The Story of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon: Community Resistance Against Authoritarianism
Two weeks ago, I shared five ways communities have resisted authoritarianism throughout history.
This week, I want pass along one specific story – and I hope it can give us a bit of inspiration to be bold and brave as we see Trumpian authoritarianism grow in our own country.
The (abbreviated) Story of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon:
In the late 1930s, south-central France began to experience a sizable increase in refugees fleeing Nazi Germany and post-Civil War Spain.
And for a farming region with only a few small towns, this presented a real, economic and cultural challenge.
At first, the town of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, one of the main population centers with roughly 4,000 residents, turned away many of the refugees. Spanish refugees were turned away so tourist season wouldn’t be impacted; Jewish refugees were rejected and many interned in the nearby French-run Gurs Internment Camp. The folks in town wanted to maintain their way of life, their comforts, their status quo.
But as the flow continued and the small town learned more and more of the brutalities of Nazi Germany and of the inhumane conditions at their own Gurs Internment Camp, perspectives slowly began to shift: people began accepting refugees into their homes and helping them escape into Switzerland.
And when Nazi Germany invaded France in 1940, residents of the town refused to stop their efforts, despite the massive danger it put them in.
Led by a local pastor and his wife, André and Magda Trocmé, the town sheltered 2,000 refugees over the course of five years.
André preached openly about the moral imperative to shelter refugees; Roger Darcissac, a schoolteacher, quietly forged identity documents for the newcomers, changing names and nationalities; Burns Chalmers organized funding to transition a vacant hotel into housing for the kids; Magda connected incoming refugees with families who would take them in.
The unspoken rule throughout the town was simple: see something? Say nothing. The less people knew, the safer it was for them.
Obviously forged papers? No problem.
Clearly fake names? Seems legit!
There was little organization beyond one-on-one conversations and even these were few and far between; this was a town of folks choosing, grounded in their religious and cultural values, to protect people.
When a local pastor was asked about what it was like, he said this:
We never really discussed refugees…we also never told parishioners that they were hosting Jews, who had become ‘non-Jews’ with their new identification papers…if they were hiding someone and were caught, they could always sincerely say, ‘I did not know he was Jewish.’
But it’s not like the Vichy and German governments didn’t know what was going on.
Police were sent several times between 1942 and 1943 to raid the town and came up empty nearly every time. When these raids occurred, residents and refugees did everything they could to hold strong to their stories and new identity documents or escape to hide in the countryside for weeks at a time. And the town certainly and intimately understood what was at stake: the one “successful” raid resulted in German police arresting 25 kids and Daniel Trocmé, André’s cousin, most of whom were then killed in Vichy or German camps.
When pressured by the authorities to sabotage the town’s efforts and turn people in, André bravely told them, “these people came here for help and for shelter. I am their shepherd, and a shepherd does not forsake his flock.”
Eventually, because of the stalwartness of the town’s residents and the bravery of its leaders, both German and Vichy police mostly gave up – turning away from the town and informally allowing them to continue.
A few lessons from Chambon:
To point out the obvious: the context of this story is radically different from today.
Le Chambon-sur-Lignon was a tight-knit farming town, rooted together by a shared Huguenot religious history, isolated from major French cities, and facing invasion from a fascist Nazi Germany. They had deeply enmeshed shared values that made it possible for communal understanding even without communication. On the other hand, most of us live in cities and don’t even know our neighbors’ names.
That said, I still think there are some really powerful lessons we can translate from this historical moment.
We can develop communities of resilience
In the midst of conflict and widespread harm, we don’t need to think on a city-wide or country-wide level for all things. Who is on your block? In your building? Who is within your circle of trust?
The residents of Chambon were necessarily knitted together through shared tradition and proximity; if we choose to do so, we can do the same. Each of us can issue an invitation of some kind: monthly potlucks, intentional friend chats, weekly Zooms, tool-sharing networks, regular neighborhood walks.
Find your people; create a rhythm of interaction; build relational resilience.
Shared values need to be named
One of the most important aspects of this story: the residents of Chambon did not accept the refugees from the very beginning; they turned them away because of fears about their economy and way of life. Their comforts.
But when one of their pastors, André Trocmé, had the courage to name their shared values, point to the facts on the ground, and remind them of their tradition, their behaviors shifted.
If you've ever been talking with someone and weren't sure where they stood politically, and then they said something that revealed you share the same values – you know that instant sense of relief and connection.
Let’s do that more. In conversations with folks around us and when we feel like a value or concern might be shared, name them. “I’m worried about what ICE is doing.” “I want to find ways to help our immigrant neighbors more.” “I think this is just wrong and I would love to find something to do about it.”
When we name our values, our concerns, and our dreams, we invite others to remember their own – and then we can work from that space of common humanity.
Don’t look away – look out for
In Chambon, the unwritten rule was: if you see something, protect our community through silence.
In our context, with ICE raids, military deployments to cities, and the daily creep of fascism into regular conversation, our unwritten (or now written, I guess) rule can be: we look out for each other and we don’t cooperate with systems that harm our neighbors.
This is easier said than done, so here are some ideas for what this can look like in practice: attend Know Your Rights trainings and Bystander Intervention trainings (like these free trainings presented by Right to Be), connect with your local immigrants-rights group and ask what is needed, show up at protests in the ways you can, and talk to your family, friends, your partner, and your circle of trust about what each of you will do when something happens. Prepare early with tangible action steps.
For me, the most amazing aspect of this story is that the town didn’t have one over-arching organization leading the way and their resistance wasn’t a top-down, individualistic initiative powered forward by one specific leader.
It was a community of folks leaning into the skills and resources they had, to help as many people as they could.
If folks had food, they’d share food. If a family had room in their home, they hid a child. If they had a friend on the way to Switzerland, they got connected and made sure the journey would be as safe as possible. Every individual was a normal person choosing to engage in a radical act of care.
And that’s how it became an entire town that resisted authoritarianism.
A note: I think it’s important to be careful with comparing our current moment to Nazi Germany. The two are not the same, although the rise of authoritarianism in all contexts have similarities.
Rather than focusing on the context of Nazi Germany, I think this story really illustrates the power of community and taking action, no matter how small, in the face of rising authoritarianism. And that’s a message I think is very important for us today.
