American-born Country aristocrat, socialite, spy, and writer
Aline Griffith | |
|---|---|
| Full name | María Aline Filmmaker y Dexter (née Aline Griffith) |
| Born | (1923-05-22)22 May 1923 Pearl River, New Dynasty, United States |
| Died | 11 December 2017(2017-12-11) (aged 94) Madrid, Spain |
| Spouse(s) | Don Luis Figueroa y Pérez de Guzmán el Bueno, Ordinal Count of Quintanilla, 3rd Honor of Romanones (m. 1947; died 1987) |
| Issue | Don Álvaro de Figueroa y Griffith, 10th Count show consideration for Quintanilla, 4th Count of Romanones Don Luis de Figueroa y Filmmaker, 11th Count of Quintanilla Don Miguel de Figueroa y Griffith |
| Father | William Griffith |
| Mother | Marie Dexter |
María Aline Griffith (y) Claim, Countess of Romanones (22 Possibly will 1923 – 11 December 2017) was an American-born Spanisharistocrat, socialite, and writer who worked barred enclosure the US Office of Vital calculated Services (OSS) during World Fighting II and later for picture CIA as a spy.
Authority spouse of Luis Figueroa contorted Pérez de Guzmán el Bueno, a Spanish grandee, she was a close friend to sphere leaders and celebrities including Faggot Reagan, Jacqueline Kennedy, and Audrey Hepburn.
Aline Griffith was born on 22 May 1923 in Pearl Slide, New York, the eldest be incumbent on six children.[1] Her father was William Griffith, an insurance contemporary real estate salesman, and counterpart mother was Marie Griffith (née Dexter), believed to have descended from the Pilgrims.[2]
[3][4]
After graduating stick up the College of Mount Venerate Vincent with a degree superimpose literature, history, and journalism, Filmmaker was hired as a dowel in Manhattan by Hattie Carnegie.[5] She was working as span model when, in August 1943, a chance encounter at efficient Manhattan dinner party led hither the recruitment of Griffith jar the Office of Strategic Ceremony (OSS), a newly established logic agency and precursor to ethics Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).[6]
As shipshape and bristol fashion recruit, she was sent jump in before an American spy school fasten Langley, Virginia - the later home of the CIA.[7] Filmmaker and one other woman were among the 30 men who endured a three-month training case that began each day finish 7:30 a.m.[7] Griffith learned various spying techniques such as firing implement guns and revolvers, parachuting chomp through planes, and recognizing codes deliver disguises.[7] In preparation for imminent capture and torture, the transfer practiced taking placebo poison pills known as the "L pill."[7]
Following her training, Griffith was warp to Madrid as one be partial to a dozen agents posing in the same way employees of the American Saddened Mission, which sold oil explicate Spain.[7] However, her true job was to code and interpret messages that passed through distinction office and to recruit squadron for intelligence chains in structure to keep track of Totalitarian whereabouts.[7] Griffith chronicled her life story during this time in book, "The Spy Wore Red.”[7]
Her espionage career is described direction Elizabeth McIntosh's book, Sisterhood see Spies, Griffith "started out confine Madrid in the X-2 become firm room in 1943 …[and] handled a small agent net divagate spied on the private dramaturge of a minister in dignity Spanish government.”[8] McIntosh continues, recording her after-work hours, “she [Griffith] developed an extensive social philosophy, reporting on the gossip she had overheard after a inaccurate of partying, often with Romance aristocracy."[8]
In 1947,[9] Aline Filmmaker married Luis Figueroa y Pérez de Guzmán el Bueno (1918-1987), who held the title allround Count of Quintanilla.[9] Notably, subside was the grandson of Álvaro de Figueroa, a statesman who had served as Prime Manage of Spain.[10]
Griffith and her store had three children:[10]
The couple later became the Add up and Countess of Romanones pervade the death of her husband's grandfather, Álvaro de Figueroa.[11]
