Women in the Resistance

After the conquest of parts of France by German troops in June 1940 , various resistance groups were founded which acted against the occupation and organized themselves according to plan for this purpose. Women played a special role in many groups within the French Resistance . One of the first groups was a resistance cell that spontaneously formed after the German occupation forces marched into Paris from employees of the Musée National des Arts et Traditions Populaires (Museum of Applied Arts) in the Palais de Chaillot in Paris . One of the early evidence of these resistance activities with portraits of the group members and their lives can be found in Agnès Humbert's diary , which was published in Paris in 1946 under the title “Notre Guerre” by Emile-Paul Frères.

Roles and tasks

Women in the Resistance against the German occupation passed on, among other things, information about the equipment of the German Wehrmacht and troop movements to the Allies and were involved as liaison women in the procurement and transmission of messages. They looked after the wounded in their professions, some of which they had learned, as nurses or doctors. They worked in the background to feed the activists, who often also needed a safe hiding place.

In the active resistance, the Resistance began to use acts of sabotage to disrupt the infrastructure of the Germans and to interrupt supply lines. Attack targets therefore included road and rail networks, including the transport of weapons and other supplies. During the acts of sabotage , women were also often on duty to transport weapons and ammunition, deliver messages to activists or remove traces of attacks. They were exposed to a significantly higher risk than those who carried out the attacks.

The historian Christine Levisse-Touzé writes about the various activities of women in the French Resistance:

The women “joined the France Libre (Free France) resistance movement founded by General de Gaulle in exile in London. Some led resistance groups, Marie-Madeleine Fourcade z. B. the group Alliance , but that was rather the exception. 53 women, including five from the Gaullist resistance movement, were parachuted to French soil by the Special Operations Executive (established by Churchill in July 1940) to gather information about the occupiers. Women from North Africa in turn acted in the news apparatus. They were arrested and deported to Ravensbrück . "

Research situation

It was not until the 1970s - against the background of testimony in trials, such as the trial against Klaus Barbie  - that the role of women in the Resistance was raised again in the French public. The early testimonies from the time after the liberation and after the end of the war such as B. Agnès Humbert's diary from 1946 was quickly ignored. The history of the Resistance and the role of women is currently often part of gender research .

It is occasionally pointed out that there is more English-language literature on the subject than French-language literature. Margaret Collins Weitz from Suffolk University , Boston USA, intensified the debate in 1995 with her book Sisters in the Resistance. The Women's War to Free France, 1940-1945 . However, there has been a considerable body of testimony and research literature in France since the end of the German occupation regime; However, no explicit role analysis of women in the Resistance was undertaken in relation to culture and epoch. In the work of M. Collins Weitz, a large number of contemporary witnesses report on their experiences.

