Gun Control in Nazi Occupied-France
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87. Guéhenno, Diary of the Dark Years, 164 (entry dated July 10, 1942).
88. Laub, After the Fall, 188.
89. Berr, Journal, 97–99 (entries dated July 15 and 18, 1942).
90. Berr, Journal, 103, 105 (entries dated July 18 and 21, 1942).
91. Gildea, Marianne in Chains, 259.
92. Louis Maurice Charmeau, président de l’Union Départementale des Combattants Volontaires de la Résistance, Bordeaux, France, letter to author, June 10, 2003.
93. “Avis,” Le Matin, July 8, 1942, 3.
94. “Morts pour la France,” Combat, août 1942 (citing La Revue, Lausanne, Switzerland, 29 juillet 1942).
95. “Au conseil des ministres,” Le Matin, August 1-2, 1942, 3; “Les manifestations de nature à nuire à l’ordre public sont interdites,” Le Figaro, August 3, 1942, 1; The Times (London), August 5, 1942, 3e.
96. The Times (London), August 5, 1942, 3e.
97. Art. 2, Loi N° 773 du 7 août 1942 punissant de la peine de mort la détention d’explosifs et les dépôts d’armes, Journal Officiel, N° 189, 8 août 1942.
98. Art. 1 & 2, Décret-loi du 18 avril 1939 fixant le régime des matériels de guerre, armes et munitions, Journal Officiel, 13 juin 1939, 7463–7466.
99. Art. 4., Décret-loi du 18 avril 1939 fixant le régime des matériels de guerre, armes et munitions, Journal Officiel, 13 juin 1939, 7463–7466.
100. “L’ouverture de la chasse aura lieu le 6 septembre,” Le Figaro, August 19, 1942, 1.
101. “Morts au Champ d’Honneur. France,” Combat, n° 36, novembre 1942.
102. Mitchell, Nazi Paris, 77–78.
103. Frenay, Night Will End, 202, 205.
104. BA/MA, RW 35/1221, Lagebericht für den Zeitraum vom 16. Mai 1942 bis 30. September 1942, Chef der Militärverwaltung A, 5. Oktober 1942.
105. BA/MA, RW 35/289, Militärbefehlshaber in Frankreich, Monatsbericht für September 1942, 12. Dezember.1942.
106. “Le Conseil des Ministres s’est réuni à Vichy,” Le Figaro, October 19, 1942, 1.
107. He described some of the conflicts in Général Gilles Lévy, “Les Maquis d’Auvergne dans la Résistance: Pourquoi le Mont-Mouchet?” at lesamitiesdelaresistance.fr/lien1-maquis.php. See also http://www.memoresist.org/?s=Gilles+L%C3%A9vy.
108. For example, see Gilles Lévy, Drames et secrets de la Résistance (Paris: Presses de la Cité, 1984) and Guide des Maquis et hauts-lieux de la Résistance d’Auvergne (Paris: Presses de la Cité, 1986).
109. Gilles Lévy, Saint Maur des Fossés, France, response to author’s questionnaire, October 4, 1999.
110. Archives Nationales F1cIII 1183, monthly report of the Haute-Saône prefect, 1940–1944 (first two cases); Archives Nationales F1cIII 1199, monthly report of the Puy de Dôme prefect, December 1, 1942 to January 1, 1943 (third case).
