Joseph Epstein (French Resistance leader)

Joseph Epstein (October 16 1911 – April 11, 1944, Fort Mont-Valérien, France), also known as "Colonel Gilles" and as "Joseph Andrej", was a Polish-born Jewish communist activist and leader of the French Resistance during World War II. He was executed by the Germans.

Communist organizer

Joseph Epstein was born in Zamość, Congress Poland and was a graduate of the University of Chicago. He also studied law at Warsaw University. There he became aware of and later joined the Polish Communist Party. In 1931, he was arrested by the police after speaking at a communist rally but was released after a few weeks. He fled to Czechoslovakia, where he sought asylum, but his plea was rejected. Epstein returned to Poland, and was deported by the authorities.

In Tours, France where he was organizing immigrants, Epstein met and married Paula Duffau. When the French police were informed by the Polish consulate about his participation in the Communist Party, Epstein was arrested and forced to leave Tours. He and his wife then went to Bordeaux, where they continued their studies. He organized students into a collective and was appointed to the regional committee of the French Communist Party. In 1933, he went to Paris. The following year, Epstein passed his final examination and obtained a law degree; however, he was barred from becoming a lawyer because he was not French.

Armed struggle

In 1936, Epstein joined the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War and took part in the defence of Irun where he was severely wounded. In January 1938, he commanded the Romanian communists' artillery battery "Tudor Vladimirescu". On returning to France at the end of 1938, he was imprisoned at Gurs, [ [http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005298 Gurs ] at www.ushmm.org] a detention camp for political refugees and members of the International Brigades.

In 1939, he entered the ranks of the Polish Army, but later resigned and joined the French Foreign Legion. In 1940, he was captured by the Germans and sent to the Stalag IVB prisoner-of-war camp. Epstein escaped from the camp and went to Switzerland, but was deported to Germany. He managed to obtain false papers in the name "Joseph Epstein" and moved to Paris.

With the French Resistance

In 1941, he began working with Francs-Tireurs et Partisans (FTP), a communist resistance group; by February 1943, he was an operation commander in the Paris region.

He proposed a new guerrilla warfare tactic. Up till this point, the FTP had been operating in three-person cells: one person attacked and two provided covering fire for their escape. He proposed that the teams should have 10 to 15 fighters. Three or four would throw grenades or bombs, and the rest would cover their withdrawal.

The FTP knew that a formation of Wehrmacht soldiers would take part in a parade in an alley which ended in Stars Square. Epstein's group decided to attack with twelve men. Three of them would attack with grenades while the other nine would secure their withdrawal. Dozens of soldiers were killed or wounded but only one partisan was wounded. German officers reported that their soldiers were attacked by about a hundred guerillas.

In late 1943, the FTP was betrayed, possibly by Joseph Davidovitch, who was a chief of personnel in Missak Manouchian's group. Davidovitch had been arrested by the Gestapo and then released. He claimed, however, that he had escaped.

On October 16, 1943, Epstein was arrested in Évry-Petit-Bourg during a meeting with Manouchian. He was tortured in Fresnes prison and tried along with nineteen other members of the FTP and sentenced to death. He was executed by firing squad.

Quotes

"All men and women are born, live, suffer, and die; what distinguishes us one from another is our dreams, whether they be dreams about worldly or unworldly things, and what we do to make them come about... We do not choose to be born. We do not choose our parents. We do not choose our historical epoch, or the country of our birth, or the immediate circumstances of our upbringing. We do not, most of us, choose to die; nor do we choose the time or conditions of our death. But within all this realm of choicelessness, we do choose how we shall live: courageously or in cowardice, honorably or dishonorably, with purpose or adrift. We decide what is important and what is trivial in life. We decide that what makes us significant is either what we do or what we refuse to do. But no matter how indifferent the universe may be to our choices and decisions, these choices and decisions are ours to make. We decide. We choose. And as we decide and choose, so are our lives formed. In the end, forming our own destiny is what ambition is about."

References

*Albert Ouzoulias (Colonel André), "Synowie Nocy", Warsaw, Ministry of National Defence, 1979. Also published in French as "Les Fils de la Nuit", Paris, Grasset, 1982.

External links

* [http://www.humanite.fr/journal/2004-02-21/2004-02-21-388565 Interview with his son, Georges Duffau (in French)]
* [http://www.musee-resistance.com/actu/epstein.htm Resistance Museum]
* [http://www.pipeline.com/~rgibson/frenchfilm.html A French documentary film about the FTP.]