Although no precise estimates exist, the number of French soldiers captured by Nazi Germany during the Battle of France between May and June 1940 is generally recognised around 1.8 million, equivalent to around 10 percent of the total adult male population of France at the time. After a brief period of captivity in France, most of the prisoners were deported to Germany. In Germany, prisoners were incarcerated in Stalag or Oflag prison camps, according to rank, but the vast majority were soon transferred to work details (Kommandos) working in German agriculture or industry. Prisoners from the French colonial empire, however, remained in camps in France with poor living conditions as a result of Nazi racial ideologies.
During negotiations for the Armistice of 22 June 1940, the Vichy French government adopted a policy of collaboration in hopes for German concessions allowing repatriation. The Germans nevertheless deferred the return of prisoners until the negotiation of a final peace treaty, which never occurred due to the United Kingdom's refusal to surrender and Germany's defeat in the Battle of Britain. The absence of a large proportion of the male population of France also had important consequences on the position of women in occupied France and charity fundraising on behalf of the prisoners played an important role in French daily life until late in the occupation. Limited repatriation of certain classes of POWs did occur from 1940 and the government was keen to encourage the return of prisoners, even launching the unpopular relève system in order to exchange prisoners of war for French labourers going to work in Germany. Nevertheless, many prisoners remained in German captivity until the defeat of Germany in 1945. Prisoners who returned to France, either by repatriation or through escaping, generally found themselves stigmatised by the French civilian population and received little official recognition.
Background
France declared war on Germany alongside the United Kingdom following the German invasion of Poland in September 1939. The Anglo-French Supreme War Council decided to stay on the defensive along the border, relying on the Maginot Line in helping counter an anticipated German offensive across the German-French border. As neither side made any offensive moves, a Drôle de Guerre (Phoney War) developed as both sides stood-off along the border.
On 10 May 1940, the Germans launched an invasion of France through neutral Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. Shortly afterwards, a breakthrough at Sedan outflanked the force which the French and British had sent into Belgium. By the end of May, the Belgian and Dutch armies had surrendered and the British were evacuating their Expeditionary Force from Dunkirk. German forces reached Paris on 14 June. In total, around 100,000 French soldiers were killed in action. The trauma from the German victories caused a period of division within the government of the Third Republic. German commanders finally met with French officials on 18 June who sought a cessation of hostilities, with the goal being an armistice with Germany. Marshal Philippe Pétain, who had been celebrated as a war hero in World War I, came to power as Prime Minister.
Pétain's government signed an armistice agreement on 22 June 1940 to end hostilities. Shortly afterwards, he established a new conservative and authoritarian Vichy regime ostensibly to lead a moral renewal of France and to purge the country of the communism, freemasonry, and Jewish influence which conservatives blamed for causing the military defeat in June 1940. Although the Vichy regime continued to control the so-called zone libre in southern France, the north and north-west of the country, including Paris, became the zone occupée under German military occupation. Alsace-Lorraine became a de facto part of Germany while Italy also received a small occupied region in France's south-east. In practice, Vichy exercised only very limited form of sovereignty in the occupied zones. Vichy was nominally independent and saw itself as neutral in the ongoing conflict. It retained control over France's pre-war colonial empire but in practice was essentially a German client state.
Prisoners of war of Germany By the time of the armistice on 22 June, approximately 1.8 million French soldiers were in captivity; a figure representing roughly 10 percent of the total adult male population of France at the time. One of the terms of the Compiègne Armistice was that French prisoners would remain in German custody until the end of the war which was thought to be imminent. French prisoners came from all backgrounds, regions and civilian occupations within France and also included a substantial number of soldiers from the French colonial empire. Nevertheless, approximately a third of all French prisoners of war were French farmers or peasants and, in some regions, the total proportion of agricultural workers captured was much higher. This created labour shortages in many civilian occupations, particularly agriculture which was largely unmechanised.
During the interwar period, France had experienced considerable immigration from elsewhere in Europe. In particular, a large number of Poles and Spanish republicans, who had emigrated to France, subsequently served in the French army and were captured by the Germans. These foreign prisoners were often singled out for worse treatment.
In 1944 and 1945, as the German situation deteriorated, provision of food to POW camps became more sporadic and starvation became a problem. As Soviet troops advanced westwards, camps in the east were evacuated and moved on foot, in so-called death marches, away from the front in extremely poor conditions.
Prison camps
Initially most French prisoners were detained in France, but after repeated escapes, the Germans decided to move the vast majority to new camps in Germany and Eastern Europe.
