The fate of the French POW in Germany

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DavidFrankenberg
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The fate of the French POW in Germany

#1

Post by DavidFrankenberg » 14 Jan 2021, 19:40

Hi,

40.000 or 50.000 French POW died in captivity.
That's a lot.
Soldiers were young and in good health. Why so much died ?
I have heard that particularly in NW camps, prisoners suffered tuberculosis.

I have heard about the holocaust or the mistreatments inflicted to the soviets POW, but I never heard of mistreatments concerning French POW.
But this high figure of death makes me think that there were mistreatments too. Am I wrong ?
I always heard that the British or american POW were well treated. How many of them died in captivity ?

Thanks.

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Ro/Lt
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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#2

Post by Ro/Lt » 08 Feb 2021, 16:26

What is your source?
You can read a lot about the treatment of frech POW:s in this Wiki article:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_pr ... rld_War_II


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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#3

Post by David Thompson » 08 Feb 2021, 18:02

For interested readers -- AHF has a few discussion threads on this issue, at:

French colonial troops put to work on the Atlantic Wall
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=208021
Slave labor in the Krupp industrial combine
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=64075
Nazi slave labor and Nazi forced labor
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=94697

Sid Guttridge
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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#4

Post by Sid Guttridge » 08 Feb 2021, 20:36

How serious 40-50,000 deaths was partly depends on how many prisoners were taken. Apparently 1,800,000 French POWs were taken and around a million of them were held for five years. 40-50,000 would be about 2.5% of the former and about 4.5% of the latter.

I see that in 2004 on Feldgrau I sourced Overmans as saying of German POWs, "34,000 out of 940,000 may have died in French captivity." If true that would be up to 3.6%.

Cheers,

Sid.

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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#5

Post by David Thompson » 08 Feb 2021, 20:51

Sid -- Please give your sources, so the readers don't have to ask you for them.

Sid Guttridge
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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#6

Post by Sid Guttridge » 08 Feb 2021, 20:58

Hi David,

I did, in so far as I was able 17 years after the event - Overmans. One of AHF's own threads, ( viewtopic.php?t=226986) is more specific for him, giving 34,033. Overmans is a German academic and author of Deutsche Militärische Verluste im Zweiten Weltkrieg.

I have since found that Fabien Theofilakis, author of Les prisonniers de guerre allemands: France, 1944-1949, gives about 40,000. Theofilakis is a French academic.

So the order of magnitude of French POW deaths in German hands seems to be similar to the order of magnitude of German POW deaths in French hands.

Cheers,

Sid.

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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#7

Post by Loïc » 12 Feb 2021, 20:12

about the 51 000 French citizens and colonial people dead in captivity

-Unknown causes 33,6%
-Diseases 32,5% [the half 16,4% from tubercolisis, in particular among the colonial POW's kept in the Fronstalags of northern occupied zone,
where took place 5000 dead all causes among 70 000 POW's, higher ratio than the French-European POW's in German stalags]
-Accidents, wounds, bombing raids, escapes 28,8%
-Others causes 5%

Statistiques générales SHD-BAVCC from 37 718 identified profiles

Regards
Loïc L.

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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#8

Post by DavidFrankenberg » 15 Feb 2021, 04:52

Loïc wrote:
12 Feb 2021, 20:12
about the 51 000 French citizens and colonial people dead in captivity

-Unknown causes 33,6%
The first cause of mortality was "unknown" ? Such strange thing.
Is that hunger ?

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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#9

Post by Andy.X.WorldWar2 » 15 Feb 2021, 11:20

Loïc wrote:
12 Feb 2021, 20:12
about the 51 000 French citizens and colonial people dead in captivity

-Unknown causes 33,6%
-Diseases 32,5% [the half 16,4% from tubercolisis, in particular among the colonial POW's kept in the Fronstalags of northern occupied zone,
where took place 5000 dead all causes among 70 000 POW's, higher ratio than the French-European POW's in German stalags]
-Accidents, wounds, bombing raids, escapes 28,8%
-Others causes 5%

Statistiques générales SHD-BAVCC from 37 718 identified profiles

Regards
Loïc L.
Did any French POW in Nazi Germany die of being maltreated?

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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#10

Post by Sid Guttridge » 15 Feb 2021, 12:09

Hi AndyX,

Given that a 5% death rate would not have occurred if these men had been civilians at home, and that German POWs in British hands reportedly suffered less than a 1% death rate, questions certainly have to be asked about this.

There seems to have been a correlation between the death rates of POWs the degree of animosity between the antagonists.

There was also presumably some correlation with length of captivity, which for the French was relatively long, at five years.

Cheers,

Sid.

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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#11

Post by Loïc » 15 Feb 2021, 17:30

hello

not a case of good treatment were the Stalag 325 of Rawa Ruska, after serving to exterminate Soviet POW's and Jews, converted into a special reprisals punishment camp for 25 000 French and few hundred Belgians refractory POW's in 1942 (and an other similar camp stalag the 369 in Kobierzyn for the NCO's)
it was nicknamed the camp of a drop of water and a slow death due to the only one (polluted) water tap for the whole camp

his camp commander Lieutenant Colonel Herr Borck shortly before his execution on 25th September 1946 wrote to the Attorney General in Nuremberg where he explained that Rawa-Ruska would remain his work, loudly claimed his creation and specified that if he had time to complete it, no French would have come out alive. He had received secret orders from Himmler to annihilate all the French "terrorists "


DavidFrankenberg wrote:
15 Feb 2021, 04:52
Loïc wrote:
12 Feb 2021, 20:12
about the 51 000 French citizens and colonial people dead in captivity

-Unknown causes 33,6%
The first cause of mortality was "unknown" ? Such strange thing.
Is that hunger ?
«unknown» I think maybe because in the archives about these 37 718 men from which such percentages came (BAVCC Bureau des Archives des Victimes des Conflits Contemporains) the cause of death is not precised, so could be that explanation as any of the others causes indicated and found in the rest of the archives

Regards
Loïc

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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#12

Post by DavidFrankenberg » 15 Feb 2021, 19:32

Loïc wrote:
15 Feb 2021, 17:30
«unknown» I think maybe because in the archives about these 37 718 men from which such percentages came (BAVCC Bureau des Archives des Victimes des Conflits Contemporains) the cause of death is not precised, so could be that explanation as any of the others causes indicated and found in the rest of the archives

Regards
Loïc
Thanks Loic. Any idea about the average age of the deads ?

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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#13

Post by Sid Guttridge » 15 Feb 2021, 20:10

Hi David,

Given that all the POWs were of military age, it was presumably in the mid or late 20s.

One suspects that the half released were older, less threatening men who were less use as labourers inside the Reich. This would leave the remainder with a lower age profile.

Cheers,

Sid.

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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#14

Post by Sid Guttridge » 15 Feb 2021, 20:11

Hi David,

Given that all the POWs were of military age, it was presumably in the mid or late 20s.

One suspects that the half released were older, less threatening men who were less use as labourers inside the Reich. This would leave the remainder with a lower age profile.

Cheers,

A fact-free Sid.

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Re: The fate of the French POW in Germany

#15

Post by DavidFrankenberg » 15 Feb 2021, 20:27

It sounds more suspicious to me if the deads were youngs...

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