The story
Born on August 30, 1912, in Wellington, New Zealand, Nancy worked as a journalist in pre-war Nazi Germany. After marrying a French industrialist, she joined the French Resistance in occupied France and helped British airmen escape capture.
In December 1940, after being betrayed, Wake was captured. After convincing her guards that she wasn’t the woman they were looking for, she traveled to Britain and joined the Special Operations Executive (SOE). This was where she learned that her husband had been shot by Gestapo agents—which turned out to be a bad move on their part when Nancy came back with a vengeance.
She was dropped back into France in 1944 to coordinate Resistance attacks with the planned D-Day landings.
This time she led an armed raid against Gestapo headquarters and German gun factories.
After getting separated from her radio operator during a German counter-attack, she walked 200 kilometers (124 miles) and biked a 100 more kilometers (62 miles) to contact another operator.
One of her resistance members said, “She is the most feminine woman I know, until the fighting starts. Then she is like five men.” Nancy died in 2011, at the age of 98.
There's more to discover
You have arrived at just one small part of Back to Normandy — a personal project dedicated to preserving stories, images, music and memories of the Second World War.
Every record is a doorway to a larger story. Explore Back to Normandy to discover more, or visit Fred Vogels' personal website to learn about the person and the projects behind it.