One Day in Oradour

by Helen Watts

  The meeting between Dietrich and his platoon leaders in the village hall lasted only ten minutes but by the end of it, no one was in any doubt what Dietrich’s real plan was.

  ‘Our orders were to ask for hostages, and we have,’ said Dietrich, pacing back and forth. ‘They had their chance to pick their victims, but they have refused. Now we can punish them all.’

  ‘But what about the search, sir?’ one officer asked, not alone in his confusion.

  ‘There’s nothing to find,’ spat Dietrich. ‘Klausner is already dead!’

  Seeing the soldiers’ confusion, he explained, ‘My informants in St Junien confirmed it. He was burned alive – a hero of Germany, brutally murdered! His body was found in an abandoned barn outside Limoges.’

  The men exchanged silent glances.

  Dietrich continued. ‘This is our opportunity to get a grip on the Resistance once and for all. Oradour will be Major Klausner’s revenge. A lesson to the Resistance all over France. A masterpiece!’ Dietrich stared into each of his men’s eyes as he walked among them. ‘Are you with me, or not?’

  With no one daring to refuse, Dietrich delivered his new orders swiftly and refused to take any questions. If any of their men wavered, he said, the platoon leaders were to remind them what the Resistance were capable of. They were to think about Major Klausner and what had nearly happened to Storm Leader Goth. This was their chance to be heroes. To defend their fellow SS, to show their dedication to their country. There were to be no prisoners, no exceptions… and there was to be no mercy.

  No one seemed to notice Leon and Sylvie leading their children surreptitiously to the back of the crowd, and they reached the well with relative ease. From there, it was just a few more metres to the end of the fairground and the turning into Rue de la Cimetière, but two half-covered trucks parked across the road obscured their view. There was no way of knowing if the Germans were guarding the route they needed to take.

  ‘Stay here,’ said Leon. ‘I’ll sneak in between the trucks and take a look. If it’s clear, I’ll signal you and the children to follow, yes?’

  Sylvie nodded her agreement and waited, putting her finger to her lips to remind the children to stay quiet.

  Leon darted out from the back of the crowd and shot between the two vehicles. From where she stood, Sylvie could see only his feet, clad in leather boots. The boots had come to a stop. Leon must be able to see round the corner now. She prayed that the way was clear.

  Sylvie raised her eyes from the ground expecting to see Leon reappearing in the gap, ready to give her the yes or no signal, but when he did re-emerge it was with his two hands in the air, a look of total despair on his face. Walking behind him, pressing a rifle into his back, was a young SS officer.

  Sylvie instinctively stepped forwards, ready to help her husband. She would explain that it was her fault. She’d pretend that she had asked him to go and look for one of their children who had gone missing. The soldier had to understand.

  But the soldier just pushed her roughly away.

  ‘Nein,’ he said. ‘Frauen und Kinder müssen nach rechts zu gehen.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ cried Sylvie. ‘Leon, what’s he saying?’

  Leon shook his head in bewilderment as he was led off, away from Sylvie and the children, to join a crowd of men gathering in front of the Mayor’s house.

  ‘They’ve started to separate the men from the women and children,’ interjected a young woman nearby, cradling a small baby in her arms. ‘We have to go and stand on this side of the green, to the right, in front of the café and the hardware store. The men have to go to the left. Come on, come with us.’

  Sylvie could feel tears brimming in her eyes. As she followed the young mother, keeping Louis and Paulette closely in tow, she looked back over her shoulder to try to catch sight of Leon, but he had already disappeared into the crowd.

  ‘Where are they taking Papa?’ Louis wailed. ‘What about our game?’

  ‘Sshh,’ said Sylvie, trying her best to put on a brave face. ‘The soldiers just want to talk to him. We’ll carry on playing later.’

  Inside, Sylvie was in turmoil. They had waited too long. They should never have stayed in the fairground. They had broken their pact.

  She began to pray that Alfred, Christelle and Sabine would not make the same mistake.

  It was then that Sylvie heard the first terrifying sounds of machine gun fire.

