Yvonne Claire was born in Jan 1897 in France. After the death of her father, unable to live with her domineering mother, she moved to London to get a job. In 1920 she married Alex Rudellat with whom she had one child: Constance Jacqueline. The couple separated when the child was seven.
CODE NAME:Jacqueline
Madame Gautier
Ten days after the declaration of war in 1939, Yvonne's seventeen-year-old daughter joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service, and later married a sergeant. Yvonne tried several times to join her daughter in the ATS, but was turned down because of her age. In 1942, at the age of forty-five, Yvonne was finally accepted and selected to train for the SOE. Following her training, she left England for Gibraltar on 17 Jul 1942 under the code name Jacqueline and, after months of training, became the first woman SOE to be sent abroad.
During World War II, over 8,000 Frenchwomen were sent to prison camps in Germany, and only 800 returned to France. In February 1945, 2,500 elderly and ill women were sent from Ravensbrück to what they thought would be a 'convalescent camp,' but which was actually Belsen. Yvonne, who had not given the German authorities her real name, possibly suffering from amnesia, was recorded as "Jacqueline Gautier". As she had successfully maintained her alias of Madame Gautier, and was extremely ill when the Allied troops arrived, she was not identified as a British SOE agent and was buried in a mass grave.
Ten days after the declaration of war in 1939, Yvonne's seventeen-year-old daughter joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service, and later married a sergeant. Yvonne tried several times to join her daughter in the ATS, but was turned down because of her age. In 1942, at the age of forty-five, Yvonne was finally accepted and selected to train for the SOE. Following her training, she left England for Gibraltar on 17 Jul 1942 under the code name Jacqueline and, after months of training, became the first woman SOE to be sent abroad.
In terrible weather, she landed by small boat on the Riveria coast of France and travelled to Tours, close to the border of the Occupied Zone and Vichy France to act as a courier to the Prosper circuit. She and her partner, Pierre Culioli, controlled the group together, and carried out many successful operations against German-operated train lines and factories. Between August 1942 and June 1943, Yvonne worked with the circuit as a courier and also specialized in sabotage and parachute drops. She was part of the team who sabotaged Chaigny power station and personally blew up two locomotives at Le Mans in March 1943.
With suspicions mounting, the two were openly pursued by German forces. On 21 Jun 1943 she was arrested by the Gestapo while waiting for a parachute drop and was wounded during an attempt to escape; Pierre and Yvonne were trying to escape arrest in a car when a bullet hit her in the back of her head, knocking her unconscious. Pierre saw the amount of blood coming from the wound, and since Yvonne was unresponsive, he decided to kill himself rather than be taken and tortured. He slammed the vehicle into a ditch and then the side of a cottage, but the two woke up in a hospital at Blois hours later. Yvonne was told that her injury wasn't life threatening, and that the bullet hadn't pierced her brain, but that it would be unsafe to remove it. On 21 Apr 1944 she was transferred to Ravensbrück with another SOE agent, Odette Sansom. She was later moved to Bergen-Belsen concentration camp where she contracted typhus and died on or about 23 Apr 1945, shortly after the camp was liberated.
With suspicions mounting, the two were openly pursued by German forces. On 21 Jun 1943 she was arrested by the Gestapo while waiting for a parachute drop and was wounded during an attempt to escape; Pierre and Yvonne were trying to escape arrest in a car when a bullet hit her in the back of her head, knocking her unconscious. Pierre saw the amount of blood coming from the wound, and since Yvonne was unresponsive, he decided to kill himself rather than be taken and tortured. He slammed the vehicle into a ditch and then the side of a cottage, but the two woke up in a hospital at Blois hours later. Yvonne was told that her injury wasn't life threatening, and that the bullet hadn't pierced her brain, but that it would be unsafe to remove it. On 21 Apr 1944 she was transferred to Ravensbrück with another SOE agent, Odette Sansom. She was later moved to Bergen-Belsen concentration camp where she contracted typhus and died on or about 23 Apr 1945, shortly after the camp was liberated.
During World War II, over 8,000 Frenchwomen were sent to prison camps in Germany, and only 800 returned to France. In February 1945, 2,500 elderly and ill women were sent from Ravensbrück to what they thought would be a 'convalescent camp,' but which was actually Belsen. Yvonne, who had not given the German authorities her real name, possibly suffering from amnesia, was recorded as "Jacqueline Gautier". As she had successfully maintained her alias of Madame Gautier, and was extremely ill when the Allied troops arrived, she was not identified as a British SOE agent and was buried in a mass grave.
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