Isolated Burial

The grave site includes a horizontal marble slab and reportedly includes a plaque from the Royal Air Forces Escaping Society recognizing the heroism of Roberta Betty (Laurie) Countess de Mauduit, a Scottish-born American civilian who supported the French Resistance and assisted the evasion of over 50 Allied aircrew members from German-occupied France during World War II.

Escape and evasion lines in World War II helped people escape European countries occupied by Nazi Germany. The focus of most escape lines in Western Europe was assisting Allied airmen shot down over occupied Europe to evade capture and escape to Gibraltar, neutral Spain or Sweden, from where they could return to the United Kingdom. British Military Intelligence Section 9 (MI9), British Special Operations Executive (SOE), and other Allied organizations, including the American Office of Strategic Services (OSS), coordinated most operations and support for the effort to recover soldiers and airmen who escaped from German captivity or attempted to evade capture after landing in hostile territory. About 7,000 airmen and soldiers, mostly American, British, and Canadian, were helped to evade German capture in Western Europe and successfully returned through the United Kingdom during World War II.

MI9s first attempt, called the Oaktree Line, to set up an escape line to move aircrew by boat from Brittany to England failed in mid-1943 due to German infiltration, poor leadership, and extreme risk- taking under Vladimir Pavlovich Bouryschkine, a Russian-born American MI9 agent also known as Val Williams. One helper of note along Oaktree Line was the American Roberta Betty (Laurie) Countess de Mauduit, who chose to stay alone with household staff at Chateau du Bourblanc in Plourivo on the northern coast of Brittany when her French husband Henri left to join

Free French Forces in 1940. Certain that her U.S. citizenship and social status would give her sufficient protection, she assumed the risk, initially providing support to resistance efforts, then started cooperation with MI9 in April 1943. Before her capture only a few months later, she sheltered about 50 Allied aircrew members transiting along the Oaktree Line, including from U.S. B-17 aircraft #42-5717, #42-5232 Available Jones, #42-5378, #42-29627 Midnight, and #42-29767 Boot Hill. Five members of the latter crew managed to avoid capture when the Gestapo searched the Chateau and arrested her on 17 June 1943. She was detained, interrogated, and tortured at sites including Ravensbrück and later Buchenwald, from which forces from the 3rd U.S. Army freed her in April 1945.

Sources of information: www.facebook.com/ Mansfield, MA Historical Society, robertlyman.substack.com

Sources of photo: cimetiere.gescime.com, findagrave

A LA MEMOIRE DE 

ROBERTA LAURIE

QUI, ALORS QUELLE ETAIT CHATELAINE DU BOURBLANC,

HEBERGEA AU PERIL DE SA VIE UN GRANDE NOMBRE DAVIATEURS

ALLIES QUI FURENT RAPATRIES EN GRANDE-BRETAGNE POUR Y

REPRENDRE LE COMBAT, PAR LA MISSION OAKTREE ET LE RESEAU

SHELBURNE, TANDIS QUELLE-MEME PAYAIT SON DEVOUEMENT AU

PRIX DUNE DURE ET LONGUE DEPORTATION DANS LES CAMPS NAZIS.

IN MEMORIAM, THE ROYAL AIR FORCES ESCAPING SOCIETY

EN HOMMAGE DE FIDELE AFFECTION A CELLE QUE SES AMIS DE

FRANCE, DE GRANDE-BRETAGNE, DES ETATS-UNIS DAMERIQUE, DU

CANADA, DAUSTRALIE ET DE NOUVELLE-ZELANDE, AIMAIENT ET

ADMIRAIENT SOUS LE NOM DE

BETTY

English translation:

IN MEMORY OF

ROBERTA LAURIE

WHO, WHILE SHE WAS THE MISTRESS OF A LARGE ESTATE IN THE

BOURBLANC, SHELTERED AT HER OWN PERIL A LARGE NUMBER OF

ALLIED AIRMEN WHO WERE BROUGHT BACK TO BRITAIN TO

RESUME COMBAT THERE, BY THE OAKTREE MISSION AND THE

SHELBURNE NETWORK, WHILE SHE HERSELF PAID FOR HER

DEDICATION AT THE PRICE OF A HARSH AND LONG DEPORTATION

TO THE NAZI CAMPS.

IN MEMORIAN, THE ROYAL AIR FORCES ESCAPING SOCIETY

IN TRIBUTE OF FAITHFUL AFFECTION FOR THE ONE WHOM HER

FRIENDS FROM FRANCE, BRITAIN, THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

CANADA, AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND LOVED AND ADMIRED

UNDER THE NAME

BETTY