Lucie Aubrac: The French Resistance Heroine Who Outwitted the Gestapo

by Siân Rees

In May 1943, a young Frenchwoman called Lucie Aubrac engineered the escape of her husband, Raymond, from the clutches of Klaus Barbie, the feared Gestapo chief later known as the "Butcher of Lyon."  When Raymond was arrested again that June, Lucie mounted a second astonishing rescue, ambushing the prison van that was transporting him. As a founding member and leader of the important French Resistance group Liberation-Sud, Lucie served as a courier, arms carrier, and saboteur who engineered these and other escape plans on behalf of her husband and other Resistance fighters.

Spirited out of France with Raymond by the RAF, Lucie arrived in London a heroine. For the postwar generation the couple embodied the spirit of "the real France": the one that resisted, and eventually expelled the Nazis. However, in 1983, Kalus Barbie made the bombshell claim that the Aubracs had become informers in 1943, betraying their comrades. The French press and the couple themselves furiously denounced this as slander, but as worrying inconsistencies were spotted in Lucie's story, doubts emerged that have never quite gone away. 

Who was Lucie Aubrac? What did she really do in 1943? And was she truly the spirit of la vraie France , or a woman who could not resist casting herself as a heroine? Siân Rees’s penetrating, even-handed account draws from letters, newspaper articles, and other archival materials, as well as several interviews, to decipher the truth behind Lucie and her husband's wartime endeavors and near fall from grace. It offers a thrilling portrait of a brave, resourceful woman who went to extraordinary lengths for love and country.  

Genres: History, Biography, Nonfiction, World War II, France, Historical, War

256 pages, Hardcover

First published June 25, 2015

About the author

Siân Rees is a British author and historian. She has a degree in history from University of Oxford. She lives in Brighton and is an RLF Fellow at the University of Sussex. She is particularly interested in the social and maritime history of the 17th and 18th centuries.

Reviews

[Wendy · Rating 5 out of 5]

In "Lucie Aubrac: The French Resistance Heroine Who Outwitted the Gestapo" which I won through Goodreads Giveaways, Siân Rees brings to life a gripping and insightful account of the life of a heroine who served as a courier and saboteur during the German occupation in an attempt to help resist and expel the Nazis. In 1943 after her husband Raymond Aubrac a senior officer in the Resistance's "Secret Army" is imprisoned and brutally interrogated Lucie devises a crafty rescue plan only to be expelled twice from Klaus Barbie "the Butcher of Lyon's", office before initiating an explosive rescue after ambushing the prison van. With Raymond wounded physically as well as emotionally, their young son whisked away from under the noses of the Gestapo who would use him as a pawn, Lucie and her family stay hidden until the RAF sweeps them away to England where they continue the fight.

Set in France after a crippling defeat at the Maginot Line splits the nation in two, the country is faced with an Occupied Zone, and a Free Zone where eighty-four Marshal Pétain a fascist puppet has set up his government in Vichy. Siân Rees's novel illustrates the dark years of a France struggling with deprivation, financial problems and the persecution of Jews their hope kept alive with the rise of the Resistance and the optimism in a newspaper carried by women past German soldiers in baby carriages. Well-researched from letters, newspaper articles, historical documents and interviews the author searches for the truth about a heroine who years later would have her name and deeds besmirched. because of inconsistencies in her story. This historical account like Siân Rees's writing style flows smoothly and effortlessly and reads like a fictional story exemplifying Lucie's patriotism, and daring, her spirit of resistance and love of family.

Lucie Aubrac (aka Lucie Samuel) who yearned to graduate from Sorbonne University and joined a Communist Youth group wanting social reform and a redistribution of resources but not a totalitarian state is a determined, strong-willed and enthusiastic young woman. Her younger years defined by movement, parental absence and hardship, she tends to fabricate details about her early life as she grows older. Rebellious, unpredictable, excitable and bold, it is these characteristics that not only lead her into danger, but sparks her heroism and wins the hearts of her friends in the Resistance. In contrast Raymond Aubrac (aka Samuel) born into the wealth of a Jewish merchant family is thoughtful, engaging, cool and temperate. It is these traits that make him invaluable in the Resistance Movement and a help in the reconstruction process after the war.

