Petition launched to name Somerset road after World War Two hero Odette Hallowes
A petition has been launched to have a road in Somerset named in honour of a local World War Two hero.
Odette Hallowes was a special agent for the British government in France and has since become the war's most highly-decorated spy.
Petitioner Nancy Powell-Brace, from Wellington, is requesting that a road in a new housing development near the town is named after her.
Odette, a French citizen who lived on the Devon/Somerset border during part of the war, was recently honoured by Great Western Railway with a train in her name.
It was in the West Country that she was recruited to the Special Operations Executive and sent to France to work behind enemy lines against the Nazis.
On 16 April 1943 Odette was captured and sent to Ravensbrück Concentration Camp where she was tortured.
According to petitioner Nancy, Odette is known to have said in her darkest times during solitary confinement at the camp that she would "close her eyes and remember the people and views of Somerset".
The petition had received nearly 300 signatures from people expressing their gratitude for Odette one week after its launch.
With the 75th anniversary of VE Day celebrated this year, and GWR honouring her with a specially named train, the community hopes that the housing developer building in Rockwell Green will want to pay its own small tribute.