In France, a family reckons with World War II Allies' legacy of rape and murder

Europe
In France, a family reckons with World War II Allies' legacy of rape and murder

November 16, 202411:05 AM ET
Heard on Weekend Edition Saturday
Eleanor Beardsley


From left: Michelle Salaün, Jeannine Plassard and Marie-Annick Gouez, the daughters of Catherine Tournellec Salaün, stand at their mother's grave in Plabennec, in France's Brittany region, in June.
Eleanor Beardsley/NPR

PLABENNEC, France — As the world commemorated the 80th anniversary this year of the D-Day landings at Normandy and the liberation of Europe from the Nazis, one French family finally began to come to terms with the personal tragedy that befell them during the summer of 1944. ... After D-Day, U.S. troops fanned out across Normandy and the neighboring western region of Brittany to capture and secure large ports, like Cherbourg and Brest. One family's encounter with a soldier that summer would alter its destiny.

On a recent day this summer, 66-year-old Michelle Salaün walks across a field in Brittany to the house where her mother grew up. ... "This is the place, the farm, where my grandfather has been killed and my mother raped, the 20th of August, 1944, at the end of the war, by an American soldier," Salaün says.

Enthusiasts wearing replica WWII military attire ride atop a WWII-era military truck in Saint-Côme-du-Mont, northwestern France, on June 4, 2024, as part of the "D-Day" commemorations marking the 80th anniversary of the World War II Allied landings in Normandy. ... The D-Day ceremonies on June 6 this year mark the 80th anniversary since the launch of 'Operation Overlord', a vast military operation by Allied forces in Normandy, which turned the tide of World War II, eventually leading to the liberation of occupied France and the end of the war against Nazi Germany.

Her grandfather, 47-year-old Eugène Tournellec, was shot as he tried to protect his 17-year-old daughter, Catherine, from the soldier, who showed up at their farmhouse late one night. Tournellec left behind a widow and six children. His daughter survived, but was left with a terrible secret and a wound that never healed. ... "This was a secret for all the family — my three sisters and my two brothers — nobody knew," Salaün says.

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