Jewish Refugees and the French Internment Camp System

During the 1930s, thousands of foreigners fled persecution and sought safe haven in France. Howeve, escalating anti-Semitism and fluctuating immigration policies created an environment inhospitable to those seeking resettlement.  Yet refugees continued to pour into in France, even though residency papers were hard to attain. Foreigners, if caught without valid papers, were detained or expelled from the country. By 1939, the French government established internment camps that detained refugees alongside suspected Nazi supporters, and held screening commissions to ascertain whether internees were enemies of France. With the outbreak of war in September 1939, France issued a decret-loi that officially classified refugees as enemy subjects. Throughout France, internment camps were populated with foreigners living in desperate conditions and despairing for their futures.

Drawing from recently-released letters, this paper approaches the topic of refugees and the internment camp system from an on-the-ground perspective. It will examine the testimonies contained in these letters, which date from 1939 into the early months of 1940, for what they reveal about the experiences of those detained in the camps and what they tell us about the limits of French republicanism. With the sharp focus that this methodology affords, this study departs from analyses that tend to focus on French policies and gives voice to the people held in centers across France, shedding light on a range of experiences for internees. The letters offer an array of information about daily life, some of which the French government was none too eager to share with the general public, such as lack of potable water or unhealthy sleeping quarters in different centers.  In examining the contents of these first-hand accounts, many of which were written with the purpose of securing release, this paper furthermore will consider the means that internees employed to intervene on their own behalf and gain liberation.