Baron Roland de Pury (15 November 1907 – 24 January 1979) was a Swiss Protestant theologian, pastor, and writer. Living in France during

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 opposing ...

, he was a staunch opponent of

Nazism 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) i ...

and the

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...

and publicly criticized and preached against the Vichy French government and

German occupation of France The Military Administration in France (german: Militärverwaltung in Frankreich; french: Occupation de la France par l'Allemagne) was an interim occupation authority established by Nazi Germany during World War II to administer the occupied zo ...

. De Pury joined 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 ...

and organized an escape route for Jewish refugees to leave France and enter Switzerland, hiding them in his home before helping them to the French-Swiss Boarder. He collaborated with French Catholic leaders, including

Pierre Chaillet Pierre Chaillet (1900–1972) was a French Catholic priest of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits), who was recognised as Righteous among the Nations by Yad Vashem for his work to protect Jews from the Nazi Holocaust.Gestapo The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one orga ...

, leading to his arrest and imprisonment at

Montluc prison Montluc prison () is a former prison located on rue Jeanne Hachette in the 3rd arrondissement of Lyon, France. It was known for being an internment, torture and killing place by the Gestapo during the occupation of France by the Nazis. History B ...

. De Pury and his wife were honored as

Righteous Among the Nations Righteous Among the Nations ( he, חֲסִידֵי אֻמּוֹת הָעוֹלָם, ; "righteous (plural) of the world's nations") is an honorific used by the State of Israel to describe non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to sa ...

Yad Vashem Yad Vashem ( he, יָד וַשֵׁם; literally, "a memorial and a name") is Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. It is dedicated to preserving the memory of the Jews who were murdered; honoring Jews who fought against th ...

for their efforts to save Jews during the Holocaust. After the war ended, de Pury worked as a missionary in Africa, where he opposed French colonial rule and denounced torture and other violent practices used during the Algerian War.

Early life, education, and ministry

De Pury was born on 15 November 1907 in

Geneva , neighboring_municipalities= Carouge, Chêne-Bougeries, Cologny, Lancy, Grand-Saconnex, Pregny-Chambésy, Vernier, Veyrier , website = https://www.geneve.ch/ Geneva ( ; french: Genève ) frp, Genèva ; german: link=no, Genf ; it, Ginevr ...

, the only child of Baron Jules de Pury, a military officer, and Noémi Perrot, a relative of the de Pourtalès family. He belonged to a

Huguenot The Huguenots ( , also , ) were a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed, or Calvinist, tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, the Genevan burgomaster Be ...

family from the

Principality of Neuchâtel A principality (or sometimes princedom) can either be a monarchical feudatory or a sovereign state, ruled or reigned over by a regnant-monarch with the title of prince and/or princess, or by a monarch with another title considered to fall under ...

that had been ennobled by Frederick II of Prussia in 1785. His grandfather, Baron Édouard François de Pury, served as the President of the Neuchâtel Town Council. He was a grandnephew of Baron Frédéric Guillaume de Pury. De Pury studied literature at the

University of Neuchâtel The University of Neuchâtel (UniNE) is a French-speaking university based in Neuchâtel, Switzerland. The university has four faculties (schools) and more than a dozen institutes, including arts and human sciences, natural sciences, law and eco ...

with the intention of becoming a writer. With

Denis de Rougemont Denys Louis de Rougemont (September 8, 1906 – December 6, 1985), known as Denis de Rougemont (), was a Swiss writer and cultural theorist who wrote in French. One of the non-conformists of the 1930s, he addressed the perils of totalitarian ...

Henry Corbin Henry Corbin (14 April 1903 – 7 October 1978)Shayegan, DaryushHenry Corbin in Encyclopaedia Iranica. was a French philosopher, theologian, and Iranologist, professor of Islamic studies at the École pratique des hautes études. He was in ...

, Albert-Marie Schmidt, and Roger Breuil, he co-founded the

Christian existentialist Christian existentialism is a theo-philosophical movement which takes an existentialist approach to Christian theology. The school of thought is often traced back to the work of the Danish philosopher and theologian Søren Kierkegaard (1813-1855 ...

magazine ''Hic et Nunc''. He later moved to

Bonn The federal city of Bonn ( lat, Bonna) is a city on the banks of the Rhine in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, with a population of over 300,000. About south-southeast of Cologne, Bonn is in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ru ...

and studied

Reformed Protestant Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Calv ...

theology, becoming a student and follower of Karl Barth in 1932. Upon completing his theological studies, he moved to France and took up a post as a pastor at a Reformed parish church in

Vendée Vendée (; br, Vande) is a department in the Pays de la Loire region in Western France, on the Atlantic coast. In 2019, it had a population of 685,442.

. De Pury married Jacqueline de Montmollin, a Swiss noblewoman and distant relative of his, on 27 March 1931. They had eight children. In 1937 de Pury moved to

Lyon Lyon,, ; Occitan language, Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, third-largest city and Urban area (France), second-largest metropolitan area of F ...

and worked as a minister at the Protestant Temple of Terreaux on Rue Lanterne in the 1st arrondissement. He and his family lived in

La Croix-Rousse La Croix-Rousse is a hill high in the city of Lyon, France, as well as the name of a neighborhood located on this hill. The neighborhood is divided into les pentes (slopes, belonging to the city's 1st arrondissement) and le plateau (atop the hil ...

