I first became aware of the village of Oradour-sur-Glane and what happened there in 1944 thanks to the TV series “The World at War” where the massacre is described in the first and last episodes. As a result, I have for many years wanted to visit the village and was recently fortunate enough to be able to spend several days in the area and thought the community would be interested in a couple of photo’s that I took.
I purposely took no photos of the village because I wanted to see it with my own eyes and not peering down a view finder, stressing to find that "perfect" shot, waiting for people to move etc. and diluting the reason for my visit.
The first photo is a then and now comparison. The photo on the left is one of the first frames of the first episode from the World at War which starts with the words "Down this road on a summer day in 1944 the soldiers came...". This road leads to the southern end of the village and shows the Glane Bridge. The village of Oradour is directly behind where I took the comparison. Reports from that day suggest that some of the soldiers paused briefly on this bridge before entering the village. This road is now very quiet with no traffic because there is a bypass that connects the new village of Oradour to Limoges and Saint-Junien. The car shown was the only one I saw on this stretch of road during my several visits to the area.
The other photo was taken in the town of Saint-Junien and shows the property that in 1944 was the Hotel de la Gare. The book Oradour: The Massacre and Aftermath by Phillip Beck and this source: http://www.oradour.info/images/hotelgar.htm suggest that it was in this property that the massacre was planned.
I purposely took no photos of the village because I wanted to see it with my own eyes and not peering down a view finder, stressing to find that "perfect" shot, waiting for people to move etc. and diluting the reason for my visit.
The first photo is a then and now comparison. The photo on the left is one of the first frames of the first episode from the World at War which starts with the words "Down this road on a summer day in 1944 the soldiers came...". This road leads to the southern end of the village and shows the Glane Bridge. The village of Oradour is directly behind where I took the comparison. Reports from that day suggest that some of the soldiers paused briefly on this bridge before entering the village. This road is now very quiet with no traffic because there is a bypass that connects the new village of Oradour to Limoges and Saint-Junien. The car shown was the only one I saw on this stretch of road during my several visits to the area.
The other photo was taken in the town of Saint-Junien and shows the property that in 1944 was the Hotel de la Gare. The book Oradour: The Massacre and Aftermath by Phillip Beck and this source: http://www.oradour.info/images/hotelgar.htm suggest that it was in this property that the massacre was planned.
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