Marcel Rayman
Marcel Rayman , with nom-de-guerre and aliases called Faculté , Simon Maujean , Michel and Michel Mieczlav (* 1. May 1923 , Warsaw , † 21 February 1944 , Fort du Mont Valerien , Suresnes ) was a Polish Jew and Freedom fighters of the FTP-MOI , a group of the Resistance during the Second World War , as well as the leader of "Stalingrad", a very active action group.
biography
Early years
Rayman was born to a Jewish family and emigrated to France with his parents in 1931 at the age of eight . At the age of ten he became a member of the pioneer organization and the men's sports club Yask . He completed his school leaving certificate ( brevet élémentaire ) at the age of fifteen and then worked with his parents as a textile worker in knitwear .
Political commitment
When the first young communist groups ( Jeunesses communistes ) formed in France , Rayman joined them and was very active in their ranks until 1942. He took part in banned demonstrations , posted political posters and distributed illegal leaflets. Eventually he became head of the “Jeunesses communistes” in the 11th arrondissement of Paris .
Resistance
In early 1942 Rayman wanted to become a fighter in the second Jewish section of the Francs-tireurs et partisans (FTP). He was accepted into their ranks and quickly distinguished himself through his courage and intelligence. He got the supervision of the training of new fighters. When the Czech sub-grouping of the FTP was formed, he was assigned to them as an instructor in partisan tactics . He was very successful in this and the first operation he led against German soldiers on the Pont des Arts bridge caused a stir.
Member of the Manouchan group
After the establishment of the Armenian subgroup under Missak Manouchian , Rayman was assigned to this as an inspector. Manouchian's first operation in Levallois took place under Rayman's tactical direction.
On June 3, 1942 Rayman and Ernest Blankopf threw in the XI. Several hand grenades were fired at a transport vehicle of the German Navy in the 4th arrondissement in rue Mirabeau at number 17 . The Germans returned fire and severely wounded Blankopf, who - in order not to get into the hands of the Germans alive - shot his last bullet in the head. Rayman managed to escape despite being wanted by the Paris police.
During the summer of 1943, the FTP-MOI decided to kill the German commander of Greater Paris, General Ernst Schaumburg . Von Schaumburg's signature was emblazoned on posters distributed in Paris by the German military authorities announcing the execution of resistance fighters . Scouts of the FTP-MOI noticed a high- ranking German officer who regularly rode escorted by two guards in the Bois de Boulogne and then drove via avenue Raphaël to a luxury hotel and later to the Hôtel Le Meurice . The route was always the same and Marcel Rayman, Raymond Kojiski and Léo Kneller decided to kill him. On July 28, 1943, the three attacked the officer's vehicle by throwing a hand grenade into the car, which killed the officer inside. All three assassins managed to escape - but they missed their target, because the man killed was not from Schaumburg, but Lieutenant Colonel Moritz von Maliber from Schaumburg's general staff .
Under observation
From then on, Marcel Rayman became an important wanted target for the German occupation authorities. From July / August 1943, the Brigades spéciales n ° 2 of the Renseignements généraux concentrate on the resistance fighters of the MOI. The most wanted members of the Resistance in the Paris area were Marcel Rayman, responsible for planning and executing train derailment operations, Missak Manouchian , military chief of the group named after him , and Léo Kneller , a very experienced fighter.
At the beginning of August 1943, Lajb Goldberg - whose parents were deported in July during the Rafle du Vélodrome d'Hiver and who subsequently became a partisan - was identified and persecuted to passage de Stinville n ° 9. When he left the house, he was accompanied by Marcel Rayman, who in turn was being followed by Inspector Constant of the RG. The apartment on rue de Belleville in Paris, which Rayman used as a hiding place, soon became known to BS 2 of the Renseignements généraux . For the time being, however, he was only kept under covert surveillance and has not yet been arrested in order to track down further resistance members. By the end of the summer almost all of the MOI fighters had been spotted.
Meanwhile, the FTP-MOI's intelligence service observed heightened security measures in rue Saint-Dominique in Paris during the summer of 1943. One on the front fenders with swastika flags provided Mercedes - Limousine regularly brought a Nazi dignitaries in the courtyard of the Maison de la Chimie . After four months of observation, the military leadership of the MOI instructed Marcel Rayman, Léo Kneller and Celestino Alfonso to develop an assassination plan against this Nazi functionary. The operation came under the responsibility of Missak Manouchian in late August 1943 .
