Éliane Jeannin Garreau (March 18, 1911 – June 15, 1999) served in

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

in France as part of the

French Resistance The French Resistance (french: La Résistance) was a collection of organisations that fought the German occupation of France during World War II, Nazi occupation of France and the Collaborationism, collaborationist Vichy France, Vichy régim ...

Biography

She was the "right-hand person" to the leader of the

Nazis Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...

captured her and placed her in Ravensbrück. While there, she was tortured for the name of the leader (whom they had also unknowingly captured), but she would not speak. When she was not being tortured or working she would draw different scenes of what was happening in the women's

concentration camps Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simply ...

. She was eventually released and married Roger Garreau in 1948. She had one daughter, Anne. She wrote a book about her experiences, titled ''Les Cris de la Memoire'' or ''Cries of Memory''. She had her sister, Nicole Jeannin Neilson, translate it for her into English (Neilson also served in World War II as a codebreaker). She met her American husband during the war and moved to

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, where she lived with her husband and eight children.

External links

Creteil University entry (in French)
French Resistance members 1911 births 1999 deaths {{World-War-II-bio-stub