François Thierry-Mieg

François Thierry-Mieg a.k.a. "Vaudreuil" on September 10, 1941 François Thierry-Mieg MBE (18 November 1908 – 30 September 1995) was a high-ranking member of Bureau Central de Renseignements et d'Action (BCRA), the Free French intelligence services during WWII.

After the outbreak of World War II, Thierry-Mieg fought in the Battle of France. He was captured by the Wehrmacht but managed to escape to the Soviet Union in January 1941. At the time, Joseph Stalin was still an ally of Hitler. François Thierry-Mieg was imprisoned for a few months in the NKVD prisons (Kaunas, Lubyanka).

After Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, he joined General de Gaulle and the Free French Forces in London. He was promoted to the rank of captain and took the code name of “Vaudreuil”. He was then appointed as head of the French Military Mission to Gibraltar, shortly before the Allied invasion of French North Africa ("Operation Torch”). He received the Medal of Freedom with bronze palm and the Resistance Medal After the war, Captain Thierry-Mieg became chief of staff to General Henri Riviere, the new head of Service de Documentation Extérieure et de Contre-Espionnage (1946-1951). He eventually retired from the army and became a businessman.

His daughter Pascale married Sir Christopher Mallaby, British ambassador to Germany (1988-1992) and France (1993-1996).