by: Paul R. Benson
On Wednesday February 13th, 2019, the Krannert Center’s Foelinger Hall was packed with hundreds of people running around looking for seats at a free event. At the event, Marthe Cohn spoke about her experience as a spy during World War II.
Marthe Cohn started off the speech by saying, “I do not intend to offend any media attending the event, but I have to tell you that this has nothing to do with fake news.” The audience gave a round of applause. Marthe Cohn had a very thick accent and was elderly. It was challenging to understand what she was saying sometimes, especially at the beginning.
She was accompanied by her husband, Lewis Cohn, whom she jokingly referred to as her, “prompter, because he puts me back on track when I’m off track.” The couple were incredibly adorable and had been together for 61 years. They met after the war, in 1956 while studying in Geneva. They then worked together for many years, she as a nurse and he as an anesthesiologist.
After a friendly introduction she went into detail about growing up in the city of Metz at the border of Germany and France. She said that Metz was under control of the Germans from the Franco-Prussian War in 1870 until the end of World War I. While the Germans controlled the city, they forbid people from speaking French. Once Metz was freed, Marthe Cohn’s parents taught her French. Being bilingual with blonde hair and blue eyes set her up for her unexpected career as a spy.
Marthe Cohn talked about her city being occupied by the Germans, and her family going into hiding. She explained ‘SiPo’ as an abbreviation for a long word meaning German police.
“I am a nurse, I take care of people, I do not kill anybody, even the Germans I hate.”
“My sister, Stephanie had been arrested by the SiPo.” Cohn said. “She was taken to the officers of the depot and questioned. She refused to give any answer, because the reason she was arrested was we had helped hundreds of people to escape Occupied France to Non-Occupied France… We didn’t know who these people were, we didn’t know from where they were coming, but they needed help.” Cohn said. Marthe and her family tried to help Stephenie escape. Stephenie, as a medical student, refused, because she thought it was more important for her to help nurse the children in the camps who were hurt. Stephenie was later sent to the concentration camp in Auschwitz, where she was murdered.
Once Paris was liberated in 1944, Marthe wanted to join the French army. “It was very difficult, because thousands of people wanted to join the army.” Cohn said. The officers did not take Marthe Cohn seriously. They did not think she would be very helpful, or able to kill. Marthe told the officers, “I am a nurse, I take care of people, I do not kill anybody, even the Germans I hate.” This obviously did not help her case, but Marthe was stubborn and she was eventually enlisted as a sergeant “social worker”. Marthe wasn’t given any orders and she didn’t know anything about being a social worker, so she helped in any way she could by providing troops with supplies from town.
When the Colonel found out that Marthe Cohn could speak fluent German, she was then tasked with finding intel from behind enemy lines. She was eventually successful at walking into Germany from Schaffhausen Switzerland. She took on the identity of a German nurse looking for her fiancée.
Cohn was very frightened before approaching the first group of German soldiers she saw. She built up courage and called out, “Heil Hitler!” The Sentinel officer asked for her identity card and she handed it to him, afraid they would know it was a forged card. Luckily, they did not realize the I.D. was forged. She was able to follow the soldiers and learn their patrols. When she discovered important information she crawled back through the Swiss border and relayed the information back to the French army.
“The audience was shocked when Marthe told how she easily tapped vital information from a high ranking officer”
Two major pieces of information that she was able to discover were that the German army evacuated the Siegfried line and that the remnant of the German army laid in ambush in the Black Forest. She found out about the remnant German army after pretending to be in distress in front of a German Colonel. Marthe said that the Colonel told her, “‘don’t be so afraid, the war is not finished.’ And then he told me exactly where the Remnant army was waiting.”
Everyone in the audience was shocked when Marthe told how she easily tapped vital information from a high ranking officer. It was really funny how she was able to woo German men into giving her important information. No one expected the 4 feet 11 inches tall, 24 year old nurse to be a French spy.
The amount of courage and strength that Marthe built up when faced with life threatening situations is truly inspiring. She did not start telling her story about what happened to her during WWII until the 1990s, because she didn’t think people would be interested in her story.
For those interested in learning more about her story, she has a short video about her, and a book titled, Behind Enemy Lines : The True Story of a French Jewish Spy in Nazi Germany.
“In France, 75 percent of Jews survived, and they survived because so many non-Jews risked their lives to save ours.” Cohn said. It goes to show what people can accomplish when we look out for each other.
