{"id":5885,"date":"2021-03-09T14:25:51","date_gmt":"2021-03-09T13:25:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vercors-resistance.fr\/?page_id=5885"},"modified":"2021-04-06T18:33:28","modified_gmt":"2021-04-06T16:33:28","slug":"the-resistant-vercors","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.vercors-resistance.fr\/en\/the-resistant-vercors\/","title":{"rendered":"The resistant Vercors"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
In the beginning<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n
The military project
<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n
The civil project
<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n
Summer of ’44
<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n
July 44
<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Introductory historical framework<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The Vercors maquis (late 1942 – May 1944)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the French Campaign (May-June 1940), the Vercors massif remained in the background of the fighting, even the Battle of the Alps which took place at its feet (Cluse de Voreppe). The inhabitants tried to acclimatise to the changes imposed by the French state, but a few isolated acts of disobedience were already evident in 1940. The reluctance was particularly strong among the socialists of the massif, who organised meetings in order, at first, to reconstitute their party clandestinely. In addition, a number of outsiders found refuge in the Vercors: students from several private Parisian high schools, young Poles, Israelites, or children from the Var in the canton of La Chapelle-en-Vercors from 1942 onwards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After the introduction of the Rel\u00e8ve in 1942, the creation of the Service du travail obligatoire (STO) in February 1943 forced many young Frenchmen to go and work in Germany. This contributed decisively to the creation of the Vercors maquis. At the end of 1942-beginning of 1943, a group of socialists from the Vercors, Eug\u00e8ne Samuel<\/a>, Victor Huillier, Andr\u00e9 Glaudas, etc., in relation with militants from Grenoble, led by Dr L\u00e9on Martin and Aim\u00e9 Pupin<\/a>, gathered under the banner of the Franc-Tireur movement, organised, with the support of local relays, refugee camps for the refractory people: the first camp was set up at the Ambel farm in December 1942-January 1943. Several others were set up in the following months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, Pierre Dalloz<\/a>, an architect and mountaineer, imagined a strategic use of the Vercors, conceived as a natural citadel protected by ramparts formed by the cliffs. The aim was to create landing grounds to receive airborne Allied troops during a landing in the south of France, and then to cover the Germans’ rear. Jean Moulin and the general staff of Fighting France approved this project in February 1943; it was called the “Montagnards Project”. Pierre Dalloz then assembled a small team, including military personnel, to implement the project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These two initiatives merged and a combat committee was set up, bringing together members of Franc-Tireur and initiators of the Montagnards project. The objective was to transform Dalloz’s project into a military plan and to supervise the maquisards’ camps in order to transform the refractory into combatants. After the arrests in the spring of 1943, which dispersed the first leaders (Martin, Pupin, Huillier), the responsibilities were shared with the designation of a civilian leader (Eug\u00e8ne Chavant<\/a>) and a military leader with successively Alain Le Ray<\/a>, in 1943, Narcisse Geyer<\/a> at the beginning of 1944, and finally, Fran\u00e7ois Huet<\/a> from May 1944.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The local population gave the maquisards a great deal of support, which was essential for the survival of the camps; the La Chapelle gendarmerie brigade had the same attitude: after the Liberation, the brigade collectively received the Resistance Medal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the 300 or so men who joined the maquis during 1943, domestic chores, rounds, military training and long periods of waiting set the pace for life in the camps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Allied parachute drops of arms and ammunition were essential to the existence of the maquis. The Vercors had seven approved airfields, the most important being the “Taille-crayon” airfield at Vassieux. The first parachute drop took place on 13 November 1943. To communicate with the Allies and fighting France, the maquis had to have radio teams, which were gradually set up from February 1943 in the Vercors, but the links remained fragile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The maquis suffered several incursions by the occupying forces and the militia during the first half of 1944. They resulted in the death of maquisards and civilians: in January, in the hamlet of Barraques and then in Malleval<\/a>; in March, in Saint-Julien-en-Vercors; in April, in Vassieux, with the arrival in force of the Militia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
The Special Operations Executive (SOE) Eucalyptus mission – staff meeting in the field, 1944. In the centre, the head of the mission, Major Desmond Longe (Refraction), and Colonel Zeller<\/a> (Faisceau, Joseph), Resistance leader for South-East France, on the far left. The man with his arm outstretched is the forester Boissi\u00e8re.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The Vercors, liberated zone (6 June – 21 July 1944)<\/strong>
The announcement of the landing on 6 June 1944 caused euphoria in the region, as elsewhere in France, as the Liberation seemed imminent. In the Vercors, during the night of 8 to 9 June, the regional chief of staff Marcel Descour, who had just arrived from Lyon, gave the order to the military command of the Vercors, despite the latter’s reluctance, to proceed with general mobilisation. The order was implemented. Civilian companies as well as many young people, alone or in groups, climbed onto the plateau, the massif was “locked down” and its access routes controlled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Between 9 June and 21 July 1944, the Vercors thus became a liberated zone with a dual command. The civil government was presided over by Eug\u00e8ne Chavant, whose main concern was supplies (rationing, supplies). As for the military command of the Vercors, it remained in the hands of Fran\u00e7ois Huet, with Marcel Descour<\/a>, regional military commander, setting up his regional headquarters in the massif.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 3 July, at Saint-Martin, Yves Farge, commissioner of the Republic of the R1 region (now the Rh\u00f4ne-Alpes region), proclaimed the restoration of the Republic in the Vercors. As the Vichy regime had brought down the Republic, this restoration reflected a desire to establish a counter-state and to prepare for the future. In the Vercors, this restored Republic provided itself with the main services of a State: services to control movements at the exit points of the massif and the mail; repressive bodies with a military tribunal and a detention camp at La Chapelle, where German soldiers, militiamen, collaborators and also many simple suspects were imprisoned; communication tools with the publication of a newspaper, Vercors Libre and then Le Petit Vercors; relations with the outside world, in particular with the Allies, thanks to the reinforcement of radio teams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hundreds of men quickly arrived. On 11 July, all the young men of the Vercors aged between 20 and 24 were mobilised (around 400). By mid-July, nearly 4,000 men were gathered in the Vercors, the largest concentration of maquisards in the region. In this context, Commander Huet decided on 14 July to give a military structure to the Resistance in the maquis, assigning the maquisards to former French army units that had been reconstituted: the 6th, 12th and 14th Alpine Hunter Battalions, the 11th Cuirassiers Regiment, etc. Training and weapons handling exercises were intensified.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Allied parachute drops of weapons, some of which were carried out in broad daylight, notably on 14 July 1944 at Vassieux, resulted in the reception of several dozen tonnes of weapons. The Allies also sent several missions: the “Eucalyptus” mission (mission \u00ab Eucalyptus \u00bb<\/a>) with a radio team; the “Justine” mission to train the maquisards in the handling of weapons; the “Paquebot” mission to prepare a landing strip at Vassieux\u2026

