Oradour sur Glane- the martyred village

So we sat outside in the sun to eat lunch as I told you last time, and discussed Ian's suggested visit to Oradour sur Glane, over in the Limoges direction. He had visited it before and told me about it, giving me enough information for me to decide to change my mind, but I agreed to go. It seemed the right thing to do.

On 10 June 1944 this small town was to suffer horrifically at the hands of the Nazis. Six hundred and forty inhabitants were murdered and every building burned. Yet today the ruined buildings still stand as they were left, as a memorial to all who died here and in other places like it. It is an eery and extremely sad place to walk through and I soon found the tears streaming down my cheeks! I couldn't help it! Seeing a town that was once as vibrant as others we had driven through and were to drive through later, and thinking of the people going about their daily business suddenly finding themselves being hustled out of their homes and into the town marketplace on the pretext of it being an identity check. There the men were separated from the rest to be taken to various barns and other buildings to be shot, and the women and children right down to a baby of one week old, herded into the church where an attempt to asphyxiate them failed, so they too were shot and the church set alight. Then the nazis systematically searched the town, building by building, through homes, hotels, shops and cafés, shooting any escapees they found and setting each building on fire as they left......

Is it any wonder that I cried!

This is Monsier Lanot's butcher's shop, once tiled throughout with probably white ceramic tiles, now long gone.

Ian too was quite moved even though he had visited before. He could see in his mind's eye the soldiers moving through the town, and hear the shouts and screams of a terrified population.The spookiest thing though was that in the silence when we were looking at a burned out shop, somewhere out of sight a baby began to cry. Talk about the hairs on the back of your neck standing on end! Then round the corner we came to the church where a group of men all in black jackets and working men's cloth caps were coming out, milling around outside talking to each other, for all the world like a group of paysans just coming from the Sunday mass, and at the top of the steps at the church door another couple of men stood talking. They could have been the priest and one of his parishioners. It was like a flashback in time. This is how it would have been.

We stood in the church and saw bullet holes in the memorial board to the dead of the 1914-18 war; saw the remains of the melted church bells, the altar behind which 15 children had hidden, the window through which Madame Rouffanche the only survivor of the church massacre escaped. Of course today the walls that were once blackened by fire have been washed of their soot by the elements leaving the place just a honeycoloured stone shell. There is not the horror of the aftermath in the church now - only peace.

The inscription translated says - Here hundreds of women and children were murdered by the nazis. You who pass here are welcome. You who believe say a prayer for the victims and their families.

We didn't know the full story at the time, but since coming home I have looked up quite a few websites on which I found a lot more information. No-one can really say why this happened in Oredour. It may have been reprisals for some resistance activity, but the town had seen little or no action in that line, though it happened in another nearby village earlier in the day when the nazis were shot at by some members of le maquis. 27 villagers were shot in retalliation. Or was Oredour just the wrong place as some contend. These are a couple of websites if you want to read more about Oredour/s/Glane and the events of 10 June 1944.

I have to say it has taken a while for me to complete this section of my blog. I wanted to read all I could, to try and understand. I wanted the photos I am including to be my tribute if you like, to the people who died, and contemplated the best way in which to display them - in black and white? Sepia? In the end I decided that colour was best, though I did include one in black and white. See for yourself!

This is the main street down near the church. There was a café through that arched doorway. That tree would have been a small sapling no doubt.

Here are the wrecks of two cars burned as they stood in a garage, perhaps having had work done on them that morning.


This is said to have been the doctor's car, in the market place where everyone was ordered to gather. He had been out of town but returned as everyone was making their way to the square. He too died that day.

The date in the fanlight above this doorway bears the date 1768

This building has a plaque to say it was the Girls' School. Several children attended from outlying areas. They too died in the church. Here are some of their grave stones in the cemetery.

"In memory of our dear little girls and sisters, Claudine 13, Renée 10, Huguette 7, Maryse 6.

Pupils in Oradour sur Glane school. Murdered and burned in the church by the nazi hordes on 10 June 1944"

"A sad memory of our three children, murdered by the nazis on 10 June 1944.

Eternally regretted."

Irène Redon 19 years old

A momument to one of the many families.

The new Oradour was built not far from the old town, in my mind a two fingered salute to the nazi organisation who destroyed so much - and for what? I can't help but remember it is still going on in a different world and in different countries. As Bob Dylan once sang When will we ever learn?

Talk again soon.