The Most Daring Female Spies In History Led Lives That Could Have Come Straight Out Of The Movies

As an ambitious young American woman, Virginia Hall hoped to join the United States Foreign Service. But a tragic accident — and probably her gender — prevented Hall from achieving this goal. Instead, she joined the Special Operations Executive during World War Two, working with the resistance in France. Dubbed “la dame qui boite,” or the lady who limps, on account of her prosthetic leg, Hall established a spy ring and earned herself the wrath of the Germans. But she was never caught. Hall was given the Distinguished Service Cross after the war — one of just two women to do so.

Born in England to a Dutch mom, Anne Dawson traveled to German-occupied Belgium during World War One to serve as a British agent. One of only two female operatives to serve behind enemy lines in the war for Britain, she gathered information on military movements and passed it to the Allies — risking her life in the process. Dawson’s dual nationality and language skills made her a valuable asset to the British, but also a target. Thankfully, she survived the war and went on to receive an MBE in 1920.

Born almost 50 years before slavery was abolished in her home state of Virginia, Elizabeth Van Lew was an abolitionist from a young age. And after her father’s passing, she devoted her inheritance to the cause. But it was when Civil War broke out in 1861 that this heroine really came into her own. Working for the Union, Van Lew established the Richmond Underground, a ring of spies working undercover in Confederate circles. And she didn’t stop there. Once she received important information, she’d translate it into a cipher and transfer it out of the state — sometimes hidden inside hollowed-out eggs.

Thanks to her privileged upbringing in Romania, Vera Atkins often rubbed shoulders with diplomats in the years prior to WW2. And when the conflict broke out, she was enlisted by the Allies as a spy, charged with ferrying information from Europe to Winston Churchill himself. Later, she became part of the Special Operations Executive. Like many female spies, Atkins is said to have used her looks and charm to trick the enemy into revealing their secrets. But that wasn’t all. As the war progressed, she found herself in charge of an entire unit of women operatives, supervising their missions out in the field.

A member of the Polish aristocracy, Krystyna Skarbek was beautiful, charming, and the “bravest of the brave.” At the outbreak of WW2, she tried to sign up to fight for the Allies but was rejected because of her gender. So, she strapped on skis and crossed into occupied Poland, ready to work behind enemy lines. There, Skarbek joined forces with the resistance, spreading British propaganda and smuggling vital information out of the country. Once, she brazenly walked into a jail and persuaded the guards to release their prisoners — including a man who’d become her lover. Though she survived the war, Skarbek was later murdered at the hands of a jealous admirer.

Dubbed the White Mouse by the Gestapo, Nancy Wake was an Australian who’d enjoyed a privileged life in France before WW2 broke out. But when conflict arrived on her doorstep, she rose to the challenge, initially driving an ambulance that she’d persuaded her husband to buy. Later, she used her wealth to establish an underground railroad, smuggling Allied servicemen to safety across the Pyrenees. When the Germans occupied France, Wake escaped to Britain, where she enlisted with the Special Operations Executive. And for the rest of the war, she engaged in dangerous missions, parachuting behind enemy lines to aid the resistance.

According to legend, Belle Boyd’s life as a rebel first began when she shot an interfering Union soldier during the American Civil War. Now on the Yankees’ radar, she managed to turn the attention to her advantage, seducing at least one officer and passing confidential information on to the Confederate Army. At one point, she even rode through enemy fire to deliver a vital message to the Confederate General Stonewall Jackson, helping him to victory in Virginia. The woman was later awarded the Southern Cross of Honor for her brave actions.

Before WW2, American-born Josephine Baker was a popular entertainer in Paris, an icon of the Jazz Age. But when war broke out, she turned into an informant, charming German officers at parties and passing intelligence on to the French military. Later, she used her career as a cover to travel without suspicion, carrying classified messages penned in invisible ink. In 1941 Baker traveled to North Africa to continue her work with the French resistance, delivering intelligence between Morocco and Spain. Even though she was eventually sent to London for her own safety, Baker’s espionage career inspired her to become a serious performer.

Paris-born Violette Szabo was living in London and working at a department store when the horrors of WW2 began. After marrying a French soldier, she spent the early years of the conflict as part of a women’s army defending home soil. But when her husband was killed, she signed up with the Special Operations Executive instead. Arriving by parachute in occupied France, Szabo — affectionately dubbed “La P’tite Anglaise,” meaning The Little Englishwoman — successfully gathered intelligence on damaged Allied equipment. But during her second mission, she was captured and tortured by the Gestapo. Even under terrible duress, though, she refused to reveal her secrets. Eventually, she was executed at Ravensbrück concentration camp.

