When Paris went dark The city of light under the German occupation1940 -1944 by Ronal Rosbottom

   21/6/23   On French collaboration in WW2  380pg  

Paris managed to survive the greatest conflagration of the 20C almost unscathed. Today one senses a lack of widespread communal and patriotic desire to remember. The Third Republic established in 1871 legally voted to end itself.  The first time since the Renaissance France in 1940 was a geographically incoherent nation.  From the 6 Century under Clovis it enhanced its reputation by lavishly spending on Paris and French became the language of European Inteligencia  Paris philosophers had shown that the city though under absolute rule was the centre of progressive ideas.  

1940 Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein musical The Last time I saw Paris  with the song played frequently, "Till the town went dark". 

1940 Oct The communist Party was following orders from the USSR not to fight the German occupiers.

1917 Big Bertha shells were landing on Paris without warning and one killed 150 people in a church service on Good Friday.

1937 Luftwaffe and Italian air force dropped bombes on the on the population of Guernica in Basque country and devastated 3 quarters of the city, purely to demoralize the town as this had no military value. The war was no longer a matter of 2 armies and the word "Home Front" came about.

Hitler brought thousand of German soldiers and civilians into Paris to colonize it culturally. A German guide to Paris a month after the occupation had 16 pages the last edition 2 weeks before Liberation had over 100 pages.

Paris had fallen before the Armistice was signed. First this was used to enhance National Socialism that it was in the hand of a sophisticated cultured race worthy of continental leadership. Then allowing the British escape at Dunkirk was another of Hitler's signal to the English. Many of the upper echelons of the Occupying force spoke and excellent French and recognised it as a city of freedom charm and beauty.Ostensibly the German were protecting part of the worlds patrimony while taking material advantage of it.

1852 to 1870  under Napoleon III we see that no other city had a greater example of reconstruction than Baron Hausmann had done. The Nazis occupied a city steeped in blood of revolt, massacre's of civil strife and they would succeed where the French had not .

What is the line between an accommodator and collaborator in dealing with the German Army? Citizens began to feel disconnected from familiar environment .and wondered how long it would take before his city was returned to him. The citizens are closer together in lines, movie houses cafe, suspicion becomes the norm and openness diminishes. Suite Francaise written in 1942 by Irene Nemirovsky and published in 2004. "Silence of the Sea" published clandestinely in 1942 by Jean Bruller a writer and member of the Resistance..

In the 9 months of phony war(drole de guerre) Poland fought Germany alone while France's army thought to be the greatest army in Europe with England navy increased that invulnerability. After  6 weeks the gates of France were breached and a quick armistice was signed. Since Hitler had taken power there had been a dozen French governments installed and dissolved

Since the Dreyfus Affair 1894 -1906 there had been crises. On the right the Catholics , military monarchist and industrialist imagined their power was waning to the Third Republic of public education, labour, secularism a social safety net. A France that welcomed fleeing Spanish Republicans and Jews and political dissidents fleeing Eastern Europe. French politician were deeply divided by fear of communism and hatred for the English with admiration for Hitler's National Socialism experiment.

Charles de Gaulle flew back and forth between France and England at PM Reynaud behest was no match for the influence of Phillip Petain. De Gaul was negotiating with Churchill that all French citizens could get 2 nationstatus and become British?

1940 June 3rd the Renault and Citroen factories were bombed giving fashionable neighborhood feeling of what war would be like. Both Warsaw and Rotterdam had been flattened and the public had seen this on movie news. There were thousands of refugees plodding through Paris from Netherland, Belgium and northern France. .The comment was better Hitler than Blum the Socialist PM and a Jew. Better fascist troops invading than communist ones. Had there been resistance a civil war could have broken out.

