She was the most famous Polish "spy in a skirt" during World War II. A Polish aristocrat on her father's side, she was of Jewish descent on her mother's. Her undeniable successes in intelligence work were never properly recognized. She was murdered under highly suspicious circumstances at the age of just 44, "a countess stabbed to death in London," wrote The New York Times.
Krystyna Skarbek was born on May 1, 1908, the product of a much-publicized misalliance. Her landowner father, Count Jerzy Skarbek, to shore up his finances, married a wealthy Jewish girl, Stefania Maria Goldfeder, whose father was a Warsaw banker, in late December 1899. The bride's substantial dowry paid off Skarbek's debts and allowed him to live a high life for a time without taking up permanent employment. He brought his noble ancestry to this marriage. The family had been prominent since the 12th century. Jan z Góry (Jan of Góra) established a successful career and became the tutor of the future Prince Bolesław Krzywousty (Bolesław III Wrymouth). Krystyna's father was also a distant relative of the Hungarian regent Miklós Horthy . Skarbek had his firstborn son, Andrzej. Eight years after him, the future agent was born. After her birth, she was baptized by water. The official church baptismal document dates from 1913 and lists Warsaw as her birthplace. When she was four, her entire family moved to the Count's family estate in Trzepnica. She was "daddy's little girl." He taught her how to ride. She rode like a man, sitting astride a horse, not side-saddle like other women. At 10, she met her future lover, Andrzej Kowerski, in the stables at home. Her home schooling ended when she was sent to school for fifth grade. But that ended in 1926, when she turned 18. The Skarbek family faced serious troubles. Destroyed, they were forced to sell the Trzepnice estate. Krystyna's father died after a long illness in 1930. Her mother's Jewish relatives were unable to help them. Their family bank went bankrupt and closed in 1932.
| Krystyna Skarbek in her youth
Writer Arkady Fiedler recalled: "She was a young woman of extraordinary beauty and a turbulent fate. Although endowed with a lively temperament, we remained just friends; I preferred to create pleasant atmospheres with her at the restaurant or dance table, full of cheerful madness and champagne imagination, rather than engage in lovemaking. Krystyna was exceptionally charming, intelligent, but riddled with strange complexes; she was experiencing family whims and snobbish twists." The beautiful countess had no dowry and had to take up paid work. She found it in the office of a Fiat car dealership. There she met her first husband. Gustaw Gettlich was an entrepreneur from a wealthy family of German descent from Łódź. They married on April 21, 1930, in the church of the Seminary in Warsaw. Her husband was a workaholic. They divorced after only six months of marriage. In 1930, Krystyna won second place in the Miss Poland competition. She was a slim, shapely brunette. After her divorce, she returned to work at the Fiat office. There, she developed lung disease from the exhaust fumes emitted by the cars being tested. Initially, doctors suspected tuberculosis, from which her father had died. She received compensation from the insurance company and was advised to spend as much time outdoors as possible. She saved her health by hiking in the Tatra Mountains. She worked as a journalist in Cieszyn. It was suspected that she might also have been smuggling cigarettes. She was an excellent skier, even becoming "Miss Ski." Her father taught her the sport when she was a child. In 1931, she met her second husband on a ski slope, who literally saved her from a dangerous fall. Jerzy Giżycki, nearly 20 years her senior, was a writer, diplomat, and traveler. He was wealthy and had extensive international connections. He came from a wealthy Polish family from Kamieniec Podolski. He graduated with degrees in law and sociology. Before 1914, he found himself in America, where he worked as a gold prospector, lumberjack, and cowboy. He also worked as a driver for millionaire John Rockefeller. After the end of World War I, he served as secretary at the Polish legation in Washington, D.C. He organized the Polish national sports team for the 1924 Olympics in Paris. Two years later, he embarked on the journey of a lifetime. He served as secretary and photographer for writer Ferdynand A. Ossendowski during his trip to Africa. Giżycki was captivated by the African continent, and he returned to it many times, devoting several travel books for young people to it. He and Krystyna married in November 1938. In 1939, much to the dismay of her mother, Krystyna traveled with her husband to Africa. He was assigned to work at the Polish embassy in Abyssinia. Living conditions there proved difficult. Giżycki also had volatile moods, was eccentric, and despotic. Arkady Fiedler recalled: "he was still beautiful and captivating, aquiline, but impossibly gloomy, capricious, and of course the marriage had to fall apart quickly."
| Krystyna Skarbek (second from right) among French partisans.
