Repeatedly invaded by the English through the Middle Ages and later fought over by the Huguenots and Catholics during the vicious Wars of Religion, the Corrèze had been left economically devastated by its long history of conflict, and largely remained a neglected rural backwater even into the twentieth century. Characterized by steep, thickly-wooded hills, ancient valleys and deep gorges, its landscape was dotted with medieval fortresses, ruined chateaux and other reminders of its bloody past, rising slowly up to the huge Millevaches Plateau in the Haute-Corrèze, a wild, sparsely-populated expanse of forests, lakes and moorland on the western edges of the Massif Central. For most corréziens life had changed little over the centuries – inhabiting the innumerable isolated villages and hamlets scattered across the department, they still depended upon agriculture and livestock for their survival, the region being particularly renowned for its foie gras, walnuts and truffles. The terrible atrocities witnessed by their ancestors had bred an inherent distrust of foreigners and outside interference, and in some ways the arrival of German forces represented yet another attack on their long-established way of life, hardening the resolve of many to fight back.
Known as the ‘Smiling Gateway to the South’, the respectable market town of Brive was one of the Corrèze's biggest commercial centres, and lay directly on the main routes running between Bordeaux and Clermont-Ferrand, Limoges and Toulouse. The original siege walls that had earned it the name ‘la Gaillarde’ (the Gallant) were long gone, replaced by tree-lined boulevards that followed the same lines, encircling the thirteenth-century church of Saint Martin at the heart of the town. With a population of around 30,000, Brive had been the site of the first recorded act of French resistance when local activist Edmond Michelet went from door to door distributing leaflets against the occupation in the summer of 1940, but after the dissolution of the unoccupied zone the town was dominated by a garrison of several hundred Germans, and in early 1943 Michelet and many of his colleagues were arrested by Gestapo raids in Brive and the nearby prefecture of Tulle. These losses were a serious setback for the Resistance, yet there were always others willing to take their places, even though they understood that capture meant death or deportation.
One SOE report described the structure of the Resistance in the Corrèze at this time as ‘very confused’.1 This was something of an understatement. Through 1943 the region's clandestine networks had become complex and extremely fragmented, and the challenges involved in successfully coordinating them were daunting. The areas around Tulle had a history of communist support, and the FTP attracted a motley collection of Russians, Spaniards, Jews and other fugitives who had fled from the north to fight under their banner. They were well organized and regulated, but since mid-September had been carrying out numerous assassination attempts and guerrilla attacks on German targets, provoking serious reprisals amongst the local populations.
The other major resistance force, separate and increasingly hostile to the communists was the Gaullist Armée Secrète (AS), which was also attracting growing numbers of réfractaires to its maquis in the Corrèze and neighbouring Dordogne to the west. It began setting up camps in the early spring of 1943, though by mid-June the first of these at Chambon had been overrun by the GMR (Groupes MobilesdeRéserve, a paramilitary extension of the Vichy Police), and was soon followed by the discovery of several others across the Haute-Corrèze, leading to many arrests, deportations and executions.
In part these setbacks were due to poor security, but were also symptomatic of a greater problem: maquis were often established by local businessmen or regular military men with no knowledge of guerrilla tactics, and were run with varying amounts of jealous fervour which easily led to overconfidence and complacency. As the sole British representative in the region it was important for Peulevé to remain neutral and to convince all of these groups that cooperation with the British was worth their while. This raised a particular problem when dealing with the FTP, which was determined to remain independent of Allied strategy and follow its own political agenda, only willing to pledge that good use would be made of any arms and supplies it received. If AUTHOR was to succeed, its relationship with the communists would be crucial, and Peulevé's diplomatic skills would have to equal his capabilities as an organizer and instructor.
Arriving at Brive station, Peulevé was first introduced to Gontrand Royer (Raffin), an ex-armistice army colonel who had taken over from Michelet as commander for the whole of the ‘R5’ region (a designated military area covering the whole of the Limousin), and René Vaujour (Hervé), a handsome and impressive former Foreign Legion officer from Tulle who had left the 41st Infantry Regiment stationed at Brive to join the Resistance, and now held responsibility specifically for the Corrèze department. Between them they had organized small groups consisting of NCOs and men from their previous units, but much of their support still lay with the sédént-aires, those who remained in the local towns and villages and did not take up arms. Both recognized that Peulevé would need help to establish himself in the town, and called on a local businessman and résistant named Maurice Arnouil (Pernod), who would quickly become one of AUTHOR's most important members.