7
Arms for the Resistance
OPERATION TORCH, THE American-British invasion of French North Africa, was launched on November 8, 1942. After initial resistance from French forces, an agreement was made on the 10th with Admiral François Darlan, the highest-ranking French officer there, to lay down their arms. Many would join the Allies with the Free French Forces. Hitler immediately ordered the occupation of the free zone of France. “The German army is panicked, runs to the Mediterranean, occupies all of France, and the whole French Empire is entering the war,” as Jean Guéhenno put it in his diary.1
Pierre Laval was awakened at 4 a.m. on November 11 to be informed that the Axis would now occupy Vichy France. Vichy authorities let Pétain continue to sleep as they ordered that the military and police not resist. French police could remain armed, but the French military would be disbanded and disarmed, other than certain exceptions for officers explained below. Days later, power was conferred on Laval to issue laws and decrees without Pétain’s approval.2
Seeking to justify his actions after the war while awaiting trial, Laval wrote, “The most lurid violation of the Armistice Convention was the crossing of the demarcation line by the German army” in 1942, adding that “the Armistice lasted four long years, and we had no means, no weapons, other than negotiations described to-day as ‘intelligence with the enemy,’ to serve as a barrier to German cruelty and rapacity.” The lack of weapons could be traced in part to Laval’s own 1935 decree that firearms be registered with the police and his subsequent collaboration with the Germans. Laval justified his continued collaboration with the Nazis who now occupied all of France as follows:
Had I abandoned my post in November 1942 the whole of the country would have become one vast Maquis. The cost would have been thousands and thousands of dead. It is understandable that brave men and true patriots did not hesitate to expose themselves to the consequences of Article 10, which outlawed them as guerillas or francs-tireurs. But how could the head of Government be justified in taking a decision which would expose the entire French population to this terrible risk?3
The whole of France as “one vast Maquis,” as rural resistance fighters were called, would have meant a popular armed struggle against Nazi occupation. The liability of guerillas, also known as francs-tireurs, not to be treated as prisoners of war under Article 10 of the armistice was a brutal but expected consequence of being in the Resistance. Laval’s continued collaboration only delayed the defeat of Nazi occupation. It goes without saying that the conjured disaster would not have occurred had Laval, to use his words, abandoned his post.
The handwriting was on the wall for gun owners in the newly occupied free zone. Maxime Ducrocq, president of the Saint-Hubert-Club de France, wrote to the interior minister in Vichy—that was Pierre Laval—on November 13 expressing the dread of hunters that decrees would be issued requiring all hunting arms to be turned in to town halls or to Kommandanturen and banning hunting, either along the coast or in the entire free zone. If arms were required to be surrendered, Ducrocq urged that labels with the name and address of owners be firmly attached, noting that this was not done in 1940 in three-fourths of the cases, which would have made return of the guns much more difficult.4 His hope that surrendered firearms would be returned to their owners after the war was an illusion.
The Gestapo Confronts the Resistance
Members of the Resistance had far broader issues in mind. Reflecting that many were in the previously unoccupied zone, Resistance leader Henri Frenay noted, “For Combat, for my comrades and for myself, the battle was to change radically. We were now confronted by the Gestapo itself.” The Gestapo aggressively repressed the Resistance in Lyon, a center of anti-German activity. Frenay recalled, “Soon I was packing a loaded pistol whenever I went out. That way, if the enemy were to appear, he and I would be a little more evenly matched.”5
When defeated in 1940, the French army had not turned in all of the arms required by the armistice. Vichy had an arms-concealment program for hiding large numbers of firearms, ammunition, and artillery throughout the unoccupied zone. Frenay had actually met with the member of the general staff in charge of the program, and later wrote him, “The army’s weapons belong to the nation and not to you alone. It is your duty to give them to those who will use them for the liberation of our homeland.” He warned against them falling into the enemy’s hands. Frenay would bitterly recall, “Soon afterward, Laval ordered that all existing arms caches be turned over to the Germans, which, with a few exceptions, they were.”6
Vichy planned to make good use of the firearms it was confiscating from its August 1942 decree-law that imposed the death penalty. The ministry of the interior categorized confiscated weapons as follows: Group 1, weapons that can be used by the police—6.35 mm and 7.65 mm pistols; 8 mm revolvers; 1892 models or similar light machine guns; military rifles; hunting rifles in good condition and well taken care of; Group 2, weapons that can be used by other entities that maintain law and order—pistols, revolvers, rifles in good condition and well taken care of that are not listed in the first group; and Group 3, weapons that do not qualify for either.7
Weapons of groups 1 and 2 would be retained permanently. Regional prefects would consult with the Central Armament Service and requisition weapons necessary to equip police forces in their respective regions. The remaining inventory was to be sent to the Service to distribute them to occupied or unoccupied territories.
Of group 3, weapons from collections would be returned to the private citizens who surrendered them or to local authorities if the owner could not be established. Hunting guns not confiscated by the Central Armament Service would be given to holders of hunting permits for the years 1942 to 1943. Unusable or obsolete weapons would be scrapped and paid for by weight.
