Jane Horney

[William Douglas]

"Jane" Ebba Charlotta Horney (married Granberg), (8 July 1918 – 20 January 1945) was a Swedish woman, believed to have spied in Denmark for the benefit of Nazi Germany, and to have been killed by the Danish resistance movement on a fishing boat at Øresund, but it has never been confirmed for which nation she actually worked. The Gestapo in Denmark believed that she was an agent for the British or Soviet Union, and after World War II it was denied that she had been a Gestapo agent. Abwehr officers likewise denied, when inquired by Säpo (Swedish intelligence), that she had been their agent.

Wikipedia stsates that Ebba Charlotta Horney was born in Sweden as the daughter of Swedish civil engineer Fredrik Horney. Her mother was a Danish nurse. There were two younger siblings: Johan and Britt-Marie. Horney grew up in Sweden, and from the age of 14 she was educated in London in an English private school for girls. In 1934 she took the name Jane, and became known as Jane Horney. In 1937-38, she traveled to Greenland, and then sold her travel experiences to the newspapers in Stockholm, where she later worked as a secretary and journalist. She married the Swedish journalist Herje Granberg, who worked for the newspaper Aftonbladet, in Bromma church in December 1939.

Others believe that she born around‭ ‬1918‭ ‬at Dungavel or somewhere else in Scotland, the dsughter of Count Michael Jacek Radziwill-Hamilton, later on called major, who died in the autum of 1949, and is said to have been burried in Balmoral Castle. He used the name Jakubowski in Poland.‭ But this particular ‬Radziwill family without doubt was of Polish-Lithuanian origin. Her mother was Marie Schroder (Mary Hamilton) born in lanarkshire, c1870. Ebba was put into the care of the Horenys when she was about 4 years old, according to some.

Early in the morning of 20 January 1945 Jane Horney was shot, her body entangled in iron chains and dropped in the sea. The murder was claimed to be undertaken on Swedish territory, at Larød north of Helsingborg, while Danish authorities claim that it happened on Danish territory. Those present were probably only the captain on Tärnan and the student "Jens", later identified as Hjalmar Ravnbo, who shot her.

Some contend that Horney was not killed, but was replaced by her friend Bodil Frederiksen, who was killed in her place. Under this theory, Horney was taken to England, where she became a spy in service of the British intelligence during the Cold War, and died 3 April 2003, but this is not confirmed, as Bodil Frederiksen is known to have lived until 1963. No documentation exists to prove that Horney was alive after January 1945. All documentation stating otherwise has been claimed to have been falsified.

An alternative theory is that her 1945 death was falsified as a deception prior to her involvement in the smuggling of Danish Princess Margrethe and another royal family member to safety in Sweden. This same source claims that Jane Horney is a pseudonym; she was actually named Janina Radziwill-Hamilton, daughter of Major Count Michael Jacek Radziwill-Hamilton. This version states that she died on 3 April 2003 in London of a heart attack at the age of 84 years.

[William Douglas]

Following the publication of this article, I have received the following information:

Dear William Douglas.

Summing it all up a little bit. Two Danish journalists have for years published books, stating that a certain Jane Horney, called Ebba Charlotta Janina (Radziwill) Hamilton, was born July 8, 1918 in the Scottish Hamilton area with the Polish Michael Jacek Radziwill as biological father in exile, and as mother Marie Hamilton, born Schroeder, and confirming the very same informations which William Douglas has now found, too, and then kindly passed on to me. Later on Ebba should then have been adopted by (a) her Swedish Horney family, four years old.

In the meantime I have stumblet over some more reliable and very convincing facts but which at the very same time makes me oh so sad ..., and because of all your efforts to help me solve this sensitive problem, hopefully once and for all. But I can assure you that you have not done all this in vane.

The original document from the church book of the Gustaf Vasa community, Stockholm, gives the following reliable informations:

Ebba Charlotta Horney, born July 8, 1918. Father Fredrik Horney, ingeneer, born 1888 mother, Nina Horney, born Schroeder 1889, Denmark. The father presented the newborn child. (See file: Birth Certificate, marked with pencil).

No proof of any adoption of Ebba Charlotte by a Swedish Horney family has never been found or proved by any Swedish authority.

Even if Nina Horney has the very same surname and maiden name as the Marie Schroeder of Hamilton, Nina Horney was of Danish and Marie Schroeder of German origin. So that Nina was the sister of Marie seem not to make any sense at all.

Anyhow, it seems more likely and as far as the new information presents, to be a socalled free construction, but now slowly evaporating into thin air.

By the way. According to the ship booking document Ebba Charlotte Horney was working as a stewardess on an America Liner, August 8, 1937 (See file: Ebba Horney_1937, nb 434).

Later on her mother, Nina Horney returned to Sweden from a journey to USA, Dec 5, 1947.

(See file: Ebba_Nina1).

.....

Yours faithfully

Aage

Note: Copies of the documents were provided.