I was a spy! : the classic account of behind-the-lines espionage in the First World War / by Marthe McKenna ; foreword by the Rt. Hon. Winston S. Churchill, P.C., C.H., M.P. (Secretary of State for War, 1918-1921).

Originally published: 1932.

"With her medical studies cut short as the German Army swept across Belgium in 1914, her house burned down and her father arrested for suspected "sharp-shooting", it was perhaps unsurprising that the multi-lingual Marthe McKenna was recruited by British Intelligence. At the time she worked as a nurse tending the wounds of occupying soldiers, and as a waitress in her parents' café in the Belgian border town of Roulers. I Was a Spy! is McKenna's vivid narrative of these breathtaking adventures as she, aided by a gallant band of loyal locals, goes undercover to sabotage enemy phone lines, reports suspicious activity or train movements, and even instigates an aerial attack on a planned visit by the Kaiser. This thrilling account goes on to explain how, in 1916, the young nurse was caught, and court-martialled by the Germans, placing dynamite in a disused sewer tunnel underneath an ammunition dump. She was sentenced to the firing squad and only survived due to the Iron Cross honour received as a result of her earlier medical service to the German Army. McKenna was later mentioned by Douglas Haig in British Despatches and was awarded the French and Belgian Orders of the Legion of Honour for her espionage work."--Back cover.