World War II

In 1940, during

, he led a spiritual

resistance movement A resistance movement is an organized effort by some portion of the civil population of a country to withstand the legally established government or an occupying power and to disrupt civil order and stability. It may seek to achieve its objective ...

against

and helped Jews, who were being persecuted during the

, leave France for Switzerland. On 14 July 1940 he preached against Nazism, Marshal

Philippe Pétain Henri Philippe Benoni Omer Pétain (24 April 1856 – 23 July 1951), commonly known as Philippe Pétain (, ) or Marshal Pétain (french: Maréchal Pétain), was a French general who attained the position of Marshal of France at the end of Worl ...

, and the collaboration of

Vichy France Vichy France (french: Régime de Vichy; 10 July 1940 – 9 August 1944), officially the French State ('), was the fascist French state headed by Marshal Philippe Pétain during World War II. Officially independent, but with half of its te ...

with

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

in a sermon titled ''You Will Not Steal''. In 1941 he was one of the signatories of the '' Theses of Pomeyrol'', a declaration of spiritual resistance in France. In November 1941 he and his wife, Jacqueline, collaborated with Françoise Seligmann, a social worker who had recently joined Combat, to create a chain of escape to Switzerland, passing through Archamps. They hid Jews in their home before assisting them to the French-Swiss border. De Pury also collaborated with Germaine Ribière and Father

Pierre Chaillet Pierre Chaillet (1900–1972) was a French Catholic priest of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits), who was recognised as Righteous among the Nations by Yad Vashem for his work to protect Jews from the Nazi Holocaust.Jesuit priest and head of the rescue organization ''Amitiés Chrétiennes'', to facilitate full cooperation among Catholics and Protestants to rescue Jews. The

Œuvre de secours aux enfants Œuvre de secours aux enfants (, Children's Aid Society), abbreviated OSE is a French Jewish humanitarian organization which was founded in Russia in 1912 to help Russian Jewish children. Later it moved to France. OSE's most important activitie ...

connected de Pury with Paulette Mercier, a French pharmacist and member of the resistance movement, who contacted Ruth Jaccard Monney and her parents, Arthur and Whilhelmine Jaccard, as well as the Dupeyreix family in Switzerland, to establish a network of resistance members across the border. Through the network, de Pury, the Jaccards, and the Dupeyreix were able to hide Jewish women and girls at a Catholic estate in Labalme, between Lyon and Geneva, and use the estate as a transit point to Switzerland. After German forces occupied the

Zone libre The ''zone libre'' (, ''free zone'') was a partition of the French metropolitan territory during World War II, established at the Second Armistice at Compiègne on 22 June 1940. It lay to the south of the demarcation line and was administered b ...

in November 1942, and the

Gestapo The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one orga ...

was installed in Lyon, German officials discovered du Pury's operation to help Jewish refugees escape to Switzerland. On 13 May 1943, while presiding over a church service, de Pury was arrested by the Gestapo and was detained for several months at

, despite the petitions made by Cardinal-Archbishop Pierre-Marie Gerlier and Marc Boegner. While he was imprisoned at Montluc, he authored the book ''Cell Diary''. He was transferred to

Bregenz Bregenz (; gsw, label= Vorarlbergian, Breagaz ) is the capital of Vorarlberg, the westernmost state of Austria. The city lies on the east and southeast shores of Lake Constance, the third-largest freshwater lake in Central Europe, between Switze ...

in Austria, where he was turned over to local authorities and released in an exchange for German spies who had been arrested in Switzerland at the end of October 1943. After his release, he took refuge in Neuchâtel, his ancestral home, with his family, and then returned to Lyon.

Post-war life

After the war, de Pury focused on writing. He authored the books ''What is Protestantism?'', ''Your God Reigns'', and ''Letters from Europe: A Young Intellectual in the Interwar Years''. From 1957 to the 1970s, he worked as a missionary for the

Paris Evangelical Missionary Society The Paris Evangelical Missionary Society (in French, ''Société des missions évangéliques de Paris''), also known as the ''SMEP'' or ''Mission de Paris'', was a Protestant missionary association created in 1822. As with other Christian societie ...

, serving in

Cameroon Cameroon (; french: Cameroun, ff, Kamerun), officially the Republic of Cameroon (french: République du Cameroun, links=no), is a country in west-central Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria to the west and north; Chad to the northeast; the C ...

and

Madagascar Madagascar (; mg, Madagasikara, ), officially the Republic of Madagascar ( mg, Repoblikan'i Madagasikara, links=no, ; french: République de Madagascar), is an island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately off the coast of East Africa ...

. He protested against colonial rule in French Algeria and denounced torture practices used during the Algerian War. He also preached against the cultural practice of exchanging a

bride price Bride price, bride-dowry ( Mahr in Islam), bride-wealth, or bride token, is money, property, or other form of wealth paid by a groom or his family to the woman or the family of the woman he will be married to or is just about to marry. Bride dow ...

before marriage, which he witnessed in Cameroon. After his work in Africa, he visited Russia and became a critic of

Communism Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a ...

. He moved back Southern France and became a university chaplain and led a reformed congregation in Aix-en-Provence. In 1976

bestowed de Pury and his wife with the honor of

for their work helping Jewish refugees during the Holocaust. He died on 24 January 1979 in Aix-en-Provence.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pury, Roland de 1907 births 1979 deaths Roland Barons of Germany Clergy in World War II French Resistance members Nobility of Neuchâtel Writers from Geneva Protestant Righteous Among the Nations Swiss Protestant missionaries Swiss Righteous Among the Nations Swiss Calvinist and Reformed ministers Clergy from Geneva University of Neuchâtel alumni World War II civilian prisoners