Perhaps the most notorious of history’s female spies is the woman known as Mata Hari, a Dutch-born exotic dancer who turned to espionage during WW1. Born Margaretha Geertruida MacLeod, she fled an abusive marriage and traveled to Paris, where she was the mistress of a number of influential men. When war broke out, MacLeod’s exotic alias and globetrotting ways brought her to the attention of the French authorities, who persuaded her to turn spy. In 1917 she was arrested and executed for being a double agent. Today, though, many regard her as innocent of these crimes, and no conclusive evidence has ever been found to support her conviction.

Photographer Edith Tudor-Hart fled her native Austria to escape persecution in the run up to WW2. Settling in Britain, she used her art to make political statements, commenting on everything from industrial decline to the plight of refugees. But ultimately, her communist sympathies led her to seek out allies in the Soviet Union. In the 1930s Tudor-Hart became involved with the Cambridge Spy Ring, a group of informants who fed British intelligence to the KGB. Despite recruiting members while under surveillance, she was never prosecuted for her actions. Instead, she lived a quiet life after the war, running an antiques store before her death in 1973.

Watchmaker Corrie Ten Boom had been the first Dutch woman to work in her trade prior to the Germans invading her home country in 1940. Though she and her family were Calvinist Christians, they opened their doors to Jews fleeing persecution, becoming part of the Dutch underground movement. Even as the Gestapo closed in, she hid refugees behind a false wall in the bedroom of her Haarlem home. Later, Ten Boom joined an underground railroad network, smuggling Jews out of the city to safety. She was personally responsible for saving some 800 lives. Arrested and sent to Ravensbrück concentration camp, she was eventually released and went on to support other survivors after the war.

The daughter of a WW1 hero, Odette Hallowes was born in France but relocated to Britain with her English husband in the 1930s. When conflict broke out in Europe again, she trained with the Special Operations Executive to work for the French resistance behind enemy lines. And in 1942 she arrived on the shores of Cassis. During her time back in France, Hallowes risked her life to transport supplies across dangerous terrain. Later captured by the Germans, she refused to reveal confidential information. She wound up at a concentration camp but lived to tell the tale. In 1946 she was awarded the George Cross, the first woman to receive the honor.

Born in Moscow, Russia, Noor Inayat Khan was living in France with her family when WW2 began. After fleeing to England, she joined the Allies’ cause, signing up as a wireless operator with the Special Operations Executive. The devout pacifist felt unable to kill anyone, choosing instead to take one of the most dangerous jobs around. In June 1943 Khan was shipped behind enemy lines to operate wireless communications, the first woman to do so. There, her language and technical skills made her a valuable asset, until she was betrayed, captured, and sent to Dachau concentration camp. Executed in September 1944, she was given a posthumous George Cross.

A British national born in France, Pearl Witherington Cornioley set her sights on the French resistance in the outbreak of WW2 and was recruited to the Special Operations Executive. According to reports, she was the best marksman her superiors had ever seen. Initially, Cornioley used her cover as a cosmetics agent to travel through France, delivering sensitive information. But when her radio operator was taken out of action, she stepped up to replace him — eventually controlling a network of 3,500 resistance fighters. Later, she turned down the offer of a Civil Division MBE in recognition of her work. Allegedly, she retorted, “There was nothing remotely ‘civil’ about what I did.”

When the French resistance leader George Loustaunau-Lacau was arrested towards the beginning of WW2, he nominated young spy Marie-Madeleine Fourcade to take over. Married but estranged from her family, she threw herself into the war effort, moving from city to city to evade capture by the Gestapo. At the head of a network of 3,000 resistance fighters, Fourcade, nicknamed Hedgehog, gathered vital intelligence for the Allies. She was captured twice, but she escaped to London and continued to direct her agents from across the Channel. Curiously, Fourcade wasn’t among the — mostly male — heroes whom Charles de Gaulle named after the war.

When the Germans invaded in 1940, Mauritius-born Lise de Baissac fled Paris for Britain, where she signed up with the Special Operations Executive as soon as women were allowed. Two years later, she and Andrée Borrel parachuted into occupied France — the first female agents to do so. In France, de Baissac was bold and brave, carrying out covert operations right under the Germans’ noses. Befriending a Gestapo chief, she took lodgings with the enemy, hiding her subterfuge in plain sight. With her brother Claude, she was instrumental in the Allied invasion of France. She survived the war and received an MBE in 1945.

