La Mémorial des Martyrs de La Déportation, Paris

“This monument was inaugurated on April 12th 1962 by General de Gaulle, President of the French Republic, as a place of contemplation and remembrance of the suffering caused by the deportation.

It was created by Georges-Henri Pingusson, and depicts certain features that define the concentration camp environment: narrow passages, tight staircases, spiked gates, restricted views with no sight of the horizon, and frequent reference to the triangle, the distinctive mark of the deportees.

Triangular recesses inside the crypt show the names of the main camps, enclosing earth and ashes that were gathered from each one.

The thousands of sparkling lights that can be seen in the gallery represent the deportees who never returned.

The ashes of an unknown deportee from the Natzweiler-Struthof camp are interred at the entrance to the gallery.

Texts and poems recalling the deportation, from Robert Desnos, Louis Aragon, Paul Eluard, Jean-Paul Sartre and Antoine de Saint-Exupery, have been reproduced on the walls of the crypt.”

- from a plaque posted at the entrance to the memorial in Paris

LINK

Photo by David Pettigrew, March 2009

"1940 TO THE TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND
WHO DIED IN THE CAMPS"