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Virginie Babaud – January 15, 2014

2010

In 1941–1942, my great-grandfather hid the Himson family in the Charente. The father’s first name was Théodore and the son’s Maxime. However, I know neither the mother’s nor the daughter’s name. I know that the father and son were arrested on the demarcation line in 1942 but survived (they sent a letter after the war). What became of the mother and daughter? Are the children “listed” on your website the same ones my great-grandparents hid?

In any case, I am deeply moved and overwhelmed to have perhaps finally found a trace of their memory, and I hope to keep it alive so that they are not forgotten.

Thank you in advance for any help you can give me.

2014

As you may remember, I was looking for the Himson family, whom my great-grandfather hid during the war.

Then, thanks to your website, I discovered that their children had been saved by the Marcel network. On your good advice, I went to the CDJC some time ago to consult the network’s archives. There I found the health records of Odette and Maxime Himson.
In case this information is useful to complete your website, here it is:

Odette’s false identity was Renée Bertrand. She was first at the Maison Blanche institution in Nice, then at the Moulinet institution, and also with Madame Castel at Clos le Conte (the microfilms are of very poor quality). I have the dates of her stays but not the year, as well as a report on her condition. Maxime’s false identity was Albert Bertrand. He was lodged with Madame Gause, 3 avenue Lemeray in Antibes, then in a social insurance holiday home (was this the OSE?); there too, there are notes on the visits made to him.

Daniel Czerwonajagoda - 11/06/2010

THANK YOU again. As with several of your young witnesses, our parents told us little about that difficult time, when many parents did not come back from the “camps”.

Here are the memories of a little boy of five.

In 1943, in Nice, when the Germans replaced the Italians as occupiers of the city and the region, rumour spread through the Jewish community that men, women and children would be rounded up and sent to Germany to be exterminated.

Immediately, families began to hear of an organisation called the “Marcel network” that would take the children to safety.
It had been agreed that the children would be left with a very small bundle at a predetermined place, and that the parents would leave at once so that the Nazis could not discover the place.

So one morning I found myself in a small, empty, whitewashed room with little wooden benches against each wall. It was reached by a stone staircase leading down to the basement of the house. As the hours went by, several other children arrived, aged from about four to 11 or 12. Nobody spoke. A horse-drawn cab arrived and stopped in front of the basement. All the children got in. The cab’s black curtains were drawn.

After a journey of a few hours, there were several stops and some children got out of the cab. When I got out, I found myself on a mountain road in front of a building, which I was taken into. I was five at the time, and I was made to understand that from now on my name would be Daniel Langereau.
I was taken in hand by a sister, a nun in her habit, who gave me a thorough wash. I was then put into a class. There were various activities. Among other things, I remember round dances and songs in a courtyard bordered by high walls – or at least walls that seemed very high to me then.
In a niche in this wall was a small statue of the Virgin, to which we paid homage.

I have no precise idea of how long I stayed there. Anyway, my parents had learnt that I had been placed in an institution “in the mountains”. This information had been given by a boy of 10 to 12 who had escaped from the convent or institution where he was and had managed to get home. With only this information to go on, my father set off every day by bike to look for me. After a few weeks of fruitless searching, he arrived at the convent where I was. He spoke to a nun and asked her if Daniel Czerwonajagoda was there. Luckily, this sister was of Polish origin, so she and my father got on very well. She told him that there was a young boy called Daniel, but that his surname was Langereau. My father asked to see this child. She told him that she could not grant his request and that she had to ask her superiors.

The following week I was brought to my father. In the weeks that followed he came back to see me and brought me, in a white bowl, the chocolate or vanilla custards made by my mother, which I adored.

Later, my father took me home. One day he was summoned to the police station and told that he had to go home, pick up a few things and come back immediately. He understood how serious this kind of order was. He left to enlist as a voluntary combatant, while that same day my mother took me, together with my little sister, who was a few weeks old, to the Tarn-et-Garonne.

So the Marcel network made it possible to warn the Jewish community of Nice quickly in order to save the children and keep them from being exterminated by the Nazis in the gas chambers. Note the successive changes of name: Daniel Bianchi, given first by the Marcel network, then Daniel Langereau, given at the convent.

Despite how young all these children were, they were aware of the importance of the instructions they were given about their names.

Liliane Mignon - 09/10/2010

I am the daughter of JULES HOFSTEIN. I never knew him, because he was deported to AUSCHWITZ and, after he came back, he never looked back. If anyone can tell me a little of his story, I would be grateful.

All I have of him are a few letters that describe, in veiled terms, his movements and his anxieties, and then, at the end of 1942, nothing more. His family, who knew of my existence and that of my mother, who was struggling alone in Paris, ignored us. In any case, I am proud and moved to find a trace of his memory.

Eve Schmidt - 06/03/2010

At the Marinville primary school in Saint-Maur-des-Fossés, Madame Ahsbahs, who teaches the last year of primary school, asked me for the second time to talk about my childhood during the Second World War.

After describing my journey and placing it in its historical context, I showed the film “Le réseau Marcel”. The children were attentive and curious. A number of questions were asked. Madame Ahsbahs, delighted with the talk, would like to repeat it.

Beatrice Chervonaz Halfon - 05/10/2010

My husband, Daniel Chervonaz (CZERVONA-JAGODA Daniel / 1938 / Paris / BLANCHI), is very touched and moved to have found this list.

It stirs up many memories, but he had long been looking for evidence of this part of his life, which he used to tell our children about.

Thank you.

Daniel Chervonaz - 05/09/2010

I was taken in a horse-drawn carriage with its black curtains drawn to a convent in the mountains.

An older boy, “Kupernic”, ran away and went back home to Nice (I believe they later went to South America). My father looked for me in many convents and found me thanks to a Polish sister. He took me back after a few weeks, and then we went to Normandy.

Thank you for what you did.

Laurence Brust-Fitoussi - 02/18/2009

Hello,

I am the daughter of Isidore Brust, who appears on the list of children saved by the Abadi network, and I am very moved, because my father died in 1974 at the age of 42 and all I know is that he was placed with the Gérard family in Vevey for several years. Madame Gérard, who was a Protestant, insisted that my father have his bar mitzvah while he was living with her! I am very grateful to Monsieur and Madame Abadi.

That is all I know. Are there any archives that would allow me to find out how this story unfolded?

Kind regards,