THE PÈNE FAMILY – 1939-1945
My cousin, Bruneau Lévy, has been pursuing me, asking that I write the story of our family
during WWII. I wanted to get him off my back so one day, in one sitting, I finally wrote 15 pages (he
had asked me for 3 or 4 pages), the briefest I could make it so that the story would be intelligible.
Almost each paragraph could be developed into several pages. But I had to, at long last, put down on
paper this bare skeleton. Now, I am doing it in English, for those who want it so. It is limited to what I
remember of what I experienced, and what I have heard others tell. It is an incomplete sketch, slightly
modified, and shortened.
Françoise, my mother, had wealthy and highly educated Jewish ancestors, who had lost most
everything by the time she was born in Epernay (Champagne), in 1904. Her father’s family had
emigrated there from Alsace after its occupation by the Prussians in 1871, so as to remain French.
Her father, Armand Lévy-Neumand, went to war in 1914 and came back home to die in September,
1915, as Françoise was turning 11. In 1917, Hélène, Françoise’s mother, left war- wracked
Champagne and went with her three children first to La Baule where her sister had a summer house
and where Françoise and her sister Elizabeth had a bout of the Spanish flu. Then, they hopped on
trains going south. The family finally stopped in Grenoble, in the Alps, the first town they came to
where housing was available and where they could settle. There, Françoise attended art school.
Pretty, lively and well read, she was invited, although known to be Jewish, into the « best » houses.
This was a time, after the terrible butchery of WWI, when the need to have fun was intense.
The young held dances frequently. At one of these, Françoise met Pierre Pène.
Pierre had graduated with high honors from the prestigious Ecole Polytechnique after coming
back from the war in which he had been an officer cadet in the Artillery. He had then graduated as an
engineer from the Ecole des Ponts et Chaussées and, before going to « the Colonies, » was
completing an advanced training course in electricity in Grenoble. His grand-father, descended from
Pyrenean peasants, had moved to Paris from Cier de Rivière, a small village, and had become a
modest bureaucrat. Pierre’s father, Louis, who planned schedules for a railroad company, took early
retirement for health reasons, after which the family lived in semi poverty. Pierre’s older brother Henri
had been mortally wounded in 1916 at the battle of the Somme and, paralyzed from the waist down,
died two years later. The two boys and their younger sister Clotilde had all been brilliant students but
at Ecole Polytechnique, Pierre had felt uncomfortable among the scions of wealthy families.
World War I had left deep scars, and broken many lives and hearts. It had also done away
with many social taboos. Therefore, it had become possible for the charming but impoverished, young,
Jewish, fatherless girl, to dance and flirt with the handsome Catholic veteran, equally moneyless but
with a promising future. Françoise’s mother Hélène had not been allowed to marry the Catholic
student of architecture she had loved, and would not object to such a union (her three children married
Catholics). Pierre’s mother Alice had, in her short professional life as a piano teacher, intensely
disliked the nuns she had encountered, and appreciated the Jewish students and teachers she had
met, to the point that Clotilde, Pierre’s sister, attended a secondary school run by Jews ! So, although
her faith was intense, Alice did not object to a mixed marriage, so long as the children were raised as
Catholics. Her husband Louis did not care, and was taken by Françoise’s charm.
Françoise and Pierre married in July, 1925. After a short stay in Paris, then Brittany, they soon
left for Madagascar where a girl, Annette, was born in 1926. They then went to Ethiopia where I,
Florence, was born in 1931. Back to Paris in 1933, they had their first son, Henri Didier, in 1935. They
soon realized that loving Paris and often frequenting its cabarets, theaters and dancing clubs, they
would soon spend all their savings. Pierre asked for a transfer to the Provinces.
In 1936 the family moved to a small town north of Paris, Soissons, which had sustained much
damage during WWI. Life there was pretty normal and calm but there were increasing signs that a
serious crisis was imminent on the international scene.
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In the summer of 1939, we were taking an educational trip around France. Annette was 13
and I, 7 ½. We started east in Pierre’s beloved Peugeot, 3 ½ year old Henri-Didier, then called Rizou,
sleeping in a hammock that was hanging from one side of the car to the other. We visited countless
churches and museums along the way. In mid-August we arrived at our half way point, Cier de
Rivière, the small village at the foot of the Pyrénées from which my father’s ancestors had come.
There, in his mail, Pierre, a 41 year old father of three, found his order to join his unit.
