The necessity to become a gangster was more or less forced upon me by the shortness of the summer nights, which precluded the possibility of supplies arriving by parachute. And the Maquis was growing fast. Our work was growing. The young men from Vieilley were going out now to do the training which I had done in the beginning. They spoke with the authority of blooded warriors. They led attacks with other new Maquisards, many of whom I had never even seen. With our new formations which were beginning now to encircle Besançon, Boulaya had ordered a great offensive drive against the depot's water supply. After swaying one way and another the battle had been won again by the Resistance. The outlying pumps had been attacked, then the three sources of water for the depot itself. The Germans were reduced to sending empty locomotives under tow to collect water from far distances, even to calling on the fire brigade for water. When we thought that each goods train might carry four hundred tons of French food or merchandise into Germany, or four hundred tons of German war material to the western front, it was good to see the railways dead. But there is a sadness, too, when one phase of the battle is over and it has been won. The athlete who ends the first lap in the lead would rather the race ended there. I wanted to finish the race alive, and the pace was increasing. The battle was going our way. The fame of Boulaya was growing in the land. We were expanding cautiously, as surely as possible. But there were annoying, maddening difficulties of supply. Food for the Maquis was normally obtainable because the country people were generous, and the F.F.I. now usually had adequate finances sent out from the French headquarters in England. But there were other things that the Maquis needed desperately. Things like boots, bicycles, tires, petrol, blankets, socks, grease, biscuits and tinned food or chocolate for emergency rations. We could not get those things from England, and when the parachutages began every cubic centimetre of container space would be wanted for weapons. But the German garrisons in our part of France possessed those things. Boulaya and I had to see how thefts, large-scale thefts, from the Germans could be organized. Resistance in Slovakia The Dawes Mission After the Slovak National Uprising broke out in late August 1944, the U.S. Office of Strategic Services sent a mission to the insurgents to evacuate downed Allied fliers and to facilitate the infiltration of intelligence missions into central Europe. By mid-September a group of O.S.S. operatives were working with the insurgents and sending intelligence back to Italy de scribing the course of the revolt and German operations against it. With the fall of Banská Bystrica in late October and the end of organized resistance, the Americans fled into the interior where most had been captured by the end of the year. This group of prisoners was later transported to Mauthausen concentration camp and executed at the end of January. Among the reports transmitted to Italy by the "Dawes Mission" was the following message, dated 4 October 1944. Reprinted from Washington, D.C., National Archives, Record Group 226, Entry 136, Message Number 69–70. I reporte from Truava/Trnava October 3rd. 15,000 Hune there and now transports Coats. Ukranians. Frenchmen with large proportion Alsace Lorrainers and Belgians,, WPI reports fros Nitra dated October 3. Equus of Slovak gır:ison is Lt. Cal Soviet-Jewish Partisans The following is the story of a Jewish youth who fought with Jewish partisans in the forests of the Soviet Union. He and his family were imprisoned in the Minsk ghetto, which was established by the Germans on 20 July 1941, several weeks after the invasion of the Soviet Union. The young man's parents died in the ghetto, and he was later deported to the Vilna ghetto. Escaping with seven young friends, he joined Jewish guerrillas in the forests. Thousands of Jews attempted to flee to forests; most lost their lives. Reprinted from Ovadi Savich, "Jewish Guerrillas Fight Germans," Embassy of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Information Bulletin (Washington, D.C.), vol. 4, no. 40 (4 April 1944):3. SERIAL RECOR EMBASSY OF THE UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS APR 6-194 Information Bulletin JEWISH GUERRILLAS FIGHT GERMANS When the Germans invaded the Soviet Union, a Soviet officials inspect mass grave of Jewish citizens mother died, and a few weeks later his father was As a medical student, the Jewish youth had been signed to a veterinary surgeon, who put him to work The boys offered to join the guerrilla detachment The eight young men took his advice. Unarmed, they attacked two German soldiers on a highway and thus got their first tommy gun and rifle. Next they had to learn how to use the arms, for these "specialists" had been students and not soldiers. A guerrilla was assigned to instruct them and in 10 days the boys had learned to shoot and hurl grenades. It was the young medical student's idea that they should form a detachment of Jewish guerrillas. They were soon joined by 11 more refugees from the ghetto. Within a month all the young men were armed. They began to carry out dangerous operations and their fame spread. Many Jews who had taken refuge in the forests sought them out and joined their ranks. To the usual guerrilla's oath, the commander had added these words: As a son of the Jewish people, I vow always to remember all the sufferings which the Germans have inflicted on my people. From the Vilnius Region the detachment moved to the Pinsk district. There in the dense forests and marshes it is operating today, with more than 200 fighters. And it is no longer the only Jewish detachment. As a rule, people do not escape from the ghettothey die there. And to the Germans the Jewish guerrillas appear as spectres returned from the dead. They call these Jewish detachments "Refugees from the Ghetto." In their plan for the total extermination of the Jewish people, the Germans have murdered hundreds of thousands. But the "Refugees from the Ghetto" will live. Those who have vowed "always to remember all the sufferings," know the sole means of deliverance from these sufferings. Miriam Sommerburg. Cycle of Symphonies. Fort Ontario, Oswego, New York, 1944. Woodblock print, black ink on paper, 13 × 12% inches. One of five prints sent to Margarete Loewenberg in appreciation for gathering clothing and supplies for the artist. Source: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum; gift of J. Joseph Loewenberg |