1940 June 10th Italy attacked France from the southeast..

Diplomats and ministries were  burning documents and French and foreign Jews felt vulnerable.and Border Guards all over Europe discovered how easy it was to fleece fleeing Jews. The Third Republic voted itself out of power installing a quasi fascist regime. Vichy was a spa town with lots of hotels and superb rail connections and was geographically the centre of France.

The Germans had to climb the Eifel tower to put up the Nazi flag, as the lift had been put out of order. The Germans put up German language signs. German spies had been  in Paris before the war had made records of the buildings and hotel of importance.

Roger Langeron chief of Paris police, kept the Vichy government at an arm's length. A few days before 2 barges of police papers had been sent away.

Picasso remained and was an outspoken opposer of Franco and refused offers to go to the US or S.America and kept up relation with a variety of anti Nazi artists, he was also protected by Arno Breker one of Hitler favorites. Henry Matisse remained in Nice under Italian control. Josephine Baker had toured the whole of Europe and been welcomed in Germany  but by 1928 Brown shirts in Berlin  hooted at her in the audience. She moved to N.Africa where she volunteered for the Red cross and entertained the Free French. Albert Camus wrote the Plague an allegory in 1947. However there were a number of suicides taking place. Foreign Jews were worried while French Jews were confident the French government would protect them.

While virile young Germans invade the French towns and unspoken comparison to the emasculated French army. The Germans tried to give the impression that they were flexible and a compassionate European ally.and were protectors of this architectural gem. Bus loads of German soldiers arrived as tourists.

The Armistice demanded that anti Nazi's Germans be immediatly arrested. Posters on the wall sought to drive a wedge between France and Britain but these were immediately torn off, till it became dangerous to.

British citizens had to register at the police but generally British women were left alone. Wealthy Jewsih homes were immediately opened and their possessions art, blankets taken to Germany.

Hitler arrived but  got a silent reception the city turned its back on him, not like his entry into Vienna 1938 or as conqueror of Warsaw.

Paris was considered a century  old open air museum not like Berlin that had only become the capital under Bismark with unification of Germany.1871. Hitler considered that France had lost much of it former glory with moral decay and leftist politics. Vienna was considered the second capital but it became a tough site for the Nazi regime. 

Free train rides were offered to get residence back home. Returning residents found that the best hotels and residences  had been taken over by the Germans. Jewish shops had yellow signs, later replaced by signs that they had Aryan manager. Jewish yellow sign initially get their businesses to grow was a form of Parisian resistance, even Catholic shops put up yellow signs as they attracted more customers. French agriculture was taken to feed the German army and rationing began. Mimeograph machines became precious and papillons (small thin pamphlets)were dropped by fast bicycle. or by mousetraps  spreading them from the roofs. There was more illness malnutrition but not starvation. 

cinema became popular but when Nazi newsreel were shown they would jeer at them. Only bikes in the streets, and cars lights were covered with only a small strip of light. France was on Berlin time.

A list of bordellos were selected for only Germans. Vibrant entertainment films theater vaudeville cabarets horse racing and the fashion industry, though short of material functioned as usual.

Thousands of Jewish businesses and residences seized and turned over to either Germans or their sympathises.

Owners of large cars were forced  to take them to be "purchased" busses were converted from gasoline to charcoal. Every bike had to be register with a small yellow tag.

The Duke of Reichstag Napoleon II  was taken from his grave next to his mother in Vienna to be buried next to his father in Paris. Petain refused to attend the ceremony that would be surrounded by a Nazi flag. The French knew the Duke of Winsor better than Napoleons boy. This ceremony in the torchlight  was a  filmed propaganda stunt.

 But Petain wanted to move as the Armistice agreement suggested to Versailles.

The Germans began a census of foreigners and immigrants.  The writer Colette later composed Gigi  wrote an advise column for women on how to cope with the difficult time in a Nazi sponsored paper. She had anxiety about her Jewish husband a journalist, who was released as she was friendly with the German ambassadors French wife.

Rubber soles of shoes were replaced by wooden ones.

