Verslag van het Procès van de oorlogsmidadigers in Bordeaux in 1953 en de uitspraak.
De officieren van de Divisie Das Reich stonden niet te recht, alleen 17 mannen uit Alsace, waarvan 1 vrijwilliger en 4 Duitse soldaten, de hoogste in rang was een sergeant uit Alsace, George-René BOOS.
Alsace was sinds het begin van de tweede wereldoorlog in het Derde Rijk opgenomen.
Misschien een beetje lang, en in het Engels,maar zeer instruktief, gegeven de spannende politieke situatie die er na de oorlog in Frankrijk heerste. Frankrijk is het enige land in West Europa geweest dat in twee zones was gedeeld, een bezette zone in het noorden en een zogenaamde vrije zone in het zuiden. Met een demarcatielijn die het reizen van hete ene deel naar het andere moeilijk maakte. De regering van Vichy stond onder Marechal Philippe Petain, een held van de 1ste wereldoorlog van de Slag bij Verdun, en was open collaborationniste met de Nazis.
Official work of the committee of the Memory and the National Association of the Families of the Martyrs of Oradour-on-Glane
ORADOUR-SUR-GLANE
The lawsuit of Bordeaux
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A complicated beginning
After a request during 8 years of the survivors and sympathizers whom the culprits are punished and the victims avenged the lawsuit waited a long time of the 21 soldiers having taken part in the massacre of Oradour began in January 1953 front the military tribunal from Bordeaux.
Why the lawsuit was so late? Although inhabitants of Oradour, or the Limousin in general, are very worried by the question, the French State had the first years after the war of other cats to whip and thought first of all has to reconcile the French by erasing the traces of collaboration of many citizens.
From the very start of the lawsuit of the problems imposed themselves.
First of all all the culprits could not be gathered any more: major Otto Dickmann which had prepared and directed the operation had died on the face of Normandy and other culprits had hidden or could not appear. Thus, the commander of Division Das Reich, General Heinz Bernard Lammerding, lived in the British sector in Germany (Düsseldorf) and the English refused the extradition (for complicated legal reasons).
More disconcerting still was the fact that there was also of guilty French to the massacre: 14 Alsatians, of which a volunteer and 13 built-in of force in Division.
Thus, before total 21 men appeared before the court: 7 Germans and 14 Alsatians.
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Amnesties for the Alsatian collaborators?
From the very start the lawsuit started sharp polemical around the co-operation the French soldiers, of Alsatian origin, with the massacre.
Were they to be judged as well as the Germans? Was one to make the distinction between ' volontaires' (Germans + 1 Alsatian) and ' built-in of force' (12 Alsatian)?
It is thus not astonishing that the debate very quickly exceeded the room of the court. On the one hand, the MRP and the Christians of the RPF, insistent on the need for the national unit against the Soviet threat, led a movement in favour of the amnesty in general and Alsatian built-in of force in particular.
Other share, especially the Communists were highly against, seeing a new neofascist threat in such a measurement (let us not forget that at the same time the debate on the rearmament of Germany and the creation of the C.E.D. took place). The Socialists on the other hand, chose leniency in the interest of the nation but were opposed to any rehabilitation former collaborators.
However, between 1951 and 1953 two important laws of amnesty were voted, which had as consequence that in the 1953 only notorious collaborators were still kept in prison.
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End of the myth of the national unit: the combat enters the Limousin and Alsace
The debate concerning the culpability of the 13 Alsatian ones caused a sharp polemic between the two areas concerned: the Limousin, area in which is located Oradour and Alsace, area of origin of accused French.
A confrontation between two memories different from the War emerged.
This element will break the image of Oradour like symbol of France linked in these sufferings during the War. Or like writes it Jean-Marc Théolleyre in his book ' Lawsuit of after-guerre': "Oradour had become a symbol. The name of this village of the Limousin [... ] had a resonance such as it only resounded with him in France released with the load of emotion which could stick to names like Verdun." Contrary to that, in 1953, instead of symbolizing the French unit vis-a-vis with the Nazism, Oradour started to oppose the French to the French.