Belgian-born Elaine Madden was 17 years old and engaged to be married when WW2 came to her hometown. Disguised as a soldier, she smuggled her way onto a boat during the Dunkirk Evacuation, escaping to safety in Britain. But before long, her desire to help her fellow countrymen put her on the frontline once more. Keen to do more for the war effort, Madden was recruited by the Special Operations Executive and parachuted back into occupied Belgium. There, she collected intelligence on German rockets, passing it back to her handlers in Britain. Later, she’d state that her only regret was not getting involved sooner.

Before the outbreak of the American Civil War, Rose Greenhow was a socialite moving within influential circles in Washington, D.C. But when her husband died, she found herself drawn to the Confederate cause. Utilizing her connections, she became a spy, gathering intelligence about the Union Army and delivering it to generals in the South. Credited with helping the Confederates to a victory on the battlefield, Greenhow was eventually imprisoned — though she even continued her espionage from her cell. On her release, she traveled to Europe, tasked with drumming up support for the American South. But on her way back, Greenhow’s ship ran aground. She attempted to flee in a rowboat but ultimately drowned.

Jane Whorwood, born in Westminster, England, in 1612, played a covert role as a secret agent during the First English Civil War in service of King Charles I. When the king was captured and held captive by Parliament, Jane became a crucial figure in various efforts to secure his freedom from the Isle of Wight, specifically Carisbrooke Castle, in 1648. She was once described by Parliament spy Anthony Wood as “the most loyal to King Charles in his miseries of any woman in England.” No portrait of Whorwood survives today.

Amy Elizabeth “Betty” Thorpe once said, “Wars are not won by respectable methods.” Codenamed “Cynthia,” she was a legendary American spy, who worked for a part of the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) during World War II and later worked for the American Office of Strategic Services (OSS). Sexually and romantically seducing high-level foreign diplomats, Thorpe’s methods of espionage proved hugely successful, and she has gone down in history as one of the most successful spies ever. She’s often referred to as the WW2 equivalent of the legendary Mata Hari.

Born into a life of slavery, Harriet Tubman escaped her violent masters and fled to the free state of Pennsylvania in 1849. But rather than disappearing, she returned to her former home time and time again, risking her life to smuggle out family members and friends. Eventually, she became a vital part of the original Underground Railroad. For years, this network of secret safe houses and clandestine routes helped thousands of people flee enslavement and find safety in the free states. When the Civil War broke out, she began working as a spy for the Union Army and ultimately led a successful armed raid that liberated some 700 slaves.

Lyudmila Pavlichenko was a sniper with the Soviet Union’s 25th Chapayev Rifle Division, fighting the Germans who had invaded her country in 1941. At first the Soviet army had tried to steer her towards nursing, but she insisted that she was a crack shot and proved it by killing two enemy soldiers in an impromptu test of her skills. When Pavlichenko first went into combat, she was rigid with fear. But she ultimately killed an extraordinary 309 of the enemy, making her the most prolific female sniper in history. A 2013 article in the Smithsonian Magazine quoted her as saying, “Dead Germans are harmless. Therefore, if I kill a German, I am saving lives.”

Born into poverty in 1906 in St Louis, Missouri, Freda Josephine McDonald would later become the legendary dancer Josephine Baker. Her risqué costumes and flamboyant dancing at the notorious Parisian nightclub the Folies-Bergère made her a huge star in 1920s France and elsewhere. But Baker’s glittering career came to a halt in 1939 when WW2 erupted. Baker knew where her loyalties lay and began clandestine work for the French Resistance. She kept her eyes and ears open, passing on useful information she heard while performing. The French recognized her bravery with two prestigious military awards, the Legion of Honor and the Croix de Guerre.

Joan of Arc was born in France circa 1412 into a peasant family. Although she could neither read nor write, she was deeply religious. The girl was born into a turbulent period of French history, the Hundred Years War with England. When Joan was just 13, a voice she believed was a message from God implored her to lead her people against their enemies and to help Charles of Valois win the French crown. Some years later, Joan did indeed lead an army, riding in full armor in a victorious battle over the English. Charles was duly crowned king of France, but Joan was captured and burned at the stake as a witch. She was just 19.

