In her interview, Anne Marcelle Kahn elaborates on the dangers faced by Jews in Marseille after the German occupation of the Vichy zone in November 1942. (Such dangers had been noted by her father, Abraham Schramack, in his interview.) She also adds some pertinent details to the daring and grueling escape of the Kahn family from France to neutral Spain across the Pyrenees. This was the same route her husband, Admiral Louis Kahn, had taken to effectuate his escape, most probably in the summer of 1940. Her proactive, risk-taking, and resolute endeavors to escape the Nazi threat were fortunately met with success, and she and her children were able to reunite with her husband in Free French-controlled North Africa.

This interview is part of a group of interviews with the eminent Kahn family and their chauffeur taken in Paris on August 21, 1946 during an evening at the home of Admiral Louis Kahn. The interviews were conducted in the following order: Abraham Schramack (Mrs. Kahn's father), Jean Kahn (the family's younger son) Anne Marcelle Kahn, and her husband, Admiral Kahn. These are followed by an interview with the family's chauffeur, Charles Jean, who during the German occupation was in the French resistance. The Kahns were among the approximately 150,000 French Jews who had deep roots in France. (Another 200,000 Jews in France during the Holocaust were more recent immigrants.) Despite their long-standing residence in France, the Kahn family lived a precarious existence during the Occupation. Due to his service in the French navy, Admiral Kahn was separated from his family at the start of the war and was not in France during the war years.

—Elliot Lefkovitz

Charles Jean was in the French army at the outbreak of the war. He was captured by the Germans but escaped and returned to his home in the Vichy-controlled zone of France in 1940. When he was summoned for compulsory labor service in Germany in 1943, he joined the FTP-MOI, the communist wing of the French resistance and was an active resister until the liberation of France at the end of the summer of 1944. The majority of interview is devoted to Charles Jean's time in his resistance group, which operated in south central France.

Regarding this interviewee's surname, it is possible that as the family chauffeur, "Charles Jean" was called familiarly by his first two names. Since the exact spelling of "Jean" is not known, it is also possible that this was his surname.

This interview is part of a group of interviews with the eminent Kahn family and their chauffeur taken in Paris on August 21, 1946 during an evening at the home of Admiral Louis Kahn. The interviews were conducted in the following order: Abraham Schramack (Mrs. Kahn's father), Jean Kahn (the family's younger son) Anne Marcelle Kahn, and her husband, Admiral Kahn. These are followed by an interview with the family's chauffeur, Charles Jean, who during the German occupation was in the French resistance. The Kahns were among the approximately 150,000 French Jews who had deep roots in France. (Another 200,000 Jews in France during the Holocaust were more recent immigrants.) Despite their long-standing residence in France, the Kahn family lived a precarious existence during the Occupation. Due to his service in the French navy, Admiral Kahn was separated from his family at the start of the war and was not in France during the war years.

—Elliot Lefkovitz

Abraham Schramack had a distinguished career as a governmental administrator and political figure during the French Third Republic, which lasted from 1871-1940. Among the positions he held were secretary general of the prefecture of Marseille, member of the Senate, the upper chamber of the Third Republic's National Assembly, and minister of the interior, in which capacity he was head of the national police. Due to his pre-war prominence and despite his advanced age (he was in his seventies at the time of the Occupation), he found himself in peril especially after the German takeover of the Vichy-government-controlled zone of France (the so-called "free zone") on November 11, 1942. Mr. Schramack survived with the help of friends and acquaintances and his own pluck and good fortune. He died on October 19, 1948 in Marseille, a little over two years after the interview was conducted.

This interview is part of a group of interviews with the eminent Kahn family and their chauffeur taken in Paris on August 21, 1946 during an evening at the home of Admiral Louis Kahn. The interviews were conducted in the following order: Abraham Schramack (Mrs. Kahn's father), Jean Kahn (the family's younger son) Anne Marcelle Kahn, and her husband, Admiral Kahn. These are followed by an interview with the family's chauffeur, Charles Jean, who during the German occupation was in the French resistance. The Kahns were among the approximately 150,000 French Jews who had deep roots in France. (Another 200,000 Jews in France during the Holocaust were more recent immigrants.) Despite their long-standing residence in France, the Kahn family lived a precarious existence during the Occupation. Due to his service in the French navy, Admiral Kahn was separated from his family at the start of the war and was not in France during the war years.

—Elliot Lefkovitz

Jean Kahn was only ten years old when France capitulated to Nazi Germany in 1940. He was the youngest member of his family to endure the trials and tribulations of the Occupation. In his interview, Jean recounts the daring escape he, his mother, and elder brother, Pierre, made across the Pyrenees mountains into neutral Spain in October 1943. They were among the some 30,000 Jews from France who made this difficult journey during the war years. They went without a guide and like most other Jewish escapees arranged their trip independently, without the aid of a rescue organization.

The Kahns were fortunate in their timing, because after the German occupation of southern France on November 11, 1942 (following the Allied landings in North Africa several days earlier), the Spanish expelled few refugees who managed successful border crossings. By the fall of 1943, when the Kahns crossed into Spain, it was obvious that the Germans were losing the war, and the Allies had put pressure on Spain earlier that year not to turn away refugees who had crossed the Spanish border—provided that they would leave the country for another destination without delay. One estimate is that between the summer of 1942 and the fall of 1944, some 7,500 Jews found temporary refuge in Spain.

This interview is part of a group of interviews with the eminent Kahn family and their chauffeur taken in Paris on August 21, 1946 during an evening at the home of Admiral Louis Kahn. The interviews were conducted in the following order: Abraham Schramack (Mrs. Kahn's father), Jean Kahn (the family's younger son) Anne Marcelle Kahn, and her husband, Admiral Kahn. These are followed by an interview with the family's chauffeur, Charles Jean, who during the German occupation was in the French resistance. The Kahns were among the approximately 150,000 French Jews who had deep roots in France. (Another 200,000 Jews in France during the Holocaust were more recent immigrants.) Despite their long-standing residence in France, the Kahn family lived a precarious existence during the Occupation. Due to his service in the French navy, Admiral Kahn was separated from his family at the start of the war and was not in France during the war years.

—Elliot Lefkovitz