Born in Lamonzie-St-Martin near Bergerac in 1903, Arnouil had begun as an engineer with Gnome et Rhône and later worked for the Montupet factory at Ussel, where he became involved with early local Resistance groups, including Marie-Madeleine Fourcade's SIS-backed intelligence circuit ALLIANCE. Following a move to Brive in 1941 he set up his own company, ‘Société d’Exploitation des Procédés Arnouil', more commonly referred to as ‘Bloc-Gazo’, based near the train station at 26 Avenue de la Gare. Here Arnouil manufactured gazogenes, charcoal-burning furnaces designed to provide an alternative means of powering cars and trucks (in these times of rationing, only the Germans, Vichy forces and doctors were likely to be seen driving petrol-driven vehicles). However, his enterprise served a more clandestine purpose when it became the preferred meeting place for the town's Resistance and a hiding place for their arms. Though his short, paunchy build did not suggest a heroic freedom fighter, Arnouil was ready to do whatever was required to help the cause, and after their first meeting he offered to provide Peulevé with a useful cover, appointing him sales director for his company. His connections with the local mairie also made it possible to obtain genuine papers in the name of Henri Chevalier, as well as a legitimate permis de circulation, which would enable him to travel freely across the region.
Using the Bloc-Gazo premises as a base, Peulevé started to construct a small body of staff to form the core of his circuit. Once again Arnouil proved invaluable, being able to suggest a number of reliable and trustworthy contacts. One of the first to be selected was a 28-year-old Corsican, Louis Charles Delsanti. Originally trained as a police inspector in Marseille before the war, an injury had led him to take the post of commissioner of Ussel in June 1942, though he was forced to resign a year later over his suspected obstruction of the STO and supplying of fake identity cards for the Resistance; having an extensive knowledge of the area and its inhabitants, he would make a very useful lieutenant. Peulevé also set to work on establishing a reception committee, which he would train in readiness to accept supply drops once suitable landing grounds had been found. For this task Arnouil recommended Paul and Georgette Lachaud, a couple who owned the Moulin du Couzoul, a mill near Daglan on the southern bank of the Dordogne. Unquestionably loyal, they were also ideally placed for such work, being far removed from the German-occupied towns and cities. In collaboration with Delsanti, the Lachauds were to head a small group that would carry out the dangerous job of waiting through the night to collect the arms and munitions dropped by RAF bombers. Their home was large enough to cache a substantial amount of matériel safely, and Paul Lachaud (known as ‘Poulou’) could use the cover of being a Bloc-Gazo customer, allowing him to visit their headquarters regularly without arousing suspicion.
During his first weeks in Brive, Peulevé also made contact with an important name he had been given in London, that of the novelist and adventurer André Malraux. Having established his literary reputation by winning the Prix Goncourt for La Condition Humaine in 1933, Malraux's association with resistance fighters had begun with his formation of the republican Escuadrilla España, an improvised air force of antiquated bombers and mercenary pilots during the Spanish Civil War. Taken prisoner in June 1940 whilst serving with a French tank regiment, he later escaped to the unoccupied zone and spent the next two years living quietly on the Côte d'Azur, refusing to endorse any of the Resistance leaders who approached him (when visited by Libération's Emmanuel d'Astier de la Vigerie, Malraux declared, ‘I am marching, but I march alone.’)2 Deciding to move when the Germans nullified the unoccupied zone in November 1942, he looked for a quiet retreat and chose the peaceful village of Saint-Chamant, near Argentat on the Dordogne. Remaining reluctant to ally himself openly with the Resistance, he had nevertheless forged links with Arnouil through an old Spanish contact in Paris, and learnt that he had recently taken on a new employee, Henri Chevalier.
