Hugo Bleicher
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Hugo Bleicher (b. 1899) was a German agent of Abwehr who worked against French Resistance in German-occupied France.
Huge Bleicher was born in Germany in 1899. He became a businessman but was recruited into Abwehr during World War II because of his knowledge of many languages. However, he never rose above the rank of sergeant.
Bleicher was ruthless in his pursuit of anyone in France who opposed Nazi domination. He demolished the Interallie network and captured both Roman Sziarnewski and Mathilde Carre. Some think he may have become Carre's lover and others believe he forced her to work as a double agent under threat of torture.
In March 1943 he arrested André Marsac, a member of the resistance organisation known as Carte. Masquerading as a German intelligence colonel attempting to defect to the Allies, he deceived Marsac and his associate Roger Bardet, and in April succeeding in capturing SOE agent Peter Churchill and Odette Sansom. Both Churchill and Sansom were subjected to brutal torture before being shipped to a concentration camp.
Bleicher persuaded Bardet to work for him. As a result, in July 1944 Bleicher captured Henri Frager, another former Carte member who had been commissioned by SOE as leader of its Donkeyman circuit.
He was also believed to be associated with SOE agent Henri Dericourt, who was considered by many to have been a double agent.
At the end of the war Hugo Bleicher was arrested in Amsterdam and was placed on trial and imprisoned by the Allies. More than "carrying out orders of his superiors," as a result of his near-fanatical support for Nazi goals of world domination, many French Resistance workers and SOE agents such as race car drivers, Robert Benoist and William Grover-Williams were arrested, tortured and forced to live in subhuman conditions in concentration camps before being executed.
In 1954 Bleicher published his memoirs, Colonel Henri's story.