Agnès Humbert
Encyclopedia
Agnès Humbert was an art historian, ethnographer and a member of the French Resistance
during World War II
.
, France, daughter of French senator Charles Humbert
and English author Mabel Wells Annie Rooke.
She spent her childhood in Paris, where she studied painting and design. In 1916 she married Egyptian artist Georges Hanna Sabbagh
(1877–1951), by whom she had two sons: Jean Sabbagh, a sub-mariner and advisor to General Charles de Gaulle
, and television director and producer Pierre Sabbagh
. From 1929 she studied the history of art at the Sorbonne
and at the Louvre
school, and took a course in philosophy. Agnès and Georges divorced in 1934. Her first book was on the painter Louis David, published in 1936. She then worked as an Art historian at the Musée National des Arts et Traditions Populaires
in Paris, and broadcast on art on Radio Paris
at the start of 1936.
encouraging the people to France to continue the struggle against the occupying Germans and Philippe Pétain
's Vichy government. It was offensive to her when books were removed from her library by the Germans, and German authors added. On 6 August a notice was fixed on the gateway of the Palais de Chaillot, ordering free entry to German soldiers, and she wrote in her diary that she told her colleague Jean Cassou
"I feel I will go mad, literally, if I don't do something!". So, with Boris Vildé
, Anatole Lewitsky
, Jean Cassou
and Yvonne Oddon
she formed the Groupe du musée de l'Homme
out of members of the Museum, the first resistance movement in occupied France. In a few months these pioneers built a highly diffuse underground network. Their action spread rapidly with the creation of a clandestine newsletter, Résistance, which had only five issues, between 15 December 1940 and the end of March 1941, with editorials (the first written by Boris Vildé) holding no illusions on Pétain
and the Vichy government
. This group went on to feed information to the British.
The leaders of the resistance cell were betrayed and arrested in April 1941. Humbert then recruited Pierre Brossolette
to continue with the last number of Résistance before being arrested herself. The Museum group were sent to the harsh Cherche-Midi prison
and then Fresnes Prison
in Paris where they were tried by the Wehrmacht
and in February 1942, along with seven members of the group, sentenced to death. However she was transferred to the Prison de la Santé where conditions were better and she was visited by her son Pierre and her mother, but she learnt that the men had been put to death by firing squad (they sang "Vive la France" in their last moments). The women were sentenced to 5 years slave labor and deported to Anrath
prison in Germany. She was made to work in appalling conditions at the Phrix rayon
factory in Krefeld
: there workers died, went blind, and developed horrible skin conditions. After four years, in June 1945 she was liberated by the Third United States Army and her diary records how she took part in the "Nazi Hunt
" at Wanfried
in 1945. She set up soup kitchens for refugees and expressly stated that everyone was to get a share, even the German civilians. Later she helped to start the denazification
process.
After the war Humbert refused to return to work at the Museum. Though her health had been affected by her experiences, she continued to write books on art. In 1949 she was awarded the Croix de Guerre
with silver gilt palm for heroism. She spent her final years with her son Pierre in the village of Valmondois
and is buried in the cemetery there.
She published her diary under the title Notre Guerre in 1946. This was later reissued as well as being translated into English by Barbara Mellor under the title: Résistance.
Her Journal:
French Resistance
The French Resistance is the name used to denote the collection of French resistance movements that fought against the Nazi German occupation of France and against the collaborationist Vichy régime during World War II...
during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
.
Early life
Humbert was born in DieppeDieppe, Seine-Maritime
Dieppe is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in France. In 1999, the population of the whole Dieppe urban area was 81,419.A port on the English Channel, famous for its scallops, and with a regular ferry service from the Gare Maritime to Newhaven in England, Dieppe also has a popular pebbled...
, France, daughter of French senator Charles Humbert
Charles Humbert
Charles Humbert was a French army captain, tax collector, Senator and newspaper proprietor.-Biography:...
and English author Mabel Wells Annie Rooke.
She spent her childhood in Paris, where she studied painting and design. In 1916 she married Egyptian artist Georges Hanna Sabbagh
Georges Hanna Sabbagh
-Biography:Georges Hanna Sabbagh was born at Alexandria in Egypt. He studied art in Paris, being the first Egyptian at the Louvre School. He was a pupil of Paul Sérusier, Félix Vallotton and the Symbolist painter Maurice Denis...
