This last week traveling throughout the Norman countryside has been another extraordinary adventure in our tour through history. Our journeys led us through some of the first crucial battles in the Allied liberation of Europe with Utah and Omaha Beaches as well as other locations like Hill 314 and St. Mere Église. Caen also hosted a phenomenal museum dedicated to the war overall with a unique perspective of its own. Just like how the British sites told the story of the British point of view, the French perspective is keenly felt throughout the Memorial de Caen.
Our professors explained to us that the museum was built to showcase the darker facets of war, particularly its human cost to both soldiers and civilians. After some thought, I wasn’t too surprised that the French people decided to focus on such a perspective. The military campaign against Germany was shockingly quick whereas their occupation lasted years. A bloody and intense fight for liberation left its own scars on the land and had a profound effect on the cultural spirit of the French people. And to give them credit, I think this is showcased well in the memorial.
Aerial photograph of the bombing of Caen.
This message is shown even in the details of the museum’s location. Caen was bombed thoroughly during the war and over 70% of the city was reduced to rubble. To build a museum meant to commemorate the price of peace upon the ashes of your own broken city is one of the most poignant and personal messages I can think of. The museum also hosted some thought-provoking pieces about different facets of the war. It’s no surprise that they covered much of the humanitarian tragedies of the Nazi regime such as the deportation of Jews, concentration camps, and a fair bit about France dealing with the Nazi occupation and its associated evils.
Bust of Philippe Pétain, leader of Vichy France. Below is the Statut des Juifs.
Tucked in a small corner though was a piece of their own dark legacy with the Statut des Juifs, France’s own Nuremburg laws, that relegated its Jewish population as second-class citizens and was an important stepping stone for their deportation and death in the extermination camps. It’s a hard thing to reckon with the evils of one’s past, but relegating such an important document into a small corner about Vichy France feels almost dismissive of its weight and impact. There was also much talk about the bombing of France by Allied bombers, and it’s another fantastic example of France’s perspective bleeding into their works. We understood the cost of the bombing campaign and its necessity, but the death of their own countrymen was a tragedy personal enough to memorialize.
An anti-Semitic poster depicting Jewish caricatures rallying behind Charles De Gaulle. The red lettering reads “The Micro General, Quartermaster of the Jews”
It’s also evident that the builders intended to cover more than just the Holocaust and the occupation. Exhibits about the Siege of Leningrad, the Nanking Massacre, and even the atomic bomb showed how the war touched every corner of the world. The Holocaust is often shown as the pinnacle of human tragedy in the war, and rightly so in so many cases, but it is almost comforting that these other events do not go unnoticed in a museum dedicated to peace. And for the most part I think that the museum does a fine job exploring this subject. The people of France certainly don’t have a monopoly on the suffering of the war, but they do have their own special stories to tell at the hands of both friend and foe here in Caen.
A really great stuff you have shared with us. Keep it up.