Born in Sumatra, Cut Nyak Dhien is revered in her homeland for her resistance to Dutch colonialists. Abandoning a comfortable life, she joined her father and her first husband in the jungle in 1873 to wage guerilla warfare against the Dutch. Tragically, both her father and husband were killed. Dhien now took over her father’s command, leading the resistance against the colonizers. Surprisingly, Dhien surrendered to the Dutch in 1875, but it was a tactical subterfuge. Having convinced the Dutch of her loyalty, she made off with many armaments and fighters. Now well-resourced, Dhien was able to mount effective resistance to the Dutch for many years.

In 1136 Gwenllian ferch Gruffydd, a Welsh princess, led a group of patriots in rebellion against the English and Norman invaders. After an initial defeat, the Normans were determined to fight back and mustered a strong force to counter-attack the Welsh. Princess Gwenllian now embarked on a campaign of guerilla warfare against her enemies. Dismayingly, her fate was sealed when she was betrayed by a supposed ally: the Normans captured her and put her to death. Still, the brutal slaying of the warrior princess enraged and inspired her people, and a successful rebellion forced the Anglo-Normans from much of Welsh territory.

Ruby Bradley was serving with the U.S. Army Nurse Corps in the Philippines in 1941 when the Japanese invaded after their surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. She was taken prisoner and sent to the Santo Tomas Internment Camp in Manila. Bradley made it her mission to help fellow prisoners suffering from malnutrition. She smuggled food to those worst affected and often went without herself so that others could eat. All through the three years of her captivity she continued with her medical duties, delivering 13 babies and carrying out 230 vital operations. When the camp was liberated by American soldiers in February 1945, Bradley weight just 84 pounds. She continued as an Army nurse and rose to the rank of colonel.

Deborah Sampson was a servant at the age of ten, a teacher at 18, and then at 22 she disguised herself as a man so that she could join the Revolutionary Army fighting to free America from British control. Taking the name Robert Shurtleff, Sampson fought with the Company of Light Infantry in New York. She undertook dangerous missions like scouting Manhattan for enemy positions. She led a force of some 30 men that ended up in hand-to-hand fighting with British loyalists. After two years her ruse was revealed when serious illness forced her into hospital. The Revolutionary Army gave her a well-deserved honorable discharge.

Khutulun, born circa 1260, was a Mongolian leader whose military prowess became legend. The fact that the famous Mongol leader Genghis Khan was her great-great grandfather may go some way to explaining her leadership qualities. As a young woman, it’s said that she upset gender stereotypes by becoming an outstanding wrestler. Marco Polo once described Khutulun as “so strong, that there was no young man in the whole kingdom who could overcome her, but she vanquished them all.” When it came to battle, Khutulun liked to be in the thick of things. She would charge into the enemy soldiers, snatch one, and drag him off to her own troops. Sounds terrifying.

Born in New Zealand but brought up in Australia, Nancy Wake traveled to Europe in 1932. She settled in Paris, France, where she worked as a journalist for the American press. As the 1930s rolled on, the reporter filed stories from Berlin and Vienna, where she witnessed the rise of Hitler. After the German invasion of France in 1940, Wake and her husband joined the Resistance movement. They helped Allied airmen and Jewish refugees to escape the clutches of the Germans by spiriting them over the border to neutral Spain. Eventually Wake ended up in Britain, where she joined British special forces and was parachuted back into France. Not until France was liberated did she learn that the Gestapo had killed her husband in 1943.

Born in about 357 B.C, Cynane was a half-sister of Alexander the Great. As per Illyrian tradition, she had instilled in her from a young age that she, as a woman, was born to fight. Alexander the Great eventually took the Macedonian throne, but when he died he was succeeded by his dim-witted half-brother Arrhidaeus. Cynane saw her chance to grab power. At the head of an army, she marched on Babylon with the aim of coercing the new ruler into a marriage with her daughter Adea, ensuring that she had a position of influence and control. Yet, after winning a battle against her Macedonian rivals, Cynane was undone by the treachery of an old friend, Alcetus. He murdered her during a meeting.