(1877–1951), by whom she had two sons: Jean Sabbagh, a sub-mariner and advisor to General Charles de Gaulle
Charles de Gaulle
Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle was a French general and statesman who led the Free French Forces during World War II. He later founded the French Fifth Republic in 1958 and served as its first President from 1959 to 1969....
, and television director and producer Pierre Sabbagh
Pierre Sabbagh
Pierre Sabbagh was a major personality in French television, as a journalist, producer and director.Pierre Alain Sabbagh was born in Lannion and died in Paris...
. From 1929 she studied the history of art at the Sorbonne
Sorbonne
The Sorbonne is an edifice of the Latin Quarter, in Paris, France, which has been the historical house of the former University of Paris...
and at the Louvre
Louvre
The Musée du Louvre – in English, the Louvre Museum or simply the Louvre – is one of the world's largest museums, the most visited art museum in the world and a historic monument. A central landmark of Paris, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the 1st arrondissement...
school, and took a course in philosophy. Agnès and Georges divorced in 1934. Her first book was on the painter Louis David, published in 1936. She then worked as an Art historian at the Musée National des Arts et Traditions Populaires
Musée national des Arts et Traditions Populaires
The Musée national des Arts et Traditions Populaires was a museum of the popular arts and traditions of France. It was located at 6, avenue du Mahatma Gandhi, Paris, France, but is now permanently closed to the public...
in Paris, and broadcast on art on Radio Paris
Radio Paris
Radio Paris was a French radio broadcasting company best known for its Axis propaganda broadcasts in Vichy France during World War II.Radio Paris evolved from the first private radio station in France, called Radiola, founded by pioneering French engineer Émile Girardeau in 1922...
at the start of 1936.
Wartime resistance
A few days after the fall of Paris on 14 June 1940, Humbert heard an appeal by General de Gaulle on the BBC's Radio FranceRadio France
Radio France is a French public service radio broadcaster.-Mission:Radio France's two principal missions are:* To create and expand the programming on all of their stations; and...
encouraging the people to France to continue the struggle against the occupying Germans and Philippe Pétain
Philippe Pétain
Henri Philippe Benoni Omer Joseph Pétain , generally known as Philippe Pétain or Marshal Pétain , was a French general who reached the distinction of Marshal of France, and was later Chief of State of Vichy France , from 1940 to 1944...
's Vichy government. It was offensive to her when books were removed from her library by the Germans, and German authors added. On 6 August a notice was fixed on the gateway of the Palais de Chaillot, ordering free entry to German soldiers, and she wrote in her diary that she told her colleague Jean Cassou
Jean Cassou
Jean Cassou was a French writer, art critic, poet and member of the French Resistance during World War II.- Biography :Jean Cassou was born at Deusto, near Bilbao,...
"I feel I will go mad, literally, if I don't do something!". So, with Boris Vildé
Boris Vildé
Boris Vildé was a linguist and ethnographer at the Musée de l'Homme, in Paris, France. He specialised in polar civilizations. He was born in St. Petersburg into a family of Eastern orthodox Russians. His family moved to Tartu, Estonia in 1919...
, Anatole Lewitsky
Anatole Lewitsky
Anatole Lewitsky was a French anthropologist and member of the French Resistance in World War II. He was head of the European-Asiatic department at the Musée de l'Homme, and a world authority on Siberian shamanism....
, Jean Cassou
Jean Cassou
Jean Cassou was a French writer, art critic, poet and member of the French Resistance during World War II.- Biography :Jean Cassou was born at Deusto, near Bilbao,...
and Yvonne Oddon
Yvonne Oddon
Yvonne Oddon was one of the leaders in the reformation of French libraries, and a member of the French Resistance in World War II.- Biography :Yvonne Oddon was born in Gap, Hautes-Alpes to a Protestant family...
she formed the Groupe du musée de l'Homme
Groupe du musée de l'Homme
The Groupe du musée de l'Homme was a movement in the French resistance to the Nazi occupation during the Second World War....
