Profile

Profile:
Margaretha Geertuida Zelle was born in Leeuwarden, Friesland in the Netherlands 1876. She was born with olive skin and dark eyes, making her stand out from the entire blue eye, blonde hair girls. Her father, Adam Zelle, a wealthy hat maker, adored her and called her 'An orchard among buttercups'. But the adoration soon failed as he went bankrupt and abandoned her. It was decided she was to live with her godfather in Amsterdam. Whilst living there she felt her life needed more meaning, so she started to train to be a teacher, soon after she started her studies, the proprietor of the college fancied her, quite flattered they spent the time they could together, however it was short lived as their liaison was found out; Margaretha left the college in embarrassment, her dreams of becoming a teacher ruined. It seemed as if getting married was her only option, she married Captain Rudolph Macleod after seeing his advertisement in a local newspaper for a wife. Together they had one daughter, named Jeanne Louise, born in 1898, and a son named Norman-John. However Jeanne Louise often went by her Malay name Non. Being the wife of the garrison commander she performed in front of the officers often; playing the piano and dancing. Her husband was proud, but hated that she was getting a lot of attention from the junior officers. Soon after in 1899 her children were poisoned, her son dying as she held him in her arms, they soon found out the Nanny had been forced by an unknown, outside source to do the dirty deed. Margaretha was traumatised, leaving Macleod helpless in protecting Non. Eventually he left her in a bout of rage, violently beating her and taking Non with him. Outraged she made it her job to get Non back, she divorced Macleod in 1907, even though her ex husband didn’t support her as the law states he should’ve, Margaretha still sent off to find money in her attempt to return to Non, richer and more stable to keep her. This is when Margaretha remembered the adoring faces of the junior officers she danced for so many years back, she was excited when she arrived in Paris, seeing all the local dancers and wishing to be them. Mata Hari was ‘born’, her alter ego meaning ‘eye of the dawn’. She became very successful and as time went by, gained confidence in her erotic dances, and soon enough performing behind the bedroom door. Her audience was mainly soldiers, but she lost track of whether they were German or French. Mata Hari was a huge success, many people were devoted to her, and she even started charging more for her services, attracting crowds from all over Europe. She finally had enough money to support Non, but felt guilty as her replies to Non became fewer and fewer, eventually not replying at all. Margaretha’s job became so demanding that Non would never even fit into her new chosen lifestyle, and she soon forgot the reason she started in the first place. She admits later if she hadn’t become a striptease artist, she would have committed suicide. Soon enough exotic dancing was considered revolting, now almost forty, she started to get less bookings and her audience was erratic as she didn’t have the energy she used to. Nevertheless she still had many faithful lovers and continued making money, more for herself rather than for Non. Therefore Margaretha was delighted when in early 1916; she was offered a six month job at Metropole Berlin for her seductive services. This was, perhaps the moment when she first became a spy. Sources say that she began training in a course specialising in spying techniques, her code name was H21, but this could also be untrue. She worked on the home front, sewing, cooking, working on the land; she was bound to be distrusted. Suspicion filled her life, what other lady would journey through the country at such a dangerous times, being stopped regularly by officials, yet remaining calm. In others eyes she could definitely be seen as a spy, but Margaretha could have been quite possibly expanding her ‘business’ further. Spy stuck to many people when they looked at the facts, she had all the training, and was very persuasive and had many contacts all over Europe. Mata Hari had lost all conventional notions of home and loyalty to family, friends and her country. Her son had been murdered and she had lost almost entirely all of her contact with her daughter, she had nothing to stay true to, which made her even more suspicious. A man names Captain Georges Ladoux was not fooled by her charms and had her followed by two detectives, whom told him she had a lot of male visitors, many French and Belgian, this was later used as evidence against her. She met Vladimir de Masloff, a twenty one year old and fell madly in love with him; she was devastated when he had to leave for the front line. Margaretha was even more troubled when she had found out her lover had been injured, seriously contaminated with mustard gas, making him blind in one eye. When she applied for a visa to be with him, Captain Ladoux got the papers and requested a meeting with her, he was informed of suspicions in France and England, asked straight up if she was a spy. Margaretha was dumbfounded, she said she had never thought about it, still keeping a calm, and charming composure. She was made an offer, for one million francs she would consider an espionage mission for France. With that amount there was no way she could resist, if she could get to Brussels, she had the necessary contacts to meet with the crown prince of Germany whom she could get information from. If she wasn’t a spy before she certainly was now.

It became quite an effort even to get into Belgian’s capital, Margaretha kept getting questioned by suspicious officials and officers, she told them she was a French spy, but Ladoux did not back up her story and even denied knowing her, possibly to protect her mistake of revealing her secret, or to protect himself history does not reveal. This however did not throw off Margaretha as she pursued her mission, even with no instructions and little to no money; she took matters into her own hands. By January 1917 she went to Madrid, the German military attaché broadcast radio messages to Berlin describing the helpful behaviour of a German spy, code names H-21. French intelligent agents intercepted the message, and found out through some research that H-21 was identified as Mata Hari. Later in February Mata Hari was found at the Hotel Plaza Athenee in Paris where she was arrested. She was accused of spying for Germany and the cause of atheist 50,000 soldiers deaths. Neither the French or British intelligence who accused her of being a spy for Germany had any real evidence against her, but secret ink (invisible ink) was found in her room which in that time was incriminating evidence. She wrote many letters to the Dutch Consul in Paris, claiming she was innocent, arguing her travels and suspicious manner was just her doing her job as a dancer. She was found guilty and was executed by a firing squad on 15th October 1917, aged 41.