Memoirs of a Courtesan

Born in 1876 in the Netherlands, Margareta Gertrud Zelle married a captain in the Dutch army at the age of 18. In 1897, together with her husband, they moved to the island of Java, where Margareta gave birth to two children.

Her husband was a violent and aggressive alcoholic. In order to somehow escape from a bleak marriage, Margareta plunged into the study of Indonesian culture and traditions, including dances.

In 1902, after returning to the Netherlands, the Zelle family broke up. The woman moved to Paris, where she soon found work as a circus rider. Sometimes she moonlighted as a model and performer of exotic dances.

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Making good money from the growing popularity of oriental shows, Margareta took the stage name Mata Hari, which means “sun” in Malaysian, and invented an impressive legend about her past. The woman said she was an Indonesian princess trained in Indian dances and exotic rituals.

She skillfully used her attractive appearance, which, combined with a rather promiscuous character, made her a sensation on the dance scene. Of course, dances were not always traditional and chaste. Sometimes Hari's performances were more like a striptease.

She was admired by audiences all over Europe. Basically, of course, the male half, which she conquered with dances and provocative photo shoots. Mata Hari soon gained a reputation as an expensive courtesan.

She did have sexual relations with several high-ranking men, including the diplomat Jules Cambon and the crown prince of Germany.

Hari's career began to decline with age, but she continued to visit her "boyfriends". The courtesan traveled widely and often crossed the border. It was because of this that the secret services drew attention to the woman during the First World War.

Shortly before the start of the war, Mata Hari was in Germany. Her request to travel abroad to Paris turned into a search and confiscation of a large part of the property. She had to return to her homeland in Holland, where one of her lovers was able to provide her with housing.

Instead of waiting out the war at home, the woman went to Paris through England, which made her the object of close attention of the British intelligence services. They were sure that Mata Hari was a German spy.

Meanwhile, in Paris, Mata Hari has fallen in love with a young Russian captain who has become partially blind while serving in the French army. During a visit to the hospital to her lover, Mata Hari ran into a French counterintelligence officer. He heard from the British that the dancer was suspected of being a spy.

After their meeting, the man invited the courtesan to use her connections and spy for France. Then Mata Hari agreed on the condition that she would be paid an impressive amount of money. She dreamed of earning enough money to live a carefree life with her new lover.

On her first mission, Mata Hari went to Germany, again paving the route through Foggy Albion. In England, a woman was arrested and interrogated. Meanwhile, the French recruiter denied having met the dancer. In the end, the woman was released, and after a while she ended up in Madrid, completely broke.

Then she decided to seduce the German attache in the hope of getting at least some benefit from this connection - be it information or money. She told him all the French gossip, while the failed lover, who suspected Hari of a spy, fed her outdated information.

On December 13, 1916, French intelligence intercepted a secret message from an attache, which was actually fictitious and contained rumors told by a former dancer. According to the information received, the information to the attaché was provided by an agent codenamed H-21. The secret services branded Mata Hari as a double agent, and the Germans in this way tried to find out if the woman was a French spy. As a result, German counterintelligence was convinced that they were right.

Mata Hari soon returned to Paris hoping to receive the promised money for her work, but was unable to contact her recruiter. On February 13, 1917, a woman was arrested by the French secret services on suspicion of espionage.

The habit of inventing legends about his past during interrogation played a cruel joke on Mata Hari. She was constantly confused in the testimony. As a result, it turned out that the failed spy really received money from representatives of the German intelligence services. True, she was not going to get information at all and considered this gesture as revenge for what happened to her at the beginning of the war. As a result, the court found Mata Hari guilty of espionage and sentenced to death.

The sentence was carried out on October 15, 1917. 12 soldiers took part in the execution. Standing on the scaffold, as if on a stage, Mata Hari threw off her coat and blew a kiss to her executioners: "I'm ready, gentlemen!"