Odette Hallows was an agent for the Special Operations Executive who survived the second world war but only at the cost of repeated interrogation at the hands of the Gestapo during which she lost all her toenails and enduried three months’ solitary confinement in complete darkness on starvation rations in an underground bunker. She witnessed others screaming from torture and cannibalism by starving prisoners.
How did she survive? Perhaps she had been toughened by suffering temporary blindness and paralysis as a child. Her approach was “surviving another minute – that was experiencing another minute of life”
She may also have been saved by her clever deception that she was married to a fellow imprisoned SOE , Peter Churchill, who she claimed was the nephew of Winston Churchill.
Odette and Peter did indeed get married after the war but divorced a few years later and married Geoffrey Hallowes.
Odette was the first living woman to be awarded the George Cross. There is a plaque dedicated to this remarkable woman on the side of St Paul’s church in Knightsbridge.
NB: Thanks to fellow tourist guide Rosalind, for the inspiration. www.wideeyedlondon.com