WOMAN'S RUSE

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIII, Issue 175, 27 July 1942, Page 3

WOMAN'S RUSE

ESCAPE FROM FRANCE Rec. 9.30 a.m. LONDON. July 26. By pretending to feel faint when about to be questioned by the Nazis, an Englishwoman taken prisoner in France was able to escape to Britain to join the Auxiliary Territorial Service. She is Sergeant Violet Cross, who now wears six medal ribbons, including those of the Croix de Guerre and the Medaille de la Reconnaissance Francaise. She was nursing with the French Army when captured. After a number of adventures she managed to reach Paris, where she said her husband was living. The Chamber of Deputies in Paris was crowded with Nazi officials and, while waiting for an interview in the endeavour to get a pass to Spain, she closed her eyes, as she hated the sight of so many Germans in one room.

A Nazi tapped her on the shoulder and offered her water, and another gave her a bar of chocolate. She suddenly realised they thought she was ill. and proceeded to give a realistic display of fainting fits. Embarrassed, and anxious to get rid of her, the Germans gave her a pass to the Spanish frontier and bustled her out of the room.