Digitally Mapping Colonial Fighters in the French Resistance

In this blog post, DCCH Interns Stella Burgon and Jeremy Nunn reflect on their experience of following the lives and military careers of Colonial subjects in the French Resistance during the Second World War, and mapping these through digital methods. 

Introduction

Nina Wardleworth’s archival research has identified over 2,500 colonial soldiers who were involved in the French Resistance. Yet the contributions of these non-European resistants have been systematically ignored, and many of the most widely read histories of the Resistance make no mention of them. These omissions from the historical record are only just being corrected in research, hence Nina’s initiative to create public history materials so this information reaches a non-specialist audience.

At the beginning of the internship, Nina gave us a spreadsheet full of names; some with dates and places attached, some had nothing at all, their stories having faded into the abyss. We were instructed to make a digital map displaying the birth places, movements during the Resistance and places of death. Early on in the internship, we refined our project goals to reflect the next academic year’s competition in French schools on the Concours National de la Resistance et de la Déportation. Encouraged by interest from France 24 journalist Stéphanie Trouillard, we worked to an internal deadline of the 27^th of May for the creation of the project website which ensured that our output could be used by students and teachers as classroom and research materials.

Background: About Us

Stella

Having no prior background in programming or the use of advanced software, this internship provided me with a great opportunity to learn new digital skills. Passionate about bringing underrepresented stories and voices to life from various historical periods, I applied this mindset to humanise the fighters rather than gather them into one data set. It is easy to lose sight of the experiences of those who fought during the war and Resistance, however my approach to this project helped to visualise the narratives in an engaging way for audiences by making ArcGIS StoryMaps and individual fact sheets.

Jeremy

My prior programming knowledge and computer skills were extremely relevant to this internship. My understanding of Nina’s mission and dataset led me to favour the big picture in my approach and focus on patterns of migration to France and involvement in the resistance. The data had to be consistent and organised to do this, which provided the perfect occasion to build on my previous experience and make my first big SQLite database project! Our maps complement each-other, as each tells a different aspect of the story.

The Database (Jeremy)

I struggled to design maps at first, as it was difficult to manipulate the inconsistent body of data stored in the spreadsheet. This arrangement required me to completely re-organise the spreadsheet every time I wanted to make a different map, which was time consuming and prone to errors. Eventually, I decided that we should migrate to an SQLite databse, solving these issues by allowing us to standardise data and making it easier to perform operations on it.

Designing an effective database structure required me to study the data Nina had gathered, which made me reflect on the scale of the colonial involvement in the resistance. The main thing that struck me about the dataset was how little we knew about some of these people. Of course, this makes sense given the documents used often were not written with the intention of precisely identifying all the individuals they mention. We do not know where almost half of the resistants were born, and of those whose place of birth is recorded, we know only the country. Nearly 60 of the resistants are recorded as born in Algeria.

We selected our mapping software carefully, based on criteria we set describing our needs and wants for the project. Following much experimentation with tools lacking in essential functionality, we settled on ArcGIS and ArcGIS StoryMaps to create the maps. ArcGIS is an advanced piece of software, offering all the target functionality, especially support for layers and different types of symbols – clickable to reveal information about individual resistants. It also supports making SQL queries straight from the application. This allowed me to analyse all of Nina’s data. My maps visually demonstrate how Algerians were dominant of colonial involvement in the resistance, and also that people originated from all over France’s empire.

 

Individual Stories (Stella)

StoryMaps

ArcGIS StoryMap proved a great software to visually trace the lives and journeys of individual colonial resistants due to its combination of photographic and written sources through the medium of an interactive map. It is inter-operable with other versions of ArcGIS, offering us the possibility to integrate both parts of the project. I started by making these interactive maps with the purpose of demonstrating the great distances that colonial fighters came from across the globe. The first map I made was on Mohammad Ouled Taleb, a halal butcher who used his business to conduct resistance activity. I found that zooming in on specific locations within Paris helped to visualise his resistance activities more clearly. I hope that this element will encourage engagement with school students as it offers them the opportunity to pinpoint where colonial resistance fighters lived or worked in relation to their own homes.

Click here to view more stories of Colonial fighters in the French Resistance (opens new window)

Fact Sheets

Since we wanted to cater to the needs of teachers and students, I compiled clear and detailed fact sheets on individual resistance fighters, made as accessible classroom handouts and downloadable pdfs, which you can view on the project website.

I have also recorded a podcast about Tanou Bematogoma, a soldier from Burkina Faso who led a group of fellow prisoners of war in the Arbeitskommando in Brittany to engage in resistance activity. This story reveals how colonial soldiers held important authoritative positions in actively resisting German power through destroying their machinery. Podcasting is another digital media that seeks to engage audiences in less academically focused ways, and I have further strengthened my skills in using various recording platforms such as Camtasia and Audacity.

Research trip to Paris

Thanks to the DCCH development fund, we had the opportunity to visit Paris and look at the primary sources Nina consulted for her research at the Paris Police Archives. Here, we spent time deciphering the arrest files of Mouloud Kaouane, a problematic figure due to his simultaneous membership of resistance and fascist groups. We also used this opportunity to visit the former home addresses of the resistants, where we took photos of street signs for future projects and ArcGIS StoryMaps. For instance, we visited 2 rue Cambronne, in the 15^th arrondissement where one of the Kaouane brothers lived. We also visited the Paris Mosque, which acted as a hub and meeting place for colonial Muslim communities during the war. These images have been used in the interactive maps to make them more engaging and visually appealing. You can follow our whistlestop tour of Paris in this vlog!

Reflections

We both feel privileged to have had the opportunity to work so closely with academics and university staff to engage with a real university research project in a quickly evolving field. Though it was often difficult to balance the internship work with our coursework and exams, we both found that DCCH gave us the flexibility to work around these deadlines and thus created a very positive work environment to pursue such an interesting project alongside university work. The internship has greatly complimented both our history degrees. We have built on our existing skills in historical narrative and programming, and become competent in complex mapping software, the use of archives, and the production of different media through blogs, vlogs, and podcasts.

Stella

This experience has furthered my interest in museum and library work to preserve understudied histories and promote public engagement with important historical narratives. I am now looking to start a career in the field of heritage and conservation. I have been inspired to pursue work in digital humanities, as it is a growing area of work whose goals are similar to those of this internship: democratising knowledge and improving public accessibility of information. This internship has allowed me to develop extremely relevant and valuable skills for these roles.

Jeremy

I still have two years left of university, so the start of my career is a little further off. Nevertheless, this internship has provided me with valuable skills I will certainly use in my future. Working on a public history project with academics and research professionals has improved my skills in everything from teamwork and project management to the use of advanced computer software. The uniqueness of the DCCH programme comes from its interdisciplinary link between traditional humanities subjects and technology. Curriculae often resist these links, so this is the first time I have been able to combine my digital skills with my knowledge of history, keeping a subject sometimes derided as old-fashioned relevant into the future.