Mother, Widow, Dancer, Spy

The Fearless Adventures of a World War II Operative Who Fought for Love

Joe Dwinell

The incredible story of a first-time mother and recently widowed wife of a soldier killed in action who became an invaluable intelligence asset to the Allies.

Patricia Rosalind Fowler was an ordinary newly-wed when tragedy struck. Her beloved Bobby died in the shark-infested waters off Guadalcanal in the South Pacific during the harrowing early days of World War II. He was a Navy torpedo officer killed in battle; she was left pregnant and grieving back home in Manhattan.

What Patricia did next nobody ever believed, until now. Leaving her her newborn child sleeping dreamily in his bassinet in upstate New York, under the care of her in-laws, she headed off to war.

Mother, Widow, Dancer, Spy is the unforgettable true story of an unsung American heroine who joined the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) to complete her husband’s mission. But instead of taking to the seas or the sky, she would go undercover.

Patricia was assigned to the elite X-2 counterintelligence branch under a brilliant London-based boss who sent her to Spain under the guise of a flamenco dancer to spy on the Nazis who had found a haven under Franco. She worked the seedy bars of Madrid, scouted the bloody bullfights, and helped with the top-secret chains of intelligence carried over the mighty Pyrenees Mountains from inside occupied France in the run-up to D-Day.

In a tale brought to vivid life by Joe Dwinell's dramatic prose and backed up by thousands of now-declassified documents in the National Archives, we follow Patricia as she works alongside her spy partner and other intrepid sleuths, including agents 007 and 005.

Returning home to America at the end of the war, Patricia felt peace, knowing she had fought hard and kept Bobb'y memory alive. She felt no need to tell her story. Yet half-century later, she would forge a trusting relationship with Dwinell and finally tell the unguarded version of her story for the first time, in what turned out to be the final year of her long eventful life.

By turns inspiring and astounding, Mother, Widow, Dancer, Spy is a story of resistance and heroism, love and triumph in the face of personal tragedy and one of the darkest eras of human history.

Joe Dwinell is the executive editor of The Boston Herald and an investigative reporter at the paper. He was an adjunct professor in the Emerson College journalism department and on-air reporter for the former WB56 Ten O’Clock News in Boston reporting from the Herald newsroom. He is also the executive editor of the Herald’s sister publications in Massachusetts, The Lowell Sun and Fitchburg Sentinel & Enterprise, part of the MediaNews Group-Tribune national chain. He is a married father of three and has appeared on national news shows for major stories, including the Boston Marathon bombings to high-profile homicide cases. He has won numerous journalism awards. He went in search of Heroes of a Generation: World War II stories for a series for the Herald where he found Patricia.

Buy it now in print:

Buy it now in ebook:

Endorsements & Reviews