France and the Occupation

1. Dr Chris Millington Swansea University c.d.millington@swansea.ac.uk @DrChris82 Frenchhistoryonline.com France and the Occupation

2. Structure of the lecture • Life in Occupied Paris • The Resistance • De Gaulle and the Free French • Domestic resistance • Communist resistance • What was ‘resistance’? • How many French resisted?

3. Post-armistice France, 1940

4. Vichy France Above: Pétain meets Hitler at Montoire, Oct.1940 Left: ‘Are you more French than him?’

5. Jean Texcier, Conseilsà l’occupé(July, 1940) • Street sellers offer them [the Germans] maps of Paris and phrasebooks; buses pour out incessant waves of them in front of Notre-Dame and the Panthéon; there is not one of them who has not got a camera to his eye. Be under no illusion: they are not tourists.

6. Images of Occupied Paris (1941) ‘Paris through a Nazi’s Lens’, Daily Mail, 11 September 2013

7. Images of Occupied Paris (1941) ‘Paris through a Nazi’s Lens’, Daily Mail, 11 September 2013

8. Images of Occupied Paris (1941) ‘Paris through a Nazi’s Lens’, Daily Mail, 11 September 2013

9. Images of Occupied Paris (1941) ‘Paris through a Nazi’s Lens’, Daily Mail, 11 September 2013

10. Images of Occupied Paris (1941) ‘Paris through a Nazi’s Lens’, Daily Mail, 11 September 2013

11. Images of Occupied Paris (1941) ‘Paris through a Nazi’s Lens’, Daily Mail, 11 September 2013

12. Was there a single French resistance? • No, not in 1940: there was resistance inside and outside France Charles de Gaulle, leader of the London-based Free French Christian Pineau, founder of Libération-Nord

13. Charles de Gaulle’s Free French • Based in London De Gaulle speaks to France via the BBC

14. The appel du 18 juin Located at the Arc de Triomphe, Paris

15. The Free French • 1940-1941: de Gaulle and his comrades are isolated • Free French agents, under Dewavrin, operate in France • On 2 October 1941 de Gaulle claims to be directing the resistance…… • But he has little knowledge of, and contact with, resistance movements in France • BBC radio is primary means of actions

16. The Resistance in France • 1940: disjointed and diverse • Practical problems – such as the Demarcation Line - obstruct operations • There are several groups in the North and the South such as Libération-Nord and Libération- Sud – two different groups

17. Resisting in the North • The presence of the Germans makes resistance difficult • Groups were fragmented, small, often did not survive • Printing materials controlled A 1944 British propaganda poster: ‘French resistance helps throttle the Boche’

18. German propaganda in the North

19. Resisting in the South • Groups are freer to act than in the North • But there is a need to break public complacency Image from a resistance poster

20. Resistance in the South Vichy propaganda presented the Marshal as the saviour of France and the French

21. The Resistance unites • Jean Moulin • Gathers information on the resistance movements during 1941, and meets de Gaulle in London in October that year • He was the link between London and France

22. The Resistance unites • Resistance leaders meet with de Gaulle (1942) • 13 July 1942, Britain recognises the Free French as leader of the whole resistance • Conseil National de la Résistance, created May 1943, under the impetus of Jean Moulin • The CNR was ‘the voice of the internal resistance’ (Nick Atkin) • The CNR recognised de Gaulle as representative of French interest.

23. The Free French A Free French poster, showing the Cross of Lorraine

24. Colombey-les-deux-églises

25. Communist Resistance • 1940 – French Communist Party is officially neutral • 1941 – Nazi invasion of USSR sees a change in policy • Communists commit violent attacks against Germans L’Humanité was, and is, the newspaper of French communism

26. Communist resistance A Communist recruitment poster: ‘The Irregulars and French Partisans are going to spill their blood for the people of Paris’

27. Communist Resistance

28. The Resistance Press • A vital form of propaganda • Most important in the South • Used for recruitment, spread of ideas, opposition • But how many people read them? • Example of 14 July 1942 – shows public awareness of the Resistance Combat (Southern resistance)

29. Le Silence de la mer(1942) • Published by The Midnight Press • Written by Jean Bruller, aka ‘Vercors’ • Encouraged ‘moral’ resistance – in this way it reflected the time in which it was written (before 1942) Image from Jean-Pierre Melville’s 1949 film

30. How successful were the resistance movements before 1942? • Not very! • Few French had heard of a movement • Only in mid-1942 did the public begin to turn away from Vichy • 14 July 1942, first signs of mass public disaffection

31. Women and the Resistance - Women did take part in combat but were more important In logistical and support roles - Fighting still thought of as a man’s job

32. What is, or was, ‘resistance’? • Is it simply active resistance? • According to US historian Robert Paxton, about 400, 000 French were members or a movement • 2 million read the underground press • Only in 1943 did French turn away from Vichy • The ‘overwhelming majority’ of French were not prepared to resist – they were as good as collaborators

33. What is, or was, ‘resistance’? • Should we count minor acts, and passive resistance, too? • US historian John Sweets thinks so • There were many brave but small acts of resistance outside the movements • We need to think again about the meaning of ‘resistance’ • Was it enough to just think anti-German thoughts?

34. By way of a conclusion…. • Imagine that Britain was defeated in 1940 • The Nazis are in London and a collaborationist government runs the country Visions of a Nazi Britain

35. What would you do? • Resist, of course! • But, on second thoughts…….