An Uncertain Hour: The French, the Germans, the Jews, the Barbie Trial & the City of Lyon 1940-45

by Ted Morgan

Sifts through the ten thousand pages of secret documents prepared for the Klaus Barbie trial

Genres: History, World War II, France, Nonfiction, Holocaust

416 pages, Hardcover

First published December 1, 1989

About the author

Born Saint-Charles Armand Gabriel de Gramont*, he used the name Sanche de Gramont as his byline (and also on his books) during the early part of his career. He worked as a journalist for many years, and was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 for local reporting written under pressure of a deadline. He first came to the United States in 1937, and became a naturalized citizen in February 1977, at which time he had his name legally changed to Ted Morgan. He was a National Book Award finalist in 1982 for Maugham: A Biography.


*His father was a military pilot who died in an accident in 1943, at which point he inherited the title "Comte de Gramont". He was properly styled "Saint-Charles Armand Gabriel, Comte de Gramont" until he renounced his title upon becoming a U.S. citizen in 1977.

Reviews

[Jill H.]

I did not finish this book but put it aside to possibly read later. I just couldn't stay interested as the author was all over the place which totally interrupted the flow of the narrative. The title is misleading since Klaus Barbie is only mentioned briefly.

I am really in the minority as this got many 4 and 5 star reviews but it just wasn't my cup of tea.

[Mikey B. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book reminded me of teachers I had (decades ago now) who rambled constantly off-topic. Many of those topics are highly interesting and many poignant.

There are several stories and characters presented. The history ranges from France to Berlin and even Stalingrad. The author is kind to Pierre Laval, many French historians less so (after a trial Laval was executed by French authorities in October of 1945). He also tends to depict perpetrators and evil-doers as being mechanistic, as cogs in a machine. I disagree with that viewpoint. Other books I have read have led me to believe that “these tormentors” enjoyed what they did, like hating and rounding up Jews to torturing people.

Also I don’t know why “Klaus Barbie Trial” is in the subtitle as there is very little about him and the trial in this book. There is more about Himmler, a nauseating person. The last chapter is on the last train that left France for Auschwitz and other concentration camps in August, 1944. It is devastating.

Page 384 (my book) – after liberation from Ravensbruck

She (Cecile Goldet) felt as though she were impersonating someone, that her real self was still at the camp, still standing in line with an empty bowl, still shivering at roll call. She knew that the camp would continue to exist within her, that there was a staggering amount of suffering that could never be made up for, and that nothing else that ever happened to her would seem as real as camp life. It could never be erased, it would rise up and fill her mind, stronger than memory, stronger than imagination, stronger than the beat of her own heart.

[Ellie Midwood · Rating 5 out of 5]

What stands out about this particular book among the others written on the same topic, is that it reveals not only the story of the Lyon’s French Resistance and persecuted Jews but equally concentrates on the antagonists fighting them, and namely Klaus Barbie. It’s a carefully crafted mosaic of separate stories told from multiple perspectives: those of the victims and freedom fighters, and those of collaborators and criminals. Individual stories of Jewish families were at times heartbreaking to read, and particularly in the last section of the book which describes what happened to the Jews, who were transported to camps on the last train, in all its horrifying vividness.
The author does a wonderful job in bringing to life the city of Lyon itself and does it so brilliantly that I felt like I was actually there, walking the streets and seeing the events unfold as a witness. The Gestapo operations and also the character of their Chief, Klaus Barbie, were also meticulously researched and presented, and I couldn’t help but applaud the author’s knowledge and passion concerning the subject. A great book if you read it for research purposes or if you’re simply interested in the history of Occupied France. Highly recommended!

[Bill · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ted Morgan was born into a French aristocratic family in 1932. His father joined the Free French and was killed in a training flight in 1943. Morgan was educated at Yale became a reporter and in 1961 won a Pulitzer for local reporting. He became an American citizen in 1977. This brief biography is necessary to put the Uncertain Hour into context. It is his revenge for German occupation and its mass killing of Jews, Resistance fighters and other innocent French citizens.

France by the late 1930's was still recovering from its terrible losses in WWI. It built the Maginot Line to protect itself from a direct east west attack from Germany. In the process France forgot that Germany in WWI attacked through Belgium. Germany followed the same route in WWII bypassing the Maginot Line. France was quickly defeated but Marshall Petain, hero of WWI sought and was granted an armistice by Germany. At the time of the armistice Petain was in Vichy, hence the name. France was separated into occupied and unoccupied zones. The Vichy government technically was responsible for governing all of France and was permitted a small, ineffective army. The Nazis occupied all of France in November, 1942 ending any effectiveness the Vichy Government may have possessed. Morgan notes that no other country occupied by Germany sought an armistice.

Morgan describes how the French police on orders from Eichmann and other Germans rounded up Jews and sent the on trains to their death at Auschwitz. Morgan's calm description makes the crimes more horrible. At first only Jews who were not citizens of France were sent to Auschwitz but they were not enough. Naturalized Jews were next and then some French Jews by birth were killed. At times the unavailability of trains from France to Poland slowed the killing.

More than half of the book describes arrests, tortures and deaths by the Germans in France. After listing dozens of these incidents, Morgan turns to Lyon during the war. In many cases neighbor informed on neighbors. Rewards were offered for the capture of Jews and some Lyonnais responded. The Resistance was infiltrated by German spies.

Unfortunately, Morgan dismisses Barbie in a paragraph by saying that his capture in Bolivia is well described elsewhere.

The last section describers in even more horrible detail what happened to the last train from Lyon once these unfortunates reached Auschwitz and other concentration camps.

Morgan has his revenge. Individual vengeance is not the central them of An Uncertain Hour. Rather the many descriptions of genocide, torture, cruelty, betrayal, inhumanity help to assure that these events never happen again.

[Woodstock Pickett · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very absorbing study of France during the years of WWII. The author lived in France as a young man, and presented a very interesting viewpoint on the events and tragedies of those years.

[Allyson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a valuable book but very meandering and could have been more properly organized and edited.
And the subtitle is misleading as it concerns so much more than Barbie and Lyon.
It is horrifying in it’s subject matter.
He writes with an immediacy that I find false and which should more properly be called historical fiction I would say.
Are his sources letters/ journals/interviews one wonders. If not, how can he ascribe the feelings and thoughts correctly?

[Ken French · Rating 3 out of 5]

Morgan's condemnation of French collaboration during the war, set against the crimes and trial of Klaus Barbie.