France Antelme

Who was France Antelme?

Major Joseph Antoine France Antelme OBE was one of 14 Franco-Mauritians who served in the Special Operations Executive, a World War II British secret service that sent spies, saboteurs and guerrilla fighters into enemy-occupied territory.

After spying in Vichy-held Madagascar ahead of the allied landings there in May 1942, Antelme joined the SOE F section in England. He undertook two missions in occupied France. On this third mission, on 29 February 1944, he parachuted into a Gestapo reception committee and was captured. He was murdered, with 18 other captured SOE officers, at the Gross-Rosen concentration camp in Lower Silesia in July or August 1944.