Heroes or Villains?

Same Time, Lunel, France, Home of Toureille On a chilly fall evening, the Toureille family had just finished dinner and Délie cleared the dishes while Pastor Toureille stoked the fire in the fireplace. Just as he threw a few more logs on the blaze, there was insistent rapping on the door. Toureille sighed. He could now recognize from the knock that of a beleaguered refugee seeking help. He opened the door and faced what appeared to be a family of four, very frightened and very desperate. “Come out of the cold, please. How can I help you?” “I am Simon Goldberg, and this is my family, my wife Sarah, and my two daughters, Leah and Marthe. We were told you could help us get out of France.” Toureille smiled. “Well, we can certainly try. In the meantime, please come in, take off your coats, and warm yourselves by the fire. You must be hungry. We’ll give you something to eat before we discuss how we can help you.” Later, Simon and his wife sat down with Pastor and Mrs. Toureille. “Do you have travel documents and passports?” Toureille inquired. Simon nodded. “Yes, but they won’t do us any good, because as soon as I show them to the authorities, they would know we were Jewish, and that would be the end for us.” Toureille thought for a moment. “So what you will need are new names, because Goldberg would never do, as well as forged travel documents and baptismal certificates showing you are good Aryan citizens and Christians. That way, you will not be bothered by the gendarmes on your way to one of the border towns near Spain.” Simon looked puzzled. “And how do we get such documents?” Toureille smiled. “A good question. I have procured a number of blank baptismal certificate forms that we can use for you and your family. Also, I’m in touch with people who are excellent forgers, so we’ll have no problem arranging for the appropriate travel documents.” “More important, how do we get across the border?” Marthe asked. Toureille spread a map across the table. “Once you get close to the border, as you can see,” tapping his index finger on a particular spot on the map, “there are several trails you can take to reach the Spanish border guards.” Sarah’s face clouded over. “You mean we have to go alone over those trails?” Toureille shook his head. “Oh no, we are far more efficient than that. We will provide you with guides who will take you to the border in a way that will avoid the French border guards, which you definitely don’t want to encounter.” Simon shook his head. “Hard to believe that we were fortunate enough to meet up with a Protestant pastor who was willing to help Jews.’ “Not just me,” Toureille said. “Virtually all of the pastors in this area are of the same bent. Any one of them would do what I am doing. But listen, I see that your daughters are nodding off. I’m sure they’re exhausted. We will put you up for tonight and then find you a hiding place in one of the homes of the good people of Lunel.” Simon looked at the pastor, “Aren’t they taking a big risk?” “Not from the local gendarmes, who know how we feel about helping the less fortunate. It is only when the French national police and/or the Gestapo come sweeping through here that we have to take measures to see that you’re not found in any of the homes. You definitely don’t want to end up in wind-swept Gürs; it is one of the worst internment camps. People there often die from hunger and illness, being fed one evening meal of some watery soup with one small piece of stale bread and, in the morning, a cup of horrible tasting ersatz coffee, really just plain dishwater. Trying to help people in those camps is one of the most frustrating aspects of this business and the French government puts every roadblock in our path, even with respect to simple things like trying to supply the inmates in Gürs with packages of food and other necessities for daily living. “So acting as a rescuer has not been easy for me, or for my health, or in my role as a husband, father, and pastor. I hardly know what family life is like anymore; and I doubt that my children really know me now.” Toureille shrugged. “Some of my associates in the church treat me like a pariah. But my conscience and my God would not permit me to act otherwise.” Late October, 1940, Lyon, Home of Harry Bingham Fry, a frequent visitor to Bingham’s home for dinner, relaxed in a club chair in Bingham’s study. He savored a jigger of well-aged scotch poured for him by the vice-consul, swishing some in his mouth. Bingham plopped down next to him with a heavy sigh. “I think you’ll need that drink. I just heard through my sources that the Vichy police arrested your anti-Nazi German Socialist friend, Rudolph Breitscheid. Why couldn’t you get him out of France?” Fry sighed. “I tried, Lord knows, I tried. But Breitscheid just wouldn’t listen. He insisted he was safe as long as he did nothing illegal to try to escape from France. I pleaded with him, telling him that just being anti-Nazi would get him arrested. Didn’t he know, I asked him, that under Article 19 of the Armistice Agreement, the French were required to turn over any German citizen on the demand of the Germans? He just shrugged.” Fry shook his head. “Such a stubborn man.” Bingham nodded. “The news is worse. The French have already turned him over to the Gestapo. He’s headed for a concentration camp.” Fry frowned. “They’ll kill him like they do all the dissidents who speak out against Hitler and the Nazi Party.”