Royal Air Force News Friday, November 3, 2023 P23
Obituaries
The ‘schoolgirl’ spy with codes in her hair tie
YOUTHFUL: Pippa could pass for a school pupil
Phyllis Latour Doyle, MBE
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STAR OF FRANCE: Pippa in Paris in 1939 and wearing her Légion d’honneur, inset © Peter Hore, author’s collection
PECIAL OPERATIONS Executive agent and former WAAF Phyllis ‘Pippa’ Latour Doyle – the last of the French section of the female spies who served in Winston Churchill’s ‘secret army’ – has died aged 102. The RAF Benevolent Fund paid tribute to the World War II heroine who was born in Durban, South Africa on April 8, 1921. She passed away in Auckland, New Zealand where she had made her home after living in Kenya, Fiji and Australia. Pippa’s wartime exploits began in September 1943. She was a member of the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force when she was seconded to the SOE. She then undertook training at the SOE’s special training school, which included parachuting, weapons, explosives, unarmed combat and wireless and telegraphy training. In 1944 she parachuted into the occupied Nazi-controlled Normandy area to act as a
wireless telegraphy operator for an SOE/Marquis circuit using the code name Genevieve. On D-Day she watched as Allied troops stormed Normandy. Posing as a schoolgirl, Pippa was a radio operator whose job it was to supply intelligence that would lead to the bombers being brought in. She hid her codes in a flat shoelace, used as a hair-tie, and when the Germans strip-searched her she threw the tie casually to one side shaking her hair to show she wasn’t concealing anything. It didn’t occur to anyone to examine the hairtie. Her work made a significant impact on the Allied victory, and she was awarded the Croix de Guerre for bravery, and the MBE.
The fearless WAAF veteran was recognised again by the French government in 2014 when she was presented with the Medal of the knight of the French National Order of the Légion d’honneur for her actions and bravery during WWII, and she went on to receive the French Resistance Medal of 1943, and the French Defence Force Brevet Militaire de Parachutiste operational French military parachute wings. In 2020 Auckland City Council approved the naming of a street, Genevieve Lane, in the old RNZAF Air Base at Hobsonville Point, in honour of her military service to the Commonwealth. “Pippa was supported by the Benevolent Fund for the last decade, enabling her to remain in her own home and be as independent as possible during her final years,” said a RAFBF spokesperson.
Bomber Command ground crew & RAF weather observer The Very Reverend Trevor Beeson, OBE
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SERVICE: Beeson trained for priesthood straight after demob from the RAF
ORMER DEAN of Winchester, Canon of Westminster and chaplain to the Speaker of the House of Commons, the Very Reverend Trevor Beeson, who served in the RAF in World War II, has died aged 97. The current Dean of Winchester, the Very Rev Catherine Ogle, paid tribute. She said: “Trevor was Dean of Winchester 1987–95 and outlived his successors, Michael Till and James Atwell. Trevor was a great speaker and writer, the author of many books and much loved. He has lived an active life into his 90s and it’s hard to believe that he is no longer with us.” Born in Nottinghamshire on March 2, 1926, at 14, after leaving school and going to work as a clerk at a local accountancy firm, he started to keep a diary recording aircraft losses on both sides during the Battle of Britain. As soon as he was old enough, he applied to join the RAF. Due to a wartime shortage of bank staff, aged 16 he became a counter clerk with the Westminster Bank. Called up to the RAF in 1944, he served as ground crew at Bomber
Command airfields in Lincolnshire. When World War II ended, he was posted to the RAF meteorological office, and flew out of Gibraltar as a weather observer in converted Halifax Bombers. Luckily, he survived when his aircraft ditched in the Mediterranean. He made his first visit to Westminster Abbey when he was still in the RAF and decided to take Holy Orders on demobilisation. As soon as he was demobbed he went to train for the priesthood at King’s College, London, and St Boniface, Warminster. He was ordained in 1951. He was a notable diarist and obituarist for the national newspapers and published highly-regarded books including A Dean’s Diary: Winchester 1987-1996. After retiring as Dean of Winchester, he was awarded the OBE in the 1997 New Year’s Honours List “for services to the Church of England, particularly as Dean of Winchester Cathedral”. Two years later he was awarded an honorary degree from Southampton University.