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Overlooked Important WWII Figures from History

Khalid Elhassan October 20, 2019 31 min

35. The Teen Fighter

French Resistance members sabotaging rail tracks. Pintrest

Simone Segouin was taught how to operate a submachine gun – a weapon with which she became highly proficient. She was also gradually brought up to speed on the activities of the Francs-Tireurs et Partisans, a combat alliance of militant communists and French nationalists. As a courier, she needed a bicycle to get about, but not having one, her first mission was to steal one from the Germans.

She pulled it off, and the bike was repainted and became her personal reconnaissance vehicle, allowing her to deliver messages and stake out targets. After demonstrating that she could handle herself in dangerous situations, Simone was allowed to take part in hazardous combat missions such as blowing up bridges, derailing trains, and killing or capturing Germans.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.