List of women in the Resistance

Surname	Data	Remarks	image
Berty Albrecht	1893-1943	Co-founder of a resistance group in France
Agniel, Michèle	1926–	Réseau d'évasion Bourgogne
Lucie Aubrac	1912-2007	French history teacher
Josephine Baker	1906-1975	American dancer and actress
Olga Bancic	1912-1944	Romanian resistance fighter
Beaumanoir, Anne (Annette)	1923	Parti communiste français
Mélanie Berger-Volle	1921	Austro-French seamstress and Trotskyist resistance fighter
France Bloch-Sérazin	1913-1943	French resistance fighter
Marguérite Bouillon-Housiau	1926	SRA, presse clandestine, service de renseignements, Belgique
Franceline Bloch	1919	EIF, Armée Juive
Fernande Brouwez	1926	Milices patriotiques du FI (Belgium)
Fernande Carlier	1923	Partisans armés (FI), Belgium
Danielle Casanova	1909-1943	Communist, died in Auschwitz
Regine Chatelain	1923	Groupe Jacques Messner; SR Kléber, Réseau Marco
Chatenay-Crémer, Anne Marie	1928-2014	Maquis du Berry
Rachel Cheigam	1917-2018	Réseau Anti-Ax, Armée Juive
Claudine Chomat	1915-1995	Communist, Comités féminins de résistance
Marie-Josè Chombart de Lauwe	1923–	Renseignement: Evasion Georges, France 31
Suzanne Citron	1922-2018	Réseau Périclès- Témoignage chrétien, Mouvement unis de Résistance
Marianne Cohn	1922-1944	Caregiver, was an organizer of the Zionist Youth in the southern zone of occupied France.
Yvonne Cormeau	1909-1997	On August 23, 1943, she landed with her parachute in the German-occupied France to support the Resistance there as a radio operator.
Marie Dorothée de Croy	1924-2005	Support of the Maquis "Morvan"
Charlotte Delbo	1913-1985	Artist and writer, joined the resistance group around the Marxist philosopher Georges Politzer .
Marie Déletraz	1891–?	Maquis
Deroubaix, rose	1924	Belgian resistance fighter; FI (1941), Groupe G (1943)
Marie Louise Dissard	1880-1957	Escape assistant for allied soldiers.
Emmy Dörfel	1908-2002	Nurse, member of the KPD; joined the International Brigades in Spain in 1937 . Then she fought in the French Resistance.
Marguerite Duras	1914-1996	Writer, screenwriter and film director, However, in 1940 he joined a resistance group.
Gabrielle Ferrières	1901-2001	Mouvement Liberation North; Réseau Cohors
Fillet, Marie (Médard)	1921-2013	Réseau Jonque
Marie-Madeleine Fourcade	1909-1989	headed the resistance and espionage group " Alliance ".
Jacqueline Fleury	1925–	Defense de la France, Mithridate (réseau)
Liliane, fresh	1924–?
Geneviève de Gaulle-Anthonioz	1920-2002	was active in organizing the intelligence service. In 1987 she appeared as a witness in the trial of Klaus Barbie .
Paulette Gutwirth (Dreyfus)	1922–?	EIF, sixième
Marie Hackin	1905-1941	Oriental archaeologist and member of the Free French Armed Forces (FFL) , wife of Joseph Hackin , posthumously awarded as Compagnon de la Liberation with the Ordre de la Liberation and the Croix de Guerre with a palm branch
Hautval, Adelaide	1906-1988	Psychiatrist, doctor, resistance fighter
Agnes Humbert	1894-1963	Employee at the “Musée Nationale des Arts et Traditions Populaires”, Palais de Chaillot, leaflet campaigns, news transmission from September 1940; Member of the Musée de l'Homme group, Paris
Emma Ickowicz	1911–?
Hélène Igla	1913-1943	Member of the FTP-MOI
Andrée de Jongh	1916-2007	Belgian; Nurse; organized the escape network 'Réseau Comète' (German: comet line);
Doris Kahane	1920-1976	German; CALPO , propaganda against the Nazi occupation army.
Hanna Kamieniecki	1924-2020	Parti communiste
Marie Médard (Fillet)	1921-2013	Réseau Jonque
Noor Inayat Khan	1914-1944	also "Nora Baker" and "Madeleine", daughter of Hazrat Inayat Khan, writer, musician, Sufi master and British agent. She landed with her parachute in the German-occupied France to support the Resistance there as a radio operator. Murdered in 1944 in Dachau concentration camp.
Hélène Kro	1913-1942	Real name: Hania Mansfeld. Polish communist, Jewish, member of the FTP-MOI
Rega Levine		Member of the FTP-MOI
Renée Lévy	1906-1943	Member of the Musée de l'Homme resistance group
Lise London	1916-2012	Communist
Suzanne Masson	1901-1943	French industrial illustrator, trade unionist and communist as well as resistance fighter in the Résistance . In June 1940 she distributed leaflets and organized people's committees (comités populaires) in Paris, which was occupied by the German Wehrmacht. In La Courneuve, she played a key role in setting up the Resistance group there.
Andrée Monier-Blachère	1922–	Parti communiste; Forces unies de la jeunesse patriotique
Paulette New (Benroubi-Khantine)	?	Réseau Sixième-EIF Maquis Juif de la Montagne Noire
Renée Nourry-Souliman	1923–2013 (?)	Groupe Jacques Messner, Réseau Marco
Simone Perl (Lévy)	1917-2004	Combat
Madeleine Riffaud	1924	Journalist, writer
Élise Rivet	1890-1945	Catholic nun, died in Ravensbrück concentration camp
Charline Roy Haag	1919-2013	Maquis du Lomont
Lilian Rolfe	1914-1945	Died in the Ravensbrück concentration camp
Jacqueline Sabatier	1924–	Francs-Tireurs et partisans francais
Evelyne Sullerot	1924-2017	Réseau Charles Verny, maquis en Sologne
Irma Schwager	1920-2015	Austrian; escaped an internment camp in 1939 and joined the Resistance.
Suzanne Spaak	1905-1944	Franco-Belgian resistance fighter of the Red Band .
Germaine Tillion	1907-2008	Ethnologist. Commander of the first Resistance group that formed in the occupied territory, the Groupe du Musée de l'Homme .
Dora Schaul	1913-1999	Jewish refugee (1934), interned in 1939, escaped from internment camp in 1942, under the code name Renée Fabre she worked for the Resistance in various German agencies and collected important strategic information.
Marie-Louise Streisguth	1914	Resistance fighter, liaison avec le réseau Mithridate, deported to Mauthausen, 1945: Liberation
Elsa Triolet	1896-1970	Writer
Marie-Claude Vaillant Couturier	1912-1996	Photographer, journalist; published secret reports directed against the occupiers during the German occupation of France; later coordinated the civil and military resistance.
Rose Valland	1898-1980	Art historian, French resistance fighter, officer in the French army and one of the most decorated women in French history.
Hélène Viannay	1917-2006	Defense de la France, maquis de Ronquerolles
Jeanne Vandercoilden	1924-2007	Belgian resistance fighter, 4 mouvements et 4 réseaux
Nancy Wake	1912-2011	Highly decorated woman of the Allies, was a Resistance fighter and British agent.
Emmy Weisheimer	1918–?	Groupe du scoutisme feminin
Nelly Willer (Scheigam)	1924–	Armée juive, mouvement zioniste
Irene Wosikowski	1910-1944	German emigrant, KPD, interned in Gurs, worked in Marseille for the Travail allemand (German labor), arrested by the Gestapo and executed in Berlin-Plötzensee. French patriots lovingly awarded her the honorary name “La Femme Allemande” for her steadfastness under severe Gestapo torture.