  15: Alfred’s Choice

  By 2.45, all of the children in Alfred’s class had seen Doctor Depaul and were looking forward to being dismissed for the rest of the afternoon. The doctor had left about half an hour earlier, so the children knew they would be going home soon.

  Although they were disappointed about having to come back into school after lunch, the afternoon had started on a cheerful note. Monsieur Gravois had invited them all to sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to Didier, who was ten years old that day, and Didier had proudly shared out some tiny home-made jam tarts, sent in by his mother.

  Didier was a friend of Sabine’s and had been to the Fournier house many times. Alfred didn’t like it when Didier came round because that usually meant he walked home with them from school. All the way, Didier would try to make Sabine laugh with his silly jokes and usually Alfred was the butt of them. He called him Ginger Top and Carrot Boy and, because he was so much taller than Alfred, kept rubbing his knuckles on the top of his head.

  Now, as the afternoon drew on, Alfred was getting increasingly restless and was keeping himself entertained by flicking screwed up pieces of paper, dipped into the little white porcelain pot in his desk and soaked in blue ink, at the back of Didier’s head with a ruler. So far he had scored three direct hits and Monsieur Gravois still hadn’t noticed.

  In fact, thinking about it, Monsieur Gravois was decidedly distracted. A short while before, the children had heard some heavy footsteps marching past the school in the direction of the village centre. They were desperate to run to the windows to see who it was but Monsieur Gravois had told them firmly to stay in their seats. He had gone to the school door and looked out, but he must have seen nothing of interest because he came straight back in and shut the door quickly behind him, saying it was nothing, and that the children should get out their reading books.

  Alfred stopped firing pellets and peered closely at Monsieur Gravois, who was now pacing up and down in front of his chalkboard, holding a book but definitely not reading it. He was white-faced and was chewing his bottom lip. Something was wrong. What was Monsieur Gravois waiting for? Doctor Depaul had been gone for ages. Why hadn’t he let them go home yet? Was it something to do with the footsteps they had heard outside? What had he really seen out of the window?

  Then Alfred nearly jumped out of his seat.

  Gunshots. Not far away.

  The children all stopped reading and looked about them in bewilderment. Monsieur Gravois dashed over to the window.

  The gunfire was followed by shouts. Men’s voices. German voices.

  Alfred turned round to look at his sisters sitting in the back row with the other older students. Christelle was staring intently at Monsieur Gravois, waiting to see what he would do next. Sabine was sitting bolt upright staring back at her brother, gripping the edge of her desk, her knuckles pale.

  More gunfire. Louder now.

  ‘Get down!’ screamed Monsieur Gravois. ‘Lie face down on the floor!’

  The children scrambled for the floor, sending pencils, rulers and exercise books flying. Several of the children were whimpering in fear. The girl next to Alfred began to cry. Another sobbed, ‘I want my mother.’

  Alfred began to crawl under the desks across the chalk-dusty floor towards his sisters, who were lying side by side. Christelle had her arm laid protectively over her younger sister’s back.

  ‘We’ve got to get out,’ he said softly when he reached them.

  ‘Quiet!’ said Monsieur Gravois, hearing him. ‘Lie still.’

  Alfred looked imploringly at Chri
stelle, but she just shook her head quickly.

  Maybe Christelle is right, thought Alfred. We should wait to see what happens next. The Germans might just pass by.

  But they didn’t.

  The door burst open and in strode a dark-haired German soldier carrying a sub-machine gun.

  ‘Out!’ he shouted. ‘All of you. Out!’

  Monsieur Gravois got rapidly to his feet. More children started to cry.

  ‘Everyone stay calm. It will be all right. Just do as he says. Line up along the wall then follow me.’ Monsieur Gravois turned to the soldier and spoke in German. ‘They’re only children. Where do we have to go?’

  ‘To the fairground. Tell them that their parents are all there. You lead. I will stay at the back. Tell them no one must try to escape.’

