The Hidden River: A Memoir of Resistance, Recovery, and Renewal

By Michel A. Marx

Real adventures are not always coming out of the make believe book factories.
Instead the most fascinating and entertaining one are generated by the life. The Hidden River is such a story. A very young man caught in the infernal maelstrom of the World War two, his struggle for survival in an environment of carnage, destruction and hopelessness and of his discovery that sometimes challenges in life are the tools that makes us understand that we are more than we think we are.
His adventures are endless, hard to believe but fascinating as they take us to a world few of us can imagine was existing. Victories are not always won by cloak and dagger plot. Sometime survival itself is the victory and endurance and resourcefulness are needed.
The war ended .By a miraculous set of events he was able to come to the USA, then meet Frank Lloyd Wright, the famous Architect, then go on with a normal life.
But his mental balance had been shattered and he was in need of healing and directions he went on another adventure, the one of self discovery.
From Frank Lloyd Wright he had glimpsed the world of beauty harmony and creativity.
Not enough for him for, he needed the reassurance that all was not misery and ugliness in the world.
A fateful meeting with Paramhansa Yogananda, the great Yogi, gave him the spiritual and mental direction he had been lacking .The new adventure of his Recovery is the last part of the book!

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Sep 25, 2012
• ISBN: 9781477268322

Michel A. Marx

Michel was born in Paris the youngest of four children, two brothers and a sister. His father died just before World War II. After the German invasion, the whole family worked in the Resistance. Jean, the eldest, was caught with a British agent in 1942 and deported. Pierre was shot in Paris, on Rue Bonaparte, in 1943when he attempted to deliver valuable information about the traffic of German ships and submarines. Marie Odile was then arrested and sent to Ravensbruck. Michel, at sixteen, started to participate in the planned evasion of Allied airmen shot in Europe. He helped some fifty of them to evade before he was caught by the Gestapo. For these activities during the war, he received many decorations, including the following: The US Presidential Medal of Freedom, given by President Truman The French Medal of Honor, at the highest rank of Officier The British Empire Medal The Belgian Medal de la Resistance The French Medal of the Resistance The French and Belgian Medal Militaire and Croix de Guerre He also received citations from: Dwight D. Eisenhower Air Field Marshall Alied Expeditionary force Field Marshal B. L. Montgomery

Book preview

The Hidden River

A Memoir of

Resistance, Recovery, and Renewal

Michel A. Marx

US%26UKLogoB%26Wnew.ai

AuthorHouse™

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.authorhouse.com

Phone: [phone]

© 2012 by Michel A. Marx. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 09/14/2012

ISBN: 978-1-4772-6593-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4772-6592-5 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4772-6832-2 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012916516

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

Preface

Preamble

April 23, 1945: Freedom

PART I: RESISTANCE

The German Invasion: Spring of 1944

Paris under the Occupation

The Life under the German Rule

The Awakening of the Resistance

Tragedy in the Paris Metro

The Revolt

The Arrest

The Prison of Fresnes

Interrogation and Torture

The Transit Camp of Compiegne

Auschwitz-Birkenau

Buchenwald and Flossenburg

Life in the Extermination Camps

Block 19

The Revier

The Escape

PART II

Recovery

The Return

France after the War

New Beginning

The USA

New York in 1947

Taliesin East and Frank Lloyd Wright

Taliesin West

The Story of the Chickens

San Francisco in the Fifties

Start of Professional Life

PART III

Renewal

The Healing Process

The Healing Tools

The Search for Truth

Epilogue

Brief Biography

Appendix The Resistance Organization

References :

Preface

I started writing this book as personal therapy to help me deal with the memories of a time when I was imprisoned in the extermination camps created by Hitler’s madness and subjected to the tortures of the Gestapo. The writing had a positive result, and with the help of a competent psychologist, I was able to recover from the symptoms of the trauma.

As I wrote the stories in Part I, it became clear to me that there was also a historical value in my recollection of these horrible events, and the book became a testimony to what happened in the last years of the war as lived by a young man caught in the maelstrom of the day-to-day events of that time.

