Monday, March 8, 2010

Andrée Peel, 1905-2010. R.I.P.

Andrée Peel, an instrumental figure in the French Resistance during the Second World War, died on Friday due to complications from a fractured hip in Britain. She was 105.

Risking her life to help Allied pilots she became affectionately known as Agent Rose.

Indeed, she spent time in the Buchenwald concentration camp and was literally moments away from being shot by a firing squad when American troops arrived to liberate the camp.

Peel would later remark, "You don't know what freedom is if you have never lost it."

It is difficult to appreciate freedom if you haven't had to fight for it. And what I mean is by fighting for freedom you have the knowledge that you might lose and not live to fight another day. I can definitively state I have never been in such a precarious position. Sometimes our blessings are a curse.

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