Historical context
In 1933, Hitler came to power. The nature of the Nazi regime became clear and began to affect universities on the right bank of the river Rhine. As a border region directly under threat, Alsace had an evacuation plan ready to be implemented upon the declaration of war.
Even before the outbreak of the second world war, Strasbourg's university community began to come together. France had abandoned its Czechoslovak allies with the signing of the Munich Agreement, and on 9 November, Kristallnacht marked countless acts of violence on the right bank of the Rhine. Synagogues in Baden-Baden, Oberkirch, Freiburg im Breisgau and nearby towns were set on fire, witnessed by the people of Alsace.
In January 1939, 128 Strasbourg academics signed a petition addressed to President Albert Lebrun, calling on France to “maintain its traditions of freedom and of political, religious and ethnic tolerance, which, just as much as its territory, constitute the heritage of the nation, strengthen its patriotism, and are the source of its universal influence.”
Mr President of the Republic,
The one hundred and twenty-eight undersigned professors, drawn from the seven faculties of the University of Strasbourg, placed by virtue of their mission at the borders of France and attentive to the echoes that reach them or that they bring back from abroad, remaining above all partisan considerations and deeply concerned by the rise of forces which, by upsetting the European balance, risk isolating France on the continent and are already threatening the integrity of its Empire,
- believe that any further concessions can only hasten this development and render it irreversible;
- are aware of the grave consequences that the decisions to be made in the coming months will have for the country’s future;
- and have decided to express their concern and to respectfully ask you to use your considerable influence:
- to ensure that not only any cession of territory, which goes without saying, is ruled out, but also any measure likely lead to our dispossession or to compromise the security of our borders and communications;
- to ensure that France maintains its traditions of freedom and of political, religious and ethnic tolerance, which, just as much as its territory, constitute the heritage of the nation, strengthen its patriotism, and are the source of its universal influence;
- to ensure that France does not completely withdraw from the major issues facing Europe, nor renounce the friendships essential to maintaining its place in the world.
And they ask you, Mr President of the Republic, to accept the expression of their profoundly respectful devotion.
The list of signatories was published in the 5 February 1939 issue of the Dépêche de Strasbourg.
Exile in Clermont-Ferrand
Strasbourg was evacuated from 1 to 4 September 1939, and around 380,000 people from Alsace and Lorraine were relocated to south-western France.
On 3 September 1939, the Allies declared war and the University of Strasbourg was transferred to Clermont-Ferrand, taking with it its library collections and scientific equipment. The choice of Clermont-Ferrand was justified by its exceptionally strong growth, driven by its industrial and tertiary activity. It also had spacious university buildings, which opened in 1934, as well as a large student residence.
In November 1939, the academic year began in Clermont-Ferrand with reduced numbers due to large-scale mobilisation: 1,200 students and 175 academic staff.
Joining the Resistance
On 22 June 1940, Alsace was annexed by the Reich. The German authorities attempted to have members of the university return to Alsace, but the majority refused and remained in Auvergne. When the Vichy regime's antisemitic laws came into force, students, hospital staff and many lecturers lost their jobs. The anti-Jewish policy resulted in the dismissal of respected academics.
In the autumn of 1940, the French State agreed to have the cultural property and equipment that was evacuated a year earlier returned to Strasbourg, despite opposition from the university community and even though this had not been provided for in the armistice. Efforts to prevent the transfer of the library collections failed, and it went ahead in the summer of 1941. However, steps were taken to remove as much as possible beforehand to keep the Germans out of the Clermont-Ferrand premises.
The reluctance of Alsatian professors and students was immediately apparent to the German delegation sent to Vichy. In the words of Commissioner Herbert Kraft, “It is useless to try to influence these people; any attempt is doomed to fail from the outset.”
The Resistance began to form in Clermont-Ferrand. The Libération-Sud movement, in which the philosopher Jean Cavaillès played a leading role alongside Emmanuel d'Astier de La Vigerie and Lucie Aubrac, began there in the autumn of 1940.
The following year, the Liberté network, created by the lawyers René Capitant and Marcel Prélot, joined the Combat movement and the Lyon-based Franc-Tireur group led by Jean-Pierre Lévy, with which the historian Marc Bloch was closely associated.
