A collecting field I know nothing about, but isnt the "I" in FFI foe "Interieur" ie. resistants inside France?
-
-
FFI stands for Forces Françaises de l'Intérieur. This was one of the main Resistance bodies. The other one was the FTP - Franc-Tireurs Partisans - which had many hardline Communists and other bolshy types under its aegis. The FFI was recognised by General de Gaulle's government-in-exile in London whereas the Red-tinged FTP was the focus of strong disapproval.
These little silver badges are individually numbered to recipients and only bona fide resistance fighters awarded them. Here is another group to a young resistance fighter from Paris. You see his FFI combattant's badge and its provisional certificate, his Victory Medal and the badge of the Paris Battalion of the FFI, which is one of the rarest things I possess. I also have his FFI combattant's brassard, marked with the Milice Populaire and the 9th Arrondisement Town Hall stamps. Like many others, he was absorbed into the 2nd Armoured Division and saw combat right up to the end in 1945.
The recipient of the large group of medals saw a different kind of combat. He was evacuated at Dunkirk so he didn't have to spend time in an internment camp in England like so many foreign volunteers from occupied Europe. A civil servant by profession, he worked in the Free French HQ in London in an administrative capacity for a while, before volunteering to return to France and work for the FFI. His Resistance Medal is the rare 1945 type made in London during the war. He got a job in a metalworks as a manager. The factory was run by FFI men. His job gave him access to transport in the form of trucks - which was the general idea - and these were used to collect arms and other material dropped to the FFI in parachutages.
They saw very little of the Germans during these operations. France is a huge country and the German occupying forces were actually quite thinly spread. But on one occasion, according to his grandson, they had to shoot their way out of trouble when the French Gendarmerie surprised them. So our man saw a bit of combat as a member of the Resistance, hence the Resistance Combat Cross.
He was eventually arrested. I do not yet know the full story but it seems that he fell foul of the French national sport, which is anonymous denunciation. Someone blabbed on him. He was apparently taken by the French police but then handed over to the gentlemen of the Gestapo. You can imagine what must have happened to him in their hands. But he never cracked and he survived their treatment. They knew he might know more so they did not kill him out of hand but deported him - that's the medal with the vertically striped ribbon - to Dachau - that's the one for 'Internees' with diagonal strips on the ribbon - in 1943. He survived. Before his retirement in the early 1960s, he worked at the Ministry of the Interior in Paris. He subsequently received the Legion d'Honneur for his service to France in peace and war. I am still researching the group and am waiting for the papers and other effects to arrive.
Not a comic book hero with a Sten in each hand yelling "A bas les boches!" but an old warhorse of an NCO who fought with distinction and was wounded at Verdun in WW1, then worked to alleviate slum conditions in Paris in the 1920s and 1930s, before being called back to fight in a criminally mis-managed campaign of defence. He won the Croix de Guerre with Palm in 1940, went to England where he got a cushy job at Free French HQ but then volunteered to return. He quietly organised and participated in supply ops for the FFI and was brought down not by the Germans but by his own countrymen...who handed him over to the enemy. And that's when his real combat began...
I know Seba has imposed a moratorium on political discussion so out of respect for that I shall not comment on recent slaggings of the French as fighters. All I will say is that Kaiser Bill was talking about the wrong people when he referred to the English as "a nation of lions led by donkeys". It is far more applicable to the French, whose fighting soldiers and NCOs are forever being let down by the lack of quality of the leadership.
Prosper KeatingComment
-
Here's the other Resistance group.
PKComment
Comment