Saving Mona Lisa: The Battle to Protect the Louvre and its Treasures During World War II by Gerri Chanel

Author:Gerri Chanel [Chanel, Gerri]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Heliopa Press, LLC
Published: 2015-04-12T18:30:00+00:00

ANDRÉ CHAMSON

Jacques Jaujard juggled so many battles, he appeared to be in multiple places at once. In Paris, he attended one meeting after another, including curators meetings, those of the Réunion des Musées Nationaux and its subcommittees and others with his spy at the Jeu de Paume. He met with his superior, Louis Hautecœur, and had numerous meetings with Göring’s representative Hermann Bunjes about the exchange proposal. In addition, he continued to make endless phone calls and issue endless memos, letters and reports that went to and from the curators on every conceivable topic from guns to guards. Memos kept him abreast of events at each depot; many were of grave importance, others a bit less so. In January 1942, with qualified staff scarce, Germain Bazin at Sourches wrote to Jaujard that a new guard was needed—a “younger and more intelligent” one—who could take care of vehicle maintenance. Jaujard found a candidate and arranged the paperwork. At the beginning of March, Bazin wrote to Jaujard that the new guard was worse in aptitude and intelligence than the previous one and that he appeared to be “ignorant of the most basic principles of the workings of a motor and the mechanism of a vehicle.” Jaujard replaced the guard. Five weeks later, Bazin wrote to Jaujard that the new guard was not up to par and that he was worried about expensive repairs that would result from damage “by the hands of a man so inept and unintelligent.”17

Jaujard’s memos and phone calls also went to and from the Kunstschutz to enforce rules intended to prevent troops from entering the depots and to push back efforts of German troops to commandeer outbuildings and grounds at depot locations. Jaujard also worked with the Kunstschutz to obtain vehicles and gas, telephones, heating fuel for the depots and fuel for the motorized fire-protection water pumps, all of which became harder to come by as the war went on. He also made countless trips to the depots across France, not only those holding items from the national museums but also almost sixty18 provincial depots. In 1943 alone, he made six trips totaling more than eleven weeks of travel to southwestern France to find replacement depots for Montauban and to inspect all the Louvre depots. Beginning in 1943, he also fought to obtain exemptions for young men from Vichy-imposed forced labor rules, which in many cases would save their lives.

Jaujard battled with the Germans and he battled with the Vichy government; he was also engaged in another battle, one of the heart. Though married, he had fallen in love with Jeanne Boitel, a well-known actress from the Comédie-Française and an active Resistance member who operated under the code name Mozart. Behind the scenes, the resolutely private Jaujard was doing his part in the Resistance as well. A bond formed between the two comrades in war; after the war he would divorce his wife and marry her.

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