Summary of Caroline Moorehead's A Train in Winter

By IRB Media

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Book Preview:

#1 The French were shocked by the speed of the German victory, and how young and healthy the troops looked. They were stunned by the fact that a nation whose military valour was epitomized by the battle of Verdun in the First World War and whose defences had been guaranteed by the supposedly impregnable Maginot line, had been reduced to a state of vassalage in just six weeks.

#2 The first signs of German behavior were reassuring. The French were told to respect property, and the Germans took control of the telephone exchange and the railways. The French were relieved, and handed in their weapons.

#3 The terms of the armistice, which were signed after 27 hours of negotiations in the clearing at Rethondes in the forest of Compiègne, were brutal. The German military defeat was signed at the end of the First World War in 1918, and France was now being divided up between them and the Italians.

#4 The Germans had been preparing for the occupation of France for quite some time. They had prepared a thousand railway officials to supervise the running of the trains, and they had prepared a group of twenty men to infiltrate and interrogate.

• Language: English
• Publisher: IRB Media
• Release date: May 7, 2022
• ISBN: 9798822507074

IRB Media

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Insights on Caroline Moorehead's A Train in Winter

Contents

Insights from Chapter 1

Insights from Chapter 2

Insights from Chapter 3

Insights from Chapter 4

Insights from Chapter 5

Insights from Chapter 6

Insights from Chapter 7

Insights from Chapter 8

Insights from Chapter 9

Insights from Chapter 10

Insights from Chapter 11

Insights from Chapter 12

Insights from Chapter 13

Insights from Chapter 14

Insights from Chapter 15

Insights from Chapter 1

#1

The French were shocked by the speed of the German victory, and how young and healthy the troops looked. They were stunned by the fact that a nation whose military valour was epitomized by the battle of Verdun in the First World War and whose defences had been guaranteed by the supposedly impregnable Maginot line, had been reduced to a state of vassalage in just six weeks.

#2

The first signs of German behavior were reassuring. The French were told to respect property, and the Germans took control of the telephone exchange and the railways. The French were relieved, and handed in their weapons.

#3

The terms of the armistice, which were signed after 27 hours of negotiations in the clearing at Rethondes in the forest of Compiègne, were brutal. The German military defeat was signed at the end of the First World War in 1918, and France was now being divided up between them and the Italians.

#4

The Germans had been preparing for the occupation of France for quite some time. They had prepared a thousand railway officials to supervise the running of the trains, and they had prepared a group of twenty men to infiltrate and interrogate.

#5

The French police, who had initially been ordered to surrender their weapons to the Germans, were soon told to take them back. The German occupation was a step towards the domination, ruling, and exploitation of France.

#6

France had been the first country to emancipate and integrate its Jews as French citizens. But after the German invasion, posters were seen on Parisian walls with the words Our enemy is the Jew. Many foreigners remained in France, but they were now stateless, without protection and extremely vulnerable.

#7

The treatment of the political exiles caused little protest. The French were becoming resourceful. They began making ersatz food items out of wood and charcoal, and they crushed grape pips for oil.

#8

The French occupation of Germany was a miserable affair. The Germans were not allowed to learn about the outside world, and they were given a list of banned books that included anything written by a Jew, a communist, an Anglo-Saxon writer, or a Freemason.

Insights from Chapter 2

#1

The first acts of resistance were small, spontaneous and ill-coordinated, carried out by individuals acting out of personal feelings of rebellion and shame. The