During the bloodiest years of World War II, British intelligence was determined to defeat the Axis powers by any means necessary. As part of a spy operation code-named Columba, the Allied forces amassed sixteen thousand highly trained homing pigeons and dropped them in an arc across Nazi-occupied Europe. Returning to the secret government branch in charge of the “Special Pigeon Service,” the birds carried messages written on tiny pieces of rice paper tucked into canisters and tied to the patient birds’ legs. These messages were sometimes comic, often tragic, and occasionally invaluable—reporting details of German troop movements and fortifications, new Nazi weapons, radar systems and even the deployment of the feared V-1 and V-2 rockets used to terrorize London. Corera also reveals the part played by America’s specialist military pigeon units, such as their role in Operation Columba and their work in North Africa and Europe, including on D-Day.

The people who sent these messages were not trained spies. They were ordinary men and women, fearful and half-starved, willing to risk their lives in the name of freedom. Some even formed amateur espionage organizations, including the Leopold Vindictive network—a small group of Belgian villagers led by an extraordinary priest named Joseph Raskin. Raskin became such a valuable asset that his intelligence eventually reached Churchill himself, and MI6 parachuted agents behind enemy lines to assist him.

Gordon Corera uses declassified documents and extensive original research to tell the moving story of Operation Columba and the Secret Pigeon Service for the first time. A powerful tale of wartime espionage, bitter rivalries, extraordinary courage, astonishing betrayal, harrowing tragedy and a quirky, quarrelsome band of spy masters and their special mission, Operation Columba opens a fascinating new chapter in the annals of World War II.