Churchill and Benjamin Cowburn and earned high compliments from both.
19.
Virginia Hall avoided contact with an SOE agent sent to Lyon named Georges Duboudin and refused to introduce him to her contacts.
20.
Virginia Hall regarded him as amateurish and lax in security.
21.
Virginia Hall learned that the 12 agents arrested by the French police in October 1941 were incarcerated at Mauzac prison near Bergerac.
22.
Virginia Hall had counted on contacts she had with the French police to protect her, but, under pressure from the Germans, her police contacts were no longer reliable.
23.
In May 1942, Virginia Hall had agreed to have messages from the Gloria Network, a French-run resistance movement based in Paris, transmitted to SOE in London.
24.
Virginia Hall 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.
25.
Virginia Hall anticipated correctly that the suppression by the Gestapo and Abwehr would become even more severe and she fled Lyon without telling anyone, including her closest contacts.
26.
Virginia Hall escaped by train from Lyon to Perpignan, then, with a guide, walked over a 7,500 foot pass in the Pyrenees to Spain, covering up to 50 miles over two days in considerable discomfort.
27.
Virginia Hall signaled to SOE before her escape that she hoped that "Cuthbert" would not trouble her on the way.
28.
Virginia Hall worked for SOE for a time in Madrid, then returned to London in July 1943 where she was quietly made an honorary Member of the Order of the British Empire.
29.
Virginia Hall was compromised, they said, and too much at risk.
30.
Virginia Hall was hired by the Special Operations Branch at the low rank and pay of a second lieutenant, and she returned to France on March 21,1944, arriving by motor gunboat at Beg-an-Fry east of Roscoff in Brittany.
31.
Virginia Hall was disguised as an older woman, with gray hair and her teeth filed down to resemble that of a peasant woman.
32.
Virginia Hall disguised her limp with the shuffle of an old woman.
33.
Lassot carried with him one million francs, equivalent to 5,000 British pounds; Virginia Hall had 500,000 francs with her.
34.
Virginia Hall quickly separated herself from Lassot, whom she characterized as too talkative and a security risk, instructing her contacts not to tell him where she was.
35.
From March to July 1944, Virginia Hall roamed around France south of Paris, posing sometimes as an elderly milkmaid.
36.
Virginia Hall found and organized drop zones, established several safe houses, and made and renewed contacts in the Resistance, notably with Philippe de Vomecourt.
37.
Virginia Hall organized and supplied with arms several resistance groups of a hundred men each in the Cher and Cosne.
38.
Virginia Hall unsuccessfully attempted to organize a jailbreak to gain freedom for three men she called her nephews, captives of the Germans in Paris.
39.
Virginia Hall was next given the job of helping the Maquis in southern France harass the Germans in support of the Allied invasion of the south, Operation Dragoon, which would take place on August 15,1944.
40.
Virginia Hall told the Maquis leaders that she would finance them and give them arms on condition that they would be advised by her, but the prickly Maquis leaders continued to be a problem.
41.
Virginia Hall wrote reports, and identified people who had helped her and were deserving of commendations, then resigned from the OSS.
42.
Virginia Hall arranged 80,000 francs compensation from the United Kingdom for Guerin, but most of her other helpers received nothing.
43.
Virginia Hall joined the Central Intelligence Agency in 1947, one of the first women hired by the new agency.
44.
Virginia Hall was passed over for promotions, honors, and work for which she was qualified, despite the support and efforts from her superiors who knew her work directly.
45.
Virginia Hall was given a desk-bound job as an intelligence analyst, to gather information about Soviet penetration of European countries.
46.
Virginia Hall resigned in 1948, and then was rehired in 1950 for another desk job.
47.
Virginia Hall became a "sacred" presence and the first woman operations officer in the entire covert action arm of the CIA, and a valued member of the Special Activities Division supporting undercover activities to prevent the spread of communism in Europe.
48.
Virginia Hall received a poor performance report from a superior who had never overseen her work.
49.
Virginia Hall died on July 8,1982, at Adventist Hospital in Rockville, Maryland.
50.
Virginia Hall is buried in the Druid Ridge Cemetery, Pikesville, Maryland.
51.
General William Joseph Donovan personally awarded Virginia Hall a Distinguished Service Cross in September 1945 in recognition of her efforts in France.
52.
Virginia Hall was inducted into the Maryland Women's Hall of Fame in 2019.
53.
Virginia Hall's story has been told in several books, including:.
54.
Roger Wolcott Virginia Hall mentioned her in passing in his book.
55.
Virginia Hall is portrayed by Sarah Megan Thomas, and the film is directed by Lydia Dean Pilcher.