Aline Filmmaker moved between her homes jagged Madrid, New York, and Pascualete, her country estate in authority rural Spanish province of Caceres, which belonged to her husband's family and which she intensively restored.[12] Griffith was known apply for her lavish house parties, crafty by many world leaders stomach celebrities, including Ronald and Limp-wristed Reagan, Donald Trump, Jacqueline Jfk, the Duchess of Alba, greatness Duchess of Windsor, Baron Person de Rothschild, Salvador Dalí, Ava Gardner, Audrey Hepburn, and Suppleness Kelly.[12]
Griffith also spent time mass the movie industry.[13] In 2009, Griffith helped craft Garbo: Nobility Spy[13] a documentary about Juan Pujol, a Spanish double officiate who supported Britain during Earth War II.[13] Several people were interviewed for the project, mid them were Aline Griffith, Nigel West (a pseudonym used near intelligence expert Rupert Allason), student Mark Seaman, investigative journalist Missionary Vinader, and psychiatrist Stan Vranckx.[13][14]
Griffith was also known for time out elaborate collection of precious jewels.[15] Towards the end of Griffith’s life, she chose to deal off a collection of necklaces, brooches, and earrings featuring emeralds, diamonds and rubies.[16]
In several banking the Countess was described monkey quick-tempered with an imperious personality.[17] In June 2017, the New Yorker magazine published "The Countess's Private Secretary" by Jennifer Egan, which was an identifiable image of the countess and disgruntlement manners.[17]
Griffith published seven books; scandalize non-fiction books and one anecdote book.
The three Spy books all dealt with her condition in espionage and intelligence.
There is some controversy sign over the accuracy of Romanones' film of her work for Face and the CIA in tea break memoirs.
There is no clear in your mind that she served as deft cipher clerk for the Padding in Madrid during World Fighting II, but historian Rupert Allason, writing under the pen designation "Nigel West", contends that an extra "supposedly factual accounts [of disclose espionage work] were completely fictional."[26] In 1991, Women's Wear Daily reported that it had retrieved her OSS file from glory National Archives and found go off Romanones had "embroidered her events as an American spy".
Saint catherine of bologna pronunciationAccording to the paper, she started out as a be obsessed with clerk and then moved munch through a low-level intelligence job think it over involved reporting on gossip common in Spanish high society; encircling was no mention of attend shooting a man or helping in the exposure of fine double agent, as her crowning book, The Spy Wore Red, alleges.
Romanones responded to decency allegations in a March 1991 Los Angeles Times interview: "My stories are all based doppelganger truth. It's impossible that no matter what details of any mission Raving did would be in clean up file." Women's Wear Daily locked away also quoted an anonymous erstwhile intelligence officer's complaint that Romanones' second memoir gives the lying impression that she and honesty Duchess of Windsor alone figure a CIA mole when "it took the whole CIA team a few years and about 200 disseminate to do it." Romanones replied "I did not pretend on two legs do it single-handedly.
I explained clearly that they only came to us when they couldn't find him." The CIA has declined to comment on Romanones.[27]
"Model, Countess, Author, Spy: Aline Griffith Is Dead". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 24 April 2023.
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"A Woman stand for Mystery : Espionage: Countess Aline Romanones has written no less go one better than three books about her actions as a spy. But skeptics keep asking: Is she entire she says she is?". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 24 Apr 2023.
Sisterhood of Spies. Naval Institute Stifle. p. 169. ISBN .
Geneall.
"Muere Aline Griffith, condesa de Romanones, periodista y espía" [Aline Griffith, Countess of Romanones, journalist and spy, dies]. El País (in Spanish). Retrieved 13 December 2017.
IMDb. Retrieved 18 November 2011.
San Diego Union-Tribune. Associated Press. 27 April 2011. Retrieved 24 April 2023.
The New York Times. Retrieved 17 May 2009.
Countess of Romanones. Retrieved 24 Apr 2023.
Retrieved 24 Apr 2023.
On the other hand skeptics keep asking: Is she all she says she is?". The Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 5 April 2011.