During Germany’s preemptive occupation of France, which had declared war on the Worker’s reich on September 3, 1939, more French civilians died at the hands of their own countrymen and the allies than were killed by the Germans.

Government-promoted Fifth Column hysteria in France reached such ludicrous levels that one commentator, Margery Allingham in The Oaken Heart, surmised:

‘The weekly comic papers had nothing on the new Jerry invasion in the matter of invention.’

Not so funny were the tragic consequences of public apprehension and panic. In France, thousands of perfectly innocent people were slaughtered when French military units were given complete freedom to instantly shoot any persons unable to account for their presence in any given district.

In a single incident, twenty-two people were casually executed in the small town of Abbeville. Specialist historians such as James Hayward believe that thousands more were slaughtered in woodlands and at the side of roads.

The claim that downed German aircrews were taken into custody and ended up in prisoner of war camps is a myth. The commonplace procedure was to execute them on the spot.

There was little ceremony to these brutal killings. Indeed, the invasion gave the perfect excuse for an orgy of bloodlust and the selection of victims was casual.

In one hospital, a dispenser had five people shot, one a beautiful young girl. They were ‘charged’ with showing lights and curtains of different colors.

More French civilians died at the hands of their own countrymen and the allies than were killed by the Germans.

‘The widespread killing of suspected fifth columnists in France, Belgium and Holland, invariably based on little or no evidence, reflects credit on no one, including the British Expeditionary Force.

The fact that the total number of killings and summary executions probably ran into the low thousands during a campaign which lasted little more than a month is particularly disturbing.’ – James Hayward, Myths and Legends of the Second World War. You can share this story on social media:

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