The Women of Chateau Lafayette

After Operation Dynamo, where Britain recovered approximately 338,000 British and Allied soldiers from capture and annihilation at Dunkirk, French forces rapidly collapsed under the onslaught of Germany’s Blitzkrieg warfare. On June 22, 1940, France officially signed an armistice with Germany, ending the Battle of France. The armistice effectively divided France into two zones: the Occupied Zone, which encapsulated the northern and western regions of France (including Paris) and was directly controlled and administered by Nazi authorities, and the Unoccupied or Free Zone, which included the southern and eastern regions of France and was governed by the Vichy government and led by Marshal Philippe Pétain.

Known as the “Lion of Verdun” or “Vainqueur de Verdun,” Pétain was a highly decorated military officer known for his effective tactics during World War I. As leader of the Vichy government, however, Pétain sought to straddle a fine line between maintaining relative freedom in France and collaborating with the Nazi regime. Through his agreement to collaborate, Germany gained a compliant government in the southern zone of Europe that enforced their policies, including the enactment of antisemitic laws and participation in the deportation of Jews. It would also provide economic resources, labor, and administrative support to the Nazi war effort, as it allowed Nazi forces to use French infrastructure, agricultural resources, and manufacturing plants for ammunition. Internationally, the Vichy government would come to be used as propaganda to legitimize the Nazis’ occupation of France by qualifying their presence as one of partnership rather than conquest.

In the Free Zone, the Vichy government exercised authoritarian control over its territory, imposing censorship of the press, enforcing restrictions on political activity, and creating a paramilitary organization called the Milice. Pétain’s government struggled to maintain a sense of legitimacy within France and tried to use the Riom trials in 1942, for instance, to establish themselves as a legitimate institution. However, the latter would backfire, as it only succeeded in further angering the French against Pétain’s leadership. Exploiting a perceived need for order and stability in the wake of military defeat and the collapse of the French Third Republic, the Vichy government was able to promote a vision of traditional French values and identity, one that upheld concepts such as conservative family principles, manual work, and strict order. Since the Vichy government also struggled with food shortages, inflation, and rationing, resistance movements inevitably emerged. In response, Pétain’s government would use its Milice to arrest, torture, and execute members of these movements, quelling dissent and maintaining power.

Discontent over the Vichy government grew, and with Général de Gaulle fueling resistance from Britain, the control that Pétain sought to establish in the Free Zone was tenuous at best. The Vichy government would officially come to an end with the liberation of France in 1944. After the Allied invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944 (D-Day), a provisional government led by Général de Gaulle asserted control over the whole country, thereby ending Pétain’s government. When the war ended, Pétain was tried for treason for his collaboration with Nazi Germany. He was found guilty and sentenced to death, but because of his advanced age and his service in World War I, his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. He died at the age of 95 on July 23, 1951.