Conditions in camps varied considerably geographically and over time. Conditions were particularly poor in the summer of 1940, when facilities proved insufficient to accommodate the large number of new POWs, and in the particularly cold winter that same year. Gradually, as prisoners were repatriated, relieving overcrowding, conditions generally improved. From 1943, however, as the war on the Eastern Front turned against Germany, conditions worsened and the food supply became more precarious. Some camps were purpose-built, like Stalag II-D, but others could be former barracks, asylums or fortresses.
Prisoners were generally divided into camp by rank. Officers, given different status to other ranks, were imprisoned in Oflags (short for Offizierslager or "Officers' Camp") while NCOs and other ranks were imprisoned in Stalags (or Stammlager, "Main Camp"). Each Stalag included numerous Arbeitskommandos (work units) outside the camp itself, some of which could be hundreds of kilometers away. The vast majority of prisoners ( 93 percent) were not confined behind barbed wire, but instead worked in German factories or in farms, sometimes without guards.
Prisoners arriving in camps were divided into groups by the Germans. Mostly, this consisted of bringing soldiers of similar backgrounds (Communists, Jews or Bretons) together for administrative purposes and to limit their interaction with other prisoners. Although this sorting of soldiers generally occurred on a small scale only, a camp was established at Lübeck for French prisoners dubbed "enemies of the Reich", where they could be detained in isolation. Prisoners considered rebellious, however, were often sent to special camps in which conditions were extremely poor.
Daily life Within Stalags and Oflags, prisoners had substantial amounts of leisure time. Letters and parcels from home could take months to arrive in camps and be distributed by the Red Cross; consequently, most had little regular contact with their families. The Red Cross also provided food, books, sports equipment and musical instruments, as well as information and letters. Thanks to the access to books, the historian Fernand Braudel wrote most of his influential work La Méditerranée et le monde méditerranéen à l'époque de Philippe II (1949), which established the analytical concept of the longue durée, while in captivity in Germany.
Numerous clubs, bands, sports teams and societies operated within the camps. In Stalag IX-A, French prisoners established both symphony and jazz orchestras and a choir. An informal "temporary university" was also established in the same camp. The future French President François Mitterrand delivered a series of lectures on the ancien régime to his fellow prisoners in another camp. Jean-Paul Sartre also delivered lectures on philosophy. Drama was also extremely popular and, despite only having very limited resources, numerous plays were staged.
Politically, the prisoners of war in Germany were given virtually more freedom than civilians in occupied France. In accordance with the Geneva Conventions, French prisoners elected hommes de confiance (Men of trust) from among their number to represent their interests. The Germans attempted to encourage prisoners to adopt Nazi or collaborationist ideologies, even supporting the creation of a pro-German newspaper, Le Trait d'Union, for prisoners and pro-Vichy Cercles Pétain groups existed in many separate camps. Although Pétain was generally supported by the prisoners, Pierre Laval who was Petain's de facto Prime Minister was extremely unpopular. Laval's re-promotion in 1942 following his dismissal in December 1940, together with the failure of his Relève system, widely undermined support for Vichy among prisoners.
Work and forced labour
Most French prisoners of war were not held in camps for most of the war, but instead, over 93 percent of French prisoners of war lived and worked on Kommandos of work details. Under the terms of the Geneva Convention NCOs were, like officers, exempted from work during captivity, but Germans often forced them to work. Workers were fed but virtually their entire wages were paid directly to the German army and prisoners were only allowed to retain 70 pfennigs per day.
Work Kommandos were very variable, but those in agriculture were generally considered better than ones in factories or mining, where conditions were worse and prisoners were vulnerable to Allied bombing raids. In rural areas of Germany, French prisoners replaced locals conscripted into the German army as agricultural labourers. Guarding Kommandos came to be regarded as an unnecessary waste of manpower - it was thought unlikely that a prisoner would attempt to escape in a country where he did not know the language. This meant that, in practice, prisoners were allowed a wider measure of freedom compared to the camps. They were often viewed with curiosity by the German rural population, and the French prisoners were often allowed to mix quite freely with German civilians. Although unlawful, many French prisoners began relationships with German women.
African and Asian prisoners
Around 120,000 prisoners from the French colonies were captured during the Battle of France. Most of these troops, around two-thirds, came from the French North African possessions of Tunisia, Morocco and, particularly, Algeria. Around 20 percent were from French West Africa. The rest were from Madagascar and Indochina. Influenced by Nazi racial ideology, German troops summarily killed between 1,000 and 1,500 black prisoners during the Battle of France. Among those captured who narrowly escaped execution was Léopold Sédar Senghor, an academic who would become the first President of independent Senegal in 1960.