  At the back of the line, Alfred was tugging at Christelle’s sleeve and gesturing with his head towards the door in the corner of the classroom which led to the cloakroom.

  ‘Stop it, Alfred,’ Christelle whispered. ‘You heard what Monsieur Gravois said. Our parents are all in the fairground.’

  ‘But we all agreed,’ argued Alfred. ‘It’s happening. The Germans have come. We have to go to the woods behind the cemetery. Now, while he’s not looking, let’s hide in the cloakroom ‘til he’s gone.’

  Christelle looked unmoved.

  ‘Sabine, please,’ Alfred pleaded, looking at the younger of his two sisters. ‘They’re Germans. We know what they’re like. They’ll try to hurt us.’

  Sabine looked from Alfred to Christelle, then back at Alfred. Tears were streaming down her face. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I want to go and find Mother and Father, at the fairground.’

  Alfred started to back up into the corner of the classroom, all the time keeping his eyes firmly fixed on the German soldier who was waving his gun at the children at the front of the line to encourage them to start filing out.

  ‘I’m going to try to escape.’

  Christelle opened her mouth to object, but Alfred had already ducked out through the doorway and was gone.

  The two girls resisted the temptation to look back as they were herded out of the school building, not wanting to raise any suspicion about their brother. They held tightly onto one another’s hands, and shuffled along at the back of the line, keeping their heads down.

  To get to the fairground they had to walk all the way back up the Peyrilhac road, and then turn right up the hill as they approached the church.

  As they reached the end of the road by the blacksmith’s, they passed a group of young tourists who had just ridden into town on their bicycles. Christelle heard them desperately trying to explain to the German officer who was shepherding them that they had just come into Oradour for a picnic by the river. They often did it, they kept repeating, it was such a beautiful spot. Could they not just go back down to the bridge? They would find another place to stop.

  The SS officer, impatient and tired of listening, suddenly stopped in his tracks and ordered the group to lean their bicycles against the wall. Christelle watched as he marched them at gunpoint into the forge.

  It wasn’t until the line of schoolchildren had turned off into Rue de la Cimetière that Christelle heard the gunfire from the forge. She closed her eyes and fought back the wave of nausea that rose up in her throat. Alfred had been right. They should have tried to escape. She was the eldest. She should have known better, should have had more courage.

  ‘Do whatever they say, Sabine,’ she muttered, squeezing her sister’s hand. ‘Just don’t argue with them, alright?’

  Every house and store they passed seemed to be swarming with SS men.

  ‘What are they looking for?’ whispered Sabine.

  Christelle shook her head in bewilderment.

  An old man, hardly able to walk, was being dragged out of his house, his small frail body looking so fragile in the clutches of the powerful young soldier who now shoved him down onto the ground.

  ‘Don’t look,’ cried Christelle, spinning her sister to face the other way as she saw the rifle being pushed into the old man’s back and heard the crack as it fired.

  The children were now screaming and Monsieur Gravois, panicking, began to run with them towards the fairground, trying all the while to keep the smallest huddled as close to him as possible. It was too late now to try to quieten their fears, as the gunfire continued to rattle around them and the streets began to fill with the sound of panicked voices.

  Once in the cloakroom, Alfred paused for a second, trying to decide his next move. If he went out of the side door, he could escape through the playground and run off in the opposite direction to the way his classmates had gone. But that would mean staying on the road where there was every chance that there would be more soldiers. It also took him towards the river and away from the cemetery.

  No. He had to stick to the plan, even if Sabine and Christelle had chosen not to. He had let his mother down too many times lately. He recalled the look on her face the night before as she had served him that plate of dried-up fish stew. This time he was going to do as he was told.

  Above his head, offering a view out over the hill at the back of the school, was a small window. It was big enough for him to climb through, and it was open. Alfred put one foot up on the bench under which the pupils all stored their bags and their plimsolls ready for sports lessons, took hold of a coat peg with his left hand, and sprang upwards, grasping the window ledge with his right hand before heaving himself up until he was balanced in mid air, half in and half out. He looked out and could have cried with relief to see the garden and the cornfield beyond free of soldiers. He had a chance.

