Greetings Card - New Year in 1914. And a Dachau Execution.

            The Postcard

A postally unused postcard bearing no publisher's name. The card was printed in Saxony, although the design of the back of the card looks American.

The card was posted in West Lynn, Massachusetts on Thursday the 1st. January 1914 to:

Margaret Rickman,
56, Fourth Street,
West Lynn.

The message on the divided back of the card was as follows:

"Love from Blanche".

Inayat Khan

So what else happened on the day that Blanche posted the card?

Well, the 1st. January 1914 marked the birth of Noor-un-Nisa Inayat Khan, GC.

She was a British heroine of World War II renowned for her service in the Special Operations Executive.

She also went by the name Nora Baker, and was a published author of Indian Muslim and American descent who was posthumously awarded the George Cross for her service in the SOE, the highest civilian decoration in the UK. 

As an SOE agent she became the first female wireless operator to be sent from Great Britain into occupied France to aid the French Resistance during World War II, and was Britain's first Muslim war heroine.

Inayat Khan was betrayed to the Germans by a double agent working for the Sicherheitsdienst.

She was arrested and taken to Germany on the 27th. November 1943 "for safe custody". 

Khan was imprisoned at Pforzheim in solitary confinement as a "Nacht und Nebel" ("Night and Fog": condemned to "Disappearance Without Trace") prisoner, in complete secrecy. For ten months, she was kept there, shackled at her hands and feet. 

Execution

Inayat Khan was abruptly transferred to Dachau concentration camp with fellow agents Yolande Beekman, Madeleine Damerment and Eliane Plewman, and at dawn on the following morning, the 13th. September 1944, the four women were executed.

A Gestapo man named Christian Ott gave a statement to American investigators after the war as to the fate of Inayat Khan and her three companions. Ott was stationed at Karlsruhe and volunteered to accompany the four women to Dachau as he wanted to visit his family in Stuttgart on the return journey. He reported:

'The four prisoners had come from the 
barrack in the camp, where they had 
spent the night, into the yard where the 
shooting was to be done. 
Here the death sentence was announced
to them. 
The German-speaking Englishwoman told 
her companion of this death sentence. 
All four had grown very pale and wept. 
Khan asked whether they could protest 
against the sentence. The Kommandant 
declared that no protest could be made.
The four prisoners now had to kneel with 
their heads towards a small mound of earth, 
and were killed by two SS men, one after
another by a shot through the back of 
the neck. 
During the shooting the two Englishwomen 
held hands and the two French women 
did likewise. 
For three of the prisoners the first shot 
caused death, but for the German-speaking 
Englishwoman a second shot had to be fired, 
as she still showed signs of life. 
After the shooting of these prisoners the 
Lagerkommandant said to the two SS men 
that he took a personal interest in the jewellery 
of the women, and that this should be taken 
to his office'.
   

Taken on: August 4, 2019

Tags:

postcard

old

nostalgia

nostalgic

greetings

card

new

year

Dachau

execution

printed

Saxony

American

West

Lynn

Massachusetts

01/01/1914

1914

Margaret

Rickman

Blanche

Noor

Nisa

Inayat

Khan

British

heroine

SOE

Nora

Baker

wireless

operator

double

agent

1943

shackled

1944

Gestapo

jewellery

52GRE53 « less

Sets appears in: • Biographies • Greetings Cards - New Year

Camera: HP Scanjet djf4100 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	HP Scanjet djf4100
Saturation:	Low
Sharpness:	Soft
Color Space:	sRGB
Software:	PaintShop Pro 18.00
Show full info

Stats: 711 views / 2 comments