Bidspirit auction | Martyrs of the Gestapo in

Martyrs of the Gestapo in Torun 1940–1944 - An early publication on the crimes of the German Gestapo in the Torun region. First edition - Les Martyrs de la Gestapo en Touraine 1940–1944 - Martyrs of the Gestapo in Touraine 1940–1944 - on the persecution of the Jews and opponents of Nazism and their deportation to the death camps, by Pierre Chauve. Imprimerie Arrault et Cie Press. Touraine, 1946 - First edition. Rare. An early publication dealing with the victims of the Gestapo in the Touraine region (Touraine, around Tours). From the German occupation: the isolation of the Jews, forced registrations, the requirement for Jews to wear the yellow badge, forced labor, deportations, and arrests. The author describes the tragedy of Touraine upon the entry of the German forces: “Entire families are separated, the looting of property and belongings becomes systematic, ” while at the same time resistance groups meet in secret and attempt to formulate a local response. The author continues and documents the fate of those deported from the region to the death camps: “Can we accurately describe what the existence of our comrades deported to the Nazi concentration camps was like?... the whip, the dogs, the gas, the gallows, forced labor, and also the hunger that gnaws at the entrails night and day, then one withers, is emptied—this is death, ... the slow death that feeds the crematorium furnaces... In the Dachau camp, the ‘Brausebad’ (steam baths) were nothing more than gas chambers. In the Reichenau camp, children aged 10 to 14 were crushed, their skulls smashed against the corners of the walls. In the Fallingbostel camp, soldiers were buried while still alive. In the Birkenau camp, 8,000 women were injured... The Struthof camp (“the scientific terror camp”), sterilization experiments using X-rays, the collection of fresh bone and flesh remains for transplantation onto wounded Germans...”. The booklet compiles testimonies, names, and descriptions of arrests carried out by the Gestapo and German forces in the region between 1940–1944; among other things, evidence is revealed here for the first time of the perpetration of the terrible crimes in the area, which the Gestapo attempted to conceal in August 1944 during the flight of its personnel from the Allies. Dozens of names of victims appear, the manner in which they were captured by the Gestapo and how they were executed, particularly the crimes carried out in the areas of Maillé and Saint-Symphorien. At the opening of the book appears a photograph of Jacques Vost, who was arrested by the Gestapo on June 14, 1944, following a denunciation by collaborators, taken to the Châteauroux prison, from there to Bourges, and his fate remains unknown. “These events are still too recent for us to recount them with the required composure... The crimes of the Nazis, in which cruelty, cowardice, and hypocrisy provoke the conscience and cause people to doubt reason...” (from the book). In the Touraine region (Touraine), and especially around Tours, the Gestapo operated as a central mechanism of repression and control, relying on intelligence networks, denunciations, and local collaboration. Its activities included arbitrary arrests, violent interrogations, and systematic torture intended to expose underground cells and dismantle Resistance activity. Many of the detainees were transferred to regional prisons or concentration camps, and were at times executed without trial. Toward the summer of 1944, with the approach of the Allies, the violence intensified, also taking the form of large-scale reprisals against the civilian population, such as the massacre at Maillé, in which dozens of residents were murdered. The totality of these actions illustrates the operational pattern of the Nazi terror apparatus at the regional level - a combination of political repression, psychological terror, and extreme physical violence, as first revealed in the present publication. Rare. Only two copies are recorded in the WorldCat global library catalog. 61 [1] pages. Good - very good condition.