Byck, Muriel Tamara, 1918-1944
Muriel Byck (4 June 1918 – 23 May 1944) was an agent of the United Kingdom's clandestine Special Operations Executive (SOE) organization in France during World War II. She died of meningitis. Muriel Tamara Byck was the daughter of French Jews, Luba Basia (née Golinska) and Jacques Itzko Byck, who had both taken British nationality. She was born in London.[citation needed]
Her SOE file revealed that from 1923 to 1924 she had lived with her family in Wiesbaden, Germany. The family must have moved to France in 1926 as she went to school at the Lycee de Jeunes Filles, St Germain, France, before moving to England in 1930 as Byck attended the Lycee Francais in Kensington, London, SW7, where she took the Baccalaureate in 1935 and then proceeded to the University of Lille.[1]
Byck worked as a secretary from 1936 to 1938 in London before becoming an Assistant Stage Manager at the Gate Theatre in 1937. At the outbreak of war, she joined the Red Cross as a voluntary worker and the WVS. She moved to Torquay in 1941 where she worked as National Registration Clerk and was also an ARP Warden.[citation needed] Muriel joined the WAAF in December 1942 as a General Duties clerk (Service number 2071428[citation needed]) working in the records office, later being promoted to the rank of Section officer. As she spoke excellent French, she was recruited into the SOE in 1943.[citation needed] She began initial training in September 1943 at Winterfold House, Cranleigh, in Surrey. From here she proceeded to para-military training at Meoble Lodge, Morar, Invernesshire until October and wireless operator training at Thame Park, Oxfordshire in November and December 1943. She was chosen by French resistance leader Philippe de Vomécourt to be his wireless operator. Byck worked long hours as a wireless operator, so fatigue was expected. However, when she collapsed at the blacksmith's house and lost consciousness, she required urgent medical attention. De Vomécourt took her to a doctor known to the resistance; he diagnosed meningitis and told them that hospitalisation was her only chance. This posed a problem as the Germans kept a check on hospital admissions and scrutinised the papers of all people entering. The cover story devised was that Byck and de Vomécourt (as her uncle) were evacuees from Paris. Byck was admitted to the hospital in Romorantin, now Romorantin-Lanthenay, which was run by nuns. She was given a lumbar puncture, but died shortly afterward on 23 May 1944, aged 25.[3]
She was buried in Romorantin and for many years her grave was tended by the local people. The townsfold of Romorantin commemorated the Anniversary of her death as a heroine of the Resistance. Later, her grave was moved to the Pornic War Cemetery.