In 1947, the ANFM (Association Nationale des Familles des Martyrs d’Oradour-sur-Glane) had made a request impassioned with the Minister for Justice requiring highly that justice be made. The president of the Republic, General Charles de Gaulle, who had already paid a visit in 1945, with Oradour answered it positively by revealing that the government had prepared a special law for the massacre of Oradour which considered any member of a unit criminal as joint author or accessory to the crimes committed by this unit.
15 month later the French National Assembly unanimously voted this law which introduced a new element into the French criminal law: that of the collective responsibility for the groups having made war crimes.
In other words: this law made it possible to accuse all the members of a guilty unit of war crimes. Applied to the case of Oradour that meant that whoever formed part on June 10, 1944 of Division Das Reich was supposed guilty.
But it should be noted that the presumption of the collective culpability was left with the appreciation of the judge and that this law went against the principles of the right: it is indeed to the defendant to prove that it is innocent!
Nevertheless, knowing that Alsace felt very concerned, one made the difference between Germans and French: the decision was made that French would not be continued with the title of the collective responsibility but because they were ' personally joint authors or complices', a decision which hardly alleviated Alsace and its deputies, who were already outragés by the fact that the French defendants were to sit down at the sides of the Germans at the time of the lawsuit.
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The position of Alsace in the lawsuit
First of all it is necessary to make the distinction between the 12 Alsatian ones which had been built-in of force at the end of 1943 and in 1944 in Division SS (them ' in spite of nous') and single the Alsatian volunteer. Moreover, eights of them had less than 18 years at the time that they were built-in in Wehrmacht and then transferred in the SS.
When the lawsuit began, of the Alsatian deputies and associations immediately took the defense of ' in spite of nous' and pled the cause of Alsace and its particular situation during the war, a situation which must be cleared up.
In spite of the armistice which envisaged the respect by the Germans of French sovereignty and in spite of the discrete protests of Vichy, Hitler annexed de facto from the very start of the war Alsace-Lorraine, considering them, within the framework of its Pan-Germanism, as grounds authentically German (August 1940 two Gauleiter were named to manage these two areas).
Consequently, of measurements of germanisation and nazification were taken: since 1942 Hitlerjugend became obligatory for the young people from 10 to 18 years, of civil were enlisted in Reichsarbeitsdienst and on January 20, 1942 the Council of Defence of Reich decided that the Alsatian ones could obtain the German passport as well as the Germans of Reich.
But the most drastic measurement was taken on February 13, 1942, when the military service in the German army became obligatory in Alsace and Lorraine for the men born between 1920 and 1924.
The reactions opposite these measurements were not negligible: on 200.000 Alsatian-Lorraine mobilizable 40.000 deserted, 130.000 left elsewhere. But there were also 5.000 of deportees and 13.000 of internees.
After the war, this painful heritage continued to cause problems for Alsace-Lorraine: the compensation for the ' in spite of-us' and their families for example was the subject of difficult negotiations between the government of the French Republic and the federal Republic allemande33. But it was of course the lawsuit of the ‘in spite of us’ of Oradour which caused sharp polemical in Alsace.
Besides let us stress in the context of our topic once again the importance of the memory: above Obernai in Alsace Association the Escaped prisoners and Incorporated by Force (ADEIF) drew up a memorial: a white cross intended to save lapse of memory the drama of in spite of us.
The lawsuit of Oradour being imminent, the ADEIF sounded alarm and on December 10 1952 all the Alsatian newspapers published a letter of George Bourgeois, deputy and president of the claiming ADEIF of the continuations separated for the Alsatian accused and the Germans. Other associations of Alsatian veterans were added to this request.