Pierre left for the front, a captain in a regiment of Colonial Artillery. He found his soldiers very
poorly equipped. For one, they had no brogans. So, in Soissons, Françoise organized theater
productions at the high-schools in order to raise money and buy decent walking shoes for Pierre’s
soldiers. The very cold winter that followed was a boring one for the troops, French and German, each
on one side of the Rhine, playing cards, smoking, taunting each other. This was the « Phony War. »
Suddenly, in the spring of 1940, the German « Blietzkrieg » started. Pierre, an ardent patriot,
wanted to fight. The orders to pull back infuriated him. The defeat of France filled him with sadness,
humiliation, and powerless rage. He came to join us at Cier, where we had fled from the invasion.
Back in Soissons, François found that our house had been ransacked by the retreating, then
the advancing, armies. Damaged furniture, lamps and vases filled with feces, personal belongings
stolen or broken. Once it was cleaned up, she came to get us, for life – and, most importantly, school
– must go on, even under foreign occupation. We had attended schools in and near Cier for a while,
but now it must be Soissons again.
The ground floor of the house was occupied by two German soldiers. Their presence had one
advantage in the harsh winter that followed : they were entitled to some charcoal with which to heat
their floor, and the little bit of heat that wafted upstairs was much appreciated by us. However, the
kitchen, on the ground floor, was off limits for us. So, with the Roys, friends in the same situation, we
ate our meals at the house of other friends, pooling our food finds. Food was becoming more and
more scarce and, after October 1940, restrictions became severe. What we were allowed, different for
each age and professional category, had been calculated to ensure slow starvation if one did not
resort to the black market, which neither Pierre nor Françoise would have anything to do with.
Pierre, back at work as a civil engineer, had to deal with his immediate superior, a German
engineer he respected and got along with. Pierre’s sister Clotilde obviously found him trustworthy also
since, when he asked her whether the rumor was true that Françoise was Jewish, she acquiesced.
However, that German engineer also had his superiors. Controls, retrictions, new
administrative measures were imposed every day. The Occupation was becoming more and more
oppressive. One day Pierre, frustrated, told one of his subordinates, André Boulloche, that he would
like to be able to fight the occupying forces. André B., one of the first members of the Resistance, got
Pierre involved in the OCM (organisation civile et militaire) movement, as of April 1, 1941. He soon
created a network among his engineers. Thanks to his profession, he was the one distributing the
« Ausweis » or authorizations to circulate. He and his subordinates had cars, gasoline, knew the
whole area and its inhabitants well. Thus, they were able to find out about, and inform the Allies of,
German troop movements and suspicious activities.
Before Pierre got back from the front, Françoise had heard de Gaulle’s call to resistance on
June 18, 1940. Knowing Pierre’s straight and legalistic nature, she was afraid that he might not want
to rebel against the new order, but she was determined to do what she could on her own if necessary.
When my parents had arrived in Soissons, a small provincial town, in 1936, Françoise, not
wanting to hear careless antisemitic remarks, had proclaimed her Jewishness loud and clear. Now,
with mounting propaganda, new administrative measures against Jews being enacted all the time, and
denouncement being encouraged, life became perilous despite our name from southwestern France,
our catholic religion, and Françoise’s blonde hair. Her ID showing her maiden name of LevyNeumand, according to French fashion, she had to acquire a false one. Pierre being promoted to a
higher post in Laon, a town in a « restricted » area forbidden to civilians, she planned a move. Pierre
would work in Laon, and the family would move to the Paris area. No one in Soissons would know our
new address, except the Roys, best and trusted friends.
Boulogne, on the outskirts of Paris, had been bombed by the Allies, in their attempt to destroy
the Renault factory which worked for the German war effort. Many of its inhabitants having fled the
bombings, Françoise had some choice and opted for an apartment which was small, but had several
advantages : it was clean (at a time when there was no paint available, it mattered), and had a view
over a stadium from its long eighth floor balcony, with no one across the street. More importantly, it
was part of a whole complex of buildings which were connected underground through garages and
basements, something which might be useful if one needed to flee. A central outpost was occupied by
several concierges who controlled the distribution of the mail, and all telephone communications.
We settled into that small apartment (the three children sleeping in one small bedroom) in the
summer of 1942. That is when Françoise discovered that she was pregnant. Pierre often came to visit
us especially during week-ends, but very carefully, since his activities in the Resistance were
becoming more and more intense. Those involved mostly information on German activities, which
were radioed to London. Then his team did some sabotage mainly of pylones, railroads, and
whatever was useful to the Nazis. It also eventually had to hide and send back to London some
downed Allied airmen. Françoise explained to Annette, the maid Jeanine, and me, which red rag we
should hang onto the balcony if there were Germans or possibly dangerous people in the apartment,
so as to warn Pierre not to come upstairs. (She had also shown us where, in Cier, she had hidden her
jewels, and the sterling silver flatware.) We were all in full war mode.
