The Hidden Army - MI9's Secret Force and the Untold Story of D-Day by Matt Richards & Mark Langthorne

Author:Matt Richards & Mark Langthorne [Richards, Matt]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781786069054
Publisher: John Blake Publishing
Published: 2018-07-18T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 14

ENEMY ON THE EDGE

The final trek to Fréteval Forest was, in many ways, the most dangerous part of the evaders’ journey. It had to be conducted on open roads or across fields in a part of occupied France where German units were stationed and where patrols frequently roamed around Cloyes. The arrival of the first few groups saw them get off the train at Châteaudun (or rendezvous at the station if they had walked there like Beauchesne and Vickerman) and then, from a relay set up in a little grocery store owned by the Coeuret family, they would be taken to Fréteval along indirect country roads.

Every effort was made to deceive enemy surveillance and protect the evaders, escorts and guides, who constantly changed routes and the mode of travel to avoid detection. Most frequently the evaders would travel by foot from Châteaudun to Fréteval but sometimes bicycles or cars would be used and, in some instances, even horse-drawn carriages. If the evaders were led across fields they were given pitchforks and hoes to give the impression they were farm workers.

Neave wrote that, ‘Over all of us hung the fear that if the Germans knew that they were losing the war, they would turn to brutal methods and spare no one, even in uniform. It was foreseen that retreating Germans might have ragged nerves; Oradour-sur-Glane provided tragic evidence that this foresight was correct.’99

Oradour-sur-Glane was a small market town, roughly twenty miles from the city of Limoges. In June 1944, it had largely remained peaceful during the German occupation of France and, as such, it had become a safe haven for refugees such as Jews and exiles from the Lorraine region. The only real change the town had seen since the outbreak of war was the absence of men, most of whom had been sent to work in Germany. Life appeared to be going on as normal and the war seemed a distant distraction. As one resident explained, ‘Really, we sort of thought that we were – that we weren’t part of the war. We thought that we wouldn’t be concerned by the war.’100

Saturday 10 June 1944 promised to be just like any other Saturday. It was market day in the town and would be busy because tobacco rations were being given out and children also arrived from outlying hamlets for their vaccinations.

Nearby German troops were moving north through occupied France to counter the advance made by the Allies after the D-Day landings, amongst them the elite Das Reich division. Recently arrived from the Eastern Front, and bringing with them Eastern Front methods (on 9 June they’d hanged ninety-nine Resistance fighters in nearby Tulle and only stopped at that number when they ran out of rope and a priest begged them to spare the lives of others), their orders were to seek out and destroy Resistance forces who, buoyed by news filtering through about the Allied invasion, were becoming increasingly audacious and effective.

On 10 June at approximately 2 pm, in what

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