Part II details the recovery process that started with the blessing to come to the United States at the end of 1947. It was then a country of vibrant hope for the future, and this hope helped me realize that life was not a nightmare after all! I spent my first years at Taliesin, and I am grateful to Frank Lloyd Wright for his support. Without his generous invitation to the United States, my recovery would have been doubtful.

Part III is a very private insight in my belief that we all have the power and the duty to help ourselves with the help of the infinite intelligence contained in the hidden river of spirit flowing through our souls. The help and guidance I received from Paramhansa Yogananda in 1951and the wisdom of his teachings on that subject cannot be expressed in words.

Preamble

The history of World War II has been studied in great detail by many historians, and the events from 1939 to 1946 are well-known. What is not so well-known, or perhaps has been forgotten, is the everyday experience of ordinary people who lived during that period. We may have a more intimate knowledge of the tragedy and misery of that period if these witnesses, who are so few now, tell their stories. Their tales have historical value because they give us a view of these events through a personal window on that time. I hope they may also give us the resolve not to repeat these tragic mistakes in our future.

I lived during these years as a young boy and a young man, and now, many years later, I feel a sense of duty to share my memories and to tell the story of one of the darkest times of human history. It is also the story of the endurance of the spirit, of the triumph of hope over despair, and of the courage and fortitude of those people who understood the values of freedom, who recognized the threats presented to these values by misguided, negative, and often violent ideologies, and who then challenged these threats, often paying the price of their own lives.

Today we owe our liberties to these few dedicated souls and to the World War II generation, whose members fought the cloud of evil and the sick belief in the superiority of some people over others. We may well face another evil today: the ideology that some people’s religion and culture should imposed on the rest of the world at all cost. History tends to repeat itself if we forget its lessons. The new generation should be made aware that freedom is not free, that it should not be taken for granted, and that the civilized values we have preserved for them must be vigilantly defended if they want to enjoy these values in the future.

Finally, words are inadequate to describe the horror of the struggle for survival inside the insanity of the extermination camps. In the next pages, I tell the story of my own experience. There have been many instances of man’s inhumanity to man in history, but the purpose for these camps was unique: the destruction of millions of human beings in the most efficient, ruthless, and methodical way. Perhaps the memories of this witness may help to provide a sense of reality to these events.

April 23, 1945: Freedom

The Wehrmacht and the SS guards were gone. The dogs were silent. The camp and the jail had been evacuated of their miserable occupants a few days ago, all sent on a march to some other hell.

A few of us had been able to escape or to hide from the fury of the SS. Fearing the return of the dreaded torturers, we had set up a small secured area, gathered the many weapons left behind by the guards, and determined to face the enemy and to die fighting. We were a sorry-looking bunch of people of many nationalities but unified in a brotherhood born of shared trials and a life of horror.

The camp had an eerie silence now, but under that silence we could still feel and hear the everyday agony and terror of its former occupants.

Then from the Bavarian valley below emerged a strange rumbling. All night long this sound drifted closer and grew louder. Could it be what we all hoped for? Then we knew! It was the noise of liberation, the noise of the US tanks and armed vehicles coming up the steep grade from the valley through the small village of Flossenburg, where we had been forced to march in the streets, beaten all the way, on our journey to this hellish place.

And when we saw the first tank, with the star and the American flag on its side, appear at the last turn in the road, the meaning of this vision for all of us was that perhaps freedom and a new life could be ours after all!

The year was 1945. The location, the Nacht and Nebel extermination camp of Flossenburg.

PART I: RESISTANCE

The German Invasion: Spring of 1944

Today we are living in an era of unprecedented peace, and it is difficult to imagine what it must have been like for the generation at the beginning of the twentieth century to endure the horror of the First World War only to be faced some twenty years later with another world war of enormous destructive power.

My father was of that generation. In 1914 he left his family and the home in the Alsace that he loved so much to join the French army and to fight for an Alsace free of the German presence.

And he had hoped, with many others, that it would be the last world war.

But it was to be a horror of trenches, a butchery of young men on the battlefield at the River Marne and at Verdun. Four million men died on the French side alone.

My father was severely wounded and never fully recovered. But in the hospital where he was treated, a young nurse took care of him, and they started a romance.