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fighting in the Vercors (21 July – mid August 1944)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Germans, worried about the high concentration of men in the Vercors at a time when the defeat of the Third Reich was looming, feared that these Resistance fighters might, during an Allied landing in Provence, carry out raids in the Rhone valley to hinder their withdrawal from the south of France. In order to remove these threats, after a few targeted attacks (battle of Saint-Nizier-du-Moucherotte (bataille de Saint-Nizier-du-Moucherotte<\/a>), in the north of the massif, in mid-June), the German general staff prepared a general offensive against the liberated area of the Vercors, entrusted to General Karl Pflaum and called “Bettina”. With more than 10,000 men, it was one of the largest Wehrmacht operations against a maquis in Europe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From mid-July, German troops deployed on the foothills of the Vercors, encircling the massif. Aware of the imminence of the attack, those in charge increased their requests to the Allies for reinforcements and heavy weapons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Resistance fighters on the outskirts of the Vercors tried to slow down the enemy pressure here and there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 21 July, the Wehrmacht launched an offensive with the simultaneous opening of four axes of attack: to the north of the massif, from Grenoble, the German soldiers seized the canton of Villard-de-Lans; at the end of the day, they were stopped at the hamlet of Valchevri\u00e8re<\/a>. Resistance fighters held this strategic sector for two days, but on 23 July the position fell, opening up the south of the massif to German troops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the eastern flanks, from the Tri\u00e8ves, mountain troops seized the numerous passes between 21 and 23 July. They thus crossed the imposing barrier of cliffs and progressed rapidly on the high plateaus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A glider and a destroyed farm in Vassieux-en-Vercors.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In Vassieux, the order was to strike quickly and hard, without sparing civilians, as the German general staff believed that the village was home to the Resistance’s supreme command. On the morning of 21 July, twenty-two German gliders landed on the outskirts of the village and the hamlets. On board were some two hundred men. A fierce battle ensued, complicated by the rain. It was only on 23 July, with the arrival of a second wave of gliders, that the Germans took control of the situation and forced the resistance fighters to end the battle of Vassieux.
Finally, the Zabel group of the 9th Panzer from Die reached Vassieux via the Rousset and Vassieux passes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By the evening of 23 July, the fate of the Vercors was sealed. The German troops had gained decisive advantages on all fronts and were advancing throughout the massif. At the end of the afternoon, Fran\u00e7ois Huet, military leader of the maquis, gave the order to disperse. The men had to stop fighting and “nomadize” by going into the forests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The German soldiers were ordered to sweep the Vercors to track down the Resistance fighters and destroy their hideouts. Exactions multiplied: massacre of sixteen men in a farmyard at La Chapelle-en-Vercors on 25 July; destruction of the maquis hospital entrenched in the La Luire cave on 28 July; execution of twenty young men from the Vercors in Grenoble on 14 August, etc. Many farms were burnt down. Many resistance fighters managed to hide and survive in the forest. Among those who tried to leave the massif, some two hundred were intercepted at the foot of the Vercors by the cordon of soldiers surrounding the massif and then executed (Saint-Nazaire-en-Royans, Beauvoir-en-Royans, Noyarey\u2026).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The German troops left the Vercors in mid-August 1944, leaving the massif in a state of total desolation. The human toll in the whole of the Vercors was heavy; several estimates have been made and the number of deaths is generally between 500 and 800, depending on the files, dates, geographical areas and conditions of death used. The material damage was considerable. In Vassieux, more than two hundred people lost their lives (including 73 civilians) and 97% of the buildings were destroyed. However, more than three thousand combatants survived and many of them took up the fight again, particularly within the 6th BCA and the 11th cuirassier regiment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Assessment, end of the war, reconstruction and memory<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
La Chapelle-en-Vercors. Reconstruction project around the medieval church that has remained intact. Undated, 1945 ?<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

