Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I move:

That the Senate records its deep regret at the death, on 7 August 2011, of Nancy Grace Augusta Wake, AC, GM, decorated Second World War servicewoman, and places on record its appreciation of her service to the allied forces and resistance to the German occupation of France and tenders its profound sympathy to her extended family.

It is rare for the Senate to move a condolence motion other than for very specific groups of persons like former members of the parliament but, on this occasion, the Senate has agreed to do so, given the outstanding nature of Nancy Wake's contribution and her place in the history of Australia.

It is very rare for Australians to adopt New Zealanders, but Australians claim her as an Australian. Nancy Wake was actually born in Wellington, New Zealand, on 30 August 1912. Despite her many exploits she lived a very long life. Her family moved to Sydney in 1914. Nancy's early life was challenging. Her father abandoned the family in Australia after selling the family home and heading back to New Zealand. Nancy's mother was allegedly quite religious and apparently oppressively strict. It was perhaps her experiences as a child with an absent father and a controlling mother which encouraged the defiant and rebellious streak in Nancy.

At 16, she took her first job as a nurse. Then she used a small family inheritance to fund travel to Europe, with the aim of training as a journalist, a career which she would eventually pursue. We should remember that at that stage it would have been very unusual for a woman to pursue a career like that. As a journalist one of her first assignments was to interview Adolph Hitler. Her travels in the 1930s in Vienna allowed her to witness the Nazi regime firsthand. Speaking about this experience of witnessing the persecution of Jews she said, 'I don't know what I'll do about it, but if I can do anything one day, I'll do it.'

Settling in Paris, she met her first husband, French industrialist Henri Edmond Fiocca. Together they both joined the French Resistance shortly after the invasion of France by the Nazis in 1940. In this early period in the resistance, she began by smuggling messages and goods in Vichy, France. Buying an ambulance, she successfully smuggled refugees fleeing the German advance. By 1942, the Gestapo had become aware of an unidentified woman agent who they sought to capture. Nancy was nicknamed the White Mouse and placed at No. 1 on the Gestapo wanted list, with a 5 million franc bounty. She escaped to London around this time but tragically her husband was captured, tortured and killed by the Gestapo after their resistance network was betrayed.

After moving to London she joined the British Special Operations Executive, where she became a member of a 470-strong specially trained resistance force set up to work directly with local resistance forces. In 1944, Nancy Wake was parachuted into Auvergne to assist the D-Day landings. She was required to organise and coordinate an army of 7,000 resistance troops. Perhaps the most significant operation of her unit was a very successful attack on a Gestapo headquarters.

One of her resistance colleagues said of Nancy: 'She is the most feminine woman I know, until the fight starts. Then she is like five men.' Wake was never shy of being put in the middle of action, often taking responsibility because a woman was deemed to have more chance of success. In one particularly gruelling operation, she cycled about 500 kilometres in 72 hours, crossing several German checkpoints to find an operator to radio Britain and request new radio codes. That she survived the war is indeed a remarkable fact.

After the war she resettled in Australia with her second husband, ex-RAF pilot John Forward. She then, strangely, became interested in Liberal Party politics, running as a candidate for the federal electorate of Barton in the 1949 election against Doc Evatt, where she secured a 13 per cent swing to the Liberal Party. She again ran against Evatt at the 1951 election, missing out by a mere 250 votes. Her final attempt to win a federal seat was at the 1966 election in the safe Labor seat of Kingsford Smith, where she only lost by about 1,500 votes.

Her awards are numerous and she is arguably the most decorated woman of the Second World War. She has received numerous awards from France. She has the Medal of Freedom from the United States. She has the George Medal from the United Kingdom. In 1970 she was appointed Chevalier of the Legion of Honour and in 1998 was promoted to Officer of the Legion of Honour. Unfortunately, it was not until 2004 that her exploits were recognised by the Australian government, when Nancy was awarded the Companion of the Order of Australia. She has also received recognition from New Zealand.

After her second husband died in Port Macquarie in 1997, she returned to England in 2001. She lived an extraordinary life and her story is just an incredible one. I cannot do justice to it in a short condolence motion speech here, but I do recommend Peter FitzSimons's biography. I have got to be careful about advertising, I suppose, but he did a great job of bringing her story to life and providing the colour and adventure that was so much a part of her incredible story. Peter is an ex-second rower for the Wallabies and played a lot of rugby in the south of France, so he had to be tough and probably a little on the dirty side, but he said after writing the book that, 'We both agreed that she was 10 times the man I would ever be.' He paid an extraordinary tribute to her life in the book.

Nancy Wake was an extraordinary woman. Her life story is one of courage, determination and incredible commitment to freedom and opposition to the invasion of France and the German regime there. It is an incredible life story and I am very pleased to be part of the Senate as it acknowledges that tremendous life and the tremendous contribution she made to Australia and the broader allied Second World War effort.