Secret WW2

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The guests in this November 1989 episode of This Is Your Life include Yvonne Cormeau’s daughter, Yvette Pitt; Col Maurice Buckmaster, the former head of SOE’s French Section; Yvonne Burney, the former F Section wireless operator better known as Yvonne Baseden; this charity's sorely missed friend Wg Cdr Len Ratcliff; plus Jane Asher and fellow cast members of Wish Me Luck - the SOE drama series for which Yvonne Cormeau was an advisor. The Big Red Book web site summarised this episode: "Yvonne Cormeau, former Special Operations Executive agent, was surprised by Michael Aspel during a photo shoot for the ITV drama series Wish Me Luck, at the studios of London Weekend Television on London's Southbank. "After volunteering with the Women's Auxiliary Air Force, Yvonne was recruited in February 1943 by the Special Operations Executive - a clandestine organisation formed to encourage and facilitate espionage and sabotage behind enemy lines - and trained as a F Section wireless operator. "She became only the second female radio operator to be sent to Occupied France, and evading arrest on several occasions, provided the SOE with a run of 13 months' essential communications - sending over 400 transmissions back to London, which was a record for the F Section. After the war Yvonne worked as a translator in the SOE section at the Foreign Office, and was later decorated with the Légion d'honneur, Croix de Guerre, Médaille de la Résistance, and Palmes Academiques.” Full description here: www.bigredbook(dot)info/yvonne_cormeau.html Yvonne Burney had in fact been the subject of the second ever episode of This Is Your Life in September 1955, then as Yvonne Bailey - www.bigredbook(dot)info/yvonne_bailey.html That episode's guests had included Pearl Cornioley, Yvonne Cormeau, Col Maurice Buckmaster, and Col George Starr; but there appears to be no known recording in existence.

In 2016, three days after that year's annual SOE F Section ceremony in Valençay on May 6th, Secret WW2 also commemorated the 75th anniversary of the first message transmitted by its first agent to parachute into France. Georges Bégué left Britain from RAF Tangmere on the night of May 5/6th 1941 and landed near Valençay (Indre). His initial clandestine rendezvous was with the French resistant Max Hymans; and on May 9th, Bégué sent his first wireless signal back to Britain from a safe house in Châteauroux. Sadly, no record of that message survives, but it would have been received on behalf of SOE by the MI6 (Section VIII) signals station in the village of Whaddon in Buckinghamshire. While in France for the May 2016 Valençay events, the SOE historian David Harrison and Secret WW2’s co-founder Martyn Cox were invited to jointly host a press conference in Châteauroux. They proudly announced that local French amateur wireless enthusiasts were about to help commemorate the significance of Georges Bégué’s first signal by sending a Morse message using a restored suitcase wireless set from what had been his safe house in Châteauroux. It would be received in Whaddon, thanks to David White (who used to run the wireless museum at Bletchley Park) and local amateur wireless enthusiasts. Martyn then drove to Britain, with ample bottles of our specially labelled Valençay commemorative wine on board for the attendees of the simultaneous events programme that was about to take place in Whaddon. This would include a live link (hopefully!) with the former F Section wireless operator Marcel Jaurant-Singer who'd be in Châteauroux; and the MI6 (Section VIII) veteran Geoffrey Pidgeon - now our greatly missed friend - would unveil a blue plaque. This short film - https://youtu.be/jNe-Xi9YIR0?si=0aO4uzae6H06XQol ... plus the accompanying photos taken in Valençay on 6/5/2016, and in Châteauroux and Whaddon - provide a flavour of those special events on May 8th and 9th 2016. Web links for more information will be added to the Comments below …

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