Peulevé immediately recognized Malraux's potential to mobilize support for the maquis, but he also presented certain problems: aside from his public profile, Malraux's nervous ticks and continually weeping eye made him too conspicuous to undertake any clandestine work. However, he would still be a useful advisor when liaising with the various groups in the region and was already known to have established contact with the local FTP. He also suggested to Peulevé that one of his Spanish Anarchist comrades, Eugène ‘Raymond’ Maréchal, could be of use to him, particularly in the role of arms instructor. Operating under the name of Raymond Mennisier, Maréchal had previously been a gunner with Malraux's escuadrilla, and had nearly died from a terrible injury when his aircraft crashed near Teruel in 1936, requiring the surgeon to insert a metal plate in his forehead, giving him a grotesque appearance. Whilst he was troubled by his looks (he had to be prevented from shooting himself immediately after the accident, as he could not imagine any woman finding him attractive again), his generosity of spirit and apparent fearlessness would make him a valuable addition to the new circuit.
Peulevé took to Maréchal as soon as they met, sensing that he was an ideal man to construct and lead his own personal guerrilla force. Whilst political factions were rife amongst maquis groups, a small band of men directed by Peulevé under the Spaniard's command could lead small raids on targets that Gaullist or communist groups considered too risky or unpopular. Maréchal was not apolitical, but his anarchist ideals didn't interfere with Peulevé's objectives and he had no problem in receiving orders from a British officer. He quickly hand-picked twenty compatriots to join his Groupe Raymond, and spent the rest of his time giving weapons training and supplying Resistance leaders with money, enabling them to buy what they needed in the way of blankets, food and clothing on the black market.
Peulevé made his first radio contact with London on 31 October, six weeks after arriving in France, transmitting from a first-floor room on Bloc-Gazo's premises using one of the three wireless sets forwarded to him by Landes, who was now planning to return to London. Although Landes had done his best to minimize the damage caused by Grandclément's actions, he had fought a losing battle since Peulevé's departure and casualties had become inevitable. One important incident involved an F Section arms instructor, Victor Hayes (Yves), who had been parachuted in in November 1942 to help with SCIENTIST's increasing workload, and like Défence became romantically involved in Bordeaux. Since his arrival Hayes had been staying with the family of Jean Duboué, one of de Baissac's earliest contacts, during which time he had grown very fond of his eighteen-year-old daughter Suzanne. A widower in his mid-thirties (his wife had drowned two years before), the diminutive and balding Hayes seemed an unlikely match for a girl half his age, but his feelings towards her were such that he had refused Buckmaster's order to relocate and assume command of SCIENTIST's northern sectors.
This decision to stay was a fatal one for Yves, as Grandclément's collaboration with the Gestapo soon gave Dhose a lead to the arms cache on Duboué's property at Lestiac, about 15 miles north-east of the city on the banks of the Garonne. Through the early hours of 14 October, Hayes and the Duboués fought off their attackers with Stens, pistols and grenades, even forcing them to call for reinforcements, but they were eventually forced to give in when Madame Duboué was wounded in the stomach – her husband and daughter were taken away for questioning while she and Hayes were placed in separate hospitals, Hayes also having been shot in the arm and leg (in his message to London, Peulevé passed on details about his transfer to the Robert Piquet military hospital in Bordeaux). Landes was understandably nervous about what information might be forced out of Hayes and planned a mission to rescue him, but he was transferred to Fresnes prison in Paris before it could be carried out. Although falling in love had affected his judgment, in the end Hayes proved that it had not weakened his nerve or his allegiance to his organizer, and refused to divulge anything of importance to Dhose before he was deported to Germany and executed. The members of the Duboué family were more fortunate to survive the war but still paid a high price for Grandclément's disclosure, Jean being sent to Buchenwald concentration camp and daughter Suzanne to Ravensbrück.
With the foundations of AUTHOR now in place, Peulevé's daily schedule became filled with a variety of different responsibilities, visiting Vaujour's isolated maquis groups to instruct them on guerrilla warfare, inspecting possible landing grounds, maintaining wireless communications with London and distributing SOE funds to other Resistance leaders. These activities became a peculiar mixture of routine and risk, and he soon developed a perpetual awareness of the dangers involved in undertaking the simplest of errands. One of the first serious threats to his life occurred on an early visit to a maquis that had been allegedly supported by the two men who had brought Peulevé from Bordeaux. Still under suspicion of spending collected funds on themselves rather than their intended cause, they had suggested that Peulevé should meet the maquis’ commander who would vouch for their integrity.