Very quickly thus the Alsatian politicians and the Alsatian press took the defence of Alsace against what they regarded as a charge of all the area. Or as Alsatian with a Parisian observer noticed it: "Attention! Does not be light, the business of Oradour for us it is a new Dreyfus business." In more they informed that the special law of collective responsibility would have the risk to alienate Alsace in France.
By claiming the punishment of all the soldiers having taken part in the massacre the Alsatian Communists were the only exception to this unanimous movement of defence of ‘in spite of us'. It is important besides to note that the Limousin had sheltered during the war a great part of communist Resistance and the Alsatian section of PCF wanted to remain honest with the general policy of the party. The consequence was of course that the audience of the Communists in Alsace decreased very quickly.
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The Limousin
Limousins on their side in general had little sympathy to the particular situation of Alsace and they were hardly ready to make the distinction German-Alsatian.
George Lamousse, deputy socialist of the Limousin wrote for example in the socialist daily newspaper of the area: "With the lawsuit of Bordeaux, there are no for us Alsatian and Germans. There are defendants. That justice decides and that the supreme punishment falls down on the culprits!".
All thus stated that the lawsuit was going to start in an atmosphere very tended and acrimoniously.
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The lawsuit
The lawsuit took its beginning on January 12, 1953, in a tiny room of the military tribunal of Bordeaux composed of six officers of active and chaired by a civil magistrate, M.Nussy Saint-Saëns (a descendant of the type-setter).
During the days which followed the lawyers of Alsatian made long talks describing the situation of Alsace during the war and protested against the law of the collective responsibility which placed their customers on the same bench as the Germans.
However, the President of the court rejected the request of lawyers and known as "One votes laws in the Assemblies and it is then with us, military tribunal, that one comes to propose loopholes not to apply them."
Nevertheless, while the president of the court of Bordeaux tried to advance the lawsuit, the Alsatian deputies had succeeded in organizing a debate on the collective responsibility with the French National Assembly which caused sharp polemical between the deputies of the Limousin and those for Alsace.
Thus, January 27, 1953 the French National Assembly voted - with the great relief of the Alsatian ones - by 365 against 238 votes the exemption of the French of the law of the collective responsibility.
However, a feeling of indignation was dominating and even President, Vincent Auriol, expressed in a negative way on the vote: "It is the most depressing thing which passed under my legislature."
But let us turn over to the lawsuit where initially testimonies came from the Alsatian ones, which treated, like lawyers before, abundantly the precarious situation in Alsace during the war and impossibility of deserting for a soldier SS (it should not be forgotten that the Alsatian ones of Oradour were still very young!).
The witnesses of Oradour on their side, spoke of course about other things; there was for example the account of Marguerite Rouffanche, the only survivor of the burnt church which moved the audience with its serene words: "I ask that justice be made with the assistance of God. I left alive the crematorium, I am the crowned witness of the church. I am a mom who very lost."
Although the president of the court had expressed his hope which the sufferings of both sides can become a ' element of union between French who suffered from the same doctrines and same the men', the Alsatian ones continued to see in the lawsuit the lawsuit of their area and Limousins was irritated by testimonies which placed the Alsatian ones in the position of victims.
Thus, all along the lawsuit and a long time after the feelings exceeded the small room of the court: the inhabitants of Limoges, for example, expressed their support for Oradour massively (40.000 Limougeauds ravelled the evening of February 3 while the bells of the churches sounded). A demonstration which was commented on of continuation by an Alsatian daily newspaper: "This demonstration proceeds at the time when the official spokesman of our province tries, since four days, to render comprehensible the Alsatian drama. Its insistent efforts do not seem to have much effect in Limoges."
One could finally summarize this painful lawsuit with the words of the World of January 30, 1953: "What a strange lawsuit! One could even qualify it lawsuit with double face. On a side, the law, right, the interpretation of the texts, operations in slide, and other, a deep horror, a sum of ineffaceable pains, upsetting accounts of humanity simple and painful which make cry. To the liking of the events, one passes from the one to the other."
Judgements
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Exactly a month later, February 12 1953 the judges met for the deliberations.
