Yolande Elsa Maria Beekman (7 January 1911 – 13 September 1944) was a British spy in World War II who served in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force and the Special Operations Executive. She was a member of SOE's Musician circuit in occupied France during World War II where she operated as a wireless operator until arrested by the Gestapo. She was subsequently executed at the Dachau concentration camp.
Early life
Beekman was born Yolande Elsa Maria Unternährer to a Swiss father and an English mother in Paris. As a child, she moved to London and grew up fluent in English, German, and French. Young Yolande had a gentle disposition and liked to draw, so her family expected that she would become a designer or illustrator. After schooling in England she was sent to a Swiss finishing school.
Wartime service
WAAF and SOE
When World War II broke out, Beekman joined the WAAF where she trained as a W/T operator. Because of her language skills and wireless expertise, Beekman was recruited by the SOE for work in occupied France, officially joining the SOE on 15 February 1943. She trained with Noor Inayat Khan and Yvonne Cormeau.
In 1943, Beekman married Sergeant Jaap Beekman of the Netherlands Army, whom she had met on the W/T operator's course, but a short time after her marriage she said goodbye to her husband and was flown behind enemy lines in France. Beekman was landed in France on the night of 17/18 September 1943, having been flown in a Double Lysander aircraft in operation Millner.
Lands in France
In France, Beekman operated the wireless for Gustave Biéler, the Canadian in charge of the Musician circuit at Saint-Quentin in the département of Aisne, using the codenames "Mariette" and "Kilt" (wireless codename), and the alias "Yvonne". She also transmitted messages for the adjacent Farmer network, headed by Michael Trotobas. Beekman became an efficient and valued agent who, in addition to her all important radio transmissions to London, took charge of the distribution of materials dropped by Allied planes.
Beekman's first lodgings were with a long serving résistant and schoolmistress, Mlle Lefevre, but this could only be a temporary stay. At the beginning of October, she moved to the house of Camille Boury, who worked at the Pharmacie Corteel, and lived on the corner of Rue Baudelaire. Odette Gobeaux, who worked with Boury at the pharmacy, offered Beekman the draughty attic of her house from which to transmit.
Beekman began quietly visiting Gobeaux's house in Rue de la Fère, letting herself in with her own key during the day, placing her set on a small table and passing the long aerial out through the window above. Interviewed after the war, Gobeaux remembered Beekman often waiting for the next transmission, lying on a divan with her head in a book, apparently unruffled by the possibility of arrest. Eugène Cordelette, one of MUSICIAN's lieutenants, later described Bieler and Beekman as being "both of the finest stuff imaginable", but her training should have left her more mindful of security.
Following her instructions from London, Beekman transmitted using a pre‐arranged schedule (or "sked"), sending messages at specific times and frequencies three times a week. This was standard practice for SOE wireless operators in France, though most would try and set up several sets at different safe houses, switching between them to avoid detection (some safety improvements such as more flexible transmission skeds were introduced only after Beekman was sent to France). Operating from a single static radio post greatly increased the chances of being hunted down by German direction finding (D/F) teams, which were known to prowl the streets of major towns and cities across the country, and it is not clear why Beekman apparently did not use additional hideouts – perhaps it was too difficult to find suitable locations in such a densely populated area, or she might have had technical problems with the wireless sets available.