Historical Figures

Lucie Aubrac, resistance fighter and activist

Lucie Bernard, better known as Lucie Aubrac (1912 – 2007), is a famous French resistance fighter. Among many resistance actions, she notably helped her husband, Raymond Aubrac, and 13 other resistance fighters escape.

Communist and pacifist activist

Daughter of Louise Vincent and Louis Bernard, Lucie Bernard was born on June 29, 1912 in Paris into a modest family. His sister, Jeanne, was born the following year and the family moved to Eure so that Louis could exercise his profession as a gardener. Mobilized at the start of the war, he was wounded in 1915 and remained partially disabled; Lucie and Jeanne will be recognized as wards of the nation in 1924.

In 1916, the two little girls were sent to live with their grandmothers, in Saône-et-Loire, where their parents joined them in 1918. Louis found a job as a gardener, Louise as a milkmaid, and Lucie and Jeanne, encouraged by their parents, begin studies. Lucie tries the competition to enter the Ecole Normale d'institutrice des Batignolles (in Paris) and fails twice, in 1929 and 1930. When she obtains the competition, the following year, she finally chooses not to take it. enter:she can't stand the idea of ​​being inside, and of not being free to come and go.

Her parents not accepting her decision, Lucie takes a room in Paris and becomes independent. She replaces teachers and works right and left, while resuming her studies. After successfully passing her baccalaureate in 1932 and 1933, she obtained the aggregation of history and geography in 1938. In parallel with her studies and her jobs, Lucie has been active, since 1932, in the Young Communists. She also frequents pacifist and student associations, where she is highly appreciated.

Coming into resistance

In 1938, Lucie was appointed associate professor in Strasbourg. She met Raymond Samuel there, whom she married on December 14, 1939 in Dijon. When she obtains a scholarship to work for a year in the United States and prepare a thesis in geography, the war upsets her plans:Lucie does not want to leave her husband. In June 1940, Raymond was taken prisoner of war by the Germans and held in Sarrebourg; in August 1940, she organized her escape.

Refugee in Lyon, the couple finds Jean Cavaillès, a professor of philosophy who was Lucie's colleague in Strasbourg. Through him, Lucie meets the journalist Emmanuel d'Astier de La Vigerie, who has just created the anti-Nazi and anti-Vichyst organization "The Last Column". Lucie and Robert then get involved at his side. They take part in various actions, from the distribution of leaflets to sabotage, through the recruitment of new members. Maintaining relations with her former communist comrades, Lucie also participates in other clandestine publishing and broadcasting activities.

In May 1941, Lucie and Raymond's eldest son, Jean-Pierre, was born; his birth did not curb their resistance activities. The spouses help Emmanuel d'Astier to publish the resistance newspaper Liberation , which is the backbone of the nascent Liberation-South movement. They write under false names – in particular Catherine for Lucie and Aubrac for Raymond – and work tirelessly, organizing the meetings of the movement at home despite the searches of the Gestapo. Lucie also makes false papers, and organizes the passage of resistance fighters across the line of demarcation between the occupied zone and the free zone.

The arrest of Raymond Aubrac

On March 15, 1943, following the arrest by the police of an inexperienced liaison officer, ten members of Liberation-Sud were arrested; Raymond is one of them. Lucie then moves heaven and earth to have them released, going so far as to threaten the prosecutor in charge of the case with death, to such an extent that some of her comrades will consider her zeal excessive. In May, Raymond is released on parole; together, the couple organizes the escape of their comrades. On June 21, Raymond was arrested again, along with Jean Moulin and other leaders of resistance movements, this time by the Gestapo. Desperate, Lucie recovers quickly. She entrusts her son and plans her husband's escape, while continuing to participate in the actions of Liberation-Sud. In September, she pretends to be Raymond's pregnant fiancée and begs the head of the Gestapo in Lyon, Klaus Barbie, to allow them to be married in prison. Getting a visit, Lucie passes her escape plans on to her husband. On October 21, she and her companions attacked the truck transferring prisoners and freed her husband and thirteen other resistance fighters. The driver and the guards are all killed.

Really pregnant, Lucie goes into hiding with Raymond and Jean-Pierre and goes to London. She is already known there, under the name of Lucie Aubrac, and remains active despite the birth in February 1944 of her daughter Catherine, of whom Charles de Gaulle is the godfather. She speaks several times on the BBC, in particular to speak to women or to praise their fight. In July 1944, she left her children in London and returned to Paris to sit on the Consultative Assembly. She also opens homes for orphans of resistance fighters and campaigns for women's rights.

Life after the war

After the war, Lucie Aubrac had two other children and resumed her job as a teacher. She approaches the Communist Party and stands in the legislative elections of 1947, without being elected. She is also active in the Mouvement de la paix, a pacifist organization co-founded by Raymond in February 1948. She regularly takes part in meetings and occasionally travels abroad to support the actions of the organization.

In 1958, the Aubrac couple moved to Morocco, where they remained for 18 years; Lucie teaches in Rabat and Raymond is a technical adviser in liaison with the Moroccan Government. They then spent four years in Rome before returning to Paris in 1976. Lucie asserted her retirement rights and campaigned for the League of Human Rights. In 1981, then again in 1988, she supported François Mitterrand in the presidential elections.

The challenge

In September 1984, when Raymond was implicated by a book in the events that led to the arrest of Jean Moulin, Lucie Aubrac published her own story They will leave in drunkenness . Raymond is also implicated, in 1997, in a text by Klaus Barbie which designates him as one of his agents. The accounts of the Aubrac couple present inconsistencies and a meeting of historians is organized to shed light on the events; there is no evidence to support Barbie's accusations, although Lucie admits that her story is fictionalized.

Lucie Aubrac died on March 14, 2007 at the age of 94. Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor, she receives military honors and tributes from the entire political class.