Thursday the 17th
Accompanied by my niece, I go get my mother in the late afternoon and take her by bicycle, she in a trailer, to 23, quai Voltaire. Numerous German vehicles are moving through the streets. On the bridges, people are looking in the direction of Meudon at the columns of smoke rising from the Germans’ destruction of equipment. Explosions and cannonade.
After dinner, Z and I go to see my mother at 23, quai Voltaire. At about the time we are about to leave, a noise of gunfire (volleys from submachine guns). We wait a little, then we leave, for calm seems to have returned. Outdoors, there is still a little shooting, but on the other side of the Seine. As we are going past the rue Guénégaud, a revolver shot, coming from that street; the bullet passes very close to us (a few days after, when the “rooftop army” appears, I will think this shot was fired by a provocateur).
Friday the 18th
Z tells me that her friend Jeanne Chenuet was present at the liquidation of the Gestapo’s stocks in the rue des Saussaies; when the crowd became too dense, the Germans fired into the air in order to extricate themselves.
Next door to us, the T.C.R.P. building is occupied by the strikers. Toward evening, one of them holds forth: “Comrades …” (I don’t hear it myself, it’s little Jeannette who tells us this.)
We have learned that the undertakers’ assistants, then the garbage-men, had gone on strike.
Saturday the 19th
The T.C.R.P. is decked with flags. At the corner of the rue Dauphine, posters have been put up announcing that the Comité Parisien de la Libération is assuming command of the national uprising.
Coming out of the Trocadéro, I learn from my colleague Champion {whose arrest we are demanding today because of his attitude at the time of the Lewitzky-Vildé-Oddon affair} that there is gunfire in the area of the Champs-Elysées. Coming back on my bike along my usual route (the quays on the Left Bank, starting from Alma), I find, at the pont des Invalides, an armed German who is redirecting traffic along the Right Bank. Having reached the pont de la Concorde, I start across it in order to regain the Left Bank: on the right-hand sidewalk, just at the entrance to the bridge, there is a large puddle of blood; to my left, a military vehicle, parked, filled with Germans in helmets with guns cocked. Continuing on my way, I see, at the corner of the rue de Solférino, several people gathered around the dead body of a civilian (a man in a gray suit, with a soft gray hat covering his face). A little farther on, a cyclist crossing my path asks if one can get by: without stopping, I answer that the streets are open as far as the pont de la Concorde. Arriving near my house, I see a patrol of helmeted and armed Germans on the other sidewalk going toward the pont Saint-Michel; on my sidewalk, another helmeted and armed German is walking in the same direction, in front of the T.C.R.P., he points to the flags and speaks angrily.
During lunch, a telephone call from Salacrou to summon me to the Comédie-Française (which it was agreed we were to occupy) and to ask me to tell Sartre and Jacques Bost. I go look for Sartre at the Hôtel de la Louisiane, where I find him with Castor and [Nathalie] Sorokine. Sartre, Castor and I come back to the house. Telephone call to Bost to tell him to meet us at the Comédie-Française (he will join us there with Chauffard). Telephone call to Rouget, the fellow from the Trocadéro who is, in principle, part of our little group; thinking that we will do nothing at the Comédie-Française, I tell him there is no point in his disturbing himself (in the following days, after many efforts, he will find something to do in the Saint-Séverin quarter and will take part in attacks on tanks, onto which they hurl flammable bottles from the rooftops). At the Comédie-Française, where Pierre Dux and Julien Bertheau are directing operations, a number of actors are present—among others, Yonnel, whose acquaintance I make in this way and with whom I talk about Raymond Roussel; it is agreed that along with Bertheau and Marie Bell he will recite poems by Max [Jacob] during the radio broadcast planned by [Jean] Lescure for after the Liberation. In the course of the afternoon, there is some vague suggestion that our little team should go in combat formation to fetch some weapons from the place de la République. For weapons, we have only about four revolvers, I think, one of which is jammed, and a number of cartridges (perhaps a half-dozen rounds for each weapon). In a hall adjoining the lobby where we are meeting, a detonation: Bertheau, checking the functioning of one of the weapons, has let off a shot. In place of weapons, there is an abundance of pharmaceutical supplies, packets of bandages and various vials are lined up on an old desk.
