Many WWII vets pass each day. They don't make them like they used to.
====
Pearl Cornioley, WWII secret agent, dies
Yahoo
3/07/08
D'ARCY DORAN
LONDON - Pearl Cornioley, who parachuted into France as a secret agent during World War II to help arm and organize the Resistance, has died. She was 93.
Cornioley was one of Britain's greatest agents operating behind German lines, according to historian Michael R.D. Foot. who has written extensively about British special operations in France.
Cornioley died at Blois Hospital in the Loire Valley on Feb. 24, Caroline Cottard, the secretary at her retirement home in Chateauvieux, southwest of Paris, said Friday.
She parachuted into France in September 1943 to work as a courier for an underground unit. It was believed the Nazis were less likely to suspect a woman, and she posed as a cosmetics saleswoman to deliver coded messages.
When the Nazis captured the leader of her unit in May 1944, she took over the cell in the north Indre department of the Loire River valley, about 55 miles southeast of the Normandy beaches.
Using the code name "Pauline," she led a 1,500-strong team in efforts to cut railway, road and telephone communications and start guerrilla operations. The Nazis put her face on posters offering a 1 million franc reward for her capture — but she always evaded them.
Full article
