New Coco Chanel Biography Levels Explicit Nazi Spy Allegations

A work on the life of French fashionista and style icon Coco Chanel, which marked its American debut earlier this month, countenances unequivocally the long held suspicion that Chanel was a Nazi collaborator and spy, while providing very specific claims of its own. Hal Vaughan, an American journalist living in Paris, wrote “Sleeping With The Enemy: Coco Chanel’s Secret War,”
whereby he confirms the well-known relationship between Chanel and her German officer paramour, Baron Hans Gunther von Dincklage, and goes on to assert that the two were Nazi operatives who carried out assignments in Madrid and Berlin. Mr. Vaughan conducted research at English, French, German, and American archives, leading to his contention that Chanel worked with von Dincklage and others in the recruitment of new spies. According to publisher Alfred A. Knopf, the book discloses that Chanel’s espousal of the Nazi regime extended beyond being a sympathizer and collaborator, to serving as a full fledged Abwehr operative. Details of her employment by the German military intelligence agency include her operative number of F-7124 and her code name of “Westminster,” derived from her romantic connection to the Duke of Westminster. Not totally unexpected, Vaughan accuses Chanel of fervent anti-Semitism.

The House of Chanel, the fashion company she founded, contested the book’s claims, admitting only that the wartime affair of Chanel and von Dincklage was inopportune, and making mention of their acquaintance predating the war and von Dincklage’s English mother. It answered the anti-Semitic allegation by citing Chanel’s Jewish friends and financial dealings with the Rothschilds. Chanel herself had been subjected to judicial inquiry in France as to her Nazi association, followed by her release. A portion of her testimony appears in the book. At the time of Chanel’s death in 1971 in Paris, she was 87.