This is the beginning of my story, for they were married after the war ended and had four children: Marie Odile, Jean, Pierre, and me, Michel. I was the youngest by quite a few years, which gave me privileges I thoroughly enjoyed: running in the woods, walking with my father when he went hunting, canoeing on the Marne. All good fun and rough physical training. I enjoyed these activities until my father died, shortly before the start of the Second World War.

He was a strong and gentle man with a good sense of humor, and everybody loved him. To add to the loss and heartbreak of missing him, we had to relocate from the country to an apartment in the center of Paris, and to a total change of lifestyle. But he passed on his dedication to freedom and spiritual values to all of us, as my story will tell.

The war started in October 1939, but the French population was in total denial of the reality of the situation, thinking they were safe behind the fortification called the Maginot Line. They had a rude awakening in the spring of 1940!

scan_06.jpg

The exodus.

The German army has broken through and is racing toward Paris! This news spread quickly, together with rumors of massacres and atrocities by the victorious German army. The ensuing panic started an exodus to the south of France, away from this new danger. This was deliberate disinformation leaked by the fifth column to send thousands of people onto the roads, blocking the movement of French troops.

My family also took to the road, pulling a plumber’s cart filled with belongings, walking for days and days. We would stop at night, sometimes at a farm or an abandoned house, always with a friendly but scared group of people, not knowing where this running away would take us all or when it would end.

Being young and carefree, I rather enjoyed this nomadic lifestyle, for it was much better than going to school!

But the memory of the savagery of the last war was still very present in many people’s minds, and it did not take much to summon the image of the Teutonic hordes terrorizing the country. That fear made them leave their material possessions behind, along with their common sense, for the danger of their running away was real. The planes of the Luftwaffe were always above, strafing for any sign of activity. Many civilians were killed, including my maternal uncle, who stayed with his horses to prevent them from bolting away.

The roads were filled with people walking, riding bicycles, or riding in farm carts pulled by plow horses. But trial sometimes brings people together, and despite the hardship, we all shared a sense of camaraderie, a brotherhood brought about by a common danger. Along the way we found houses left open with a sign: Help yourself to wine. Better you than the German. We did. Fine wine is always the best antidepressant for the French.

This was my first lesson: shared hardship and a good bottle of cabernet sauvignon do wonders to unite most people!

But the Panzer division did not stop for wine tasting, and soon the Tiger tanks had caught up with us. There was no sense in going any farther, and we stopped at a farm for a rest in the barns for which we were grateful.

These soldiers were the finest of the German army, and I remember standing in awe of these tall and handsome young men in black uniforms. Flushed with the arrogance of victory, and now with the rest of the world to conquer, they had the nonchalant kindness of the strong. They told us that we could now return to our homes. Most of them, I dare say, were later butchered or maimed in the plains of Russia for the whims and mistakes of their fuehrer.

A few trains with cattle cars were still running, and so we were able to return to Paris, to a different world, the one our father had known in his native Alsace. He had warned us that this world would test our spirit; now our country was occupied and ruled by a foreign power. Freedom was lost. It had all been all so sudden, so unexpected, and now the reality of the French defeat faced us.

Paris under the Occupation

Most cities have an aura created by their history, their environment, their architecture, the noises in the street, and of course, their inhabitants. Paris always had an intangible character of liveliness that gave it a special identity.

Now the essence of this identity seemed to have been cut off at its source, for the freedom that created it was gone, and now doom, gloom, and despair had replaced it.

scan_07.jpg

Invasion and defeat!

Streets were mostly deserted, and the only visible activity was the traffic of German tanks and vehicles. The air was filled with the realization that, in the last few days, life had been drastically changed and that tomorrow was uncertain for all of us.

We lived in the Left Bank, on Rue de Sevres, and back in the apartment we tried to return to some sort of normalcy. Food was very scarce and gas and electricity available only a few hours during the day, so we had no hot water, and we had to get used to cold showers.

But the real heartbreak was to see our beautiful city literally under the boots of the German invaders. We learned that we had to move out of the way of the gray uniforms and to beware of the shiny boots and brass and immense arrogance of the SS officers. The fear that a false move could have fatal consequences and the dread of being at the mercy of the superior race became a torment that we knew would be with us for a long time. Paris’s