Josephine Baker’s Secret War by Hanna Diamond. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2025. xvii + 326.
Reviewed by Jeremy Black
This study of the wartime role of the entertainer Josephine Baker is a much better book than the subtitle might suggest. ‘The African American Star Who Fought for France and Freedom’ implies a degree of hagiography rather than scholarly scepticism. This is not the case. Hanna Diamond, Professor of French History at Cardiff University, clearly has the usual biographers’ commonplace characteristics of liking her subject and exaggerating her significance, but this is a very well-researched and impressive biography, drawing effectively on a range of archival sources in France, America and Britain, including personnel files in Vincennes, relevant material in French archives outside as well as in Paris, and at Stanford and Yale as well as the National Archives at College Park. There is also a very effective trawling of an enormous range of periodicals as well as of the memoir literature.
The book encompasses a wartime career of note as well as the postwar career of Baker and her reputation, which included her opposition to racism and her Civil Rights activism. The lengthy Afterword is indeed an important historiographical discussion, possibly more interesting than some of the wartime narrative. This included ‘Panthéonisation’ in 2021, a contrast to François Hollande’s rejection of the idea. Baker as icon for an idea of France, that of wide-ranging civic commitment, is linked from her career to her acceptance by both de Gaulle and Macron, and the theme was taken forward with the women celebrated in the opening of the 2024 Paris Olympics. The wartime Baker was a military entertainer of note, for American, British and French forces. She also had opinions that are linked to make her a progressive force.
Possibly some of the discussion could benefit from a little more scepticism. Take ‘Baker’s outspokenness with certain French diplomats had also been noted. Her tendency to reproach them if she felt they were not ardent enough in their support for de Gaulle or sensitive enough to the needs of the local Arab populations was not always appreciated’ (p. 175). The footnote reference is to Josephine: The Hungry Heart (1993) by Jéan-Claude Baker and Chris Chase, but it really does not amount to much, either in terms of the significance of her assessment or the supposed responses of others. I am also dubious about the significance of the meetings held at Baker’s bedside. They happened, but the impact again is overplayed.
Nevertheless, Diamond makes a number of very valuable points, not least concerning the special involvement of African Americans with North Africa, and this is linked to the interesting politics of the area in the winters of 1942-3 and 1943-4, the latter in terms of the independence movements and Baker’s stand. German-sponsored Arab nationalism is presented as a rival, and one that was challenged by a full range of American and Free French activity that included Baker. Diamond argues that we can only have a sketchy insight into the exact nature of the intelligence she collected and transmitted, which is common in intelligence history. Although there may have been embellishment, Baker played her part, followed orders, and took personal risks, using her position to support the cause she believed in. She mobilised the advantages of her position to aid the Allies and the Free French by gaining information through her access to a range of networks and she was able to pass information on because she could move around when others could not.
There is much to enjoy in this impressive and well-written work. If Baker is overplayed, so also with so many others who make a far less interesting subject for biography.
