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Lucie Aubrac
Siân Rees
Extent: 256 pages
Size: 231x153mm
Publication Date: 01/07/2015
About the Book
The full story of a remarkable woman who has become legendary in the history of the French Resistance.
In May 1943, a young Frenchwoman called Lucie Aubrac engineered the escape of her husband Raymond from the clutches of Klaus Barbie, the feared Gestapo chief. When Raymond was arrested again that June, Lucie mounted a second astonishing rescue, ambushing the prison van that was transporting him. Spirited out of France with her husband by the RAF, she arrived in London a heroine.
However, in 1983 Klaus Barbie made the bombshell claim that the Aubracs had become informers in 1943, betraying their comrades. The French press and the couple themselves furiously denounced this ‘slander’, but as worrying inconsistencies were spotted in Lucie’s story, doubts emerged that have never quite gone away.??
Who was Lucie Aubrac? What did she really do in 1943? And was she truly the spirit of la vraie France, or a woman who could not resist casting herself as a heroine, whatever the cost to the truth?
Siân Rees’ penetrating account is the first full English-language biography of this extraordinary woman.
Publication Date: 25/06/2015
Price: £5.99
ISBN: 9781782433903
Categories: Biographies, Science - History - Philosophy
About the Book
The full story of a remarkable woman who has become legendary in the history of the French Resistance.
In May 1943, a young Frenchwoman called Lucie Aubrac engineered the escape of her husband Raymond from the clutches of Klaus Barbie, the feared Gestapo chief. When Raymond was arrested again that June, Lucie mounted a second astonishing rescue, ambushing the prison van that was transporting him. Spirited out of France with her husband by the RAF, she arrived in London a heroine.
However, in 1983 Klaus Barbie made the bombshell claim that the Aubracs had become informers in 1943, betraying their comrades. The French press and the couple themselves furiously denounced this ‘slander’, but as worrying inconsistencies were spotted in Lucie’s story, doubts emerged that have never quite gone away.??
Who was Lucie Aubrac? What did she really do in 1943? And was she truly the spirit of la vraie France, or a woman who could not resist casting herself as a heroine, whatever the cost to the truth?
Siân Rees’ penetrating account is the first full English-language biography of this extraordinary woman.
About the Author
Siân Rees was born and brought up in Cornwall, spending much of her childhood in boatyards and at sea. She read Modern History at Magdalen College, Oxford. Her first book, The Floating Brothel, was written after living in Australia, and published in 2001. It was followed by The Shadows of Elisa Lynch (2003) after a stint in South America, The Ship Thieves (2006), and Sweet Water and Bitter: the ships that stopped the slave trade (2009), and Moll: the Life and Times of Moll Flanders in 2011. She lives in Brighton and France.
Reviews
- 'Fascinating... Calm, judicious and gripping', Caroline Moorehead, Sunday Times
- '[Praise for The Floating Brothel] History at its most engaging', Daily Telegraph
- '[Praise for Sweet Water and Bitter] A fluent and lively account', Guardian
- '[Praise for Moll] Rees is a lucid, intelligent guide', Sunday Herald
- '[Praise for The Ship Thieves] In Rees's hands Porter's story reads like a fictional thriller but imparts the knowledge of a serious historical work', Times Literary Supplement