Marcelle MAY

Marcelle Flore May, née Franck, was born on February 29,1892 in the 3rd district of Paris[1]. She was a French citizen and her family came from the Alsace region of France. Her parents were Gustave Franck[2], who was born in 1859 and Zoé Bickert[3], who used the French version of her name, Zoé Picard, and was born in 1872[4]. Both of them died in 1944[5].

Marcelle Flore Franck married Roger Alphonse May on July 1, 1920 in the 5th district of Paris[6]. Roger May[7], was born on October 8, 1891 in the 10th district of Paris[8] and died on April 30, 1964 in the 12th district of Paris, twenty years after Marcelle. He was a leather merchant, but there is no record of Marcelle’s occupation.

The couple had two children, Denise, who was born on June 11, 1921 and Janine[9] who was born on July 10, 1923[10], but other than that, we have no details about their family life. When Marcelle was arrested, Denise was 23 and Janine had just turned 21. We do not know where they went or what happened to them during the war, but they were not arrested at their parents’ home, so we assume they were no longer living there at the time. However, by 1947, when Janine applied to have her parents officially declared as having been deported, she was already married and using the surname Aragier. She described herself as Marcelle and Roger’s “descendant”.

On Monday July 10, 1944[11], at around 11:00 a.m., Marcelle May, who was 52 years old at the time, was arrested on the rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis in Paris. The reason given at the time was that she was not wearing her yellow star, which identified her as Jew, correctly: her star was pinned, rather than sewn, onto her clothing. The police were very strict with Jews in those days, and often arrested them without any legally “valid” reason. She was thus arrested and interned on grounds of her “race”, which is confirmed on an official verification form and on her death certificate, which bears the words “déporté politique”, meaning “political deportee”.

Marcelle May was sent to Drancy internment camp the following day[12]. She spent 21 days there before being deported to Auschwitz on July 31, 1944 on Convoy 77, which was the last major transport of Jews from Drancy. There were 986 men and women aboard the train, including Marcelle May, along with 324 children, all bound for the Auschwitz concentration camp and killing center. There are no official records about how, when and where exactly Marcelle died, but according to a ruling issued by the Civil Court of the Seine department of France in 1948, she was executed immediately after she arrived in Auschwitz. In France, the official date for the death for people who were deported to Auschwitz but were not selected to go into the concentration camp to work is August 5, 1944[13].

Of the 1306 people deported on Convoy 77, 836 were sent to the gas chambers and murdered as soon as they arrived in Auschwitz.

Marcelle May was one of the countless Holocaust victims whose tragic story bears witness to the Nazi’s ruthlessness and the injustice of their persecution of the Jews. Her story, like that of so many other victims, must be kept alive and passed on to future generations, both as a reminder of the horrific atrocities that took place and to serve as a warning against allowing them to ever happen again.

In 1947, Janine, Marcelle’s younger daughter, applied to have her parents, Roger and Marcelle, officially acknowledged as political deportees. On August 3, 1964, the authorities declared that Marcelle had vanished and died during deportation. The report[14] states that Denise, Marcelle’s older daughter, had not given her consent for the research into what had become of her mother. Marcelle May was granted political deportee status nevertheless, and the reason given was that she was an “Israélite”, meaning “Jewish”[15].

Both daughters refused to sign powers of attorney to have their mother declared “deceased”[16]. They simply wanted to have her declared as having been deported to Poland. This highlights the fact that they wanted the French State to acknowledge its role in the deportation of their parents.

Notes & References

[1] File on Marcelle May, © Victims of Contemporary Conflicts Archives Division of the Ministry of Defense Historical Service, in Caen, ref. 21 P 514 604 5.

[2] Gustave Franck was born on June 24, 1859 and died on September 27, 1944 in Paris.

[3] Zoé Picard was born on September 1, 1872 in Paris and died on August 28, 1944, also in Paris.

[4] Marcelle May’s birth certificate, © Victims of Contemporary Conflicts Archives Division of the Ministry of Defense Historical Service, in Caen, ref. 21 P 514 604 20.

[5] Family tree, from the geneanet website: https://gw.geneanet.org/jeanmarcil?lang=en&n=franck&p=marcelle+flore+gustave

[6]  Marcelle May’s marriage certificate, including her parents’ names, issued in December 1946.

[7]  Roger May’s father, Edouard May, was born on December 15, 1861 in Metz, in the Moselle department of France, and died in 1922 in the 12th district of Paris. Roger May’s mother, Jeanne Camille Netter, was born on February 25, 1860 in the Haut-Rhin department in the Alsace region of France, and died in 1922.

[8]  Roger Alphonse May’s birth certificate, from the geneanet website:

https://gw.geneanet.org/pgflacsu?n=may&oc=&p=roger+alphonse

[9] Marcelle May, © Victims of Contemporary Conflicts Archives Division of the Ministry of Defense Historical Service, in Caen, ref. 21 P 514 604 43.

[10] File on Marcelle May, © Victims of Contemporary Conflicts Archives Division of the Ministry of Defense Historical Service, in Caen, ref. 21 P 514 604 33. Request dated October 2, 1947 in the name of Janine Aragier, Marcelle’s younger daughter.

[11] File on Marcelle May, © Victims of Contemporary Conflicts Archives Division of the Ministry of Defense Historical Service, in Caen, ref. 21 P 514 604 18.

[12] File on Marcelle May, © Victims of Contemporary Conflicts Archives Division of the Ministry of Defense Historical Service, in Caen, ref. 21 P 514 604 40.

[13] A missing person’s certificate dated February 28, 1947 was issued in advance of the official death certificate, dated May 28, 1948, which states that Marcelle May was deemed to have died during deportation.

[14] File on Marcelle May, © Victims of Contemporary Conflicts Archives Division of the Ministry of Defense Historical Service, in Caen, ref. 21 P 514 604 37.

[15] File on Marcelle May, © Victims of Contemporary Conflicts Archives Division of the Ministry of Defense Historical Service, in Caen, ref. 21 P 514 604 38, dated June 8, 1964.

[16] File on Marcelle May, © Victims of Contemporary Conflicts Archives Division of the Ministry of Defense Historical Service, in Caen, ref. 21 P 514 604 18 45, 46 et 47.