Under the cover of archaeological activities, the Gergoviotes student community played an important role in the local resistance: supported by General de Lattre de Tassigny, it provided a pool of recruits for the first resistance movements. A member of this group, the young Resistance fighter Jean-Paul Cauchi formed the Combat étudiant group at the request of Alfred Coste-Floret to coordinate the student resistance. It was Jean Moulin who united these three groups to form the Mouvements unis de la résistance (MUR) in November 1942.
Under the cover of archaeological activity, the Gergoviotes student community played an important role in the local Resistance and, supported by General Jean de Lattre de Tassigny, became a recruiting ground for the early Resistance movements. A member of this group, the young Resistance member Jean-Paul Cauchi, formed the Combat Étudiant group at the request of Alfred Coste-Floret to coordinate student Resistance activity. It was Jean Moulin who brought these three groups together within the Mouvements unis de la Résistance (MUR) in November 1942.
More information:
- Listen to the podcast Les Gergoviotes, des étudiants en Résistance
- Resistance Movements | Chemins de mémoire
The 1943 roundups
On 11 November 1942, Germany invaded the zone libre and Clermont-Ferrand was occupied. The Nazi authorities were determined to put an end to this Resistance movement, “so that the very great danger posed by the émigrés of the former University of Strasbourg could be eliminated as quickly as possible.” The plan was approved by Heinrich Himmler to be carried out when the time was right.
On 24 June 1943, in response to the murder of two Gestapists by a Resistance student, an initial roundup (rafle) at the La Gallia student hostel in Clermont led to the arrest and deportation of 37 students. The Jewish students were sent to death camps.
On 25 November of the same year, the army and the Gestapo entered the university buildings while the police went to the homes of teaching staff. The Hellenist Paul Collomp, who tried to intervene, was shot dead. They rounded up a total of 1,200 staff and students and detained between 400 and 500 of them, imprisoning them at the barracks of the 92nd Infantry Regiment. They then proceeded to sort them, leading to 130 people being deported. Only around 30 people survived, and no comparable event occurred elsewhere.
In 1944, the arrests continued, with a wave targeting members of the Strasbourg university community. In total, the university lost 139 people, whose names are inscribed on a commemorative plaque at the entrance to the Palais Universitaire.
Read the article "La rafle du 25 novembre 1943"
Liberation and recognition
The dismantling of the "université de la résistance" continued right up until the eve of Liberation. Clermont-Ferrand was liberated on 27 August 1944, and Strasbourg on 23 November by General Leclerc.
30 June 1945 marked the end of Strasbourg’s final academic year in Clermont-Ferrand.
On 5 October 1945, the university resumed its academic year in Strasbourg in the presence of General de Gaulle, who declared, "I am well aware of the hardships the university has endured to reach this point, both physical and emotional; but now that it is once again fully reassembled where it belongs, it seems to me that the future before it appears brighter, stronger and greater…”
Diplôme encadré de la République française, signé par le général de Gaulle, décernant la Médaille de la Résistance française à l’Université de Strasbourg (avec rosette), daté du 20 novembre 1947
In 1947, the University of Strasbourg became the only French university to receive the Resistance medal with rosette (médaille de la Résistance avec rosette), awarded to those who had stood out either through the importance of their contributions or through the seriousness of the risks they had taken.
Members of the Resistance
This section presents academics and students who were victims of Nazism, and aims to shed light on their individual stories. It is a reminder that our societies are never immune to barbarism, and that among the victims of totalitarian regimes there have always been scientists, teachers and intellectuals. Education and science remain our strongest safeguards against the rejection of democratic values.
François Amoudruz (1926-2020)
François Amoudruz was 13 years old when war was declared and was living with his family in Clermont-Ferrand. A law student, he was arrested on 25 November 1943, thrown into a cell and then transferred to Buchenwald concentration camp. He returned to France in May 1945 and resumed his studies at the Faculty of Law in the autumn of 1947.
Lucien Braun (1923-2020)
In 1943, Lucien Braun was 20 years old and a student at the University of Strasbourg, which had been relocated to Clermont-Ferrand. He later became a professor of philosophy and a historian of philosophy. He served as president of the Université Marc Bloch and edited series for the Presses universitaires de Strasbourg. In 2011, as one of the last witnesses of this period, the Revue d’histoire et de philosophie religieuses invited him to share his perspective on these events and on how they have been remembered.
