Group    From 22/7/1940  To 15/1/1946

Special Operations Executive (SOE)

Categories: Armed Forces, Espionage

Countries: France, Germany

Spies, basically (but see below), working for the UK in WW2. Formed by Churchill and variously known as "Churchill's Secret Army", "The Baker Street Irregulars", the Pythonesque "Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare" or the deliberately dull-sounding "Joint Technical Board" or "Inter-Service Research Bureau". 117 SOE agents did not survive their missions to France. There is a plaque outside St Paul’s Church in Knightsbridge which gives the names of the women SOE agents who died in WW2. Culture 24 gives some detail of the SOE activities around Baker Street.

Parachuted into France the women operatives had a life expectancy of only 6 weeks, due, according to current thinking, to the incompetence of the SOE.

The organisation was officially dissolved on 15 January 1946.

2019: Francis Suttill (who interestingly shares a name with a member of the SOE, 1910 – 1945) contacted us via Facebook to question our use of the word 'spy' to describe members of the SOE rather than 'special agent'. From what he writes he knows much more about this subject than we do so we accept his correction.

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This section lists the memorials where the subject on this page is commemorated:
Special Operations Executive (SOE)

Commemorated ati

Christine Granville

Christine Granville, born Krystyna Skarbek, 1908 - 1952, SOE agent, lived her...

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Free French plaque

Alamy have a photo of the unveiling.

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Leopold Marks

Jewish cryptographer, Leopold (Leo) Samuel Marks, MBE, lived in flat 410 Park...

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Noor Inayat Khan bust

The Guardian reports: "the first stand-alone memorial to an Asian woman in th...

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Noor Inayat Khan - Taviton Street

Noor Inayat Khan, GC, 1914 - 1944, SOE agent, codename 'Madeleine', stayed he...

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Show all 10

Other Subjects

ORP Kujawiak

ORP Kujawiak

Former Destroyer in the Polish Navy. ORP stands for Okret Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej (Ship of the Polish Republic).

Vehicle, Armed Forces, Poland

1 memorial
Richd. Woolaway

Richd. Woolaway

Resident of the Central Ward, Hendon who served and died in WW1.

Person, Armed Forces

War dead, WW1
1 memorial
Lieutenant John David Forster Williams

Lieutenant John David Forster Williams

John David Forster Williams was born on 13 January 1922, the son of Captain Montague Williams (b.circa 1889) and Nancy Gellatly Williams née Rogers (1897-1986). His birth was registered in the 1st ...

Person, Armed Forces, Italy, Wales

War dead, WW2
1 memorial
R. King

R. King

J. Lyons & Co. Ltd. staff member who died in WW1.

Person, Armed Forces

War dead, WW1
1 memorial
Stones End fort

Stones End fort

A parliamentary fort erected to defend London during the Civil War. The picture source website is fascinating but strangely we can't actually locate Stones End on the maps there. There used to be ...

Place, Armed Forces

1 memorial