By, Anne Sebba
2 min read
ByAnne Sebba , Anne Sebba
By Caroline Moorehead
Chatto & Windus, £20
As the Second World War ended and the various welfare organisations took stock of the tragedy that had overtaken Nazi-occupied France, they estimated there were some 5,000-6,000 Jewish children who were now orphans, whether hidden in non-Jewish homes around France or over the border in Spain or Switzerland.
What to do with them was one more nightmare after so many in the previous four years as many of them had forgotten their real names or did not know that they were Jewish.
As Caroline Moorehead relates in this powerful and ultimately uplifting book, most of them were not actually French but Polish, German, Russian, Austrian or Romanian. They were the children of tailors and leatherworkers as well as doctors, businessmen and miners who had come to France in the early years of the century believing it to be the country which, having conferred equal rights on all religious minorities as part of the legacy of the 18th-century revolution, actually welcomed Jews.
In fact, that any had survived at all was miraculous in a France which had at times turned over more Jews to the Nazis than they wanted or could deal with.
The fundamental difference between France and the Netherlands, Belgium or Denmark is that, in France, there was an autonomous and legitimate government in one part of the country. In Belgium and the Netherlands, the Germans administered the country directly. This meant that, after the war, the French could not say "no, it was not us" because in fact it was their state.
How one particular group of children and babies (as well as some adult resisters, Freemasons and communists) survived, hidden and with (just) enough food and clothing high in the mountains of France, is the gripping subject matter of Village of Secrets.
President Chirac in 2004 called the village of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, "la conscience de notre pays". Although, as Moorehead shows, the village did not save 5,000 Jews - the real figure is closer to 800 lives saved - nonetheless, it is likely that 3,000 may have passed through, helped on their way to safety.
And it is a story not just of one village, Le Chambon, but several that formed part of the high mountain plateau Vivarais-Lignon in the southern Massif Central where a small number of heroic individuals risked their lives to oppose tyranny.
The rescuers were a mixture of Protestant pastors steeped in the Old Testament and Judaism, along with doctors, teachers, farmers, shopkeepers and, crucially, café owners who could sit outside and watch and give warnings - ordinary people who opened their hearts and extended a hand.
The cast of characters also includes Jewish rescuers and passeurs as well as collaborators and German torturers, and of course the children themselves, some of whom are still alive and have spoken to Moorehead for this book. What emerges is a far more nuanced account of courage - in which some Catholics did indeed help, and the links with neutral Switzerland were occasionally helpful - than previously recounted about Le Chambon.
The Protestant Pastor, André Trocmé, who believed in non-violence and pacifism, is shown as an occasionally troubled figure and certainly not the sole architect of the rescue plan but one of many who, by coming together were able to resist the Nazis and save lives.
In 1988, Le Chambon became the first village in the world to be honoured by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations.
Anne Sebba is writing a book about Paris from 1939-49 through women's eyes.
