by Matthew Cobb
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Notes
CHAPTER 1
1 There are many accounts of this period. Apart from references to specific incidents, in the short, general description given here I particularly relied upon Alexander (1990, 1997), Jackson (2003), Kershaw (2007), Lottmann (1992), Shennan (2000) and Spears (1954). For an alternative analysis, focusing on the successes and failures of Allied and German Intelligence, see May (2000).
2 Balbaud (1941), p. 8.
3 Balbaud (1941), p. 22.
4 All the memoirs covering this period have a similar tone, highlighting the contrast between the idyllic late-spring weather and what was to come. For example: ‘The sky was cloudless and innocent, the air sweet, the untroubled earth went quietly about the business of nourishing all tender green young things, and we went quietly about ours, oblivious of the calamity that was bearing down upon France.’ Borden (1946), p. 32.
5 There were 3,270 German combat aircraft deployed on 10 May, as against 1,610 Allied machines. Kirkland (1985), p. 102.
6 Balbaud (1941), pp 48–9. German rank-and-file soldiers also understood the impact of the dive-bomber attacks. A few days before, on the other side of the Nazi lines, Sergeant Prümers of the 1st Panzer Regiment had watched in appalled fascination as wave after wave of Stukas attacked French positions at Sedan: ‘Simultaneously, like some bird of prey, they fall upon their victim and then release their load of bombs on the target. We can see the bombs very clearly. It becomes a regular rain of bombs that whistle down on Sedan and the bunker positions. Each time the explosion is overwhelming, the noise deafening. Everything becomes blended together; along with the howling sirens of the Stukas in their dives, the bombs whistle and crack and burst. A huge blow of annihilation strikes the enemy, and still more squadrons arrive, rise to a great height, and then come down on the same target. We stand and watch what is happening as if hypnotized; down below all hell is let loose!’ Horne (1969), p. 247.
7 This was not so unusual – the command post of the Supreme Commander of Land Forces, General Gamelin, had no radio communication. Alexander (1990).
8 Gunsburg (1984); Gunsburg (1992), p. 225.
9 Gunsburg (1992), pp. 234–5.
10 Saint-Exupéry (1942), p. 48. The English translation has ‘grains of dust’. This is a literal translation of the original ‘graines de poussière’, where ‘graines’ should be translated as ‘specks’.
11 Saint-Exupéry (1942), p. 3.
12 Koestler (1968), p. 180.
13 There are many accounts of Dunkirk. I have used Sebag-Montefiore (2006).
14 In 1942 the historian Marc Bloch – an Anglophile who served as a rank-and-file soldier in 1940 – described the British soldier as ‘by nature, a looter and a lecher: that is to say, he is guilty of two vices which the French peasant finds it hard to forgive when both are satisfied to the detriment of his farmyard and his daughters’. Bloch (1968), p. 70.
15 Barlone (1943), p. 60.
16 Cited in Jackson (2003), p. 206. The PPS in question was the future Prime Minister Alec Douglas-Home.
17 ‘Now it starts’, Time, 20 May 1940.
18 Bankwitz (1967). According to Borden (1946), p. 47, the experience of coming under fire for the first time shook Weygand to the core. This was reported to her by her husband, Edward Spears. In his memoirs published eight years later, Spears makes no reference to this story in his account of their conversation. Spears (1954), p. 96.
19 Humbert (2008), p. 3.
20 Saint-Exupéry (1942), p. 72.
21 Spears (1954), p. 76.
22 Bloch (1968), p. 49.
23 On 26 June the population of Paris had collapsed to about thirty-five per cent of its pre-war figure. Around seventy-five per cent of the population of the six
teenth arrondissement fled, as against only fifty-four per cent of the poor, predominantly Jewish fourth arrondissement. Lottmann (1992), pp. 293–4.
24 Dubois (1946), p. 62. This period is well described in Irène Némirovsky’s novel Suite Française, written at the time but published only in the twenty-first century. Némirovsky (2006).
25 Spears (1954), p. 151.
26 Spears (1954), p. 138.
27 Spears (1954), p. 178.
28 Spears (1954), p. 148.
29 Cited in Jackson (2003), p. 99. Weygand later sneered that when the British had to fight the Nazis, they would have their neck wrung like a chicken. Churchill’s famous riposte was: ‘Some neck. Some chicken.’
30 Spears (1954), p. 156.
31 The initial point of this clause was to ensure that, in case of victory, both sides would agree on how they carved up Germany. It took on a very different meaning in the light of an approaching Nazi victory.