When the SS leader got into the car at 8:30 a.m. on September 28, 1943, Celestino Alfonso shot him, but the attacked man was only wounded (allegedly the panes of glass dampened the bullets or deflected them). The SS leader then tried to escape through the door on the other side of the car, but died from three bullets that Marcel Rayman then fired at him. The resistance fighters did not find out the identity of the man killed until later from the German press: It was Julius Ritter , who was responsible for the levy of forced labor in France ( Service du travail obligatoire , STO). The condemnation of this "heinous act" on the front pages of the newspapers, as well as the funeral ceremonies in the La Madeleine church , made this attack even more prominent.
At this point in time, Rayman had been under observation by BS n ° 2 for two months . After the attack on Ritter, the German occupation authorities put pressure on the Brigades speciales n ° 2 to show success in the fight against the resistance fighters. This triggered a wave of arrests in which the FTP-MOI actors identified to date were arrested. Some of them divulged other names under torture, leading to even more arrests.
Capture and execution
Marcel Rayman was arrested by the Brigades spéciales on November 6, 1943 at 1:30 p.m. at a meeting with Olga Bancic on rue du docteur Paul Brousse (Paris 17th) with other resistance fighters. Within a few weeks, almost all members of the Manouchian group were arrested, only one, the Italian Ildo Stanzani , escaped. The 23 arrested are tortured during the weeks of interrogation. Between 17 and 22 February 1944 Rayman and his comrades were in a show trial in Hôtel Continental sentenced to death and all but Olga Bancic even on the last day of the trial in Fort du Mont Valerien in Suresnes , a Paris suburb , shot . Olga Bancic was sentenced to death again three months later in Stuttgart and was beheaded there .
personal description
Brief description of Marcel Raymans, nom-de-guerre Faculté, made by investigators from the Brigade spéciale n ° 2 of the Renseignements généraux :
Faculté: 19 ans, corpulence trapue, visage rond, cheveux châtain foncé, frisés et abondants, chandail bleu marine à col roulé, pardessus bleu à martingale, souliers noirs, porte une serviette sous le bras.
"Faculté: 19 years old, stocky, round face, dark brown, curly and lush hair, navy blue turtleneck, blue Martingale coat (?), Black shoes, carries a briefcase under his arm."
L'Affiche rouge
Marcel Rayman appeared with a portrait photo and name on the infamous Affiche rouge (red poster), a propaganda poster that was posted thousands of times after the execution of the Manouchian group . The high visibility of the Affiche rouge meant that this Resistance group in the following decades and even as a group rouge Affiche- remained unknown.
Labeling:
" RAYMAN, juif polonais, 13 assassinations "
"RAYMAN, Polish Jew, 13 attacks"
various
Rayman's mother Chana Rayman was deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp and murdered there in the gas chamber . His younger brother Simon was sent to the Buchenwald concentration camp .
Movie
- In the French film L'armée du crime from 2009, Marcel Rayman is portrayed by the actor Robinson Stévenin . The film was directed by Robert Guédiguian . The film focuses on the role of immigrants in the Resistance, in particular the Manouchian group .
bibliography
- FFI - FTPF: Pages de gloire des vingt-trois , Immigration, 1951
- David Diamant: Combattants, Héros & Martyrs de la Resistance , editions Renouveau, Paris, 1984
- Stephane Courtois, Denis Peschansky and Adam Rayski: Le Sang de L'Etranger , Fayard, Paris, 1989
Web links
- La journée d'un "Terroriste" (French)
- Article by André Santini and Henry Karayan (French)
- Last Letters of The Manouchian Group February 21, 1944. Marcel Rayman - (Two farewell letters from Marcel Rayman to his aunt and uncle, and to his mother and brother) on www.marxists.org (English)
- United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: Jewish Partisans in France (English)
Individual evidence
- ^ Hans Umbreit: The military commander in France 1940-1944 . Boldt, Boppard 1968, pp. 320-331.
- ↑ Extrait des archives de la police ( Memento of the original from January 2, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . Last accessed October 9, 2010
- ^ "Golda (Olga) Bancic" , Holocaust Encyclopedia , United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Last accessed October 9, 2010
- ↑ Memoire-Net - II. Le rôle des étrangers dans la résistance / 2. Les FTP- MOI: la guérilla urbaine / a. en région parisienne: le groupe "Manouchian" ( Memento of the original of September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ The Internet Movie Database - L'armée du crime, 2003
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Rayman, Marcel |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Rayman, Faculté (pseudonym) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Polish-Jewish fighter of the French Resistance |
| DATE OF BIRTH | May 1, 1923 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Warsaw |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 21, 1944 |
| Place of death | Suresnes |