Jews of the Somme

The decisions of the expert appraisers could sometimes lead to paradoxical outcomes.

Maurice Thorel and Z. Carpentier were twice called in to determine whether a family of Jews could be allowed to remain in an apartment which was structurally part of a building in which the commercial premises had already been “aryanized .“  Jacques Aranias, 5 rue Porion, pleaded with the prefect that his family be permitted to stay in their apartment after their work clothes business had been turned over to non-Jewish ownership. Thorel and Carpentier decided, however, that the apartment was not structurally independent enough of the business space to be able to qualify for a technical exemption, and the Aranias family were forced to move out.  The architects decided a similar case in Cayeux-sur-Mer on the Picard coast where Armand and Fanny Dreyfus lived in an apartment on the second floor of their general store  (“Les Nouvelles Galeries Modernes”) whose stock had been liquidated. They too petitioned the prefect to be able to remain in their apartment, though being harassed by the administrator Mr. Bouderlique anxious to try and sell the building, who felt that the presence of a tenant and a independent apartment would be an obstacle to the sale. In this case, the architects decided, as shown in their blueprints/floor plans, that the residence was structurally independent, and the 70 year old husband and his 61 year old wife were allowed to remain. Staying on in Cayeux, however, Armand and Fanny Dreyfus were caught in the rafle of January 1944 in the Somme and were transported via Drancy to Auschwitz where they perished.  By contrast, the Aranias family, after being expelled from their apartment in Amiens because it was not deemed structurally independent of the business, found shelter in Paris where they managed somehow to avoid arrest and returned to Amiens to reclaim their property after the war.