32 Spears (1954), p. 206.
33 For details of the probable origins of the story, see Lottmann (1992), p. 328. The key point is that Weygand wanted to believe it.
34 Dubois (1946), p. 60. The cows were apparently from the Ferme d’Auteuil, a Parisian park.
35 Lottmann (1992), pp. 304–8.
36 Lottmann (1992), p. 319.
37 Bloch (1987), Rohwer (1999).
38 ‘Paris falls to the Germans’, Manchester Guardian, 15 June 1940.
39 Lottmann (1992), p. 356.
40 Shlaim (1974), p. 38.
41 Shlaim (1974), p. 53.
42 Spears and de Gaulle have given two very different accounts of this journey, illustrating the difficulty of reconstructing history solely on the basis of memoirs. According to Spears, de Gaulle said to him that he feared he would be arrested under the orders of the defeatists who had gained the ascendancy, and asked to be taken to London. Spears then explains, in gripping detail, how, in order not to arouse suspicion, they travelled separately to the aerodrome, under the pretext of de Gaulle saying farewell to Spears. Having been delayed for five nerve-racking minutes while some string was found to attach de Gaulle’s trunk full of papers, Spears hauled de Gaulle on board as the plane began to taxi, and the pair flew to London. This dramatic and apparently believable story contrasts with de Gaulle’s account: ‘Our departure took place without romanticism and without difficulty.’ De Gaulle (1962a), p. 80. On the basis of the assurances he received from de Gaulle and his aide-de-camp, Geoffrey de Courcel, who was also present, the French journalist and historian Henri Amouroux dismissed Spears’ account as worthy of The Three Musketeers. Amouroux (1964), p. 328.
43 Amouroux (1964), p. 332.
44 Koestler (1968), p. 206. The writer and teacher Jean Guéhenno was only slightly kinder in his diary entry for 17 June: ‘There, it’s over. An old man who no longer even has the voice of a man, but speaks like an old woman, told us at half past twelve that last night he had pleaded for peace.’ Guéhenno (2002), p. 15.
45 Passy (1947a), p. 21.
46 There were cynical attempts to put a positive spin on the collapse. In his diary for 19 June, Koestler wrote with his customary sharpness: ‘Listened during breakfast to repetition of new Foreign Minister Baudouin’s broadcast of yesterday night: “It is because we are sure of the French people’s spirit of independence . . . that we have asked on what conditions the carnage of our sons might be stopped.” Strange how melodious a self-contradictory sentence can be made to sound in French. “Because we love independence, we accept Nazi domination.”’ Koestler (1968), p. 199.
47 Frenay (1976), p. 4.
48 Levy (1998), p. 35.
49 Barlone (1943), p. 78.
50 Koestler (1968), p. 199.
51 Koestler (1968), p. 276.
52 For explorations of the nature of Vichy, see Paxton (2001) and Jackson (2001) pp. 142–212. For a discussion of the distribution of right-wing political forces on either side of the demarcation line, see Kedward (1978) pp. 82–90. For the reality of life under the Occupation, see Vinen (2006) and Gildea (2002).
53 Saint-Exupéry (1942), p. 94.
54 Alexander (1997), p. 173.
55 Figures taken from Alexander (1997). For a close examination of the French army’s performance after Dunkirk, see Alexander (2007).
56 Kirkland (1985).
57 Reynolds (1990).
58 Moulin’s scarf-wearing pre-dated his suicide attempt. The iconic photo of Moulin, wearing a hat, overcoat and scarf, dates from before the war. There are many accounts of Moulin’s life in French, some of them contentious and polemical. The best by far is that by Daniel Cordier (1989a, b, 1993a, 1999). In English, the most recent accounts are Marnham (2000) and Clinton (2001).
59 Alexander (1990).
60 Kershaw (2007), p. 63. See also n. 29 pp. 496–7.
61 During the 1936 strike wave, factories were occupied, and the bosses feared that revolution was around the corner. In fact the French Communist Party (PCF) was entirely under the thumb of Stalin, who wanted to maintain France as a friendly ally, faced with the threat of Nazi Germany, and the Communist leaders loyally argued that the strikes should end. Paid holidays and a shorter working week were immediately two of the real reforms introduced following the strike wave, but over the next three years business leaders and the right-wing parties gradually clawed these back.
62 Anonymous (n.d. 1940?), p. 13. The source is given as ‘A British General, who is also a Conservative MP, and speaks excellent French, returned from Bordeaux.’ This is clearly Spears.
