​​Odile de Vasselot de Régné, born on 6 January 1922 in Saumur, France, joined the Resistance at a young age and played an active role throughout the Second World War. The daughter of a military officer taken prisoner early in the war, she grew up in a family committed to Gaullist ideals. On 18 June 1940, as a newly graduated baccalaureate student, she heard Charles de Gaulle’s appeal on the radio from her family home in the Poitou region and decided to act. ​ 

​On 11 November 1940, she took part in the student demonstration on the Champs-Élysées in Paris, one of the first public acts of resistance against the occupying forces. Soon after, she joined the Zéro resistance network under the alias “Danièle,” where she served as a courier, transporting messages between Paris and Toulouse. After the network was dismantled in April 1943, she continued her activities with the Comet Line, using the name “Jeanne.” Her missions involved escorting Allied airmen across occupied France to help them return to Great Britain via Spain. ​ 

​Odile took great risks during her missions, regularly travelling by train with escaped prisoners or downed airmen. On 4 January 1944, during one of her final missions, she was in a train compartment with two British airmen when the Gestapo intervened. The airmen, understanding the danger she faced, pretended not to know her, allowing her to avoid arrest. She later participated in the liberation of Paris in August 1944. 

​After the war, she studied history at the Sorbonne and joined the religious congregation of Saint-François-Xavier in 1947. From 1959 to 1988, she taught in Côte d’Ivoire, where she founded and led the Sainte-Marie secondary school in Abidjan. Returning to France, she remained active in sharing her wartime experiences with younger generations, speaking in schools to pass on the values of courage, resistance, and tolerance. ​ 

​Odile de Vasselot was awarded the Légion d’honneur (as commander), the Ordre national du Mérite (grand officer), and the Médaille de la Résistance française. She died in Paris on 21 April 2025, aged 103.