On 15 August 1944, the Allied troops landed on the shores of the Mediterranean, in Provence. Alongside the Resistance fighters, many of whom were former Vercors maquisards, they quickly drove back the German troops: Grenoble was liberated on 21 August, the Dr\u00f4me at the end of August and Lyon on 3 September. In March 1945, the allied forces crossed the Rhine. On 7 and 8 May, Nazi Germany capitulated unconditionally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the Vercors, as soon as the fighting was over, the populations had to deal with the emergency: a health emergency with the temporary burial of the victims; setting up the “system D” to be able to live in devastated villages, like Vassieux. There was a vast surge of national and international solidarity, fuelled by the strong reputation that the history of the Vercors maquis had acquired.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After the war, two phenomena marked the Vercors: the reconstruction of devastated villages, notably Vassieux, La-Chapelle, Saint-Nizier, taken in hand by the State, which imposed new principles of architecture and town planning on this rural society; the emergence of a memory of this “glorious and tragic” history which took shape around the creation of the Association of the Pioneers of the Vercors in November 1944, the awarding of the Cross of the Liberation to Vassieux in August 1945, the construction of necropolises and steles, annual commemorations, numerous publications of books, articles, testimonies, and, finally, the opening of the Resistance museum in 1973 and the Resistance memorial in 1994 in Vassieux.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the Remembrance Hall of the Vassieux necropolis, the Pioneers had these words engraved by a Norwegian poet, a Resistance fighter who died in combat:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We don’t want your regrets, we want to survive in your faith and courage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pierre-Louis Fillet<\/strong>
Director of the Resistance Museum of Vassieux-en-Vercors<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From June 1940 to June 1944<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Pierre Dalloz, one of the authors of the Montagnards plan.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