One day, agents of the Gestapo came to arrest Pierre at his office in Laon. Fortunately, he
wasn’t there at the time, and no one knew where to find him or us. Then the German policemen
threatened to take his family members. Some trusted friends drove to Boulogne that night to warn
Françoise that she should hide somewhere with her children. She found a nursing school for Annette
and me, and a summer camp run by priests for Rizou. She stayed with baby Olivier, who had been
born in May, 1943. She had carefully prepared (and instructed us in) a well built story, what to say if
we were ever arrested. In case she was and not us, we were told where she had hidden some money,
and where we could borrow more if needed. No matter what, we must claim never to see our father
who was supposedly taking care of his health in the Alps.
When the German police came to arrest her, she recited all her stories, and tried to call on
their pity for the adorable baby. She had destroyed all compromising papers, and, after her
interrogation at their headquarters at rue des Saussaies the next day, they let her go free.
It had become evident that Pierre now had to leave work for good, spend all his time with the
Resistance, and move into an separate place. Françoise found a small apartment for him in a popular
section of Paris. All the separate and different movements of Resistance that had spontaneously
sprouted all over the country had by then been unified by Jean Moulin, sent from London by de
Gaulle. Pierre was named head of the whole Paris area of that unified Resistance.
Meanwhile, Annette and I came back home. We went to school without books, with very little
paper, spending air raid alarms in the basement , the population of three high-schools being crowded
into the building of one (our schools being occupied by German soldiers), which we had to reach by
metro. We also underwent swimming training and competitions. Air raids and bombings sometimes
interrupted many of our activities, and our neighborhood being the usual target, we never knew
whether we would still have a home when we came back. Half destroyed buildings, bloody bodies
being pulled out of shelters were constantly in the background. Finding food was becoming more
difficult all the time. It was even more of a challenge to obtain clothes or shoes or anything else.
On April 4, 1944, Pierre and his young aide were arrested, at a building where they had gone
to make new false papers for Pierre, who sometimes had to change identity. The contents of the
attaché case he was carrying showed the German policemen (always in mufti) that Pierre was an
important catch. As was their custom, they wanted to get as much information from him as soon as
possible before his comrades knew of his arrest, and had changed identity and taken refuge. Time
was of the essence, so they tortured him, throwing him in a tub of cold water, submerged until
suffocation several times. He managed to keep calm enough to lead them into a false rendez-vous,
hoping to escape. No one was arrested as a result of his questionings.
Pierre was then emprisonned with three other men. Whenever we went to several of Paris’
area jails to try to find him and bring him some victuals, we were told he was not there, even when he
was. Meanwhile, he was hungry, cold, and subjected to rough questionings. From the prison of
Fresnes in the Paris area, he was transferred to St Quentin where he was, again, roughly treated, and
questioned. Obtaininng nothing from him, his jailers then decided to put him in the same cell as a
young man who had been his superior in the OCM and who, unknowed by him, had betrayed his
comrades. The main policeman Dr. Schott hoped that, sharing a cell with his friend whom he would
trust, in another place, a villa recently transformed into a jail in Senlis, Pierre would, at last, talk.
Instead of talking, Pierre suggested escape. His cellmate Roland accepted the idea. D-Day
had occured by then, and he was ready to turn around again.
Pierre and Roland managed to dislodge from its cement base one of the bars of their window.
They manufactured a rope with their sheets and, on the night of June 9 to 10, they escaped. Pierre, in
his fall, lost his shoes and broke his wrist. They nevertheless walked the 30 kilometers that separated
them from a factory which belonged to Roland’s family. There, they were fed, cleaned, Pierre was
bandaged and given shoes. They were then hidden in large wooden crates behind bags of charcoal
which were placed on a truck. The manager of the factory and a chauffeur then drove the truck to the
outskirts of Paris, where the two men were left to their own devices, and parted each on his way.
Pierre then had his feet and wrist taken care of by friendly doctors, and went from hiding place
to hiding place, many former friends now being too afraid of taking the risk of hiding him. He also had
a hard time re-connecting with his Resistance comrades, who were afraid that he may have accepted
to make a deal with the Germans. After a while, he managed to become active with them again.
Meanwhile, on June 10, 1944, at 4 a.m., three Nazi policemen in mufti, angered by his
escape, came to our apartment, to « take us all », claiming that this time, they would show no pity.
