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Some took advantage of their employment, like railwaymen who stole packages being shipped by rail. From 1940 to 1944, between 6000 and 7000 railway workers were fired for theft.[1] In 1942, the gendarmes arrested a train conductor from Compiègne who stole bicycles, TSF equipment and dozens of kilograms of food.[Sa 1] Part of the tobacco black market came from employee thefts of the SEITA. Most worker terminations at the Pantin factory between 1940 and 1945 were for tobacco theft.Cite error: The <ref> tag has too many names (see the help page).


Pierre Bonny

Police officers in the mob

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Former police inspectors were also members of Rudy de Mérode's [fr] rival gang, known as the "Gestapo de Neuilly".Guy Penaud, p. 174 Auda 2002, p. 121 Serge Jacquemard, p. 6 and 16</ref> Bonny personally recruited his own nephew, Jean-Damien Lascaux.Patrick Buisson, p. 283Marcel Hasquenoph, p. 141 Jean-Damien Lascaux appears as acharacter in one of Patrick Modiano's novels, as well as the memoir of Jacques Benoist-Méchin, with whom Bonny shared a cell at Fresnes prison in late 1944 and to whom he told a tale of "murders, acts of barbarism, extortion, thefts [and] trafficking of all types." He was sentenced in December 1944 to forced labor for life. Bénédicte Vergez-Chaignon, Vichy, p. 134Patrick Modiano, p. 99-100Jacques Benoist-Méchin & chap. 22</ref>

=====>Needs to be checked at Black market+++

Château d'Aine [fr] in Azé, property of Michel or Mandel Szkolnikoff

Still, the true profiteers were the professionals, Joseph Joanovici and Mandel Szkolnikoff, corrupt businessmen like the fake Baron de Wiet, and errant aristocrats like the actress Marie Tschernitcheff. They headed sophisticated networks, built fortunes and lived large. Thanks to the black market, Szkolnikoff became one of the biggest real estate owners in France, with a hundred-odd exclusive buildings in Paris, luxury hotels in resort towns, a game preserve in Sologne and a chateau in Saône-et-Loire.[Sa 2][Gr 1][2]

Black market in wartime France

Black market in wartime France

Introduction

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From the occupation of France to the end of 1941, the black market, born of diversions from official channels and the creation of clandestine supply chains, was considered shameful. Its principal clients were rich Frenchmen and the occupying forces, which organised purchasing agencies. The myth of hidden abundance led to informing and antisemitism while undermining Vichy, accused of inefficiency, but which nonetheless severely repressed these infractions.

From the end of 1941 to 1943, the black market became more widespread and more democratic. A "grey market" emerged in which more and more city dwellers travelled into the country for supplies, buying from growers for more than the fixed price. It became a common business practice and no longer seemed immoral once it was a matter of survival, and the Catholic Church no longer condemned it. Under the law of 15 March 1942, Vichy de facto tolerated small-scale black market activities and concentrated on large-scale trafficking. The black market and the additional grey market at that point accounted for between one-fifth and one-half of agricultural production. These transactions were most prevalent near the big cities, especially Paris. The profits mostly went however to large upstream wholesalers and large-scale suppliers rather than to smaller merchants.

In 1943-1944, the black market took on a patriotic aspect. The Germans, who had considerably increased their economic pillage, stopped supplying themselves on the black market and required more intense repression from the Vichy authorities. This was an element of the collaboration policy, in which the Milice participated. The French Resistance on the other hand encouraged some forms of black market, relying on the widespread resentment against Vichy in the countryside. The Vichy authorities for their part depicted resistance fighters as black market bandits.

After the Liberation of France, penalties for black marketeers were a factor in the épuration légale in response to strong public demand. Still, confiscation of illicit profits was slow and incomplete, except for the most notorious black marketeers. The economic situation improved only slowly and the black market flourished. supply problems and rationing, and therefore also the black market, continued until 1949.

The black market lingered in the French collective memory until a generation came into its own after discovering abundance during the Trente Glorieuses, 1945 to 1975. Its memory remains preserved in two major works , Au bon beurre and La Traversée de Paris.

References

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  1. ^ Grenard, 2008 & p. 166-181.
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference :13 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

Works cited

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  • Grenard, Fabrice [in French] (2008). La France du marché noir (1940-1949) [Black market France (1940-1949)] (in French). Paris: Payot. ISBN 978-2-228-90284-7. OCLC 213490047.

Further reading

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