63 Anonymous (n.d. 1940?), pp. 12–3.
64 Serge (1978), p. 381. An example of the reactionary mindset to be found at the summit of the armed forces was given by Maurice Gamelin, the commander-in-chief who had been in charge during the collapse of May 1940. In a report written while the battle still raged, Gamelin argued that the military leaders bore no responsibility for the impending defeat. He claimed it was all the fault of the French soldier, who ‘did not believe in the war. His curiosity did not extend beyond the horizon of his factory, office or field. Disposed to criticize ceaselessly all those having the least authority, encouraged in the name of civilization to enjoy a soft daily life, today’s serviceman did not receive the moral and patriotic education during the years between the wars which would have prepared him for the drama in which the nation’s destiny will be played out.’ Cited in Alexander (1997), p. 161. Alexander rightly describes this position as ‘notorious, self-serving . . . grotesque’.
65 Crémieux-Brilhac (1990), p. 237. The Party was utterly discredited – swastikas were daubed on portraits of Party leader Maurice Thorez, militants were spat at in the street. The PCF was viewed with even greater suspicion by the government and the state forces: not only were Communists loyal to Moscow rather than Paris, but they were now potentially the tools of the Nazis.
66 Crémieux-Brilhac (1990), p. 238.
67 Lottmann (1992), pp. 214–5.
68 Koestler (1968), p. 214.
69 http://www.winstonchurchill.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=418 (accessed November 2008).
70 These events are described in Bell (2000).
71 The exact time of the broadcast is the subject of a surprising amount of debate, made more complicated by the fact that there are no clear records at the BBC. Contemporary accounts are clouded by the fact that the Germans had put the Occupied Zone on Berlin time (GMT-2), but it is not clear whether this was universally applied. For a summary of the conflicting evidence, which at least shows how difficult it can be to provide precise information even about such a minor event, see Luneau (2005), pp. 29–36. She thinks it most likely that de Gaulle’s broadcast was at 22h00 London time.
72 De Gaulle’s speech has been widely reproduced. Marcot et al. (2006), p. 1027.
73 Humbert (2008), p. 7.
74 Shennan (2000), p. 18.
CHAPTER 2
75 Mandel (1986), p. 49.
76 Simon (1942), p. 23.
77 d’Aragon (1977), p. 18.
78 Cuvelliez (1995), p. 123.
79 Blumenson (1978), p. 70; Besse & Pouty (2006), p. 139.
80 Pineau (1960), p. 78.
81 Texcier (1945), pp. 8–20. For how the pamphlet was printed, see p. vii.
82 Humbert (2008), p. 14.
83 Blumenson (1978), p. 88.
84 To avoid Allied bombers using transmitters as navigation beacons, Radio Vichy and Radio Paris both stopped their long-range transmissions at 7.15 p.m. This left the field open for the BBC. Luneau (2005), p. 45.
85 Luneau (2005), pp. 78–82. This edition includes a CD of archive extracts of the Free French broadcasts on the BBC.
86 Cornick (2005).
87 When the Nazis eventually invaded the Free Zone, in November 1942, they made straight for the remaining ships of the French fleet moored at Toulon. See Chapter 5.
88 Kersaudy (1981), p. 85.
89 Horne (2000).
90 Martin-Chauffier (1976), p. 68.
91 Martin-Chauffier (1976), pp. 68–9.
92 Details from Radtke-Delacor (2001).
93 Diary entry for 19 October 1940. Schroeder (2000), p. 55. Liliane Schroeder’s maiden name was Jameson.
94 Martin-Chauffier (1976), p. 71; Schroeder (2000), p. 77.
95 Guéhenno (2002), p. 89.
96 Diary entry for 10 January 1941. Schroeder (2000), p. 64.
97 Diary entry for 17 January 1941. Schroeder (2000), p. 66.
98 Vinen (2006), pp. 227 and 245.
99 BBC broadcast of November 1940, track 24, 11 novembre 1940: Témoignages & Archives historiques (CD: Frémaux & Associés).
100 Luneau (2005), p. 85.
101 Bood (1974), p. 42. Subsequent quotes below are from pp. 45–6.
102 Not everyone got the joke, however – sixteen-year-old Communist militant Maroussia Naïtchenko was completely perplexed by the fishing rods. Naïtchenko (2003), p. 189.
103 Jean Guéhenno, diary entry for 15 November: ‘On 11 November, around 5.30 p.m., I went to the Champs-Elysées. I saw the French police, under German orders, remove the flowers that passers-by had placed at the foot of the statue of Clemenceau. I saw the German soldiers bayonet-charge the school students on the pavements, I saw officers throw them to the ground. I heard machine-gun fire three times.’ Guéhenno (2002), p. 66.