No compensation would be paid for several categories, including the types of revolvers or self-loading pistols used by foreign armies, described as Parabellum, Mauser, Walther, Colt, Smith & Wesson, Erfurt, Webley & Scott, Eagan, FN Herstal, Beretta, Star, Eibar, etc. Browning five-shot self-loading hunting shotguns would also be kept without compensation if the owners were unable to prove that they acquired them before the law of 1934 entered into force.
Up to now, civilians in the free zone were subject to the decree-law on war matériel, arms, and munitions of April 18, 1939. It banned “war weapons,” defined to include any firearm chambered for the same cartridge used by the military, such as handguns using the 7.65 mm long or greater caliber rounds. Other handguns were “defensive arms” requiring authorization from the police station or the gendarmerie, and were limited to only one weapon per home. Prefects of the free zone issued decrees that progressively forbade firearm possession, and required them to be surrendered to gendarmeries or to town halls.8
Vichy Decrees the Death Penalty for Gun Possession
At this point, as ordered by Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt, commander-in-chief–West,9 the Vichy regime decreed a further ban on firearms other than those belonging to the military and police. Following consultation with the Council of Ministers, Pierre Laval decreed a law on December 3 modifying the 1939 law, and amended it two days later to make it more draconian.10 It began with a general prohibition on firearms: “Sale, possession, transportation and carrying of firearms of any kind, including hunting guns, ammunition of any kind, explosives and individual parts of these items are prohibited.”11 In the first version, violation was punishable by imprisonment, or by death if an arms cache was possessed.12 In the version decreed two days later, that was amended to apply to any firearm, not just a cache: “Any violation of the provisions of this decree shall be punished by imprisonment or the death sentence.”
The prohibition did not apply to French military personnel who remained in service after December 1, 1942, or to government employees whose jobs put them at risk of aggression, such as police officers and penitentiary guards. It also excluded inoperable arms with only collector’s or sentimental value.13 Prior permits to carry or possess arms were revoked, and any new ones would be issued by the ministry of the interior.14
Anyone in possession of arms was required to surrender them within ten days of the posting of the decree to the places designated by the prefects.15 Anyone aware that arms or ammunition were not turned in was required to report them to the police or the city hall.16 In the first version of the decree, failure to inform was punishable by two to five years’ imprisonment. In the revised version two days later, an exemption was made to the duty to inform for direct relatives of the person possessing the arms or ammunition. It also deleted the special penalties for failure to inform and subjected violators to the general sentences of imprisonment or death.
In short, within a two-day period, the decree was changed so that one could get the death sentence not only for possessing a gun, but also for not informing the police that someone else possessed a gun. Perhaps the German occupiers did not like the first decree and ordered Laval to make it harsher. A final amendment to the decree clarified that violators would be under summary procedures for trial,17 usually meaning a quick finding of guilt with little due process.
The day the decree was announced on the radio in Paris, the Saint-Hubert-Club de France sent a letter to the Sociétés Départementales de Chasseurs (Departmental Societies of Hunters) detailing its efforts to alleviate the burdens and secure the firearms that must be turned in, including giving a receipt to the owner, the keeping of a registry, and securely fixing labels with the owner’s name and address. Hunters were urged to contact their prefect and admonish that protective measures be taken to safeguard the arms. Vermin that destroyed the crops could still be hunted, but not with guns (the letter did not say how, but archery and trapping were likely intended).18
The hunters were assured that Saint-Hubert President Maxime Ducrocq would be received by Marshal Pétain to express their concerns.19 If the senile Pétain stayed awake in the meeting, he was powerless to do much.
