Covering Their Tracks

Thursday, September 14

The men of Etobon had to dispose of the body of the German officer, and Jules Perret knew there might be serious consequences to the village if it was discovered. They had already heard of the murder of a child at Chenebier following the death of a German soldier there. The Etobonais knew the Germans could uncover their clandestine operations if they searched the parsonage: it served as the central kitchen for the camps of resistance, the British solders and German prisoners in the woods surrounding the village. The men had to work quickly before anyone came to investigate the Lieutenant’s whereabouts. Perret writes:

"I spent part of my morning arranging the Lieutenant’s grave so that it wouldn’t be spotted, adding dirt, putting dry leaves and branches on it.  Three militiamen, supposedly joining the resistance, killed a German at Chenebier.  To avenge themselves, the survivors set fire to Pierre Goux’s house, completely destroying it, and savagely killed little Gérard Pillat, a child of nine or ten years old.  What news for his prisoner father!

"Everything happens at once.  We are hurrying to remove everything from the parsonage that could tip someone off.  M. Marlier and I carry casseroles and mess kits full of food to the church, and hide them under the communion table.  Four veal heads, cooked, in a basket hidden in the brambles of the old cemetery.  At Isaac’s Mill, stoves and boilers, jars of preserves, wheels of Gruyere, sacks of sugar and coffee.  And they brought the wounded Germans to the same mill!  As for Besson, he is dead.  Mama dressed him in one of my suits and we brought him to the church. 

"The cannons are getting closer.  Hope is returning.  As soon as I was in bed, Fernand Goux came to tell me that, without electricity, he couldn’t make Besson’s coffin that night, so that we could bury him at first light.  We decided to take the body to the cemetery and put it in the Coulon family tomb, where he can wait.  11:30 p.m.  I’m home.  It went well.  Poor boy!  His brother is very upset."

Update on Tuesday, October 16, 2012 at 9:15AM by Katherine Douglass

As I compose this blog, 68 years after the end of World War II, I think about the times I led worship in the church in Etobon. Each time I stood at the altar, I thought about what had been hidden there in the autumn of 1944. There had been explosives and ammunition hidden in the steeple above my head, and pots full of soup under the altar in front of me. The drama and tragedy of those times still live in that sacred space.

The Threat in the Woods

Monday, September 18

Jules Perret writes:

"What a night!  All night long, trucks rolled by, coming from Chenebier, going towards Belverne.  Are they bringing troops from Alsace?  All day, they keep coming.  Several trucks are pulling big cannons.  And horse-drawn wagons, too.  They stable their horses everywhere.  We have four, Jacques three.  The men are polite enough and don’t take anything without asking.  We don’t recognize ourselves in this confusion.  Are we French?  Collaborators?  A soldier from Wurtemburg told us he had come up from Perpignan, that they were on the march for four weeks, fighting Americans and “terrorists.”

The stone that marks the death of two maquis on September 18, 1944, located in the woods between Etobon and Clairegoutte

"I went up to the Goutte Evotte to check on the shelters under the big rock.  What should we do with our prisoners?  Our Hindus?  The resistants of Horse’s Head, regrouped at Arthur’s Well, near Magny d’Anigon, have suffered a lot.  What a mess!"

It was a mess. German soldiers were now searching the woods. Two members of the resistance, Fabbro Libero and Jean-Paul St. Maurice, were killed in a gun battle this day on the road near La Tête de Cheval, one of the main rendez-vous points for the Etobon maquis and those they were hiding.

Tuesday, September 19

Our maquis, gone to the Valettes [a group of hamlets a few kilometers south of Etobon], play hide and seek with the Germans.  Sometimes we have an attic full while the Germans are in the kitchen asking for eggs.  To get his orders, Jacques sometimes has to go out among the Germans with a scythe and a rake.

M.P., who has his own reasons to move around had to pass near a German battery, and told an officer that he was a teacher and had a field nearby, which he wanted to get to without being questioned.  “Wait for me for two minutes.  I have to go to Belverne.  You can go with me.”  And off they went together, talking like old buddies, the German lieutenant and the lieutenant of the maquis! 

Captain Aubert, back in the woods at last, said to Jacques, “wait for orders.”

Some Germans are patrolling the forest where I’ve set up a supply tent with lots of interesting things in it.  Jacques said to me, “Are you sure there aren’t labels with our names on them on those sacks?”  Apparently, there are!  The sacks are marked.  I get chills thinking about it.  Carrying a scythe, I climb up there, pull off the labels, hide the fire buckets marked “Etobon,” all my tools, hatchet, billhook, pick, saw, Jacques and Lamboley’s FFI backpacks.  Ouf!  Now I’m back home.

