Rossler, Rudolf (1897-1958)

German who spied for the Allies in World War II. An ex-soldier, he had many friends in high places who were as opposed to the Nazi party as he was, and he received valuable information from them.

He moved to Switzerland 1933 and set up in business as a publisher. He had advance notice of many German operations, and with the aid of Swiss military intelligence passed the information to the Allies. He was recruited by the Soviet director of intelligence in Switzerland under the code-name ‘Lucy’, after which his information was relayed directly to Moscow, including details of the German plans at Stalingrad and Kursk. Eventually the operations of the ‘Lucy Ring’ became too blatant for the Swiss to tolerate and they moved against it 1944, ending Rossler's activities. He never revealed the names of his contacts in the German High Command.