The Secrets of Rue St. Roch: Hope and Heroism Behind Enemy Lines in the First World War

by Janet Morgan

Paris, 1917, and war is raging across Europe. Lise Rischard, an ordinary housewife stranded in the city, is desperate to return to her husband in Luxembourg. But her homeland is occupied by the enemy and she must pay a high price to get undertaking a dangerous spying mission for intelligence officer George Bruce of 41 Rue St Roch. As the fate of the war hangs in the balance, she and an intrepid group of men and women, including priest Father Cambron, schoolteacher Joseph Hansen and, above all, dashing adventurer and balloonist Albert Baschwitz Meau must risk their lives infiltrating German territory to bring vital information back to the allies

Genres: History, War, Nonfiction

Paperback

First published August 5, 2004

Reviews

[Rob Kitchin · Rating 4 out of 5]

In 1995 Robert Bruce and his wife Janet Morgan opened a chest belonging to Robert’s father. In it they discovered all the files belonging to a First World War spy ring run by Major George Bruce from a house on the Rue St Roch in Paris. Rather than following protocol and filing or destroying the papers, Bruce had decided to maintain a personal archive of all the letters and coded newspaper stories concerning a successful train-spotting cell in Luxembourg. The volume and scope of the material, along with subsequent interviews with the ring’s descendents, enabled Janet Morgan to construct a fascinating account of how the ring was created, how it operated, the personalities involved and their trials and tribulations, the politics of intra- and inter-service rivalries, and what the ring communicated to British intelligence.

The lynch-pin to the operation was Madame Rischard, an upper-class house-wife to a Luxembourg doctor, who manages to travel from Luxembourg, through Germany and Switzerland to Paris to see her son, who is fighting for the French. There she becomes stranded, having left Switzerland illegally, and is persuaded after many attempts by Major Bruce to become a secret agent and to set up a spy ring in her native country. The aim of the ring was to collect information on all of the German supply and troop trains crossing the country and their destination, thus giving an indication of where future attacks might occur. Whilst Madame Rischard, after intensive training in codes and espionage, was to travel back to her country by train via Switzerland, her fellow spymaster was to be flown in via a balloon drifting over enemy lines. Baschwitz Meau, a Belgian soldier, was captured by the Germans, but escaped five times from prisoner of war camps before finally make it back to Allied territory. An adventurer by nature, he volunteers to be infiltrated into Luxembourg to aid Madame Rischard in setting up the ring and collecting information. There they are aided by Madame Rischard’s husband who tends to railway workers, a local teacher who writes newspaper stories that include a secret code, a local newspaper who publishes the stories, and a handful of railway workers. The newspaper is sent to a priest in Switzerland, who then passed it on to British intelligence. For the last nine months of the war the ring supplied detailed information that helped the allies determine the German’s battle plans. After the war they were all decorated by British and French authorities.

The book is nicely written and constructed, and is full of detail about the whole operation -- perhaps too much detail in places, slowing the narrative a little. Moreover, the personalities involved and their complex interplay are brought to life. Overall, an insightful and interesting read.

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

There is a reason why the World Wars receive endless treatment in films and novels; probably because modern war comes closest to the true-life adventure people can experience in the world today. Thus, Janet Morgan's The Secrets of Rue St. Roch is a harrowing tale of the daunting exploits of British and French spies during the First World War. While trainspotting may be a leisurely British pastime, watching trains was far from a diversion during the First World War, and a crucial secret service tactic in order to determine the forces the enemy would convey into the battlefield. Trains were the essential mode of shipping troops into the various theaters of war, and one could determine the levels of troops and armaments employed just by counting the numbers of cars behind a locomotive. The British Secret Service set up an office on 41 rue St. Roch in Paris and employed agents to closely watch train stations. Thus Madame Riscard, a French woman, was employed in German-occupied Luxembourg. She would send letters in code to reveal the details of hers and other agents' clandestine observations. Rue St. Roch also includes the exploits of one Baschwitz Meau, an escaped Belgian soldier from a German prison camp, who eventually would attempt a daring night flight into occupied Luxemberg using a heat-filled balloon. Not only were trains carefully watched, but so were the skies, and the German forces would shoot down any object they determined to be of the enemy, balloon or otherwise, that appeared in their sights. A well-researched work on spycraft in the First World War, Rue St. Roch reads like a John Buchan thriller.

[Sophie Schiller · Rating 5 out of 5]

Janet Morgan has reconstructed the workings of an underground British intelligence cell in German-occupied Luxembourg. Using a hidden cache of documents, she successfully recreates the personalities and characters of the major players, depicts the danger, the bureaucratic frustrations, the triumphs, and the aftermath of this dangerous spy game. Thanks to Ms. Morgan, we now know about such personalities of Baschwitz-Meau, a Belgian daredevil whose innate love of excitement and thrills make him the perfect candidate to infiltrate enemy territory in a balloon. Great for lovers of WWI, the history of intelligence operations, and lesser-known spies.

[Sabrina Flynn · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked this up because I was doing research into intelligence during WW1. Was very happy with the information and readability. I was looking for a book that contained the little details of Intelligence efforts behind enemy lines and information about the coordinating side of things. This book definitely delivered. A fascinating read.

[Maria · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great story but very complicated writing, which made it very difficult to follow and read. I almost had the need to keep notes especially in the first 100 pages. Took me ages to read. I had to be rested and fully concentrated, in order to get what was going on. Shame because the story and the characters (all true) are amazing.

[Joyce Hampton · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book full of detail which at the start can seem a little ponderous but as the twists and turns of the events unfold you begin to see why so much detail is necessary. I found this book very well researched and the style is easy to follow. I was in fact rather sad when I got to the end of the book - so it is well worth the read

[Linda Andrews · Rating 4 out of 5]

Packed with lots of details about British Intelligence behind the lines and full of lots of little details, the book mainly focuses on the building of a spy ring in Luxembourg with only a few references to operations in Belgium and occupied France. And it covers primarily the end of the war from 1917-1918. Still a fascinating and invaluable resource since very little evidence remains of what these brave men and women accomplished.

[Heidi · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a bit dense but a decent enough book if you enjoy WWI.