Unbelievable Bravery: The Last Secret Agent

Pippa Latour was one of the last female special operations agents in France to get out alive after its liberation in WWII. Born in 1921, she became a covert special operations agent for the British Army and was parachuted into a field in Nazi-occupied Normandy. Pippa was lauded for her fluency with languages and her coding ability – attributes she put to remarkable use when she posed as a teenage soap-seller, often selling her wares to the German soldiers and sending back information via code to England. Incredibly, she kept her service secret for 70 years. We talk to Jude Dobson about what motivated Pippa, her fears and the source of her courage.

Pippa Latour lived in New Zealand from the 1960s where she raised her four children, but her work as a spy remained a secret. When her WWII work was revealed, she was awarded France's highest military decoration and recognised as the last surviving F (French) Section Special Operations agent. Before her death at the age of 102 last year, she told her story with the assistance of TV personality Jude Dobson.

Jude Dobson, known for presenting on shows such as Sale of the Century, has been researching, writing, producing and directing WWI and WWII content for the past six years. She won the New York Radio Awards Bronze Award in 2023 in the historical documentary category.