As an example of how the law was administered, the prefect of Gard in southern France informed the mayors that all weapons must be deposited in town halls with a strong cardboard label attached to the trigger guard and bearing the following information: name, address, type of weapon, caliber, and number if applicable. Each commune would transport the weapons to the gendarmerie and the lists would be sent to the prefect by December 26.20
The weapons, which included 1,124 long guns and 51 pistols, would later be transported to a warehouse in Nîmes. One family surrendered 12 long guns, 3 carbines, 4 pistols, 1 child’s carbine, 198 cartridges, and quantities of bullets and gunpowder for reloading. The author of this account noted, “And we know perfectly well that every self-respecting hunter hid his best gun and cartridges in a country cottage or chicken coop.”21
As for the exemption in the new decree for French military personnel, the Germans had other ideas. Carl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel issued a directive on December 18 stating that, in connection with the dissolution and disarmament of the French armed forces, the military commander-in-chief–West announced that French officers could keep, but not carry, sidearms and pistols that were their personal property.22
An Avis (notice) with the details was published in the press. French military officers demobilized after November 10, 1942, were required to register their firearms by make, serial number, and caliber and their ammunition between January 4 and January 20, 1943, to the security police and SD (Sicherheitspolizei und Sicherheitsdienst), which would issue them a certificate. Weapons could be kept only in their residences. All other firearms were required to be surrendered. Any officer who failed to register would be subject to the death penalty under the decree of March 5, 1942.23
The year 1942 ended with a discussion of Stülpnagel’s Summary Order for the Protection of the Occupying Forces, which may have been the order to the French to issue the above decree requiring denunciation of gun possession. Dr. Rudolf Thierfelder of the dubiously named “Justiz” group, the German legal authority, noted the previous loophole, allowing that no duty existed to report illegal weapons possession or unknown weapons caches: “In practice, this lack of a provision turned out to be an important gap in the fight against illegal weapons possession and the endeavors to collect all weapons in the occupied territory.” The gap was now closed with the duty to denounce others who possessed firearms, excluding close relatives.24 The death penalty awaited those who failed to inform on gun possessors.
Execution Without Trial
As the screws tightened, the danger increased that the Germans would dispense with the formality even of a secret trial and shoot anyone who possessed a firearm on the spot. As provided by the January 12, 1943, order signed by Belgium Military Governor Alexander von Falkenhausen, “Persons who are found, without valid authorization, in possession of explosives and military firearms, pistols of all kinds, sub-machine guns, rifles, et cetera, with ammunition, are liable in future to be shot immediately without trial.” At the Nuremberg Trials in 1946, French prosecutor Charles Dubost characterized the order as showing that the Nazis saw all citizens of France and the rest of Europe as engaged in resistance, thereby calling for “arbitrary m
easures of repression” and “extermination.”25
In January 1943, Vichy transformed the Service d’Ordre Légionnaire (SOL), supposedly a patriotic organization established in 1941, into the Milice to repress anti-Nazi forces.26 The Milice became Vichy’s primary force, in the words of Simone de Beauvoir, that “suppress[ed] all ‘disaffections on the home front,’ and which hunted down members of the Resistance even more ruthlessly than the S.S. did.”27
Meeting in Casablanca, Allied heads Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill together with Generals Charles de Gaulle and Henri Giraud representing the Free French Forces planned the next strategic moves against the Axis. Roosevelt famously announced the “unconditional surrender” doctrine, precluding any negotiated terms, much to Churchill’s surprise. The Allies would thereafter rely on bombing to obliterate the Axis war machine, although the British Special Operations Executive (SOE) favored sabotage. The Resistance also favored sabotage over bombing, which could not be pinpointed and would kill innocent civilians and destroy cities.28
Unifying the Resistance
On January 26, the groups Libération, Combat, and Franc-Tireur united under the Mouvements Unis de la Résistance (MUR, or United Movement of the Resistance).29 The Resistance was becoming increasingly active, although its members were always short of arms. They started with a few civilian arms from before the war and military arms left from the battles of 1940. The Allies began dropping arms by parachute, allowing the Resistance to escalate its activities involving sabotage and even direct combat.30
In February, Combat chief Henri Frenay sent an envoy to report on the secret army, the Groupes Francs, and the Maquis to the American Office of Strategic Services (OSS) chief Allen Dulles in Bern, Switzerland. Dulles promised funds, weapons, and radio communications to support the French Resistance. Twice a week, de Bénouville sent intelligence and requests for arms to the Resistance delegation in Geneva for their Allied contacts. Over the mountains, the delegation would send arms and munitions purchased in Switzerland back to the Resistance.31