The Marseillaise was outlawed by Vichy. Students carried 2 fishing poles which were deux gaules in solidarity. with de Gaulle. General Otto von Stulpnagel was commander of France. 

Beginning in the 1930s Germs went to Paris for a break from the moral and artistic strictures imposed by the Nazis.  

Under occupation there was a black market in which the Germans were also involved and also bought from black marketeers supplies that were short. Certain cinemas were set aside for German audiences only, including the Grand Rex of more than 2,500 seats, this was attacked by the resistance in 1942 killing or wounding hundreds of Germans waiting  in line. German soldiers stationed in France were offered a visit to Paris to see the magnitude of the German victory over that nation, however most German soldiers spoke no French. The architectural beauty of Paris was no substitute for human contact. They were surrounded by thousands of pleasant people who paid no attention to them. It was usually the more aristocratic Germans who spoke French and were able to socialize. Soldiers on the Eastern front were offered leave to relax in Paris. The Germans also wanted to reduce the French cultural influence in Europe.

1941 June The German invasion of the USSR was pleasing to the French. Calling Germans Krauts or Boche was forbidden by Vichy so doryphores (beetles )or haricot verts (green beans) was used. Even out of uniform, haircuts posture, quality of cloths and accent identified Germans. Germans rode the Metro free if they showed their IDs.

German soldiers health and youth mesmerized the French women, the Nazis had encouraged German athletic culture and they were often seen sunning naked on rooftops thus a libidinal Occupation. Vichy government would also develop this athletic youth culture. Parisian  women showed an overtly sexual demeanor.. Between 80,000 and 200,000 German fathered babies  were born in France. Enfants maudits (cursed babies) There was a shortage of French men as a result of WWI and all the men were now POWs.  In Paris the Germans seemed to turned a blind eye to homosexualism that was a capital crime in Nazi Germany. 

The Wehrmacht refused to close bordellos, to keep up morale,  but there were warning about venereal disease and condoms were freely offered. Germans enjoyed Paris but when they went home found cities like Hamburg and Hannover badly bombed. There was a huge warehouse of thousand of unapproved books to be destroyed or  left to molder.

1942 July 16-17 the Grand Rafle. Jews were rounded up. This was done mostly by young policemen brought in from the provinces to do the dirty work. At this time Hitler demanded 350,000 French workers for the Nazi war effort only 17,000 unemployed unskilled laborer's showed up. Many now joined the marquis.

Marechal Petain is everywhere on calendars , stamps already in history books and opening up movie news.

The building concierge acted as the telephone, a mailbox and knew what was happening in the building and others in the neighbourhood. and were responsible for removing anti German and anti Vichy graffiti. Some hid Jewish children some betrayed Jewish families. They knew of empty apartment to tell Jewish residents to move from one to another if they were threatened.

May Parisians kept secret diaries and scrapbooks and unsent letters showing daily life. Curfew times were arbitrary changed. It had reached a stage that people kept to their neighbourhoods as if the city had water tight compartments. Parisians also had secret maps following the constellations of troops and the moving frontier especially after D-day.The Gestapo received dozens of letter suggesting the hiding place of a Jew or communist and the Nazis were always under orders to provide a quota of Jews or foreigners to detain. Balconies turned into gardens with rabbits and chickens and even parks had vegetable hot houses.  To keep warm in apartments in the cold, people moved into a single room.

1900 Paris Metro began running, and was also used by the Germans as there was no other transportation form. You could ride all day for  a single ticket and anonymity still prevailed and Germans had pleasant encounter with the French till the roundups and assassination began making it dangerous. There were 5 cars on a train and the middle one was with soft seats for those with a First Class ticket, the Germans who rode free in uniform occupied this as if by right. This First Class coach was done away with in 1981 by the socialist government. There were signs Verboten Rauchen to remind the French they were tied to the Germans.The Germans used stations as workshops storage or air raid shelters and nobody knew which lines or stations would be open. Taxis had disappeared from the streets. Later lack of spare parts and absence of personnel caused power outings and the metro functioned sporadically

It was considered good form to travel 2nd class on the Metro and to leave a museum gallery when a German tour group entered.