This period, rich in events, can be entitled “From the defeat to the rise of the Resistance and the preparation of the liberating revenge”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As soon as the Armistice was signed and a small army, known as the “armistice army” (of around 100,000 men) was built, soldiers from this army were busy hiding equipment under the noses of the Italian and German armistice commissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, in Grenoble and Villard-de-Lans, civilian teams, initially autonomous because of the need to remain underground, were considering the means to be used to reawaken the spirit of resistance to Vichy and then to Germany.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the beginning of 1943, Pierre Dalloz<\/a> imagined a strategic use of the geographical situation of the Vercors, which threatened the Germans’ communication routes and was correlated with an Allied landing in Provence, the Montagnards Project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, the militia was created and the Germans decreed, with the complicity of Vichy, the Service du Travail Obligatoire (STO) (compulsory labour service), which was to send to the refugee zones of the Vercors those who refused to be forced to leave for Germany. They constituted one of the recruitment channels for the camps that spread throughout the massif; Ambel was the first example. The successive combat committees of the Plateau then had to transform these maquisards into fighters who were fed, equipped, armed and instructed in basic military skills. The parachuting of light weapons by the allies, and never heavy weapons, and the raids on the Chantiers de la Jeunesse shops only provided the maquisards with a minimum of equipment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Italians and then the Germans, aware of the progress of the Resistance, carried out raids on villages or suspicious areas. The militia did the same in the southern Vercors. While the former only carried out arrests, the Germans and the militia were responsible for exactions and massacres.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Authors: Guy Giraud and Julien Guillon<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first Resistance fighters<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The first Resistance group in Villard-de-Lans was formed in 1941 around Eug\u00e8ne and Simone Ravalec, Th\u00e9o Racouchot, Edouard Masson, Victor Huillier, Jean Glaudas, Marcel Dumas, Marius Charlier and Cl\u00e9ment Baudoingt.
In 1942, these personalities were joined by others living in Lans, Autrans, M\u00e9audre, Saint-Martin-en-Vercors and Pont-en-Royans. Among them, three women played a decisive role: Yvonne Ravalec, Denise Glaudas and Th\u00e9r\u00e8se Huillier.
This original nucleus ratified its membership of the Franc-Tireur movement.
On 6 April 1942, Eug\u00e8ne Samuel contacted L\u00e9on Martin in Grenoble, thus establishing the first link between the Grenoble group (Eug\u00e8ne Chavant, Aim\u00e9 Pupin in particular) and the Vercors group. The Huillier coach company facilitated the connections.
On 6 January 1943, Victor Huillier organised the Ambel camp in the Dr\u00f4me, camp 1 of the massif, to receive those who refused to take part in the compulsory labour service (STO).
In 1943, the primary source of the Resistance joined the team of Pierre Dalloz, promoter of the Montagnards Project. Thus was born the first Vercors combat committee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Author: Guy Giraud<\/strong>
Source :
Bulletin Le Pionnier du Vercors, n\u00b0 129, November 2014.
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The birth of the Resistance in Vercors<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

The first Resistance fighters in the Vercors came from Villard-de-Lans. The names of the first nine Resistance fighters are inscribed on the plaque on the fa\u00e7ade of the pharmacy in the Park. They include one woman and eight men.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sociological observation of the group shows its diversity with regard to the professions and social level of those involved: a pharmacist, a doctor, a hotelier, a banker, a trader, a transporter, an electrician from Force et Lumi\u00e8re, a tax collector and a farmer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Author: Guy Giraud<\/strong>
Source:
ANPCVV, Le Pionnier du Vercors newsletter, issue 19, Grenoble, November 2014, page 29.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The military project<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The military project, known as the Montagnards Project, took shape throughout the Vercors after a slow evolution of the Resistance, from 1941 to 1944. Several phases can be distinguished.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The phase of isolated and parallel resistance initiatives:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first groups met spontaneously on the massif, notably in Villard-de-Lans, on the initiative of the Huillier brothers, Eug\u00e8ne Samuel<\/a> and Th\u00e9odore Racouchot. In M\u00e9audre, Georges Buisson “knew that something was going on in Villard” and wanted to make contact. In Royans, Benjamin Malossane, Jean and Louis Ferroul gathered their relatives to talk about the “events” castigating the Vichy regime and the armistice. At the same time (March 1941), Pierre Dalloz<\/a>, in the presence of Jean Pr\u00e9vost, imagined the possibilities of using the massif in wartime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The phase of organised resistance to parallel projects:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