Just when I was closing the doors to go to bed for the night, a boche came up to me and, in a whisper, asked “Where can I find a girl to sleep with?”  “You’ll have to look for yourself, buddy!”

The Prisoners: Found and Lost

As the battle for the liberation of France drew nearer to Etobon, those who had been active in sheltering escaped British POWs and captured German soldiers grew anxious. On September 20, the blacksmith and journal writer Jules Perret slipped into the woods to make contact with those who were hiding there. He found some ... others were missing.

Wednesday, September 20

We woke up amazed at how well we had slept.  The big German guns are thundering, firing shells twelve kilometers away … At the forge, I have to work for them, shoe their horses.  I sabotage what I can … I’m thinking about a more secure hiding-place than the one I had.  I’ll work on it – it’s time.

We’ve heard that the gendarme Gendre and his prisoners are wandering in the woods, followed everywhere by hunger.  I leave with Jacques to take them some food.  We look like woodsmen, with our hatchets, hooks and gear.  It’s raining.  Too bad.  We hear gunshots here and there, reminding us to be careful.  After lots of turns and u-turns, we got to the Moulin des Battants, completely abandoned, then to the Sarrazin Rock.  “Look, Papa!”  What a surprise!  Under the Rock, several of our Hindu friends, Cham Dram, the man with the blue eyes, the old sergeant, the one with the Turkish-style moustache, and others.  They are not fat.  We leave them the provisions and some cigarettes.  The prisoners?  They haven’t seen them.  We leave them, all of us very moved.  Will we ever see each other again?  Near la Tâle, by the side of the road, the German engineers have cut the oaks and the big trees halfway through.  All they need is a firecracker to make them fall in front of the American tanks.  Another stop at our hiding-tent, below the Chateau, where everything is in order … bursts of machine-gun fire, planes, the sound of cannons.  We come home exhausted, without having learned anything of the prisoners. 

Cannon Fire and Desparation

Saturday, September 23

The occupying troops were becoming more and more desparate, killing the Etobonais' cows where they stood to provide meat. Didn't the people of Etobon sense how in danger they were? Perhaps they did, but could do nothing to avoid what was coming. Jules Perret writes:

"Woke up to cannon fire.  The battery at Bouloie is firing furiously.  We’re getting the cattle ready to transport.  It’s worse than the fair …  The mayor was at Belfort, so in my role of deputy, I received those who were asking for favors.  Here come four boches looking for one cow.  Even though I told them that 50 were on the road to Belfort, they argued.  One with glasses said to me, “Those won’t give us any meat.  Show me the house where there are some cows left.”  What a chore!  I took them to Guemann’s, Paul and Marthe started crying.  But what could I do?  The boches took, weighed, paid for – with Vichy money – and killed a pretty heifer, right then and there.  One of them dug a hole to bury the entrails.

"The Cossacks have attacked again and are trying to surround our maquis.  They had to abandon Voisin, wounded, where he lay.  Who will take care of him? (Emile Voisin was found dead in an attic, where, despite his broken leg and abdominal wound, he was able to crawl into for shelter.)

"Midnight.  Jacques, back from Belfort, and I killed our pig to keep it safe from looters.  We knocked it out and killed it near the rabbit cages, in the little shed , then dragged it through the orchard back to the stable."

It's Begun ...

Monday, September 25

The bombardment of Etobon has begun. Allied artillery have been firing from a distance, but now shells have begun falling in and around the village. Jules Perret anticipates that the village will be drawn into the fighting. He can't anticipate what will happen in three days.

"At two in the morning, American shells, meowing, started in the direction of Belverne.  And the boches cannons barked.  You’d think you were in Verdun in 1916.

"Announcement.  All the men from 18 to 50 years old must go to dig trenches in Belverne in the rain and the cannon fire.  Following the advice of M.P., the guerillas absent themselves.

"So, we’ll be in the middle of the coming battle.  We have to prepare ourselves, too.

"I buried a crock of lard in grandmother’s basement, our money and five jars of roasted meat in ours, and Suzette’s trousseau, put in crates, in grandmother’s storeroom; and here and there a demijohn of schnapps, 50 liters of Tunisian wine, my writings …

"Eleven o’clock.  It’s begun!  One shell above the village, another in it.  Some boches take refuge in our house and ask, very politely, for coffee and a little glass of schnapps.  They want us to “trink” with them.  A big non-com with glasses looked at my picture in uniform that hangs on the wall:  “You, sir, you are also a non-com,” and he asks for an ashtray, “not to make dirty.”  Too polite!

"The shells continue to rain down on the outskirts of the village.  Meanwhile, Mama is salting and cutting the pork, which we’ll put in barrels and bury in the cellar."