´óÏó´«Ã½

• Continued from chapter four

Living 10 kilometres away to the north-west of La Grande Vacherie, in an isolated hamlet called Les Jubliers, north of the town of Charny, was a patriotic woman called Léonne Moreau. Despite being married and in her early forties, Madame Moreau was childless, as too was her unmarried brother, Maxence Delapierre, a French soldier who, up to his capture by the Germans during the defeat of France in 1940, had lived in the neighbouring hamlet of Les Dumands. He had had a spectacular escape from his Prussian prisoner of war camp, managing to get back to France by rail, by hiding himself under a railway wagon. Once back in the country of his birth, he succeeded in returning to the area where he was born.

It was probably, towards the end of June that Jack was transferred to Les Jubliers for a short stay at Madame Moreau’s house. What is sure that on Thursday 6th July, she and her brother were given the job of moving Jack to his next safe house, a farmhouse called Les Domats, situated just over a kilometre away from Les Jubliers on the west side of the main road running north out of Charny and about 4.5 kilometres out of town.

The people who lived there were a farming family called Doin. They had two children still living with them on the farm.

While Jack was at the Doins’, his state of health started giving cause for concern so medical help had to be summoned. The first medic to attend to him was a Dr Bothereau from Villefranche-Saint-Phal. After that, Dr Roger Fort, a surgeon at Joigny Hospital, found his way to the Doins’ farm, guided there by the resistance. When Dr Fort died in his 73rd year in 1976, Dr Fort’s courage in working to help injured résistants as well as answering the call to go to the aid of Jack was praised in his obituary in the local paper.

On Wednesday 12th July it was time for Jack to move on again. His next destination was another farm, located in the parish of St Loup d’Ordon, 10 kilometres north-east of the Doins’ farm. The transfer was effected in a horse and cart driven by Monsieur Doin accompanied by a draft evader from Obligatory Work Service called Serge Roland, who had joined the swelling ranks of the resistance.

Jack’s evacuation from the Doins’ came in the nick of time. Two days later on Bastille Day 1944, the Germans undertook a round up, centred on the town of Charny, but involving search operations in many of the surrounding farms and hamlets. The Doins’ farm wasn’t spared. A party of soldiers arrived there during the day and made a thorough search of the farm. Finding nothing untoward, they took a calf for spite. In the nearby town of Charny itself, a group of young men and a small number of women were rounded up and temporarily incarcerated in the local school. Later in the day they were loaded into three wagons and taken more than 100km south to Lyons, where they were imprisoned.

By the time this was happening, Jack had been safely moved on to another farm in the hamlet of Les Halliers, with the Mondion family. Monsieur Moïse Mondion was in charge of the farm and helping him out were his wife, two children and Serge Roland. It had been Serge, together with Jack’s previous host, Monsieur Doin, who had been charged with the responsibility of transporting Jack from the Doins’ to the Mondions’ farm.

The Mondions’ son, Robert, was a little younger than Jack at seventeen, and their older child, Georgette, at twenty-eight, was married, but her husband was a prisoner in Germany. Serge, who had had to leave his family to avoid the dreaded STO, or Obligatory Work Service, had found a hiding place on the Mondions’ farm, from where he could carry out his clandestine acts of resistance. Many were the loyal farmers who helped out in this way.

Serge kept Jack close by him as he did his chores around the farm. He later recalled a close shave they’d experienced:

‘One day, Jack and I got a nasty shock. …I was in an outbuilding busy getting food ready for the animals and Jack was nearby. Suddenly I noticed two German soldiers in the farmyard talking with the boss, Monsieur Mondion. I left Jack hidden…… and went to find out what they wanted. They were after 10kg of beans! We saw to them as quickly as possible and off they went. Phew!! We went through a number of emotions….’

On 17th or 18th July, Serge and the Mondions were sad to see Jack go. Serge, especially, had formed strong bonds with the young Englishman. Jack had given him his ‘escape kit’ map printed on a silk handkerchief as a souvenir to treasure. Jack, in turn, was now carrying a small bundle of similar treasures himself: small tokens of remembrance that his many French patriot helpers had given him — a bible, a pressed flower, coins, a St Christopher, a Lorraine cross.

The Caselli brothers ordered the evacuation of Jack to St Romain-le-Preux, a small neighbouring parish. The Mondions, like all the other people who had helped Jack, knew neither the names of the family who had hosted him previously, nor the names of the families to whom he would subsequently be entrusted. Such secrecy was vital to ensure the safety of all who were risking their lives to help an allied airmen in distress.

Jack’s new hosts, M and Mme Milon, were again small farmers whose ancestors had worked the same land for at least 300 years. Also living at the farm were their son, Roger and two young men who were in hiding from the authorities, Louis Meignen and Claude Dumont.

No doubt Jack would have continued living with the Milons for a number of weeks if his stay hadn’t been cut short.
Early on the morning of Monday 24th July, a local resistance group ambushed a convoy of Germans passing through the area, shooting dead a number of soldiers on the spot and taking more than a dozen prisoner.

Roger Milon was out working in the fields at the time, busy with the harvest. Having been told of the attack, and realising the possible consequences, he quickly ran back to the house to get Jack. They got their few things together and left the farmhouse as fast as they could, fearing reprisals against the villagers.

Roger Milon and the villagers were justified in fearing reprisals. Many were the instances of retaliatory action being taken against so called ‘acts of resistance’ or ‘terrorism’ by the occupying authorities who were swift to crack down on such acts, in order to promulgate a climate of fear in which civilians could be brought into line.

It was therefore time to get out and pray that no reprisals would be taken. It was a very hot day in high summer. Roger Milon, together with Louis Meignen and their resistance chief, Coutin, got their bikes and hurriedly left St Romain-le-Preux with Jack in tow. Fortunately, the temporary paralysis that had first afflicted him had worn off, and he was able to pedal for himself. Initially they headed north-west out of the village. Roger explained the first stop they had along the way:

‘In the course of doing this, we arrived at the hamlet of ‘Charlots’ in the parish of Sépeaux where, since it was a very hot day, we were invited to quench our thirsts by the farmers Monsieur and Madame Paul Foubard. On arriving there, we learnt that the sixteen Germans who had been captured during the ambush earlier that morning had been shot. Afterwards, we got to the hamlet of ‘Quatre Vents’ to M Morisson’s house in the parish of Villefranche-Saint-Phal where we left Jack in the care of the Casellis.’

• Continued in chapter six

This story was submitted to the People’s War site by Allan Price of the ´óÏó´«Ã½ Radio Shropshire CSV Action Desk on behalf of Janet Marsden and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

© Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.