  Swivelling his body round to the side, and hanging on tight, Alfred swung his left leg up. As he lifted his foot over the window sill his clog caught on the latch and he wobbled dangerously. Steadying himself, he tugged with his foot. He was free, but he felt his clog come loose and his breath caught in his throat as it fell back inside. Alfred froze as he waited for it to hit the tiled cloakroom floor, but the noise of the last few children filing out of the classroom disguised the sound. He could still escape.

  He swung both legs out of the open window until he was facing back into the cloakroom, then gradually lowered himself down, feet first, as far as he could before letting his body drop to the floor onto the soft grass. Thankful that the ground was dry, Alfred kicked off his remaining clog and sprinted across the grass and scrambled over the wall at the end of the school garden.

  He looked about him. Behind the school was a gently sloping hill, a lush green pasture used for grazing sheep which was dotted with fruit trees. If he ran straight up the hill he could dart from tree to tree. But what if he was spotted in between? The higher he went, the easier it would be for the soldiers to see him from down on the street. If he ran to his left, staying low on the edge of the pasture behind his own school and the infant school next door, he could hug the wall and keep out of sight until he picked up the footpath that crossed the corner of the field and led to Rue de la Cimetière, further up towards the edge of the village. Not knowing how many Germans were about, the second option seemed safer to Alfred for now.

  Sticking closely to the wall, he began to jog along the edge of the field, parallel with the Peyrilhac road. As he went, his thoughts wandered back to the classroom. Had Monsieur Gravois done a head count? Had the German noticed that he had gone missing from the back of the line? Suddenly worried that he was being followed, Alfred looked back over his shoulder. He didn’t see the figure coming out of the garden gate in front of him until it was too late.

  Smack! The pair collided. Alfred bounced off the larger man and landed in a pile of old sacks. Temporarily dazed, he expected to hear a German voice ordering him to get up, but instead a floury hand reached out to help him up.

  ‘Sorry, son,’ a familiar voice whispered. ‘I didn’t see you coming.’

  It was Benoit Martin, his father’s boss from the bakery. Separated from his wife, Benoit had been convinced that, wha
tever the Germans’ reason was for taking the men away from the women and children, it was bad. He had heard all about the Fourniers’ experience in Charly from Leon and didn’t trust the Germans for a second. So he had taken advantage of a scuffle between one of the soldiers and a group of men who had come into Oradour for the day by tram from Limoges. He had waited until the soldier was surrounded by the men and then darted down an alleyway behind the smithy. From there he had crossed the street and slipped round the back of the Joubert family barn. Then he had crept along the backs of the houses until he had reached the garden of his own cottage on the Peyrilhac road, next to the infant school.

  He had intended to hide indoors, perhaps in the loft or in the cellar, but as he had made to open the back door leading into his kitchen, he had heard movement inside. The Germans were searching the rooms, making sure that no one was hiding there. He could hear his furniture being thrown around, his possessions being smashed, cupboard doors being torn open.

  As quietly as he could, he had retreated up the garden path and back out of the rear gate. He was planning on carrying on along the field edge until he reached the end of the village. If he could get beyond the road block without being seen, he could run to the next village and get help.

  ‘Why don’t you come with me, Monsieur Martin?’ Alfred suggested. ‘I have a plan. I’m heading for the woods behind the cemetery. That’s where my mother and father will be going.’

  Benoit was about to explain to Alfred that his mother and father were still in the fairground when he suddenly heard German voices in the garden the other side of the fence. He grabbed Alfred’s sleeve and dived with him behind a large sheet of corrugated iron which was leaning up against a compost heap. He held his hand over Alfred’s mouth and put his other finger to his own lips, the fear in his own eyes meeting the panic in Alfred’s.

  Alfred and Benoit clung to one another, trying desperately to control their rapid breathing as they heard the two German voices getting louder. One soldier said something to the other and then laughed nastily. The sound made Alfred’s flesh turn cold.