See also

• Women in the time of National Socialism
• Women in guerrilla movements
• Women's story
• Resistance to National Socialism

literature

German-language literature

• Ulla Plener (Ed.): Women from Germany in the French Resistance . Bodonoi, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-929390-80-9 (Workers' Movement series: research, documents, biographies).
  • Cristina Fischer: Review with additions, error correction, further literature ( dkp-online.de ).
• Christiane Goldenstedt: Les femmes dans la Résistance. In: Annette Kuhn, Valentine Rothe (ed.): Women in history and society. Volume 43, Herbolzheim 2006, ISBN 3-8255-0649-5 .
• Christiane Goldenstedt: "Liberté - j 'écris ton nom". Motifs of French and Belgian resistance fighters, Spiral der Zeit 6/2009, writings from the House of Women's History Bonn, pp. 62–65.
• Dorothee von Keitz, Andreas Ruppert: My youth came to an end in Ravensbrück. Fourteen Spanish women report on their deportation to German concentration camps . Tranvía, Berlin 1994, ISBN 3-925867-11-2 .
• Florence Hervé : "We felt free". German and French women in the resistance . Klartext, Essen 1997, ISBN 3-88474-536-0 .
• Florence Hervé: "At heart something is invulnerable and invulnerable". On the resistance of women in Germany and France, Spirale der Zeit 6/2009, writings from the Haus der FrauenGeschichte Bonn, pp. 58–61.
• Florence Hervé: With courage and cunning. European women in the resistance against fascism and war , Cologne 2020, Papy Rossa Verlag, ISBN 978-3-89438-724-2 .
• Mechtild Gilzmer: Women's internment camp in southern France. Rieucros and Brens 1939–1944 . Orlanda, Berlin 1994, ISBN 3-929823-10-1 .
• Margaret Collins Weitz: Women in the Resistance . Unrast Verlag, Münster 2002, ISBN 3-89771-410-8 .
• Ingrid Strobl : Never say you go the last way. Women in the armed resistance against fascism and German occupation . Fischer Verlag, 1989, ISBN 3-596-24752-7 .
• Germaine Tillion : Ravensbrück women's concentration camp , Frankfurt / M. 2001, Fischer, Frankfurt 2001, ISBN 3-596-14728-X .