From the spring of 1942, from Grenoble, thanks in particular to L\u00e9on Martin and Aim\u00e9 Pupin<\/a>, the Franc-Tireur movement was to weave its web by relying on the existing groups on the massif. In December 1942, a “Note on the military possibilities of the Vercors” was written by Pierre Dalloz. It included a “Programme for immediate action” and a “Programme for further action”. This note, sent at the end of January 1943, via Yves Farge, to Jean Moulin, who gave his approval, became the “Montagnards Project”. Charles Delestraint, Vidal, head of the Secret Army (SA) on a national scale, validated this project and brought it to the attention of London. On 25 February 1943, the message “Les Montagnards doivent continuer \u00e0 gravir les cimes” (The Montagnards must continue to climb the peaks) indicated that it had been validated by Free France.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The phase of merging the projects:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

From February 1943 onwards, due to the influx of STO refractory soldiers, farms and hostels took in the latter who, being too numerous, had to be directed to other places, thus giving rise to the first camps organised by the civilians of the Franc-Tireur movement. In addition, at the beginning of 1943, Pierre Dalloz’s strategic idea emerged of making the Vercors an organised reception area for some 7,500 Allied parachutists who, guided by the 400 to 450 fighters in the camps, would act on German communications in support of a landing in Provence. Alain Le Ray conceived the military plan corresponding to the project. In March 1943, a survey of the massif was carried out by an initial team consisting of Pierre Dalloz, Yves Farge, Remi Bayle de Jess\u00e9, Marcel Pourchier<\/a> and Alain Le Ray<\/a>, in order to refine the project. After close contacts with Aim\u00e9 Pupin (Mathieu) of the Franc-Tireur movement, initially for questions of camp supplies, the two teams merged. The isolated mountain camps contribute to bring density and concretization to Pierre Dalloz’s project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first tests:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This first team is quickly dismantled by the arrests made by the Italian political police, the OVRA: L\u00e9on Martin on April 24, 1943, Aim\u00e9 Pupin on May 27, 1943. The links with Free France were also broken because in June 1943, Charles Delestraint and Jean Moulin were arrested. For his part, Pierre Dalloz went to Paris, then Algiers in November 1943, where he wrote a new, more complete note on the project to use the Vercors, drawing on the input from the camps created by the Franc-Tireur movement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From refuge to combat :<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Eug\u00e8ne Chavant, 3 May 1952.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

A second combat committee, led by Captain Alain Le Ray (Rouvier), the military leader, and Eug\u00e8ne Chavant<\/a> (Cl\u00e9ment), the civilian leader, aimed to transform the refractory into combatants. In August 1943, at the Arbounouze meeting, the logic of dual command between civilians and soldiers was established.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alain Le Ray, following reproaches from Marcel Descour<\/a> (Bayard) concerning the lack of organisation of the November 1943 parachute drop at d’Arbounouze, resigned and became the head of the Forces Fran\u00e7aises de l’Int\u00e9rieur (FFI) of Is\u00e8re. Another important figure left the Vercors: Pierre Dalloz, who left for London and Algiers to defend his plan, without apparent success, did not return to the Vercors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eug\u00e8ne Chavant, exasperated, leaves for Algiers to obtain confirmation of the consideration of the Montagnards Project. The Central Intelligence and Action Bureau (BCRA) promised him orally that French paratroopers would be sent. Jacques Soustelle encouraged him with a written text and a large sum of money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the spring of 1944, the Vercors received numerous parachute drops of weapons and teams of agents from the inter-allied services to instruct the fighters in the handling of these weapons. One of them, which arrived at the beginning of July, was given the task of setting up a landing site at Vassieux-en-Vercors. Everything concurs so that Marcel Descour decides to mobilize the forces of Vercors after receiving the message of the BBC, June 5, 1944, “The chamois of the Alps leaps”, despite some reluctance of Fran\u00e7ois Huet, partisan to wait for the launch of the landing in Provence, which nobody knew the date. In accordance with the provisions of Alain Le Ray’s plan, the Vercors was locked down with between 3,500 and 4,000 fighters instead of the 450 initially planned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Authors: Julien Guillon and Guy Giraud<\/strong>
Source:
From “La R\u00e9sistance en Vercors”, article by General Le Ray in Le Pionnier du Vercors, n\u00b0 71, Grenoble, ANPCVV, June 1990.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From the Montagnards Project to the military plan<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