Lucien Braun's testimony in the Revue d'histoire et de philosophie religieuses
Gaston Mariotte (1919-2020)
Born in Moselle in 1919, Gaston Mariotte was a law student at the University of Strasbourg when war was declared. After his military service, he joined the university in Clermont-Ferrand and became a member of the Resistance. Arrested at the La Gallia hostel on 24 June 1943, he was deported to Buchenwald and sent to the Schönebeck kommando. When Buchenwald was liberated, his kommando was evacuated on foot. He was repatriated to France after a 23-day march.
Read the article "Le résistant-déporté Gaston Mariotte s'est éteint"
Armand Utz (1922-2022)
Armand Utz was born in Ottrott in 1922. During the Second World War, he was sent to Germany for the Reich Labour Service (Reichsarbeitsdienst). Opposed to the forced conscription of Alsatians into the Wehrmacht, he fled Obernai with a friend in 1942 and joined the University of Strasbourg in Clermont-Ferrand in May 1943. A member of student resistance networks, he was arrested during the roundup of 25 November 1943 and deported to Buchenwald, then Flossenbürg. He was liberated on 11 April 1945 and evacuated on foot. He contracted typhus and weighed only 40 kilograms at the time of his liberation by the Russian army. He returned to France on 17 June 1945. After the war, he settled in Stotzheim, got married and became the father of three children. He became the last surviving member of the Cavaillès group, a Resistance movement formed in the autumn of 1940 around the philosopher and epistemologist Jean Cavaillès. He notably gave testimony on camera to students from the University Centre for Journalism Education (Centre universitaire d'enseignement du journalisme – CUEJ) in November 2011.
More information:
- Étudiants en temps de guerre
- Collective work "De l'université aux camps de concentration : témoignages strasbourgeois"
Hélène Geismar-Sinay (1920-2004)
Having earned a PhD in law in 1942 and miraculously escaped arrest in 1943, Hélène Geismar-Sinay went into hiding for the duration of the war and resumed her career at the University of Strasbourg at the start of the 1945 academic year. She appears in L'Université résistante (1999), a documentary by Barcha Bauer.
Jean Cavaillès (1903-1944)
A philosophy lecturer and respected epistemologist, Jean Cavaillès served as a lieutenant in the Cipher Department in 1939. After being captured during the war, he escaped in June 1940. He was dismissed by the Vichy regime for his Resistance activities, having co-founded the Libération movement. Arrested in August 1943 and tortured, he was shot dead on 17 February 1944 in Arras. He died for France.
Marc Bloch (1886-1944)
Marc Bloch was a professor of medieval history, a veteran of the Great War and a co-founder of the École des Annales in Strasbourg, and was dismissed by the Vichy regime because he was Jewish. A member of the Resistance within the Franc-Tireur movement, he was arrested at his home on 8 March 1944, tortured by Klaus Barbie and executed on 16 June 1944. He died for France.
Robert Waitz (1900-1978)
Professor of medicine and member of the Resistance from 1941, Robert Waitz served as a regional leader in Auvergne. Jewish and originally from Alsace, he was deported to Auschwitz, where he was assigned to the infirmary. He survived the death march to Buchenwald in January 1945 and testified at the Nuremberg trials in 1946.
Yvonne Lobstein
Yvonne Lobstein was a student at the University of Strasbourg in Clermont-Ferrand. She experienced the round-ups of 1943.
Watch Yvonne Lobstein's testimony
Useful resources
Further reading
- Bischoff, G., & Kleinschmager, R. (2010). L'université de Strasbourg: cinq siècles d'enseignement et de recherche (Preface by A. Beretz). La Nuée Bleue. ISBN 978-2-7165-0768-4
- Collective (1996). De l'Université aux camps de concentration : Témoignages strasbourgeois. Presses Universitaires de Strasbourg. ISBN 2-86820-714-2, Digitised version
- "La restitution d'œuvres spoliées sous la loupe des chercheurs" in Savoir(s), the University of Strasbourg's magazine
- "L'Université de Strasbourg, seule université à avoir obtenu la médaille de la Résistance française" in Savoir(s), the University of Strasbourg's magazine
- "Étudiants en temps de guerre" multimedia dossier