They even insisted that they wanted the maid also. Françoise took advantage of this fact to make as
much of a racket as possible, wanting neighbors to be aware of what was going on. She also slowed
us down, hoping to have time and persuade our jailers that they didn’t want to embarrass themselves
with children. While preparing the baby’s diapers and bottles, she also managed to destroy some
papers, hide some money, and kept telling those men that it was unconscionable to arrest children.
We were all driven to a plush apartment which clearly served as a headquarter of sorts for
them. We saw that our aunt Clotilde was there also, as well as Roland’s wife and his mother, at the
other end of the long corridor. We were hungry and cold, but our guard being as tired as we, and half
asleep, Annette and I were able to listen to Françoise’s questioning, when Dr Schott finally took her in,
in the afternoon. She was berating him : they were savages, worse than their Russian enemies, taking
children ! they would give rise to anger, resentment, and more resistance on the part of the general
population. She kept badgering and taunting him, and didn’t flinch when he told her that Roland had
betrayed, or when he intimated that he knew she was Jewish.
During our car trip to that place Françoise, although forbidden to talk, had managed to tell us
that she was concerned about a key to a room where some food and papers – and sometimes Pierre
– were hidden, and about an address book she had left in the living-room, on top of the radio. Her
constant and repeated rantings succeeded and Dr Schott eventually told her that the children and the
maid could go back home under escort. They were keeping only Françoise, Clotilde, and Roland’s
relatives.
Two policemen drove us back home, and stayed, taking over the living-dining area of the
apartment. They forbade us to talk to anyone, and to go out or even on the balcony. Annette, however,
was so quick that she managed to prevent a young resister from coming up to the apartment where he
was expected that day. She managed also to toss the key that worried Françoise to a friendly
neighbor, around which a note was written asking the concierges to prevent any mail or telephone call
from reaching us until further notice. I was able to snatch the address book Françoise had told us
about right under their noses and hide it as instructed in Rizou’s messy toy chest. After three days
without any activity or sight of Pierre, the two men left. Of course, we knew we were watched closely.
Fearless Annette and Pierre managed to communicate, their messages going through a
friendly doctor (whom Pierre could pretend to need to consult), his sister (a friend of Clotilde’s), and
the baker’s wife, in whose shop Annette or Jeanine went to buy the daily bread. He let us know that
we should go to the countryside where a friend would loan us a small cottage. So Jeanine, 19 years
old, Annette, 18, Olivier, 13 months old, and I, 12, rode the 30 or so kilometers to a small town southwest of Paris on three bicycles, the only vehicle available to us at the time. It was very difficult there for
us to find food, even though Annette and I rode our bikes at dawn from farm to farm in search of some
cabbage or a few carrots.
Meanwhile, Françoise and Clotilde were suffering in their cells ; cold, hungry, they learned to
communicate with their neighbors through the water pipes, and the camaraderie that was born betwen
those unfortunates warmed their hearts. When Françoise disobeyed orders and dared open her
window, she was put in a punishment cell where she nearly died. When she was questioned, she
stuck to her well rehearsed stories. Their comfort was to think that as long as they were still in jail,
Pierre was probably still running free.
Six weeks after their arrest, and fortunately, just before the last trains to the death camps
departed, in which so many died of thirst, fatigue and starvation, Françoise, Clotilde and Roland’s
mother and wife were freed. Cr. Schott obviously hoped that they would be good bait, making it
possible for him to catch the escapees.
We all got back home, and meanwhile the Allies had advanced enough that the Liberation of
Paris was close, in that late August, 1944. Pierre was not able to be there with us for the Liberation
itself, a most moving experience, however : he was sent north, to take charge of the territories he
would administer when they would be liberated. The bicycles he and his young aide were traveling on
were soon stolen by fleeing German soldiers, and they pursued their trip on foot. In his headquarters
at St Quentin, ruling over four departments, Pierre was facing a very hard task. There was no food, no
heat, most of the infrastructure had been destroyed ; a large part of the population was intent on
vengeance, and was demoralized. The discovery of the atrocities the Nazis had perpetrated, and the
death in the camps of so many of their friends and comrades had been devastating to Pierre and
Françoise, as to so many.
After a year and a half in St Quentin, we were back in Boulogne for a while. Then Pierre was
sent to administer part of the French zone of occupation in Germany, the duchy of Baden, where he
worked diligently towards Franco-German rapprochment, from 1946 until 1952.
Florence Rosenberg Pène