It is worth analysing the criteria that underpinned the decision of the Vercors Government to anticipate the possible implementation of Pierre Dalloz’s Montagnards Project by implementing the military plan drawn up by Alain Le Ray on 9 June 1944, the date of the mobilisation of the Maquis forces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alain Le Ray set out the general procedures for blocking access to the Vercors. It was a question of ensuring the remote security of the Vassieux-en-Vercors landing ground to allow the expected landing of the allied parachutists, to regroup them and, without delay, to leave the massif to harass the Germans on the communication routes of the Rhone valley and the Alps road in connection with a landing in Provence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Author: Guy Giraud<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The civil and political project<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Pierre Flaureau (Pel) of the Franc-Tireur et Partisans Fran\u00e7ais (FTPF) movement, of communist obedience, also known as FTP, at the instigation of the provisional government of the French Republic in Algiers, decided to bring together in M\u00e9audre, on 19 January 1944, personalities of the Resistance in Is\u00e8re, belonging to the various large movements as well as to the armed organisations: FTP, Secret Army (AS), Vercors maquis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the one hand, it was a question of defining a strategy of action against the occupier. The differences of opinion between the FTP and the AS, theoretically grouped under the name of Forces Fran\u00e7aises de l’Int\u00e9rieur (FFI), led to stormy debates. The FTP, who were in favour of immediate insurrection whatever the cost in civilian casualties, were opposed to the ideas of the FFI, who instead advocated a waiting scenario aimed at supporting the Allied landings in France in due course; on the other hand, it was a question of appointing the future president of the Is\u00e8re Departmental Liberation Committee and the future Commissioner of the Republic in Grenoble.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During this meeting, Eug\u00e8ne Chavant defended the originality of the Vercors in the department with regard to the national mission received from fighting France (the Montagnards Project).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Authors: Guy Giraud and Julien Guillon<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Organising the Is\u00e8re departmental committee for national liberation<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

In application of the directives of the provisional government in Algiers, a meeting was held in M\u00e9audre on 29 January 1944 to define the composition of the Is\u00e8re departmental committee for national liberation, its objectives and the means to be implemented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The participants represented different local Resistance movements with diverse, if not opposing, political commitments and action tactics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Due to the importance and sensitivity of the topics discussed, differences of opinion emerged. Nevertheless, the meeting made it possible to sketch out the future administrative organisation of Is\u00e8re, particularly for Grenoble.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Author: Guy Giraud<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Youth workcamps<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Villard-de-Lans, Is\u00e8re. Undated, but in 1943. Home of Youth Camp n\u00b08. <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The Chantiers de la Jeunesse were created on 4 July 1940. General Paul Marie Joseph de la Porte du Theil became its Commissioner General. The laws and decrees of 18 January 1941 set out the organisation and the status of the cadres. They were dissolved on 4 January 1944 to become a formation of supervised workers, intended to carry out work for the Germans. De la Porte du Theil was arrested. They came under the control of the Minister of Labour and Industrial Production, the technocrat Jean Bichelonne, an ultra-collaborationist, who was responsible for the implementation of the Obligatory Labour Service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The armistice of 22 June abolished military service. It had to be replaced in order to supervise and keep a disorganised youth occupied in a healthy way. Young men, born between 1920 and 1924, were incorporated into groups organised from 1941 in the free zone, then in 1942 in the occupied zone as well as in North Africa. The training courses lasted eight months. The trainees were not armed. The aim was to replace the forbidden military service with an experience combining political training and moral and physical education through teamwork in camps in the middle of nowhere. Discipline is of the paramilitary type. The staff is made up of demobilised active or reserve officers. In order not to appear to the occupying forces as a disguised military organisation, the camps were placed under the supervision of the Secretary of State for National Education and Youth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Around the Vercors massif were the following groups: n\u00b0 9 Monestier-de-Clermont, n\u00b0 10 Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, n\u00b0 11 Villard-de-Lans, n\u00b0 14 Le Diois, n\u00b0 15 Saint-Jean-en-Royans. Their shops are rich in supplies and various equipment. The Resistance, by trickery or with certain internal complicities within the groups, would make them a source of supplies (clothes, supplies, tents, skis, etc.).
When the Chantiers were disbanded, some of the leaders and young people joined the armed resistance in the maquis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Authors: Julien Guillon and Guy Giraud<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Vichy concept of national revolution<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