Lilya Litvyak was a Muscovite born in 1921. Before the war she’d trained as a civilian pilot from the age of 14, but when she applied to join the Soviet air force, she was rejected for lack of experience. Undeterred, she applied again after doctoring her papers to add an extra 100 hours of flight time. That did the trick and she joined the all-female 586th Fighter Regiment. Soon dubbed the “White Rose of Stalingrad,” she became internationally famous. But on August 1, 1943, she was shot down on a mission, presumed killed. Astonishingly, her grave was not located until 1979; she was posthumously awarded the title “Hero of the Soviet Union” in 1990.

Cathay Williams was born into slavery in 1844 in Missouri. When During the Civil War, Williams became a “captured slave.” But she volunteered her services to the Union army and worked in its catering section and doing laundry. In 1866 Williams decided to officially enlist under a different identity. She became William Cathay and joined the 38th U.S. Infantry as a man after passing a rudimentary medical examination. That gave her the distinction of being the first African-American woman to join the U.S. Army. The all-black regiment she served with became the basis for the legendary Buffalo Soldiers outfit. Her deception only came to light after a serious illness struck her down; she was honorably discharged in 1868.

Flora Sandes was without doubt one of a kind: she was the only British woman to fight on the frontline during World War I. Sandes first signed up with the St. John Ambulance Service and was posted to Serbia. Having learned Serbian, she moved to the Serbian Red Cross. The Germans were making advances into Serbia, and Sandes now signed up with the Serbian Army, a rare military force that allowed women to fight. She was wounded in action in a grenade attack, sustaining a broken arm and shrapnel wounds. Sandes rose to the rank of sergeant-major in the Serbian Army.

Keen to have a go at the Germans in WWII, Susan Travers joined the Free French Forces as an ambulance driver with the French Foreign Legion. She had been born in 1909 into a well-to-do family in London, England, her father a Royal Navy admiral, her mother a rich heiress. Still, Travers was happy to rough it with her comrades as they fought in French West Africa. Eventually, Travers ended up driving her ambulance in Eritrea where dodging bullets and mines was all in a day’s work. At one point, the Germans were advancing and French troops had to evacuate. Travers led the way, driving her commander’s staff car under intense fire through the desert.

Dr. Mary E. Walker was already a rarity in mid-19th-century America: a female surgeon. But she wanted to become an army doctor fighting with the Union forces in the Civil War. Aged 29, she applied to the Union Army in 1861 but was rejected. Undaunted, she gave her professional skills as a volunteer. After two years of service, the army finally accepted her as an assistant surgeon. Dr. Walker was unlucky enough to be captured by the Confederates 1864 and held as a prisoner of war for four months. Her bravery was recognized in 1866 when she was awarded America’s highest military accolade, the Medal of Honor.

Born in 1905 into a Ukrainian peasant family, 20 years later Mariya Oktyabrskaya met and married a Soviet artillery officer, Ilya Ryadnenko. Maria’s husband was killed in 1941. Grief-stricken and deeply angered, Oktyabrskaya was determined to take revenge on the Germans. The 36-year-old applied to fight but was rejected due to her age. Oktyabrskaya instead embarked on the improbable task of raising enough money to pay for a T-34 tank. Somehow, she achieved her goal. Then she wrote to Joseph Stalin demanding that she should drive “her” tank. Incredibly, the Soviet leader agreed. In 1943 Oktyabrskaya became the first female Soviet tank driver, her vehicle named “Fighting Girlfriend.”

U.S. Navy flight nurse Jane “Candy” Kendeigh was just 22 years old when she boarded a flight to the Pacific island of Iwo Jima in 1945. At the time, American G.I.s were meeting bitter resistance from the occupying Japanese troops. Never before had a Navy nurse landed on a Pacific island where fighting was still under way. Eventually, Kendeigh and other colleagues evacuated nearly 2,400 U.S. Marines who had been wounded in the Iwo Jima battle. In 1985 The San Diego Union quoted Kendeigh about the rewards of her work: “wan smiles, a slow nod of appreciation, a gesture, a word — accolades greater, more heart-warming than any medal.”

When Roman invaders decided to take over the Iceni tribe in 60 A.D., the dead king’s queen, Boudicca, had other ideas. Enraged by the ill-treatment of herself and her daughters at the hands of the Romans, Boudicca led her people in rebellion. Under the queen’s command, the Iceni warriors routed the Roman 9th Legion. The Iceni and other tribes then marched on London, destroying the city. Eventually, though, the Roman governor Gaius Suetonius Paulinus crushed the revolt at what was later called the Battle of Watling Street in 61 A.D. Boudicca is said to have taken her own life with poison rather than be captured by her Roman enemies.