Without awaiting the verdict, the members of the ANFM turned over on their premises but the following day evening there was a great patriotic demonstration in Bordeaux while the bells of the close church sounded during one hour.
After 32 hours of deliberation, the court pronounced the sentences:
- the German soldier more graded, sergeant Lenz, was condemned to death,
- another German who had been able to prove his absence with Oradour on June 10 was released,
- 4 other Germans were condemned to sorrows of forced work from ten to twelve years,
- George-Rene Boos, only Alsatian volunteer of the group was condemned to death,
- 9 Alsatian was condemned to sorrows of forced work from five to twelve years,
- 4 the other Alsatian ones were condemned to prison sentences from five to eight years.
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Reactions
Outraged Alsace
It is clear that Alsace was hardly satisfied with the verdict, quite to the contrary.
The New French Rhine wrote at the head in its special edition: "an affront for Alsace. A refusal of the right. Alsace does not accept this ashamed verdict."
Some pages further, one can read the reactions of the inhabitants of Mulhouse: "In the stops of bus, in the trams, with the corner of the streets, everywhere where knowledge and friends meet, it is the same astonishment, same incomprehension, same rancour."
But also in other Alsatian cities same amazement seemed to reign: the following day of the verdict in Strasbourg and in other communes the flags were put in Bern and later in the day of the posters were posed in each commune of Haut-Rhine, carrying the message of the Association of the Mayors: "We do not accept. All Alsace declares itself interdependent with his/her thirteen children condemned wrongly in Bordeaux and with the 130.000 built-in ones of force [... ] It will remain with them in the sorrow. French Alsace rises with vehemence against the incomprehension who's its wire are the unhappy victims."
But it was especially the ADEIF of the Low-Rhine which had the strongest reaction: the sympathizers covered the kiosks of Strasbourg of yellow small posters carrying the name and the sorrows of ' in spite of us'. These small posters were besides identical to the small posters sticked up by the Nazis to announce the death sentences the resistant Alsatian ones. It was also a manner refined of the core use collective.
In Colmar, the Association of the Mayors of Haut-Rhine organized a meeting which adopted a motion protesting ' against the incomprehension whose are victims the built-in ones of force' and claiming the immediate suspension by the government of the sorrows pronounced against in spite of us.
Besides a deputy of Alsace made the same request with Rene Pleven, Minister for the Defence, which had the highest authority as regards military criminal law, but the answer was negative (the reason being of course the separation of the capacities, crucial element of any democracy) but Pleven ensured that the government would facilitate any effort of the Parliament for the amnesty of the Alsatian ones. A new intervention of the legislative power in the Oradour business was thus considered, to undoubtedly avoid a political crisis.
Nevertheless the response of Pleven brought a little calm in Alsace and the mayors of the area cancelled their movement envisaged of administrative strike.
But the pressure on the government was maintained by imposing demonstrations: February 15 for example, the mayor of Strasbourg directed a walk of 6.000 people towards the memorial of the First World War, wrapped of black crepe (the monument symbolizes two dying soldiers, wire of Alsace who fought themselves in the opposite camps of France and Germany).
Agitation caused such a concern with the government that it gave its support for another law of exception: the whole amnesty for those which had been built-in of force in the German armies. It was to some extent an epic of the whole nation (except for the Communists) in favour of Alsace.
Another deputy deposited a request in front of the Parliament so that an investigation is open on ' the conditions and the atmosphere in which the lawsuit of Oradour had taken place like on the effects morals on the youth of Alsace and the future of the area.'
Consternation in the Limousin
If Alsace were made indignant by the sorrows for the 'in spite of us', the families of the victims and the Limousin in general found the sentences scandalously lenient, since only the death penalty for all the participants in the massacre was considered to be acceptable.
The proposal for an amnesty in addition increased still this feeling of insult.
But Limousins were not the only ones to complain.