French-language literature

• Mireille Albrecht: Berty. La grande figure féminine de la Résistance , Paris 1986, Editions Robert Laffont, ISBN 2-221-04408-8 .
• Christiane Goldenstedt: Motivations et activités des Résistantes. Comparaison France du Nord - France du Sud , in: Robert Vandenbussche (éditeur): Femmes et Résistantes en Belgique et en zone interdite (1940–1944), Institut de Recherches Historiques du Septentrion, Université Charles-de-Gaulle-Lille 3rd Colloque organisé à Bondues 2006, p. 199-217. ISBN 978-2-905637-53-6 .
• Marie-Jo Chombart de Lauwe: Toute une vie de résistance , Paris 1998, Editions Graphein FNDIRP, ISBN 2-910764-13-3 .
• Raisin Crémieux: La Traîne-sauvage . Flammarion 1999.
• Laurent Douzou: Lucie Aubrac, Paris 2009, Perrin, ISBN 978-2-262-02746-9 .
• Clarisse Feletin: Hélène Viannay. L'instinct de résistance de l'Occupation à l'école des Glénans, Editions Pascal, Paris 2004, ISBN 978-2-35019-000-6 .
• Marie-Madeleine Fourcade: L'Arche de Noé. Le réseau "Alliance", Paris 1968, Fayard, ISBN 978-2-259-18677-3 .
• Ania Francos: "Il était des femmes dans la Resistance" . Stock, Paris 1978.
• Geneviève de Gaulle Anthonioz: La traversée de la nuit , Paris 1998. Editions du Seuil, 9-782020363747.
• Evelyne Morin-Rotureau (dir.): 1939–1945: combats de femmes. Francaises et Allemandes, les oubliées de la guerre, Paris 2001, Collection Mémoires ISBN 978-2-7467-0143-4 .
• Frédérique Neau-Dufour: Geneviève de Gaulle Anthonioz. L'autre de Gaulle, Paris 2010, Editions du Cerf, ISBN 978-2-204-10390-9 .
• Rita Thalmann : L'oubli des femmes dans l'historiographie de la Resistance . In: CLIO . No. 1 , 1995 ( clio.revues.org ).
• Rita Thalmann : Tout commenca à Nuremberg , Paris 2004, Berg International éditeurs, ISBN 2-911289-64-1 .
• Agnès Humbert: Notre guerre. Souvenirs de Résistance, Paris 1940–41. 1946, 2nd edition, introduction by Julien Blanc, Tallandier, 2004.
• Francoise Thébaud (dir.): Resistances et Liberations. France 1940-1945 , CLIO, Histoire, Femmes et Sociétés, no. 1, 1995, Presses Universitaires du Mirail, Université de Toulouse-Le Mirail.
• Laurence Thibault (dir.): Les femmes et la Résistance , Paris 2006, La Documentation francaise, ISBN 2-11-006092-1 .
• Robert Vandenbussche (éditeur): Femmes en Résistance en Belgique et en zone interdite (1940-1944), Institut de Recherches Historiques du Septentrion, Université Charles -de -Gaulle-Lille 3, Colloque organisé à Bondues, ISBN 978-2-905637- 53-6 .

English-language literature

• Florence Hervé: "At the innermost core there is something unassailable and invulnerable". About the Resistance of Women in Germany and France, Spiral of time 6/2009, Journal of the House of Women's History Bonn, p. 58-61.
• Christiane Goldenstedt: "Liberté - j 'écris ton nom". Motivations of French and Belgian Female Resistance Fighters, Spirale der Zeit 6/2009, Journal of the House of Women's History Bonn, pp. 62–65.
• Agnès Humbert: Resistance. Memoirs of Occupied France . Bloomsbury, London / New York 2008 (English, French: Notre Guerre . Paris 1946. Translated by Barbara Mellor).
• Margaret Collins Weitz: Sisters in the Resistance. How Women Fought to Free France 1940-1945. John Welley & Sun. Inc., New York 1995.

Web links

• Mechtild Gilzmer: The women in the resistance in France. DRAFD-Info December 2001.

Individual evidence

1. ^ French. New edition 2004, Thallandier Editions, Paris; English translation 2008: Bloomsbury Publ., London, New York. As paperback 2009.
2. ^ Susan Zuccotti : The Holocaust, the French, and the Jews . In: Bison books . University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln 1999, ISBN 0-8032-9914-1 , pp. 271 (English, 383 pages, limited preview in Google Book Search).
3. ↑ Women in Resistance - Interview with the historian Christine Levisse-Touzé on a documentation by ARTE, March 10, 2005 ( Memento of September 7, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
4. ↑ also: Golda, also: Bancik
5. ↑ "These strangers ... and yet our brothers" - Jean Morawski , April 30, 2005, accessed July 15, 2018.
6. ↑ drafd.de
7. ↑ Kurt Hälker: La Femme Allemande. DRAFD information May 2001.
8. ↑ Testimonials from 50 Republicans from Spain who had to leave their country in 1939 and who lived as refugees in France. Their part in the Resistance as an anti-fascist struggle is described. Only 14 survived the deportation to Ravensbrück.