Using a Chevrolet convertible given to him by Arnouil, Peulevé was directed by his companions to a steep, wooded valley. Leaving the car hidden in a turning some way from the main road, the three of them began walking towards the camp, Peulevé arming himself with a Thompson sub-machine gun (a concealed compartment had been fitted inside the car to carry it, in case of German searches). Although they appeared to know the route, Peulevé was careful to take compass readings every so often in case anything went wrong – there was always the possibility that he was being led into an ambush, and he did not wish to take any chances. However, after about 5 miles trekking through the forest they arrived at the outskirts of what appeared to be their camp.
It was similar to other maquis that Peulevé had seen since he arrived in the region, consisting of around thirty men living in tents and makeshift shelters, with a few shallow earthworks and defensive trenches around the perimeter. From his conversation with the commander, it was clear that their only arms were a few old rifles and grenades and that the men had received only the most basic of training. Even more concerning was the apparent attitude of the younger members towards security. Boredom and isolation wore down their morale very quickly and to break the monotony they would spend the weekends at the nearest village meeting local girls; this was particularly dangerous, as the Germans were known to employ prostitutes as informers. Even worse, one of these women had been recently visiting the camp for several weeks to cook for them, and had disappeared a few days previously.
When Peulevé voiced his fears over their safety the commander seemed unconcerned, replying that escape routes were in place, and with a small rearguard most of them could evade any assault – anyway, they had never been attacked before, so why expect it now? Peulevé was dismayed by this casual attitude, but could not have guessed that an attack was only hours away. As dusk approached he agreed to join them for their evening soup, but shortly afterwards the sound of strange voices on the perimeter made it obvious that they had been discovered.
Judging by their lack of stealth, it seemed that the approaching German unit had stumbled on the camp – had they crept up and surrounded it Peulevé and the group would have stood no chance. As the maquisards began firing at the startled invaders, Peulevé ran in the direction of his attackers towards a thick clump of trees on some slightly higher ground, planning to stay out of sight until the better-equipped German force had overpowered their opposition. Watching the unfolding battle from his hiding place, Peulevé was surprised to see how a few men with their antiquated arms pinned down at least a dozen German soldiers, though it was not long before they were killed or made a run for it, leaving the commander to fight alone.
Admiring the tenacity with which this Frenchman continued to defend his ground, Peulevé now felt compelled to offer some support, deciding to make his move when the Germans began their advance. As several men started to run forward to take the camp, Peulevé left his position, firing as he moved about 20 yards in front of them. To his great surprise he felled all five of his opponents ‘without so much as dirtying my black marketeer's raincoat’,3 and quickly scuttled back behind the trees to await the second wave. When it failed to appear, he assumed that the remainder must have run off in pursuit of the other maquisards who were making their escape.
Taking the commander with him back to the car, Peulevé anticipated running into German reinforcements but found none, though when they later received news on the attack it turned out that the rest of the group had not been so lucky. The small force they encountered had merely shepherded the fleeing maquis towards a larger group waiting for them some distance behind the camp; half of those captured had been executed on the spot, while the rest were deported to concentration camps.
Raids like these were not uncommon through the autumn, yet they did little to discourage acts of resistance. The Prefect for the Corrèze reported that during October and November nearly 300 assassinations had been attempted by the réfractaires from local maquis. However, the cost was high and these attacks were followed by terrible reprisals, often resulting in local civilians being taken hostage and shot. Whilst some held the maquis responsible and sympathized with Vichy portrayals of them as criminals and bandits, the Germans’ ruthless behaviour increasingly fuelled public support for their cause, though the approaching winter threatened many of the camps with extinction if they could not obtain substantial help from London.
Although Peulevé's brief was to coordinate resistance within a specific area, the great demand for arms and supplies meant that news of the British officer's presence spread quickly to neighbouring departments. One who was eager to make his acquaintance was Jean Vincent, also known as ‘Colonel Vény’, a former Foreign Legion officer who was based in the Lot and represented Froment Action, a paramilitary wing of the French socialist party, the SFIO (Section Française de l'International Ouvrière); Vény claimed to have built up substantial underground networks, but had resisted integration into the MUR and was looking for other means of acquiring support. At a meeting on Bloc-Gazo's premises, Peulevé agreed to provide both arms and training for the Groupes Vény, though he also made it clear that new SOE circuits would have to be formed to aid its main groups in Limoges, Marseille and the Lot. Making wireless contact with London, Peulevé received approval for the plan but was informed that no agents would be sent until early in the New Year, when his proposed landing grounds had been vetted by the RAF and the appalling weather had improved.