"Lucie Aubrac: The French Resistance Heroine Who Outwitted the Gestapo" is a thrilling portrait of a fearless and brave woman who dearly loved her husband, family and country and would do anything to protect them. I thoroughly enjoyed and highly recommend it.

[jeffrey · Rating 3 out of 5]

This engagingly written story of a French resistant and her husband has a title that is somewhat of a misnomer. It is focused more on the difficulties of unifying the various, mostly communist underground factions to work together against their common enemy, the Nazi occupiers and the puppet Vichy government, and less so on outwitting the Gestapo. It is interesting that even before the war ended, this fragile unity of purpose fell apart and continued to fracture as time went on.

[Judy Gacek · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well written. Sheds light on the different factions of the resistance in France during WWII and the part the Aubrac's played in fighting the Germans.

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent

This is a beautiful, tragic and compelling book that was a joy to read. I was fascinated with the depth of the history learned here but even more so by the details pertaining to the incredible life of Lucie Aubrac, her husband and their families, friends and colleagues. Highly recommended.

[Jennifer]

I received this book in a Goodreads giveaway. (Thank you.) This is about a French resistance operative. I found it interesting, but not fully engaging. It started slow for me but got better towards the middle. I didn't dislike the book, I've just read others about similar subjects that made me want to learn more than this one did.

[Daniel Pearse · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating look at a inspiring woman. Ms. Aubrac lived an interesting and consequential life, that should set an example for others.

[Justin Grant-Duff · Rating 2 out of 5]

Lucie Aubrac was a non-controversial figure who died a heroine of France and the French Resistance. Decorated by Presidents of the Republic, a personal acquaintance of de Gaulle, she and her husband Raymond were communists who gradually through the war grew closer to the unifying feature of a Resistance network that would be representative of all French people. Lucie gained her reputation as a resister when her husband was in prison, taken by the Millice and defended by his pseudonym. Remarkably they had not comprehended that he was not Raymond Vallet as he had claimed. The interrogators and Gestapo were unaware who they had in custody. According to Lucie's version of events she concocted a plan with her colleagues to go to the jail to plead as Lucie Montet to plead for her fiance. She managed to arrange to get married in a civil registry office; this unremarkable event caused his transportation to another location. Lucie was told of her husband's whereabouts and as the van holding the prisoners moved out they were ambushed by Resistance fighters. The escape plan carried her and her newly released husband south to a number of doctors and safe houses until they managed to get a lift from a RAF piloted plane that came into the mountains to rescue them. In London they were feted by the Free French community for the intelligence information; debriefed by British Secret Services they received plaudits for the amount of data they carried. Not obliged to return to France she later worked at the BBC in the foreign broadcasts department. On their return they were awarded the Croix de Guerre, living a long and happy retirement. Historians challenged the veracity of her escape and suspected her when she declared that it was Rene Hardy, a resistance fighter who had betrayed them to Gestapo. In spite of this Lucie ensured by giving many interviews and writing books that her family reputation would remain uppermost in the mind of veterans. On balance she is believed as being truthful. A well-written book by a young Oxford-educated historian who shows in good English how Lucie's books have been completely translated into a 21st world of universal accounts covering the whole canon of the Resistance history of the era. Replete with footnotes and bibliography it is one of many books that now focus on women's role in the French Resistance.

[Allyson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had already read Outwitting The Gestapo so aside from the final discussion about the many accusations leveled against the Aubracs, I felt I was reading a less interesting version of her autobiography.
That is not completely fair to the author as her recounting was more wide ranging but it prevented me from rating it more highly.

[Melisende · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story of a French Resistance leader and her husband who were accused by Klaus Barbie (Butcher of Lyon) as being Nazi informers.

I was left with many questions after reading this account of the wartime activities of these two that involved escape, torture, rescues. Was Lucie really a resistance hero or was the life she claimed merely a fantasy. Were she and Raymond both collaborators or was this just a malicious piece of last minute rumour-mongering by Klaus Barbie at his trial in 1983?

More compelling was reading of the lives led by Lucie and Raymond after the war, and their need to justify their wartime role even in their last years.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received this book from a GoodReads giveaway. I love reading about WWII, this is a good book, well written but not an easy read.

[Nancy Reynolds · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very factual book about Lucie and her husband - and their lives and times with the French Resistance. It was very informative.

[Pixie Kris · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great insight into the time, and her life.