These abominable measures, the obligation of denunciation, punishment inflicted upon families, permitted the German authorities to carry out the enlistment of Alsatians and Lorrainers, which for many of them had fatal consequences and which was for all of them a particularly tragic ordeal.
I must finally indicate, to conclude this part, that the Germans proceeded to the mobilization of women for war work. I produce a Document Number RF-745, the ordinance of 26 January 1942, completing the war organization of labor service for the young women of Lorraine.
Then we find an ordinance of 2 February 1943, Document Number RF-746, concerning the declaration of men and women for the accomplishment of tasks pertaining to national defense. (Official Bulletin of the Reich, 1943, Page 26.) This ordinance concerns Alsace.
The following Document, Number RF-747, deals with Lorraine. This is an ordinance of 8 February 1943 concerning the enrollment of men and women for tasks relating to the organization of labor. The Tribunal will note that the ordinance concerning Alsace used the expression “tasks of interest to national defense,” whereas the ordinance relative to Lorraine specifies simply “tasks concerning the organization of labor”; but in principle these are the same. Article 1 of this second ordinance, Document Number RF-747, refers to the ordinance of the General Delegate for the Organization of Labor, relative to the declaration of men and women for tasks of interest to national defense, et cetera. This is a question of making not only men, but also women, work for the German war effort. I shall read for the Tribunal an extract from a newspaper article which comments on this legislation and likewise on the measures which Gauleiter Wagner proposed to undertake in this connection. This constitutes Document Number RF-748, taken from the newspaper Dernières Nouvelles de Strasbourg, dated 23 February 1943.
“In his speech at Karlsruhe Gauleiter Robert Wagner stressed that measures of total mobilization would be applied to Alsace and that the authorities would abstain from any bureaucratic working method. The Alsatian labor offices have already invited the first category of young women liable for mobilization to fill out the enlistment form.
“In principle, all women who until the present have worked only at home, who have had to care only for their husbands, and who have no other relatives, shall work a full day. Many married men who until now had never offered to help their wives with the household work will be obliged to put their shoulder to the wheel. They will work in the household and do errands. With a little goodwill, everything will work out. Women who have received a professional education shall be put, if possible, to tasks that relate to their professions, on condition that they have an important bearing on the war effort. This prescription applies only to all feminine professions which imply care given to other persons.”
Here again a rather comical or clumsily worded presentation should not prevent one from perceiving the odious character of these measures, which obliged French women to work for the German war effort.
THE PRESIDENT: We will adjourn now for ten minutes.