Peulevé had initially found it difficult to establish contact with the FTP, but was eventually able to arrange an introduction to André Bonnetot (Vincent), one of its regional commanders for the Dordogne; they got on well and Peulevé was able to gain his confidence by emphasizing a willingness to supply arms with no political strings attached. During a tour of the camps they also visited the regional école des cadres at Lespicerie, close to Montignac and the prehistoric landscape of the Vézère valley, where Spanish Civil War veterans trained classes of young maquisards in guerrilla warfare. The organization of the school was impressive, but Peulevé could see how desperate they were for weapons – the instructors even had trouble obtaining arms to show their students. Knowing that Bonnetot's men would make good use of any matériel they received, he pledged to deliver some of his first consignments of arms to them at landing grounds near the village of Jugeals-Nazareth, south of Brive.
Although SOE had no responsibility for the running of escape lines, Peulevé's territory lay directly on the route that Allied airmen took to reach the Pyrenees, and it became his job to find them safe houses and supply them with false identity papers – once six escapers had been received, they were collected by a white-haired schoolmistress who would take them south to Toulouse to carry on their journey across the border. With his workload increasing daily, helping fugitive airmen was an extra headache Peulevé could well do without, though he was not the only one at risk – the families who sheltered these men had far more to lose if they were discovered.
German security forces would often try to infiltrate such networks, using agents posing as airmen to collect intelligence as they were passed from one contact to the next, and as a precaution Peulevé would interrogate each man, corroborating their details with London before deciding to harbour them. On one occasion he was notified that two pilots were sheltering in the cellar of Bloc-Gazo having been picked up by Arnouil, and since the danger was much greater in the middle of town Peulevé had to move them before any check could be made on their authenticity.
Using his own car, Arnouil insisted on driving them to a safe house in one of the outlying villages and pulled up some distance from the garden gate. Peulevé made his way up to the front door but noticed that it was slightly ajar; suspicious, his right hand instinctively went into his coat pocket, where he kept a sawn-off Colt.45 revolver. Knocking on the door with the other hand, he was greeted by the face of an old woman who gave the pre-arranged password, though as he was about to offer a reply he suddenly became aware of something prodding him. Already nervous, he was shocked to see a man crouching out of sight behind a tall shrub, silently mouthing the word ‘Gestapo’. Realizing that he was about to enter a trap, Peulevé kicked the door open, firing at the woman at the same time from his pocket. He withdrew his gun as the door swung open to reveal her male companion, who was killed instantly by his second shot.
The man in the bushes ran to congratulate him, explaining that this couple were imposters. Two days before he had been working in the garden when the Gestapo had arrived to arrest his wife and himself, and though his wife was taken he had been able to remain hidden behind some trees. Knowing that another airman might be delivered to them at any time, he elected to keep watch over the house and witnessed the couple that Peulevé had met arriving to take over as bogus residents; having slept rough in the barn opposite, he had eventually seen Arnouil's car coming up the road and done what he could to alert them to the danger before it was too late. Peulevé considered himself fortunate to have been warned this time, but was also humbled and inspired by this man's willingness to take such risks to prevent the capture of Allied servicemen. Examples like this continually served to remind him that resistance was not solely the work of the maquis, and that without the support of the local population they could have achieved nothing. They would also persuade him to take greater risks with his own safety.
In November, Peulevé was informed that another downed pilot was being hidden at a remote farmhouse by an elderly couple, where he would be kept until his identity was confirmed. Once his details were verified with London, Peulevé travelled to meet him and was unexpectedly honoured by the couple with a special dinner and their best wine. Later in the evening they retired to leave him to talk with the RAF airman in front of the fire, accompanied by a bottle of brandy. During their conversation Peulevé learnt that the airman was stationed close to his parents’ home near Cambridge, and they soon got onto the subject of ‘the availability and acquiescence of the local belles and the best pubs in which to make their charming acquaintance’.4 However, as they chatted Peulevé suddenly noticed that although the airman invariably agreed with everything he said, he never offered any opinions of his own. Warning bells had started to ring in his mind and to test his suspicions Peulevé added a fictitious venue into their conversation. As he had predicted the pilot gave the impression of knowing this place well, mentioning several liaisons with the barmaid there.