out of members of the Museum, the first resistance movement in occupied France. In a few months these pioneers built a highly diffuse underground network. Their action spread rapidly with the creation of a clandestine newsletter, Résistance, which had only five issues, between 15 December 1940 and the end of March 1941, with editorials (the first written by Boris Vildé) holding no illusions on Pétain
Philippe Pétain
Henri Philippe Benoni Omer Joseph Pétain , generally known as Philippe Pétain or Marshal Pétain , was a French general who reached the distinction of Marshal of France, and was later Chief of State of Vichy France , from 1940 to 1944...
and the Vichy government
Vichy France
Vichy France, Vichy Regime, or Vichy Government, are common terms used to describe the government of France that collaborated with the Axis powers from July 1940 to August 1944. This government succeeded the Third Republic and preceded the Provisional Government of the French Republic...
. This group went on to feed information to the British.
The leaders of the resistance cell were betrayed and arrested in April 1941. Humbert then recruited Pierre Brossolette
Pierre Brossolette
Pierre Brossolette was a French journalist, left-wing politician, a top leader and major hero of French Resistance.-Education and journalism:...
to continue with the last number of Résistance before being arrested herself. The Museum group were sent to the harsh Cherche-Midi prison
Cherche-Midi prison
The Cherche-Midi prison was a French military prison located in Paris, France. It housed military prisoners from 1851 until 1947.Construction on the prison began in 1847, when the former convent of the Daughters of the Good Shepherd was demolished on Rue du Cherche-Midi in Paris...
and then Fresnes Prison
Fresnes Prison
Fresnes Prison is the second largest prison in France, located in the town of Fresnes, Val-de-Marne South of Paris...
in Paris where they were tried by the Wehrmacht
Wehrmacht
The Wehrmacht – from , to defend and , the might/power) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the Heer , the Kriegsmarine and the Luftwaffe .-Origin and use of the term:...
and in February 1942, along with seven members of the group, sentenced to death. However she was transferred to the Prison de la Santé where conditions were better and she was visited by her son Pierre and her mother, but she learnt that the men had been put to death by firing squad (they sang "Vive la France" in their last moments). The women were sentenced to 5 years slave labor and deported to Anrath
Willich
Willich is a town in the district of Viersen, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located near the cities of Düsseldorf, Mönchengladbach and Krefeld, about 30 kilometres from the border with the Netherlands.-History:...
prison in Germany. She was made to work in appalling conditions at the Phrix rayon
Rayon
Rayon is a manufactured regenerated cellulose fiber. Because it is produced from naturally occurring polymers, it is neither a truly synthetic fiber nor a natural fiber; it is a semi-synthetic or artificial fiber. Rayon is known by the names viscose rayon and art silk in the textile industry...
factory in Krefeld
Krefeld
Krefeld , also known as Crefeld until 1929, is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located northwest of Düsseldorf, its centre lying just a few kilometres to the west of the River Rhine; the borough of Uerdingen is situated directly on the Rhine...
: there workers died, went blind, and developed horrible skin conditions. After four years, in June 1945 she was liberated by the Third United States Army and her diary records how she took part in the "Nazi Hunt
Nazi hunter
A Nazi-hunter is a private individual who tracks down and gathers information on alleged former Nazis, SS members and Nazi collaborators involved in the Holocaust, typically for use at trial on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity...
" at Wanfried
Wanfried
Wanfried is a town in the Werra-Meißner-Kreis in northeasternmost Hesse, Germany. It is classified as a Landstadt, a designation given in Germany to a municipality that is officially a town , but whose population is below 5,000. It literally means “country town”.-Location:The town lies right on the...
in 1945. She set up soup kitchens for refugees and expressly stated that everyone was to get a share, even the German civilians. Later she helped to start the denazification
Denazification
Denazification was an Allied initiative to rid German and Austrian society, culture, press, economy, judiciary, and politics of any remnants of the National Socialist ideology. It was carried out specifically by removing those involved from positions of influence and by disbanding or rendering...
process.
Post-war
Croix de guerre
The Croix de guerre is a military decoration of France. It was first created in 1915 and consists of a square-cross medal on two crossed swords, hanging from a ribbon with various degree pins. The decoration was awarded during World War I, again in World War II, and in other conflicts...
with silver gilt palm for heroism. She spent her final years with her son Pierre in the village of Valmondois
Valmondois
Valmondois is a commune in the Val-d'Oise department in Île-de-France in northern France.-Local attractions:*Musée des tramways à vapeur et des chemins de fer secondaires français* Musée de la Meunerie-References:** -External links:* * *...
and is buried in the cemetery there.