1943 Le Corbeau a movie  by Henri Georges Clouzot was on the subject of letters of denunciation this was not shown in Germany, but financed by a German controlled studio, it revealed the fractious society of France.. Recent research shows that there was relatively little denunciation of Jews, and most letter were mainly personal reasons. Denunciation were anonymous and signed and there were not enough police to check them all.

The Queue was a place people spent hours but women mostly, some brough small chairs to sit on or children were used as place holders as there were also spies in them. They became a replacement for illegal political gathering and you had to be careful of what you remarked casually. The line was a reminder that the rich agricultural nation had been looted and the scarcity and lack of choice was a humiliation. The line was a place of women solidarity. France had been de-manned by the occupation and about 2 thirds of them would return after almost 5 years in captivity. Women had few political and financial rights and had to learn to be a man.

There were warning of stolen ration tickets, counterfeit and black market tickets. and a dinner invitation RSVP asked guests to bring a 250 gram bread ticket.

The myth that most of the population supported the Resistance postponed the analysis for 25 years on how easily France had been beaten. In Occupation you had cooperation, appeasement , acceptance and accommodation or worse treason. A lot of resistance was not French citizens but often immigrants and often Jewish and saving Jews. They were successful in getting downed pilots back to England.  It took time to understand that Petain's leadership was anti-semitic. This  pro-fascist and that Nazi occupation was founded on a racist and imperialist ideology.  De Gaul the day after Petains first speech called for the flame of French resistance not to go out. The best organized of the Resistance were the Communist Party. It was the most ever effective in the few days proceeding and after Normandy Invasion and shortened the war by at least 2 months, less than 2% were involved 500,000 people. About 100,000 people were killed by the Germans and Vichy who called them terrorists.

Roosevelt distrusted de Gaul and saw him as a right wing fascist. Churchill called him "the Cross of Lorraine to bear"

1941 June invasion of the USSR had drawn the best trained young German soldiers to the east. Men were  being rounded up to work in the German war effort and many fled to the resistance instead.

Printing presses were hard to come by and paper was scarce for printing resistance pamphlets.

Sephardic merchants from Turkey and Greece had established themselves in Montmartre.

The civil war in Spain had sent thousands of Republican refugees to France.

Radio signals from London were successfully scrambled but not completely. BBC was on the air every night and the Allies dropped million of leaflets. From 1943 there was an surge of derailments of trains leaving Gare de l'est towards Germany.

In 1940 Surprisingly about 150,000 Parisian Jews docilely trooped up to  registered as Jews. 50%  of Jews found themselves from means of earning a living. Initially Jews thought France would protect them from Nozi idiology. Jews were not allowed to move period.There was a high number of Jewish suicides. Hungarian Jews here  were generally ignored till Hitler invaded Hungary. During a roundup of Jews many had left children behind and their neighbours took them to orphanages in Paris  and later   they were sent to places in the countryside.  However in Vichy, Petain was prepared to leave the children behind but Laval insisted that families should not be separated.

When French Jew swere rounded up it finally ended the myth that it was only foreigner that were in danger. Many Jew escaped by a friendly officer turning a blind eye. Many of these round ups the Germans were nowhere to be seen. Those rounded up were calmed by seeing only the French uniforms. Jews who had skills in leather and fur were taken to work in Germany as they needed to make warm uniforms to fight in the east.

1959 The Velodrome which had been the holding centre and also for rounding up Algerians in 1958 was finally torn down, it is a Place des Martyrs Juifs. 

1943 With food shortages and slow release of French POW and declining living standards now caused criticism of Pertains "contact with the devil" Etats francais political impotence-   Vichy supporters began to hedge their bets by joining the resistance. 