This was enough to suggest an attempted infiltration, either by German or Vichy Intelligence. Taking a chance that he wouldn't be arrested that night, Peulevé pretended to go upstairs to bed but crept out later, walking to a café at the nearest village. The owner was known to be a friend of the Resistance and allowed Peulevé the use of his telephone to contact Maréchal, telling him to meet him there at eleven o'clock the next morning with five of his men. Maréchal turned up as arranged and Peulevé explained the situation, asking to be dropped off in the woods near the farm before they collected their suspect. Although there was a possibility that the Germans or milice were now waiting for them, he and his men obeyed without question, and Peulevé recalled their return that afternoon with their new prisoner:
Our friend the pilot was surrounded by the worst looking band of brigands one could ever wish to set eyes upon. They were all dressed in an assortment of civilian and German uniforms, the latter taken off their adversaries as spoil of battle and to avoid straining our slender financial resources… They each carried a Lee Enfield rifle over their shoulders in a manner that would have been the despair of a British Sergeant Major. Canvass belts of ammunition were draped over their other shoulders like festoons on a Christmas tree and the heavy leather belts they carried were hung with pineapple-type hand grenades. Apart from the dress and armament they were unshaven and I suspect unclean with vermin. To someone who had not come to admire, and even love, such a cut-throat-looking band… they could only inspire fear and revulsion. To me they were a heavenly host upon which I could rely unto death, for there was not one amongst them that would not readily give his life to carry out an order.5
Though not immediately declaring him a spy, Peulevé interrogated the man thoroughly for two hours, though not a blemish showed in his cover. He couldn't help but admire his coolness under pressure, but still refused to believe he was genuine and openly accused him of being a German plant. Referring to London's confirmation of his identity, the pilot stuck firmly to his story, prompting Peulevé to try and force him to talk.
Maréchal proceeded with a demonstration to show what damage a small amount of plastic explosive could do, placing it around the base of a sapling before lighting the prepared Bickford fuse; a few seconds later it toppled as though severed by an axe. His men then grabbed him, ripping off his right sleeve and placing a similar charge around his shoulder. As the fuse was lit and began to burn towards his arm he fixed his eyes on Peulevé's and continued to keep silent, obviously determined not give himself up easily. Peulevé told Maréchal to remove the fuse before it reached the detonator, but knew that he still had his trump card to play, bringing up the name of the pub that he had claimed to know the previous night. Having no credible excuse for this gaffe, their suspect realized that it was pointless to continue and confessed to being a German agent, describing how he had been given the identity of an RAF pilot who had died when bailing out over France, and that it was simply luck that he had come from an area Peulevé had known.
Putting his capture down to the fortunes of war, Peulevé made it clear that he had no choice but to execute him, but would offer to write to his family and summon a priest if he wished. Leaving him to write his last lines under the light of a torch, he told Maréchal to fetch the local curé, a consideration the Spaniard thought far too charitable. However, he recognized Peulevé's troubled conscience, throwing him his brandy flask as he walked off while the rest started to dig a shallow grave with their bayonets.
Waiting for Maréchal's return, Peulevé found himself in the surreal situation of making conversation with a man he was about to kill. Accepting a swig of brandy to calm his nerves, the German talked about his family, explaining that he was at Oxford before the war and that although he felt the need to fight for his country he did not necessarily agree with Hitler's policies. As the autumnal light began to fade Maréchal and a terrified old priest finally appeared, and after receiving confession the agent was asked if he wanted a blindfold; he refused, but asked that he be allowed to give the command to fire. Peulevé agreed and did his best to instil some semblance of respect into Maréchal's men as they lined up. After the execution Peulevé felt unable to stay at the scene any longer, but asked for the others to place a wooden cross at the head of the grave before they left.
His actions had prevented a serious threat to the escape line and may have saved many lives, but these thoughts did nothing to assuage Peulevé's guilt and frustration over the nature of this event:
With a heavy heart I departed to the farm where I spent a sleepless night in thinking what an utter waste of gentle human beings our incompetent and unforseeing politicians had led us into… Here was I, peaceful I had always thought, in the middle of such a war that I had to summarily decide on the death of what could only have been a perfectly good human being, for the simple reason that he was born in a different geographical location to myself.6
Though there was no doubt about the mutual loyalty felt between Peulevé and Maréchal, the gruesome postscript to this story served to highlight how different their capacities were for compassion towards their enemy. Some weeks later Peulevé asked Maréchal to take a photograph of the grave, intending to send it to the dead man's family, but Maréchal replied that it wasn't possible, as the corpse had been loaded into a crate labelled as machinery and sent to the Gestapo HQ at Avenue Foch in Paris, accompanied by a note asking them not to send any more agents through Allied escape lines, signed ‘British Intelligence Service’. For the Spaniard this was a big joke, and he was surprised when his friend did not share it.