The clauses of the armistice of 22 June 1940 abolished military service. The Vichy government decided to create the Chantiers de la Jeunesse (youth work camps), open in the free zone and in North Africa to young people aged 20. Developed as camps in the countryside, they were inspired by the organisation of life in scouting. The aim was to inculcate the values of the national revolution advocated by Vichy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The relationship of the Chantiers with the Resistance was ambiguous. An anti-German state of mind permeated some of the leaders and young people. Well supplied with various materials, the camp shops were a source of supplies for the maquis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under German pressure, the Chantiers de la Jeunesse were dissolved on 15 May 1944 – the dissolution was ratified on 15 June 1944 – and most of the staff then joined the Resistance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Authors: Julien Guillon and Guy Giraud<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The maquis phenomenon<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

“The maquis! This word was first heard whispered, repeated in low voices in cities like Lyon, where the mountains are close by. A clandestine word like the struggle itself of the French people (\u2026). The maquis was the newest phenomenon of the vitality and will of the French people. Far above the village, the maquis watches, watches, disperses, reforms, disappears, returns, attacks, (\u2026) they are spoken of with pride and tenderness. The vast complicity of a whole people surrounds and supports them. Where do they come from, the guys of the maquis? The Germans and the filthy Vichy henchmen called them brigands and terrorists. I remember them in the Vercors, in Savoy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Logging at the C3 camp in G\u00e8ve, no date (probably winter 1943-1944).<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

I see their faces again: workers, students, peasants, craftsmen, employees, officers, of all classes and all conditions, of all beliefs and all tendencies. Gangs? Come on! A guerrilla army, certainly, but with its discipline, its brotherhood of arms, its honour, its flag\u2026”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This long quote1 is from the pen of Yves Farge (1899-1953). He was a journalist at the Progr\u00e8s de Lyon, a Resistance fighter from 1941 onwards, president in June 1943 of the Comit\u00e9 d’Action contre la D\u00e9portation (CAD, responsible, among other things, for combating the STO and supplying the maquis), commissioner of the Republic of the Rh\u00f4ne-Alpes region in April 1944, president of the ceremony for the Restoration of the Republic in the Vercors on 3 July 1944, and liberator of the 800 hostage prisoners in Montluc Prison, including Maquisards. In short, this Companion of the Liberation by decree of 17\/11\/1945 was an actor and an informed witness of the “maquis phenomenon”, in its full development. The lyricism of his text forcefully describes the phenomenon of the “fighting maquis”, of the years 1943 and especially 1944 and for the Vercors of the “maquis mountain”. According to the terminology of Fran\u00e7ois Boulet2, it is necessary to evoke first of all the “refuge mountain”, at the origin of many maquis: it collects the refractory to the STO, but also French or foreigners threatened in their safety. It developed – often near the villages – an “ethic of responsibility and “fraternity” with its “humanitarian values”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Vercors is fully in line with this approach of the “refuge mountain” – that of the camps – which gradually became the fighting “maquis mountain” – ultimately that of the reconstituted military units. However, it is clear that this path will not be “binary”, but in this chaotic period, will be strewn with many adventures, both happy and dramatic. It should also be noted that the behaviour of certain maquisards across the country was not always exemplary3.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Authors: Philippe Huet and Alain Raffin<\/strong>
Sources :
1- Jean-Fran\u00e7ois Armorin, Le temps des terroristes, Paris, Editions Franc-Tireur, 1945, preface by Yves Farge ;
2- Fran\u00e7ois Boulet, Les Alpes fran\u00e7aises, des montagnes refuges aux montagnes maquis,
Paris, Editions les Presses Franciliennes, December 2008 (pp. 356 and following);
3- Jacques Canaud, Le temps des maquis, Sayat, \u00e9ditions de Bor\u00e9e, October 2011, p. 185.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The origins of the maquis<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