In 1939 there the school population was more than 200,000 by 1944 only 50,000. The press was read more for announcement of food availability including the German ones. With the abundant wheat harvest in 1943 the daily bread ration was augmented by 25 grams, tuberculosis  increased by 30% weight loss and depression was rampant. The Germans looted till the end and many escaped on motorcycles piled with French belongings.

There were no exemptions for students from Lycees once they turned 18 and so many of them left school in the middle of the year to join the underground.

1943 the Etat francais established the Milice francais by June 1944 had more than 30,000 troops.

Parisian started to notice that the young blond German warriors were being replaced by middle aged reservists.

1943 May under de Gauls administration the Conseil national de la Resistance was formed of all the different political groups and Camus returned to Paris to edit  Combat the most influential resistance magazine

1943 October The liberation of Corsica made anticipation more intense.  

Movie star Arletty said " My heart is French but my ass is international". Coco Chanel , Maurice Chevalier who sang along with Cocteau said they were French patriots who would keep the French spirits high.

1944 April was the first time Petain visited Paris.

The Germans were now worried about an urban insurrection. The Germans were getting nervous and the more news they heard about their reversal the louder they sang when they marched but continued roundups of Jews and taking hostages. To show no weakness 9 days before liberation, betrayed would be fighter were machine gunned down in the Bois de Boulogne wooded park.

 

1944 July20 Many senior German officers in Paris were implicated in the Hitler assassination plot.

1944August the allies started invading from the Mediterranean northwards.  French railway workers went on strike. The last convey carrying children to their deaths left on July 31st a week before the Paris liberation.

All French railways passed through Paris and many ambulances trucks, staff cars were retreating with frightened soldiers and wounded.

Henry Tanguy called Colonel Rol was the leader of the resistance in Paris a Communist partisan that had de Gaul worried about the communist strength.  A lot of the resistance work was done by women

Dietrich von Cholitz the "Beast of Sebastopol" was appointed by Hitler to defend Paris. he found the troops left in Paris under armed and undertrained. Non military and German women were sent home and Cholitz did not carry out the "Rubble field orders" Hitler gave him and came out with flying colours though he had deported over 3000 political prisoners in the last few weeks.

The first troops to arrive were a  French division in American uniforms and the great bells of Notre Dame were heard for the first time since the occupation began. The American were now in Europe to stay for the cold war and they arrived with an endless supply of food. Liberating Paris had not been on Eisenhower's agenda as it delayed the end of the war as a lot more supplies were needed  to feed the army. 

August 25th the Palais de Luxembourg surrendered and Paris was totally liberated. Less than 3 months after the Normandy landings.

20,000 women throughout  were shorn only 47% of them were accused of sleeping with the enemy the rest were betrayed for working for the Germans as they had lived  better off  than others during the occupation. Later on the women who returned from Ravenbrook with heads shaved against typhus carrying lice. The FFI or official resistance army executed as many as  10,000  Parisian many of them on evidence of hearsay.The  Prostitutes' hair was not shaved as it was legal in France. Former Vichy bureaucrats denounced each other. 

Ernest Hemmingway was the correspondent for Collier magazine and one of the first American to get to Paris he had finangled his way onto a landing craft at Normandy.

1945 April POWs were making their way home with shaved heads and looked years older than their age exhausted , ill starved.

The myth that Paris had remained pure through the Vichy experiment and that the French had liberated Paris.

1994 a book published showed that before joining the resistance Mitterand had been a low level bureaucrat in Vichy.

2008 and photo exhibition of France under the Occupation taken by Andre Zucca, he died in 1973. He had worked for the German magazine Signal was right winger and a Germanophile.  He had a  about thousand  photos in colour a material that was expensive and not available during the war. This was very controversial as it portrayed propaganda of very calm period of Germans and French in casual contact. Most of theses picture were unpublished.  

 

 

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