Sartre and I made our way from my house to the Comédie-Française without difficulty. Hardly anyone in the streets, because the rumor is going around that people were advised over the radio from London not to leave their homes after three o’clock (and in fact after three o’clock we see, from the Théâtre-Français, only the rare cyclist). In the rue de Rivoli, close to the rue de l’Arbre-Sec, a Red Cross station. From the Théâtre-Français we telephone the house to say we have arrived safely.
Z, Castor and Sorokine are at the house with Jeanne, Jeanne Chenuet and little Jeannette, attacks by German vehicles begin on the quay early in the afternoon. Since Castor and Sorokine would rather be at the Welcome Hotel (at the corner of the rue de Seine and the boulevard Saint-Germain, a calmer spot at the moment than ours), Z is going to accompany them there. This is what I learn when I telephone Jeanne for news; she also tells me that “it’s horrible,” that the Resistance fighters are installed on the balcony of the house next door (at the time I think she means the T.C.R.P., occupied for political reasons by the strikers, but she is actually talking about the building at the corner of the rue des Grands-Augustins, number 53), that the fighting is violent, that they have “taken hostages” (at least, this is what I think I hear in the flood of words): I tell this to Sartre and we are very worried. A little later, Castor telephones from the Welcome Hotel to advise us not to go back home; we in turn advise her and also Z not to move, but Z declares that she is going to go to the house and see what has become of Jeanne and Jeannette and that then she will return to the Welcome. I telephone 53 bis some time after and learn that Z hasn’t arrived there yet; I tell Jeanne to advise her not to go back to the Welcome (since that route is dangerous) but to stay at 53 bis. Once the telephone is hung up and after thinking about it, I decide that this advice is bad because—if I am to believe what Jeanne told me during our first conversation—there is a risk of German reprisals against our block of houses. For a period of time we are anxious, having found out from a telephone call to Sorokine that Z and Castor left for the quai des Grands-Augustins a long time ago. At last, a telephone call from Z tells us she has arrived safely at 53 bis with Castor (after having been trapped for a long time in the rue de Seine), and that they won’t move from there between now and tomorrow.
In the late afternoon, Camus lets Sartre know that he will be waiting for him at the place des Victoires that same evening or the next day at eleven o’clock. We think this is part of his famous plan to go and occupy the premises of L’Intran[sigent], a plan that Sartre and I had abandoned when we decided to join the military unit of the Comité du Théâtre of the Front National. I tell Sartre that as far as I’m concerned, I’ve done my part (participation in the occupation of the Théâtre-Français, while waiting to obtain the liaison I’ve asked for with the F.N. of the national museums and to be able to organize something at the Musée de l’Homme), and that I don’t intend to try my luck elsewhere.
Dinner in a black-market bistro in the rue Montpensier, with Salacrou, Sartre and the movie star Madeleine Robinson. Next to us Bertheau, Lise Delamare, her sister and a young actor [Tony Taffin] are having dinner, Bost and Chauffard have stayed at the Français, from which Bertheau and Dux have decided to send everyone home, requesting they meet again the next morning.
Among others at the Français that day: the movie actor Daniel Mendaille, whom I recall having met when I was staying in Addis Ababa, at the Gleizes Hotel, but to whom I did not identify myself.
After dinner, all
four of us go to spend the night at Salacrou’s, in her apartment in the rue de Montpensier. Beautiful view over the gardens of the Palais-Royal, completely calm. Gunfire (with tracer bullets) from the direction of the Banque de France. We drink rosé wine. No electricity. In the darkness, Madeleine Robinson sings to us: “On the palace steps …” By now the uprising is no more than a backdrop to a frankly pleasant evening. Concerning a bright glow of fire noticed in the vicinity of my house, I will learn the next day that what was involved was a German truck, full of gas, that was burning against the Notre-Dame Hotel.
