Eileen Nearne

Eileen Nearne
Nickname	Rose
Born	15 March 1921 London, England, UK
Died	2 September 2010 (aged 89) Torquay, England, UK
Allegiance	United Kingdom, France
Service/branch	Special Operations Executive First Aid Nursing Yeomanry
Years of service	1943-45
Unit	Wizard
Relations	Jacqueline Nearne (sister), Francis and Frederick Nearne (brothers)

Eileen Mary "Didi" Nearne MBE, (15 March 1921 – 2 September 2010 (date body found)) was a member of the UK's Special Operations Executive (SOE) during World War II. She served in occupied France as a radio operator under the codename "Rose".

Early life and career

Born in 1921 in London to an English father, John Nearne, and French mother, Marie de Plazoala, she was the youngest of four children. Her elder sister, Jacqueline Nearne, and one of her two brothers, Francis, would also become SOE operatives.

In 1923, the family moved to France. The two young women made their way to London via Barcelona, Madrid, Lisbon, Gibraltar and Glasgow, while the rest of the family remained in Grenoble, despite the German invasion of the country. On her arrival in England she was offered service in the WAAF working on barrage balloons, but turned this down and was recruited by the SOE. She was flown by a Lysander aircraft to a field near Les Lagnys, a town in Indre, France in the late hours of 2 March and the early hours of 3 March 1944 to work as a wireless operator for the Wizard network with Jean Savy as part of Operation Mitchel. Her cover story was that she was Mademoiselle du Tort (also using the aliases Jacqueline Duterte and Alice Wood).

In July 1944 her transmitter was detected and she was arrested. Nearne "survived, in silence, the full revolting treatment of the baignoire" in the torture chamber of the Paris headquarters of the Gestapo on the Rue des Saussaies.

She reportedly managed to convince her captors, under torture, that she had been sending messages for a businessman, unaware that he was British. On 15 August 1944, she was sent to Ravensbrück concentration camp where she refused to do prison work. Her head was shaved and she was told she would be shot if she continued to refuse. She was then transferred to a forced labour camp in Silesia. While in one of these prisons she was reportedly tortured.

On 13 April 1945 she escaped with two French girls from a work gang by hiding in the forest, later travelling through Markkleeberg, where they were arrested by the S.S. but released after fooling their captors and reportedly hidden by a priest in Leipzig until the arrival of United States troops.

Awards and honours

After World War II, she was awarded the Croix de Guerre by the French government. On 19 February 1946 she was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) by King George VI for services in France during the enemy occupation.

Later years and death

After the war Nearne lived in London with her sister, Jacqueline, where, The New York Times reported, she suffered from "psychological problems brought on by her wartime service". After her sister's death in 1982, she moved to Torquay and lived there quietly until her death. She died alone from a heart attack in her seaside flat. Her body is thought to have remained undiscovered for some time until found on 2 September 2010. She was 89 years old. Nearne talked about her wartime activities on a Timewatch television documentary in 1997, but she wore a wig, and spoke in French under her codename "Rose", and her wartime activities were not generally known about. It was only when her flat was being searched by council workers to try to establish her next-of-kin that medals and other papers related to her war career were found.

Her next of kin, a niece, was located living in Italy and has said she was upset that Nearne had been portrayed as being "alone or unloved", adding, "Although I don't live in the UK, I was very close to Aunt Eileen and visited her often. I only saw her six months ago. She was always cherished by the family."

Nearne's funeral, which was provided free of charge by the Torbay & District Funeral Service of Torquay, was held on 21 September 2010 at Our Lady Help of Christians and St Denis Roman Catholic Church, Torquay. The eulogy was made by Adrian Stones, Chaiman of the Special Forces Club Her body was cremated, and her ashes scattered at sea, according to her wishes.

External links

• The Telegraph obituary for Eileen Nearne
• "Eileen Nearne's war heroism revealed in National Archives" The Guardian
• 9/1089/2—Item reference HS 9/1089/2—Eileen Mary NEARNE, aka Alice WOOD, aka Jacqueline DUTERTE - born 15.03.1921, The Catalogue, The National Archives, Part one of file also available online.
• An insight to WIZARD