Also the Communists and the old resistant ones and their respective press considered the sentences too lenient and the handling of the lawsuit by scandalous Alsace: "It is not Alsace which is in question. Other French, alas, in other provinces were, to have passed to the enemy, to have shot. Never their provinces of origin did test in their connection of solidarity. Do not let say that by condemning those of Oradour, one condemned Alsace."
The national unit initially
During parliamentary meetings concerning the projects of amnesty, the deputies of the Limousin strongly defended the separation of the capacities. Andre Barton, socialist deputy, put in particular the question: "So now the legislator begins to cancel the judgement before even as ink is dry, where do we go, in which State are us?"
For other deputies the amnesty was equal to the lapse of memory and the nullity of the judgment.
But the defenders of the bill tried vehement to tally the debate in what they regarded as a priority question: the national unit. Édouard Herriot, president of the Parliament even shouted: "the fatherland is a mother. She cannot admit that his/her children tear on his centre."
And even General de Gaulle, in spite of his essential role in the recognition of Oradour like site of national commemoration, called with the comprehension of Alsatian in the interest of the national unit.
In the final analysis, the Parliament preferred to alienate an area poor and rural rather than to cause the permanent agitation of an area thrives and populated and 319 deputies (especially MRP and RPF) voted the amnesty.
The Communists and a great part of the Socialists and radicals voted against. A great part abstained from.
Thus, president Auriol ends up granting its thanks to both condemned to dead (the Lenz German and Alsatian Boos) and in 1958, five years after the lawsuit, all condemned had been released, a step which corresponded to the general policy of indulgence with regard to the collaborators.
The revolt of Oradour
If one gave priority to the national unit, with the eyes of Limousins this unit called upon could be it only with their costs and a thing was clear: people of Oradour would not reconcile themselves.
In Oradour the feeling thus reigned that the deputies who seven years earlier had voted to make of Oradour a national symbol, had been now diverted martyrs. Even more, for the inhabitants it was like a second martyr, this time caused by their compatriots.
The response of Oradour was the request that one returned the commemorative site to him like numbers other measurements:
- the decision of the ANFM to return the Military Cross decreed to Oradour in 1947, as well as the Legion of Honour decreed with Association in 1949,
- The refusal to transfer ashes from the martyrs in the crypt built by the State,
- The refusal of the presence of representatives of the State to the commemorative ceremonies (exception being the visit of General de Gaulle in 1962),
- The inscription on a plate with the entry of the ruins of the names of the deputies (of which François Mitterrand) which had voted the amnesty.
The steps exceeded the borders of Oradour: in the Limousin and through all France, the Communist Party invited to express against the amnesty. In Paris, February 22, a gathering of 4.000 people (communist, old resistant and socialist) deposited a sheaf on the tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
But "the exploitation" of the lawsuit went even further: the PC bound the amnesty of Alsatian to the Franco-German bringing together and the will to create a European Community of defence (CED), which would mean to some extent the rearmament of FRG.
However, the competitions within the left related to the feeling which the PC exploited the massacre of Oradour started the success of other demonstrations (the mayor of Limoges for example, refused to follow the movement of strike directed by the Communists).
When in Alsace calms it returned immediately after the amnesty, agitation decreased quickly in the remainder of the country. The lawsuit of Bordeaux had thus caused an intense but short crisis. Nevertheless, in Oradour, the shock and disappointment were going to continue and for many inhabitants the memories of the lawsuit of 1953 are as painful as those of 1944.
Moreover, the anger of the survivors of Oradour had an enormous impact on the commemoration and on the evolution of the new borough and until now there is a feeling which there is a ' before' and an ' after' Bordeaux.
Bron : ANFM = l'Association Nationale des familles des Martyrs d'Oradour-sur-Glane internet :
http://oradour-sur-glane.fr.st Opgesteld in 1970 door MM. Guy Pauchou (sous-prefet de Rochechouart) en Dr.Pierre Masfrand (Conservateur des ruïnes d'Oradour-sur-Glane)