Dr Chris Millington Swansea Frenchhistoryonline.com

 Life in Occupied Paris  The Resistance a) De Gaulle and the Free French b) Domestic resistance c) Communist resistance  What was ‘resistance’?  How many French resisted?

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

1. 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.

‘Paris through a Nazi’s Lens’, Daily Mail, 11 September 2013

 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

 Based in London De Gaulle speaks to France via the BBC

Located at the Arc de Triomphe, Paris

 : 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

 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

 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’

 Groups are freer to act than in the North  But there is a need to break public complacency Image from a resistance poster

Vichy propaganda presented the Marshal as the saviour of France and the French

 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

 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.

A Free French poster, showing the Cross of Lorraine

 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

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

-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)

 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

 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

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

 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

 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?

 Imagine that Britain was defeated in 1940  The Nazis are in London and a collaborationist government runs the country Visions of a Nazi Britain

 Resist, of course!  But, on second thoughts…….