After the outbreak of World War II, they returned to Europe by ship. They separated in France. They divorced only in 1946. Giżycki was refused conscription due to his health condition. He then became deputy consul general of Poland in London. He lived in Canada and Mexico, where he died in 1970. On October 6, 1939, Krystyna was already in London. She wanted to work in British intelligence, for which she was recommended by journalist Frederic Voigt. Arkady Fiedler suspected that she was an English agent even before the outbreak of the war. In the 30s in Warsaw she was often seen in public with a man from British intelligence in Poland. She also traveled many times to visit her family in England. On December 21, 1939, already a British agent, she went to Hungary, where she pretended to be a journalist for two years. She published articles in the English magazine Nineteenth Century and After. Secret reports described her as "a passionate Polish patriot, an experienced skier, and a great, utterly fearless adventurer." She helped interned Poles in Hungary escape, repeatedly smuggled radio stations into Poland, and collected intelligence data. She collaborated with the Polish underground organization Musketeers. She worked together with Andrzej Kowerski, whom she knew from childhood. They were also connected by a romance that lasted several years. In mid-1940, she met her Jewish mother in Warsaw. She couldn't persuade him to escape. Stefania was murdered in Pawiak prison in January 1942. In January 1941, Krystyna was arrested together with Kowerski in Budapest by the Gestapo. It effectively simulated the symptoms of tuberculosis. They were released, but had to leave Hungary for safety reasons. They fled by car to the Middle East. Even then, Skarbek had a false passport as Christine Granville and a changed year of birth. She looked seven years younger. While still in Hungary, she passed on important intelligence materials, including those concerning Operation Barbarossa. Skarbek lived in Cairo for a year and a half. Due to suspicions of treason, he and Kowerski were omitted from important espionage assignments. They filled their free time with sports and an intense social life. In June 1941 they were officially dismissed from British intelligence. Krystyna was described as "too extravagant to work effectively undercover." They were left with only small wages, which were not enough to live on. Krystyna did not want menial tasks, but at that time she was viewed unfavorably by both British and Polish intelligence. It was not until 1944 that she was given a task worthy of her skills. She was trained in parachute jumping. It was recalled that he knew French perfectly. Under the pseudonym Pauline Armand, she was dropped into France on July 6, 1944. There she carried out her most spectacular actions during World War II. She bravely saved French intelligence agents imprisoned in a German prison from death. To this end, she met with the local Gestapo commander. Her personal charm and a two million franc bribe worked.
| Krystyna Skarbek with Andrzej Kowerski
She also managed to persuade several dozen Poles to defect from the Wehrmacht. She desperately wanted to join the fighting in the 1944 Warsaw Uprising, but the British refused to allow her. She and Kowerski were then scheduled to be parachuted into Poland in early 1945 as part of "Operation Freston," which failed. She was demobilized in April 1945. Despite her outstanding intelligence achievements, she was left out in the cold by the British government. She received an embarrassingly low severance payment of 100 pounds, despite British Prime Minister Winston Churchill calling her "his favorite intelligence officer." She was left without means of support. She could no longer count on her second husband, from whom she divorced in mid-1946. Her relationship with Kowerski also deteriorated. She tried to find stability in Kenya with her old friend Michael Dunford, but was denied a work permit. Humiliated, she returned to London. There, she worked in shops such as Harrods and the telephone exchange, and was a waitress and hotel chambermaid. In December 1946, she obtained British citizenship. She worked as a stewardess on two passenger ships sailing to Africa. There, she faced further humiliation. Like the rest of the crew, she was forced to wear all the medals awarded to her during the war. Their rank and number were impressive: the George Medal, the Order of the British Empire, and the French Croix de Guerre. This aroused resentment among the rest of the crew, who began to persecute her. During her work at sea, she may have met former British agent Ian Fleming. We have no documentary evidence to confirm this. Their year-long affair is likely a myth, and Fleming based the character of Vesper Lynd in his first James Bond novel, Casino Royale, on Skarbek. However, it is certain that she met her future biographer, Madeleine Masson, on the ship. Another relationship from this period proved literally lethal. Steward Dennis Muldowney defended her against the rest of the reluctant crew. But he also fell obsessively in love with her. We don't know if they had an affair. But Krystyna broke off her relationship with him, saying "he's stubborn and terrifying." She planned to go to Germany and perhaps rekindle her relationship with Kowerski.
| The funeral of Krystyna Skarbek
On June 15, 1952, tragedy struck. An unwanted suitor proposed to the former agent. When she refused, she was stabbed. She died the same day in hospital. Her murderer was immediately arrested and sentenced to death. He requested that the death sentence be carried out as soon as possible, so that he could "be reunited with his beloved in the afterlife." He was hanged on September 30, 1952. The entire murder story still raises questions about whether the mentally unstable Dennis was exploited to silence the agent, who had too much knowledge from her wartime intelligence work. Krystyna Skarbek was buried at St. Mary's Roman Catholic Cemetery in London. After her death, Kowerski effectively protected her reputation for many years. In 1971, a trunk containing Skarbek's belongings was purchased from the hotel where she died. It contained her documents, medals, clothes, and her famous dagger, which are currently stored at the Polish Institute in London. Kowerski died in 1988 and was buried, in accordance with his last will, in the same grave as his beloved. The brilliant British intelligence agent Vera Atkins described Skarbek as "very brave, very attractive, but a loner, a law unto herself."
