Photo courtesy of Michael Potter
Marthe Cohn, a true hero of the Holocaust and World War II, died in Palos Verdes, California, on May 21, 2025. Marthe, whose bravery went unknown for decades, was a spy in Nazi Germany. I had the great honor and important responsibility of accompanying her, along with her husband Major, for a day’s activities in Jerusalem, Israel, in October 2019. At the time, she was hoping to reach her 100th birthday, and she outdid that by more than five years. This beautiful day in Jerusalem was organized by Michael Potter, with whom I share a dear friend. We spent the morning at Yad Vashem, per Marthe’s request, and later in the day we went to the U.S. Embassy to meet with then Ambassador David Friedman. Later in the week, we met again at the Haifa Film Festival where Chichinette: An Accidental Spy, a documentary about Marthe, premiered. There is also a 2002 book that she co-authored with Wendy Holden, Behind Enemy Lines: the True Story of a French Jewish Spy in Nazi Germany (Harmony Books). Among the numerous obituaries in the press, see https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/article-855258.
Rochelle G. Saidel, PhD
Michael Potter offered the following eulogy for his beloved former neighbor, Marthe Cohn:
A Life Of Courage And A Spirit Of Justice by Michael Potter
It was both very ordinary and at the same time extraordinary to grow up across the street from an unlikely spy and an unlikely hero. At her tallest Marthe Cohn never came close to five feet tall, which confirms the quip that dynamite indeed comes in very small packages. Marthe explained that she was reluctant to tell people she was a spy, decades after the war, because she thought people would not believe her, since she did not resemble the tall statuesque women in the James Bond movies. She embodied so many extremes. She has a formidable memory and drive. Her internal energy and discipline were extraordinary.
It may bring a modicum of comfort from the words that the poet Maya Angelou wrote, “And when great souls die, after a period of peace blooms, slowly and always irregularly. Spaces fill with a kind of soothing electric vibration. Our senses, restored, never to be the same, whisper to us. They existed. They existed. We can be. Be and be better. For they existed.”
Like so many aspects of her life, her age was also extreme, making it to 105. Most people want to know the success of a long life. In the case of Marthe it was not diet, nor sleep, nor exercise. Perhaps a bit of her remarkable age is attributable to winning the genetic lottery. However, Marthe was driven by a larger, more powerful purpose. She wanted the world to know of her struggles, her journey, and her story. She wanted the world to remember those that lost their lives, including her sister Stephanie. But most importantly she fought to remind the world that it was necessary to stand up to injustice, hate, and intolerance. She would be happy if love or justice would prevail, or even just decency and common sense would win the day.
Marthe received countless medals and commendations from around the world. But she always held a special place in her heart for the French honor of the Médaille Militaire, the Chevalier of the Légion d’Honneur, and the Médaille de la Gratitude de la Nation. She joined the greats of Prime Minister Winston Churchill, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, General Dwight Eisenhower, General Douglas MacArthur, and other outstanding wartime heroes. Our French advisors on the issues of honors emphasize that she received legitimate and serious military honors which are very different from a civilian honor.
Marthe was fearless. In her 90s, the FBI called her to tell her not to speak at a public event because of potential threats from white supremacists. Marthe just laughed and reminded them that she survived the Nazis, and she was not going to be scared or intimidated by random extremists. I think Peggy Noonan, who met Marthe at the New Orleans World War II museum, said it best, “I had the honor of meeting Marthe, a woman with the most beautiful blue eyes, but if you turned around, Marthe was a spy and she could possibly end your life.”
In April, shortly after Marthe’s birthday, friends and family and the local community of Metz, France, honored her and her sister Stephanie by placing “Stolpersteine,” Holocaust memorial stones, in front of their ancestral home. One pledge that Marthe made that always touched me was her commitment to stand up and defend the honor of France and the ordinary French people that protected her family and others during the war. Although we struggled mightily with local politicians and technocrats navigating the placement of the stones as it was so important for us that Stephanie be honored during Marthe’s lifetime, Marthe insisted that we honor her prime directive, which was to uphold her pledge to honor those French that had saved the innocents.
In the end Marthe’s legacy was perhaps not just as a wife, a mom, or as a neighbor, or as a spy, or as a nurse, or as a researcher, or as an author, but as a true life force and a spirit for justice and courage and the determination to do what is right–which she tirelessly passed on to tens of thousands of audiences that she captured with her exploits. She was a spirit of justice far greater in size than her diminutive stature and will remain with us far longer than her remarkable age. May her memories always be a blessing.
Marthe and Major Cohn at Yad Vashem, 2019. Photo by Rochelle G Saidel.