Œuvre de secours aux enfants

The smuggling of OSE children into Switzerland started in April 1943, following negotiations with the Swiss authorities for the arrival of unaccompanied children. Several smugglers working directly under the OSE were assigned for this purpose. Jenny Masour together with Robert Job and the heads of OSE houses chose particularly vulnerable children. These children were sent to new homes in the Italian zone, Moutiers-Salins and Saint Paul in the Chablais; or in groups of 6 to 10 to Switzerland. In August 1943, the number of smuggling parties was increased from the evacuation residence centers in Saint-Gervais and Megeve.

In September 1943, with the push of the Germans into the Italian zone, the task became more difficult. The organization of the smuggling-parties to Switzerland was now entrusted to Georges Loinger. After successive arrests from November 1943 to March 1944, the smuggling of children almost came to a stop. In March 1944 they resume at an accelerated rate, carried out jointly by the OSE, the Sixth (the clandestine circuit EIF) and the Zionist youth Movement (MJS).

OSE develops residential-educational facilities

Of the temporary shelters that existed at the beginning of the war, 14 chateaux-mansions, whether lay or religious, became places where instruction was given in school-subjects, vocational education together with ORT ("Society for Trades and Agricultural Labor,") and in leisure and in sports. Georges Loinger formed a team of instructors, and organized sports competitions within the houses and between houses, so as to prevent the children from living in the stress of confinement, and to prepare for the future.

Spring-Summer 1943: The Garel clandestine network of escape routes

After the famous "Night of Vénissieux" (near Lyon) in August 1942, during which 108 OSE children were saved from capture and deportation, Joseph Weill used Georges Garel, a French Jewish Combat Engineer, to organize a secret network of escape routes (Underground Railways) for the transport of children. Despite many difficulties, Garel completed the network, which covered four major regions of the Southern Vichy Zone (except around Nice), and it was operational by the summer of 1943. None-the-less the final closing of all the houses, however, took more than a year. Each region operated in a cell and was autonomous, under the direction of an area manager.

From Lyon, Georges Garel coordinated everything, organized the technical infrastructure (false papers, hiding-places, convoys), and managed connections with all the relevant co-workers. Constantly moving, it took political decisions, visits in the regions, and bringing money to overcome arrests. Families, convents and boarding schools were prepared and made ready for the OSE children, whose identity-papers had been falsified, and who had had their ties with their parents cut. This was done through personal contacts with Monsignor Saliège, the Archbishop of Toulouse, and also assistants in both the Jewish and non-Jewish networks.