On 10 June 1944, four days after D-Day, the village of Oradour-sur-Glane in Haute-Vienne in Nazi-occupied France was destroyed when 643 civilians, including non-combatant men, women, and children, were massacred by a German Waffen-SS company as collective punishment for Resistance activity in the area including the capture and subsequent ...

On June 10, 1944, troops of the 2nd Waffen-SS Panzer Division (armored division), Das Reich, massacred 642 people, almost the entire population, and then destroyed the village. After the war, Oradour-sur-Glane rivaled Lidice as an iconic symbol of German crimes against civilians in occupied Europe.

Desperate for slave labor to continue the doomed war effort and fearful of camp survivors exposing Nazi crimes, German decision-makers put in motion nearly three-quarters of a million concentration camp prisoners. Of this number, 250,000 died in these death marches.

Nov 5, 2007 · Showing that no Frenchmen were immune to repression confirmed the necessary unity of the country, and the myth of its unanimous opposition to the German occupation. The Nazi massacre at Oradour-sur-Glane concluded the era of the Vichy regime, which had proved unable to protect the population.

May 22, 2012 · From the nameless hilltop cave site, one can look down upon the Dordogne River, the village of St. Julien de Lampon and---directly below, along the highway---Rouffillac, where, on June 8, 1944,...

Lost in lush countryside, two hours north of the most popular and scenic stretch of the Dordogne River, Oradour-sur-Glane is one of the most powerful sights in all of France, and worth going out of your way to see. The "Village des Martyrs," as it is now known, was machine-gunned and burned by Nazi troops on June 10, 1944 (four days after D-Day ...

Sep 3, 2017 · On the afternoon of June 10, 1944, 642 men, women, and children were murdered in the village of Oradour-sur-Glane, France gunned down by troops of the German army's 2nd SS Panzer Division. Following the massacre, the bodies were either burned by the Nazi soldiers or left where they lay as the men looted the town and set it ablaze before leaving.

But what drove the SS to commit such an act in a country that was supposed to be collaborating with Nazi Germany? And why, out of all the villages in west-central France, was Oradour-sur-Glane selected as a target?

By 6 pm, German soldiers roamed through the streets of Oradour, looting and setting alight every building in the town. Only the house of M. Dupic, the town draper, was spared as an overnight accommodation for the soldiers.

Oct 27, 2021 · This work explores life in the French village of Oradour-sur-Glane before, during and after the infamous massacre and destruction by Nazi Germany that took place on 10 June 1944. Robert Pike is currently a PhD student at Cardiff University.