Peulevé was clearly shaken by this episode, but knew that others were hunting for him just as keenly. Although he spoke French without an accent, and often presented himself as a French delegate from the Conseil National de la Résistance (a unified resistance body under de Gaulle's leadership), some of the corréziens he met could not believe that his English looks weren't an obvious giveaway to the Germans, and inevitably a number of those arrested spoke of a British agent working in the region. The Gestapo had also begun to receive help from former OCM officer André Noël, who like Grandclément had agreed to collaborate and had installed a number of informers in the area. Acting as Grandclément's intermediary, Noël twice attempted to try and lure Peulevé into meeting with him, but Peulevé's instincts told him to refuse and he failed to appear on both occasions.7
Despite the Germans’ increasing efforts to capture him, a more dangerous threat already sat within his own ranks: a colleague had told him that one of the surviving contacts from Bordeaux was continuing to collect funds for the Resistance under dubious means, and intended to dispose of Peulevé if he did not promise to contact London on his behalf. Considering this to be a real liability to the circuit's security, Peulevé decided that there was now no option but to eliminate him. He arranged a rendezvous outside Brive, from where they could walk to a nearby safe house and ‘discuss’ the matter. There was to be no one else involved.
Arriving early on the day, he drove some yards beyond the area they had agreed to meet in order to watch for any signs of a possible ambush. However, his contact arrived alone as requested and they drove to the nearby house, situated well away from the roadside and concealed by dense woods. Unlocking the door, Peulevé invited his victim to enter first:
As I followed him in, I had the knife ready and suddenly closing my left hand over his mouth, cut through his jugular vein as easy as picking a winkle out of its shell. As I lowered him to the floor, I felt that the sergeant major who had taught me to practise this neat flick of the wrist with a knife in Scotland would have been proud of my first effort… I do not think it took him long to die but I stayed a few minutes until I could feel no pulse and laid him out straight and saintly on the floor. Driving back, I had no feeling of revulsion such as one reads about and merely felt that I had done a good job with the knife as I had been taught to do, and eliminated a pest that, at best was preying on worthy Frenchmen faithful to our cause and at the worst got rid of a potential security risk who might have got me first.8
Although he had narrowly avoided capture or death on numerous occasions, these events had begun to accrue in Peulevé's mind, and reminded him ‘of how fate can, like a cat with a mouse, play with you for hours when every moment you think is your last, and then release you to run down your mousehole to safety and tremblingly relive those awful moments’.9 Constant vigilance for potential dangers was a fundamental part of an SOE agent's life in the field, but the physical and mental toll of the past two months was now beginning to tell, and he described how at this time ‘my nerves were such that I was scared of my own shadow.’10 As the sole British agent within the circuit he realized that he could not continue much longer without support, though Poirier and the agents to assist Vény's groups in the Lot were not expected for several more weeks yet. Perhaps the instructor's reservations about Peulevé at Meoble Lodge had been justified: could he stand the ‘prolonged strain’ that AUTHOR now demanded?
To relieve some of the pressure he began looking for a full-time W/T operator to deal with his growing backlog of wireless traffic, and Arnouil suggested a 24-year-old French Air Force radio operator, Louis Bertheau, who was based at Meymac near Ussel in the Haute-Corrèze. Originally from the Loiret, Bertheau had moved to the area after demobilization with his wife Rosa, who had their first child, Michèle, in December 1941; however, although he took an office job to support his young family and tried to concentrate on his academic studies, Bertheau eventually felt compelled to offer his services to the local Resistance. Looking for a way to make use of his radio skills, he came into contact with a local réfractaire named Jean Melon at the end of June 1943, who knew of a Madame Dumond (otherwise known as ‘Tante Jim’) who ran the youth hostel at Ussel. Dumond had long-established connections with the local ALLIANCE intelligence network, and was able to place Bertheau with a local maquis, though it was only a matter of days before the camp was dissolved and Dumond was arrested. Knowing how valuable a trained wireless operator would be to another group, she managed to pass on a final message recommending him to Arnouil, who knew her from his time in Ussel in 1941.