She published her diary under the title Notre Guerre in 1946. This was later reissued as well as being translated into English by Barbara Mellor under the title: Résistance.
Publications
- Agnès Humbert, Louis David, peintre et conventionnel: essai de critique marxiste, ParisParisParis is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, Editions sociales internationales, 1936 - Agnès Humbert (introduction), L. Chevojon (photographs), Le Musée National d'Art ModerneMusée National d'Art ModerneThe Musée National d'Art Moderne is the national museum for modern art of France. It is located in Paris and is housed in the Centre Pompidou in the 4th arrondissement of the city. Created in 1947, it was then housed in the Palais de Tokyo and moved to its current location in 1977...
: Peinture, sculpture, Paris, Musée National d'Art Moderne, 1948 - Agnès Humbert and Nadeshda Ferber, Die französische Malerei von den Anfängen zum Impressionismus ("French painting from the beginnings of ImpressionismImpressionismImpressionism was a 19th-century art movement that originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s...
"), 30 illustrations, BerlinBerlinBerlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, Minerva-Verlag, 1949 - Agnès Humbert, Vu et entendu en Yougoslavie ("Seen and heard in YugoslaviaYugoslaviaYugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....
"), Paris, Deux-Rives, 1950 - Henri BarbusseHenri BarbusseHenri Barbusse was a French novelist and a member of the French Communist Party.-Life:...
, Agnès Humbert and Max Lingner, Max Lingner, 30 reproductions, Berlin, Deutsche Akademie der KünsteAkademie der KünsteThe Akademie der Künste, Berlin is an arts institution in Berlin, Germany. It was founded in 1696 by Elector Frederick III of Brandenburg as the Prussian Academy of Arts, an academic institution where members could meet and discuss and share ideas...
, 1950 - Agnès Humbert, (preface by Jean Cassou), Les NabisNabisNabis was ruler of Sparta from 207 BC to 192 BC, during the years of the First and Second Macedonian Wars and the War against Nabis. After taking the throne by executing two claimants, he began rebuilding Sparta's power. During the Second Macedonian War, he sided with King Philip V of Macedon and...
et leur epoque 1888-1900, 51 plates, Genève, Pierre Callier, 1954 - Agnès Humbert, (introduction in French and English), La Sculpture Contemporaine au Musée National d'Art Moderne de Paris, Paris, Albert Morancé, 1954
- Gaston Diehl (notes by Agnès Humbert), Henri MatisseHenri MatisseHenri Matisse was a French artist, known for his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known primarily as a painter...
, 140 colour plates and illustrations, Paris, Pierre Tisné, 1954 (also New York, Universe Books, 1958) - Agnès Humbert, Henri Matisse, dessins, pocket edition with 42 drawings, Paris, Fernand Hazan, 1956
- Agnès Humbert, Louis David: peintre et conventionnel, 60 illustrations, Paris, Braun, 1960
- Agnès Humbert (photographs by Guy de Belleval, tr. Joan Dalrymple), Contemporary Painters: Jean-Jacques Morvan, Genève, Rene Kister, 1962
- Agnès Humbert, Exposition Maurice DenisMaurice DenisMaurice Denis was a French painter and writer, and a member of the Symbolist and Les Nabis movements. His theories contributed to the foundations of cubism, fauvism, and abstract art.-Childhood and education:...
: Peintures, aquarelles, dessins, lithographies. Du 28 juin au 29 septembre 1963 notes to exhibition catalogue, Albi, Musée Toulouse-Lautrec, 1963
Her Journal:
- Agnès Humbert (introduction by Julien Blanc), Notre guerre: Souvenirs de Résistance, Paris 1940-41, 2ème éd., Tallandier, 2004 (in French) Published in 1946, on the return from her detention.
External links
- Bold defiance in Nazi Paris
- Bloomsbury Publishing Agnès Humbert, (tr. Barbara Mellor) Résistance: Memoirs of Occupied France
- Audio Editions Agnès Humbert, (tr. Barbara Mellor) Résistance: Memoirs of Occupied France Reader: Joyce Bean