Lyon Resistance Museum

This afternoon I took the tram to 14 avenue Berthelot. This was the site of the Gestapo headquarters from 1942-1944, led by Klaus Barbie. Today, part of the site is dedicated to the French Resistance movement, for which Lyon played a central role, in a museum called the Centre d'histoire de la Résistance et de la Déportation.

This is what I learned today.

Lyon was a part of the "free zone" from 1940-1942. Very near Lyon, to the southeast, Italy occupied an area of France. At this time, about three-fifths of France was occupied, leaving the rest as "libre." Something I didn't realize was that the Vichy government (led by Maréchal Pétain) didn't just rule over the "free zone," or what I thought was the "Vichy zone." The Vichy government ruled over all of occupied France, but in occupied areas, like Paris, German laws trumped the French laws. Pétain's rule was, therefore, most powerful in the southern "free zone."

Pétain collaborated with the Germans, and his French police and milice, or militia, carried out raids on Jews, Resistance fighters, and other "undesirables." From the beginning of this collaboration period, summer of 1940, many French citizens joined the resistance movement. Charles de Gaulle, who fled to Great Britain, gave a radio address calling for the French to resist Nazi Germany. However, as the French were still in shock of the invasion and the changes happening around them, many remained apathetic until 1942, when German forces occupied the remaining part of France, renaming the "free zone," the "south zone."

As you can imagine, France experienced food shortages, fuel shortages, disorganization in transportation, labor shortages (due to high numbers of French prisoners sent to Germany to work as free labor), raids and roundups of Jews, and more while paying host to the German army.... all of which played a part in waking up apathetic French citizens. Although not everyone took part in active resistance, most resisted passively by reading the different publications (newspapers, pamphlets, etc.) or by listening to the radio. I read an interesting "rule book" for the occupied citizens of France. One of the suggested rules was to pretend not to know or to forget any German that you knew when addressed by a German officer. Another rule was to keep only one copy of this document with you (allowing friends to make a copy if need be).

Active resistance members (for which 10-15% were woman, maybe more as many wives helped their husbands or sons) sabotaged transportation and electrical plants, burned bridges, or even participated in guerrilla warfare. There were underground paramilitary groups, called the Maquis, who received weapons, explosives, and ammunition from nighttime parachute landings. They also provided intelligence to Allied forces and carried out rescue missions. The resistance was made up of people from all different social classes, communists, anarchists, Jews, and many foreigners. The Jewish population only accounted for about 1% of the French population as a whole, but in the resistance, they accounted for about 25% of the resistance fighters.... and many Jewish or other persecuted people fleeing from other countries aided in the organized French resistance.

About 76,000 Jews were sent to the concentration camps from France, 13,000 of which were rounded up and arrested in 2 days in Paris (Vel d'Hiv). Of these 76,000, only 2,500 survived. At the time, there was an estimated 350,000 Jews residing in France, many of them were not French, but German refugees. And although France saw a lot of hate, apathy, and collaboration among its clergy, including, for example, a high ranking priest in Lyon, its officials, and its citizens, France is ranked third in the Righteous Among the Nations for the most non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews during the Holocaust.

The museum had row after row of documents, pictures, and articles written by, for, or about the French resistance and resistance fighters. Countless personal stories were told; a French school teacher hiding Jewish children and teaching them in her house so that they could continue schooling when the war was over, neighbors taking in families or children, resistance leaders imprisoned but rescued by their wives, and on and on. There were also many Lyon related stories... resistance fighters using the famous Traboule passageways in Vieux Lyon to dupe the Gestapo... pictures of floods of people celebrating in Place des Terreaux and Rue de la République after the war was over.... the destruction of the building at 14 avenue Berthelot, after the bombardment of Allied forces in 1944 (targeting train stations and the Gestapo headquarters)... bridges on both sides of Presqu'ile destroyed by bombings or resistance fighters...

The museum is a lot of reading- timelines and quotes every few feet, with the occasional side area to view videos that I couldn't stomach. I left feeling a little sickened, as one usually does after reading or seeing pictures describing genocide. But, one of the last quotes written on the wall went something along the lines of, "What we don't remember about the past, will surely happen again." And so.... I'm very proud that the city of Lyon has this museum to document an important part of its history, in the building that was once the cause of such despicable acts, in hopes that that kind of history will stop repeating itself.

I'm glad that I went. I walk around Lyon and see the Renaissance buildings of old Lyon or the Roman Ruins of Fourvière... but rarely do I picture the Lyon of the 1940's. It's amazing that it all took place here less than 80 years ago...