After checking his background, Bertheau (code-named Tilou) was summoned to Brive for instruction on W/T procedures and began transmitting from a safe house on the outskirts of town, though this soon proved unsatisfactory and Peulevé decided to relocate him back in the Haute-Corrèze. On the morning of 27 November, Jean Melon arrived by train to assist with the move and accompanied Bertheau on a visit to Bloc-Gazo, where they met Peulevé and were told to pick up a W/T set from Le Sporting, a restaurant on Avenue Maillard by the Corrèze river. Making discreet enquiries at the counter later that day, the waitress immediately yelled for assistance, declaring, ‘It's about the suitcase!’ Moments later an old woman appeared, beckoning them to follow her to a back room where they were handed the heavy B1 set.
Planning to return to Meymac, they left Bertheau's flat in rue François-Villon just before four o'clock the next morning, carefully dodging the curfew patrols as they made their way through the deserted streets towards the station. Though most people had arrived the evening before and were sleeping on the train they eventually managed to find a nearly empty carriage, but after placing the wireless suitcase on the rack above their heads they heard the sound of Germans approaching and saw the beam of a torch light. Suddenly noticing the sign Réservé à la Wehrmacht on the window, they rushed for the door, hearing the shouts from other passengers as they were being thrown off. Melon grabbed the case and made a run for it, whilst Bertheau attempted to stall one of the soldiers by apologizing for their mistake. As he rushed down the platform Melon barged through a group of guards, but they found the terrified man so funny that they didn't think to check the contents of his luggage.
Reaching the end of the train, they left the suitcase in the mail van before squeezing into one of the packed carriages and completed the journey without any further interruptions. Once back in Meymac they began transmitting from the Moulin de Breuil, a mill owned by Melon's parents where they had been hiding Jews and réfractaires for some months; with Melon posted at the window on the lookout for any German patrols, Bertheau was soon in almost daily contact with London, and together they were making three regular trips a week to Bloc-Gazo, dropping off the messages received and collecting any replies waiting to be sent. Despite the obvious dangers in carrying such material, Melon chose to courier Peulevé's telegrams in the lining of his hat, a hiding place that proved good enough to avoid detection when passing through German checkpoints.
With the wireless situation solved, Peulevé could afford to get away from the circuit for a while and took a train south to see André Girard (not to be confused with Carte in Antibes), a retired croupier and colleague of Audouard's who had sheltered him briefly in 1942 at his villa in Cannes. Aside from offering him somewhere to stay, Girard also loaned 300,000 francs to Peulevé's circuit, in return for the usual promise of a BBC message to confirm the deal. The change of scenery and Girard's hospitality did him some good; however, he could not stay for more than a few days, mindful that there was still much to do before the end of the year.
Through the autumn the Armée Secrète and FTP groups had continued to grow across the Corrèze, though the MUR suffered a setback when the Gestapo set a trap for Gontrand Royer, arresting him at Limoges on 13 December. His place was taken by René Vaujour, who enlisted the help of his old comrade Captain Marius Guédin (Georges), another long-serving ex-army resistant; Guédin had a bookish appearance, but his direct approach made him an ideal field commander, despite his disagreement over Peulevé's arming of the FTP (relations between the AS and the communists would continue to deteriorate over the following months). More support also arrived with the integration of the ORA (Organisation de Résistance de l'Armée), which represented officers from the disbanded armistice army. Although politically opposed to de Gaulle, the ORA's R5 section agreed to work under Vaujour, and their leader Guillaume d'Ussel (Nicolo), the second son of the Count of Ussel, would now act as one of his lieutenants.
By Christmas, Peulevé was at last ready to notify London that the Lachauds’ reception committee and several other landing grounds selected by the maquis were ready to receive supply drops. This marked the completion of the initial stages of his mission and was a significant milestone for a man who had waited so long to prove himself. Having passed unscathed through the carnage of the Grandclément affair and its repercussions, he had established the foundations of his circuit with only minimal support from Landes’ SCIENTIST and was now ready to create a much more effective body of resistance across the Corrèze and Dordogne. Yet with the impending arrival of an Allied invasion time was running out and over the following months Peulevé would be increasingly forced to jeopardize his own safety in order to achieve AUTHOR's objectives.