Scientific Information in Occupied France, 1940-1944

Abstract

The occupation of France by National Socialist Germany from 1940 to 1944 drastically altered France's position as one of the world's most scientifically advanced nations. French scientific resources, including scientists, laboratories, library collections, and documentation, became subject to the policies of the Third Reich. A variety of geopolitical and cultural factors prevented German policies toward French science and culture from being as harsh as German policies in eastern Europe. A Subgroup for Library Protection was established by the occupying forces to protect French library resources and make possible the Germans' maximum access to them. Two French-run indexing services to scientific literature flourished under the occupation: one, approved by the Germans and run by Jean Gérard, director of the Maison de la Chimie; and the other, published illegally by Jean Wyart, of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS). Wyart's Bulletin analytique depended on a network in Vichy France that supplied Allied journals as well as paper. Begun in 1940, it was the prototype for the CNRS's current abstract series, Bulletin signalétique (1956--).