Codenamed Dorset: The Wartime Exploits of Major Colin Ogden-Smith Commando and SOE

This gripping new history tells the little-known story of one of the most courageous men to have served with the newly formed Commandos and SOE during the Second World War. It is a story of extreme courage and a revealing portrait of a man who ultimately gave his life to the liberation of France.

Ogden-Smith was amongst the first to volunteer for the newly formed Commandos: he took part in the daring raid on Bardia on the North African Coast and fought in the heroic rearguard action during the British evacuation of Crete. In 1942 he transferred to the SOE and joined the elite Small Scale Raiding Force to carry out raids across the Channel. He then volunteered for a new, clandestine group known as the Jedbughs whose mission was to parachute into enemy-occupied France in the aftermath of D-Day to link up with the French Resistance. In July 1944, under the cover of his code name Dorset, Major Colin Ogden-Smith parachuted deep behind enemy lines as the leader of Team Francis. Three weeks later he was dead, killed in action fighting alongside his French comrades so that others could make their escape. Seventy years on, the French community still remember the gallant major Anglais.