Defiant to the end: The true story of a British spy's courage in the face of Nazi torture and the firing squad whose heroics were immortalised in the film Carve Her Name With Pride
The medal ceremony was one of the most unusual over which His Majesty King George VI ever presided. Curtseying before him at Buckingham Palace was a pretty four-year-old.
Wearing a puff-sleeved dress, with her hair in ribbons, the little girl looked ready for a birthday party.
Yet there Tania Szabo was, being presented to the monarch and having a George Cross for bravery pinned to her chest.
The explanation for this extraordinary event 70 years ago was both simple and poignant.
The award had been made posthumously to Tania’s mother Violette Szabo, one of the most courageous British agents to have operated behind enemy lines during World War II.
Only 22 when she first parachuted into France, Violette was a striking beauty who had previously worked on the perfume counter at a London department store.
She bore a strong resemblance to Hollywood star Ingrid Bergman and had ambitions to become an actress herself. But it was only in 1958, 13 years after her death, that she achieved fame on the silver screen when her story was told in the film Carve Her Name With Pride, in which she was played by Virginia McKenna.
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