Roland Philipps: Mathilde Carré, ‘La Chatte’ (1940)

Roland Philipps takes us to France on the eve of occupation. We follow the shifting fortunes of an extraordinary female double agent - Mathilde Carré, ‘La Chatte’ - whose life embodies the moral ambiguity of this period of French history.

Mathilde story – as told in our guest today’s latest book, Victoire: A Wartime Story of Resistance, Collaboration and Betrayal – illustrates the dark complexities of life in Vichy France. She was neither a perfect French patriot, nor a heartless traitor. What she was, however, was a survivor. 

Roland Philipps was a leading publisher for many years. His first book, A Spy Named Orphan: The Enigma of Donald Maclean, was published in 2018. 

As ever, much, much more about this episode – including contemporary photographs of Vichy France and Mathilde - is to be found at our website tttpodcast.com.

Show notes

Scene One: 17th June 1940.  The Loire.  France is collapsing in the face of the Wehrmacht’s lightning war, millions are fleeing Paris and the north in ‘the Exodus’, amongst them Mathilde Carré, who has left her nursing station and is following the war south, outraged at what she sees as the cowardice of her country.

Scene Two: Mid-September 1940.  Toulouse.  The Vichy government is in place and France is divided between the occupied and non-occupied zones. Despair of Mathilde, about to commit suicide when she decides to become ‘a second Joan of Arc’.

Scene Three: 14th November 1940. Paris. Mathilde Carré arrives in Paris to found the Interallié intelligence network with Roman Czerniawski.

Memento: Mathilde’s ‘Spy’s Handbook’

People/Social

Presenter: Artemis Irvine

Guest: Roland Philipps

Production: Maria Nolan

Podcast partner: Colorgraph

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