Sunday the 20th
At about nine o’clock, return to the Théâtre-Français to receive orders: Bertheau sends everyone back home. Telephone call to the house to see if it’s calm: yes. Therefore, return. Bost and Chauffard, who have spent the night in the lobby of the Comédie-Française, leave for the Left Bank with Sartre and me. Passing through the place du Carrousel, we notice, fairly far away from us, a German car, a man and woman, who also see it, are hurrying toward the buildings (which, if things go badly, will be able to offer some shelter). A sort of minus habens—no doubt consumed by fear—asks us where we are going and, learning that we are going to the Left Bank, attaches himself to us; we will have great difficulty in ridding ourselves of the little man, rather young, clean-shaven, with a foreign accent (or simply a speech impediment?) and the look of an invalid. At the corner of the rue des Saints-Pères (or the rue Bonaparte) we leave Chauffard (who is returning to his house, near the Sénat). Reaching the Pont-Neuf, we see a group of civilians armed with rifles preparing to cross the bridge, heading toward the Palais de Justice.
Bost comes with us to the house. We haven’t been there long before the attacks on German vehicles begin. Very organized: in the street, lookout men signaling the approach of the vehicles with whistle blasts and then instantly hiding; at the windows, snipers; in the building adjoining ours (at the corner of the quay and the rue des Grands-Augustins) a team made up mostly of men from the police has ensconced itself, armed with revolvers, rifles and grenades. The method consists of first trying to hit the tires or, if that doesn’t succeed, the driver of the vehicle; when a vehicle is immobilized, they throw grenades into it. When the occupants have stopped reacting, the F.F.I., emerging from their hiding places, surround the vehicle, take the survivors prisoner, then search to see if there are any weapons; if they find any they leap around the vehicle shouting Hurrah! An infinitesimal number of vehicles manages to get past. There seems every reason to believe they will be stopped farther along in any case. After each of these battles and without the firing having ceased altogether, the Red Cross teams come to collect the wounded: men and women running with stretchers and waving a white flag marked with a red cross, the men dressed in white smocks belted at the waist and wearing white caps.
Among the vehicles that we see attacked, there is one car that comes out of the quai Saint-Michel in the midst of heavy gunfire; it passes in front of the pont Saint-Michel and enters the quai des Grands-Augustins; at that moment, the driver having no doubt been hit, we see it swerve and then crash against the storefront of the Librairie Académique Perrin. It catches fire almost immediately. Since it is bearing a large red cross on its roof, I’m surprised—and even shocked—that the F.F.I. have attacked it. The blazing car is quickly surrounded by armed men. We hear the occupants shouting: “Comrades! Mercy!” In front of the right-hand car door, the only one that would allow the occupants to get out, a young man is positioned, one knee on the ground, his revolver aimed, in order to prevent the Germans who are in the car (there are two or three of them) from escaping. A dispute begins among the fighters surrounding the car. Some shout: “Let them fry! Let them fry!” The others: “Finish them off! Finish them off!” Horrified (even though certain aspects of the scene remind me of a bullfight, especially the resemblance of the kneeling young man with his revolver to a puntillero, and seem to me full of grandeur and beauty), I leave the window and go off into the kitchen where, mechanically, I wash my hands at the tap in the sink; as soon as I become aware of the significance of my gesture (it’s the ritual washing of the hands, similar to Pilate’s, that I have just rediscovered), I turn off the tap and go back to the dining room window. With his revolver, the young man finishes off one of the Germans who has gotten out of the car and whose body we see writhing for a moment on the ground. A lull; then a series of powerful detonations that cause the people who were surrounding the car bearing the red cross to run away: [it] was stuffed with grenades, which are now exploding.
Another scene: an authentic Red Cross truck is stopped; aimed at by the attackers, those who occupy it show their armbands with red crosses, raise their arms and are taken prisoner.
Vision: at a fair distance, almost level with the pont Saint-Michel, we see a German lying flat on his face on the pavement, writhing in pain in a brief death throe.
Departure of Sartre, Bost and Castor (who spent the night here with Z).
At the windows of the Dépôt building, armed resisters. Cars stop in front of the door from time to time, and men and women get out, preoccupied, busy. From time to time, the arrival of a vehicle captured from the Germans (greeted with hurrahs) or the arrival of prisoners.
Several times in the course of the day, we will hear gunshots that seem to come from the vicinity of Notre-Dame; what is happening (apparently) is that a German infantry gun is firing at the Préfecture de Police.
From the window of one of the houses on the opposite quay (a fourth-floor window), a man wearing a tricolored armband beckons to the team working on the balcony of the house next door to us; lunch is ready.
We have lunch ourselves, in the dining room, but the meal is frequently interrupted by the attacks on vehicles. Sometimes we go to the window to watch; sometimes, if the fighting is too violent and the explosions too powerful, we withdraw to the rooms overlooking the courtyard.
