A village in the mountains...
Without wishing to diminish the merits of some of the villagers of Saint Martin Vésubie, nor the solidarity and help provided by some righteous people there who deserve to be honoured, it cannot be denied that when the Nazis arrived, 980 Jews had to flee from the village where they had previously been parked, assigned there "on residence" against their will, and also forced upon the villagers.
This new population was as large in its number as the regular inhabitants, meaning co-habitation must have posed a few problems.
However, the village was still under Italian occupation, and life was much more relaxed than when they were replaced by the German occupants, in September 1943.
Obviously, the situation was the same there as in many other villages, there were both acts of hostility towards them and generosity.
When all the Jews fled towards Italy, 350 of them were arrested on the Italian side. They were subsequently deported.
Only around 15 of them came back.
The accurate lists of their names can be read in Serge Klarsfeld's book: Mémorial de la Déportation des Juifs de France, and, for the Italian side, in Alberto Cavaglion’s: Les Juifs de Saint-Martin-Vésubie, Septembre-Novembre 1943, Nice, Editions Serre, 1995, 174 pages.
The situation in Saint-Martin Vésubie was quite different from that noticed in another village of the region: Saint-Léger, whose entire population rallied to feed, hide, save its Jews, in even harder conditions, AFTER the Italians had left, earning the courageous Mayor’s daughter the title of RIGHTEOUS AMONG THE NATIONS.
But then, there were only 19 Jews there…
(And of course everyone knows of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, which is the only place to have earned this title as a village, for its whole community).