A village - and memorial - like no other, Oradour-sur-Glane, France stands silent, empty and frozen in time. As it was on the evening of June 10, 1944, so it remains today. People may visit, but, in honor of the 642 villagers who were brutally massacred by a Nazi Waffen-SS Panzer Division company sixty-seven years ago, no speaking is allowed in the village. The haunting shells of homes and businesses - many shops with tools still in their places and pots still sitting on villagers' kitchen stoves, the rusting vintage automobiles and the ancient cemetery with memorials to the victims all contribute to the surreal feelings the village imposes on all who enter, but the eerie quiet is what seems to impress visitors most.
On June 10, 1944, four days after D-Day, Nazi soldiers mistakenly entered and sealed off Oradour-sur-Glane in central France (having confused it with nearby Oradour-sur-Vayres) and ordered everyone in the village to assemble in the village square, ostensibly, to have their identity papers examined. All the women and children were then herded into the church, while the village was searched and looted. Meanwhile, the men were led to barns and sheds, where machine gun nests had been put in place. The order was given to begin shooting at them, aiming for their legs, presumably, so that they would not die from the gun-shot wounds, but from the fire which was to follow. Once the victims were no longer able to move, the Nazi soldiers coverd their bodies with fuel and set the barns on fire. Five men escaped the slaughter. One hundred ninety men perished.
The soldiers then proceeded to the church where the women and children had been taken; they placed incendiary devices inside the sanctuary, and locked the women and children inside. Those who tried to escape through the windows, were mowed down with machine gun fire. A total of two hundred forty-seven women and two hundred five children and infants died in the carnage. Only one woman escaped and survived. Other than a few villagers who happened to be away that day and a handful who had fled upon first seeing the Nazis enter town, only six people of the village of Oradour-sur-Glane were still alive by the end of the day. Six hundred forty-two people had been murdered in a matter of a few hours.
Nazi officer Adolf Dickmann said that the carnage was in retaliation for activity of the French Resistance. They suspected that Oradour-sur-Vayres was harboring members of the Resistance movement and, tragically for the Oradour-sur-Glane villagers, they'd mistaken it for Oradour-sur-Vayres.
After the villagers were murdered, the Nazis burned and destroyed as much of the village as they could. What was left remains today just as it was on the evening of June 10, 1944.
Gen. Charles de Gaulle decreed that the village would not be rebuilt on that spot, but would "remain a memorial to the cruelty of the Nazi occupation." A new town was built nearby after the war. The original village is known as the "Martyred Village." In 1999, Pres. Jacques Chirac dedicated a museum at the location. It contains items recovered from the burned-out buildings, such as, watches stopped at the time their owners were killed and other various personal and household items.
In later years, former SS officer Heinz Barth, who took part in the massacre, stated that his only regret concerning Oradour was that there were survivors.
This page is dedicated to the memory of the villagers of Oradour-sur-Glane. -- Nancy |
