Woodull describes her as “one who hath been ever serviceable to this correspondence.”Īgent 355, as depicted in an 1863 issue of Harper’s Weekly It would seem that only the best spies can expose other spies without revealing their own identities in the process – but more than two centuries later, surely her secret is safe with us! So who was she?Īgent 355 was so impeccable at espionage that her code name is only directly mentioned once in a letter between Abraham Woodhull and George Washington, leaders of the Culper Ring, a network of spies active during the American Revolutionary Wars that used secret ciphers, invisible ink, and even published coded messages in newspapers. Speculations says it’s Agent 355 who relayed the critical information that exposed the treason of Benedict Arnold, a major American general who fought for the colonies before defecting to the British side, leading to the execution of his accomplice, Major John Andre, who was head of Britain’s Secret Service during the American Revolutionary War. Enter Agent 355, America’s First Female Spy, who since the American Revolutionary War, has remained nameless.

But what makes a spy a good spy is her anonymity. She became an icon of feminine seduction, Greta Garbo played her on the silver screen in 1931, and her story has inspired countless tales of romance and espionage.

You probably heard about Mata Hari, the infamous courtesan and female spy who beguiled the men around her into allegedly betraying national secrets to Germany during WWI.

Secret spy agent pictures