Georges Kopp

Georges Kopp, (St Petersburg, Russia 1902 – Marseilles, France 15 July 1951) was an engineer who had lived in Belgium for about 25 years and volunteered to fight for the Republicans in the Spanish Civil War, rising to become commander of the 3rd Regiment, Lenin Division, a militia unit belonging to the Workers' Party of Marxist Unification (POUM) which saw active service on the Aragon front, and was later incorporated into the regular army as the 29th Division of the Republican government's Popular Army. Kopp rose to become captain in the general staff of the 45th brigade of the Republican army.

He is mentioned in George Orwell's autobiographical account of the Civil War, Homage to Catalonia (1938), and towards the end of the book, when Orwell describes the Barcelona May Days. In his account, Orwell testifies to Kopp's personal bravery in the Barcelona episode in single-handedly preventing further bloodshed. The subsequent outlawing of the POUM (16 June 1937) resulted in its members being arrested and thrown into jail, and Orwell refers to his last-minute, and ineffectual, attempts to get Kopp released from prison. Kopp was finally released after 18 months, after having been interrogated by NKVD agents, and in 1939 managed to reach England, where he was nursed by Lawrence O' Shaughnessy, a thoracic surgeon and Orwell's brother-in-law (Eileen O'Shaughnessy's brother), and his wife, Gwen.

At the outbreak of World War II in September 1939, he joined the French Foreign Legion and fought in the Battle of France in May–June 1940. He was severely wounded and made prisoner, but escaped from a military hospital. Thereafter he joined the Foreign Legion headquarters in Algeria. But because of his frail health, he was allowed to leave the Legion. He set out to work as an engineer in Marseilles, in Vichy France. He used his work as a cover to work for British Naval Intelligence. When his spy-ring was discovered, he was flown out of France by the British.

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