During the afternoon, a moment of extreme emotion. A German patrol, coming from the quai de Conti, is suddenly pointed out. Risking a look out the window, I do indeed see men dressed in gray and armed with submachine guns advancing one at a time with many precautions, taking shelter behind the trees; they have reached the Monnaie. Complete silence: so as not to reveal themselves, the resisters do not fire. Expecting that at any moment a violent battle will break out (since I haven’t yet realized that, in this case, there is only one thing the F.F.I, can do, and that is not move), I am painfully distressed: isn’t the sending of this patrol the prelude to a siege of our block of houses, a reprisal operation that will end by setting the block on fire, massacring the inhabitants or—the happiest outcome, but one that hardly appeals to me—taking the men hostage? A tank (or a car) carrying a heavy machine gun or a small-caliber gun stops just in front of our door and fires in the direction of the pont Saint-Michel. It makes an infernal racket. Z, Jeanne, Jeannette, Jeanne Chenuet and I leave the large bedroom in the rear, where we had taken refuge, to go down to the ground floor; the concierge, his wife, his son and some friends of theirs are in the courtyard and all seem to be very frightened. For a moment I wonder if I shouldn’t go on down to the cellar (a hiding-place in case the Germans should enter the house), but seeing that no one else is thinking of this, I give up the idea. After a while, calm having returned, we go back up to the apartment. We learn from the team at the house next door that the patrol has withdrawn and that it has no doubt gone to get reinforcements. I grow more and more frightened—foreseeing a victorious siege of the block—but I stay here, because there is nothing else to do but wait and see what happens. Our neighbor upstairs (who often uses our telephone since she has none of her own) comes down to our apartment because she was expecting a relative for dinner and wants to tell him it would be more prudent not to come.
The afternoon is already quite far advanced when a police officer in uniform comes out of the Dépôt and, standing against the parapet at the embankment, shouting at the top of his voice in order to be heard over the river, orders the pe
ople on our side to cease fire. The order is not heeded, even though he repeats it several times. A truce has been declared, and we feel relieved, thinking that now the fighting will have to stop soon. Not long after, we hear the sound of a bugle from the direction of the pont Saint-Michel giving in its turn the appropriate call to signal a ceasefire. The rifle fire continues nevertheless. From our dining room window, Z asks the F.F.I. on the balcony of the house next door why people are continuing to fire; they answer that it is the Germans who are not observing the truce. After some time, the truce is announced again by a car equipped with a loudspeaker. We also see a car going along the quai des Orfèvres, with a helmeted German on one running board and a French policeman in uniform on the other, both standing. Since the rifle fire is subsiding, Z and I go out. On the quai des Grands-Augustins we meet several of the F.F.I. from next door, who have also come down. We congratulate them on their fine work. One of them, very young (who had been throwing grenades), tells us, laughing: “They said the police were collaborators … Well! We showed them!” We head toward the Welcome Hotel. At the corner of the quay and the rue Dauphine, the car with the loudspeaker has stopped. I mingle with the listening crowd as it announces the conditions of the truce. What I remember in particular is that the Germans promise to treat the F.F.I. prisoners as prisoners of war. A Negro with a bit of the look of a pimp (some time before the uprising I had noticed him from my window, walking on the quay in a white suit, wearing the same broad felt hat he is wearing again today) addresses me, asking for information. He notes with satisfaction what I tell him about the promise concerning the prisoners and declares that now France is no longer dishonored. I too, like him, consider it satisfying that the Germans have consented to negotiate with the Comité de Libération, that is, to recognize it implicitly as an official authority.
At the Welcome Hotel we find Castor and Sorokine, who tell us what has happened in their part of town. We go back down with Sorokine, to walk around; but after going a little way toward the boulevard Saint-Michel, she leaves us to go back in. There’s quite a crowd in the street and everyone looks pleased. We go left on the boulevard Saint-Michel. At the rue Saint-André-des-Arts, a young man wearing the tricolored armband of the F.F.I. tells us it isn’t prudent to stay outside: the fighting will resume at any moment, and it would be better for us to go back home. We comply. Sylvia Bataille and Lacan come over to our house after dinner and we drink champagne.
Radical Shadows Page 18