Carré, Mathilde ‘The Cat’

1910–

   Carré was a double, probably triple, agent in World War II. She had worked as a nurse when war broke out and had met Major Roman Czerniawski who recruited her to the Interallié network. This was the first intelligence network to be set up in France and Carré picked up her information from conversations with German officers. Her messages to London usually began with the words The Cat reports…’ BLEICHER who had begun to break up the Interallié network arrested her on 17 November 1941 and threatened her with torture. He extracted from her all the names of her contacts which led to many arrests, and persuaded her to work for the Germans using an old codename ‘Victoire.’ Pierre de Vomécourt was one of her contacts and he began to suspect her. He confronted her and she confessed and played another double role. The situation became too difficult and she persuaded Bleicher to allow her to go to London where she said she could give him information on the inner workings of the Special Operations Executive. She went to London in February 1942 where she was interrogated about Abwehr techniques. It was decided to take her out of circulation and she was detained in Holloway Prison. After the war she was deported to France, tried, sentenced to death, and reprieved. In September 1954 she released and published her account in ‘J’ai été la Chatte…’