At the beginning, did the initiators of the Resistance imagine that they had to create shelters for people who were threatened or in an illegal situation? In the words of the historian Henri Michel, “The maquis was a gift that the occupier made to the Resistance”, since it was following the Rel\u00e8ve and later the Service du Travail Obligatoire (STO) that it became necessary to provide shelter for “refractory” people. Thus, after 8 laws and 11 decrees promulgated by the French head of state between 4 September 1942 and 26 August 1943, and according to German statistics, more than 600,000 French workers out of nearly 850,000 requisitioned workers left for the German war factories until 30 September 1944.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, not all the refractory workers joined the maquis, but there was a strong source of recruitment for the Resistance. However, it must be emphasised that the vast majority of these rebels were looking for a refuge rather than a combat base. Thus, according to the historian Fran\u00e7ois Boulet, in the spring of 1943, 8 camps of 50 men each were formed in the Vercors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Authors: Philippe Huet and Alain Raffin<\/strong>
Sources:
Fran\u00e7ois Boulet, Les Alpes fran\u00e7aises 1940-1944: des montagnes-refuges aux montagnes-maquis, Paris, Les Presses Franciliennes, 2008, pp. 360 and following.
Alain Gu\u00e9rin, Chronique de la R\u00e9sistance, Paris, Omnibus, 2010, p. 1057 and following.
Henri Michel, quoted by Alain Gu\u00e9rin in Chronique de la R\u00e9sistance, Paris, \u00e9ditions Omnibus, 2007, p. 1058.
Revue d’histoire de la Deuxi\u00e8me Guerre mondiale, n\u00b0 49, January 1963.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The camps, daily life – An attempt at synthesis<\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Keeping a group of men in the forest alive over the long term and most often in hiding is a permanent challenge that the camps had to resolve: security, health, supplies, physical and then military training, weapons, relations with the population, leisure time, so many issues to be resolved day after day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The different aspects have been studied in various books, in particular Le Temps des Maquis by Jacques Canaud – Edition de Bor\u00e9e, 2011), using a similar grid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The original and specific study of the Vercors presented here highlights the complexity of the description of an often nomadic life, in any case uncertain, which had to unite men of all ages, all motivations, all convictions – the witnesses who went to the end of the fighting will speak of a fraternity born between them for life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Deliberately in the presentation, the choice was made to exploit the testimonies “as close to the ground as possible”, to try to grasp the daily reality of the adventure of the camps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Authors: Philippe Huet and Alain Raffin<\/strong>
Source:
Jacques Canaud, Le Temps des maquis, Sayat, Edition de Bor\u00e9e, 2011.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The wait, the Italian, German and militia blows<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Is\u00e8re and Dr\u00f4me, located in the free zone from June 1940 to November 1942, experienced two periods of occupation. The first, from November 1942 to September 1943, was that of the Italian troops. Indeed, after the Allied landings in Morocco and Algeria, Italy occupied the Alpine regions and Corsica.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The armistice of 3 September 1943 signed by Marshal Badoglio reversed the situation, causing the arrival in force of German troops throughout the country, particularly in Grenoble; this was the second period of occupation, lasting until August 1944.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The occupying forces, whether Italian or German, did not deploy permanent troops on the massif before the attack of 21 July 1944.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is clear that it monitored the rise of the Resistance by infiltrating spies, engaging its observation planes and carrying out spot checks, often based on intelligence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Italian forces, through the activity of the Organizzazione per la Vigilanza e la Repressione dell’Antifascismo (OVRA), the Italian political police, dealt some blows to the Resistance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

General Karl Pflaum’s 157th reserve division, supported by the entire German repression apparatus, proved more dangerous than the Italian repression of the inhabitants of the massif.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Lyon militia made a devastating incursion into Vassieux-en-Vercors and La Chapelle-en-Vercors from 16 to 23 April 1944.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Authors: Julien Guillon and Guy Giraud<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

From the summer of 1944 to the Liberation<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The period from 9 June to the Liberation was marked by the following events<\/p>\n\n\n\n