Sagnier Marie

Sagnier, Marie File 2714 Marie Sagnier ran the dormitory of the residential high school for girls in Murat, in the département of Cantal. From 1939 to 1945, the school and its dormitory accepted approximately twenty youngsters who did not meet the admission criteria; some, because they were too young for high school and all, because they were Jewish. Admitting the youngsters provided them with shelter. One of the school’s mathematics teachers, Alice Ferrières (q.v.), referred them. Apart from Sagnier, no one was told the secret of their true identity, and when they arrived, they were given borrowed identities that they used until the end of the occupation. In November 1942, when all of France was occupied, German troops entered Murat and encamped in the main square, across from the school and its dormitory. Because of the school’s proximity, the Germans visited it frequently in search of Jewish residents or students in hiding. On every such occasion, Sagnier adamantly denied that her institution was sheltering Jewish girls. Every week she also submitted false reports to Vichy Government officials. Among the Jewish children who spent the war years in her institution were Erna Stern (from 1940 until the end of the occupation), Solange Factor (from January 1943 to July 1944), and Ruth Feldman and her sister (from 1942 to 1944). After the occupation, Marie Sagnier stayed on very friendly terms with several of “her” Jewish girls, whom she had protected during the occupation. On October 27, 1983, Yad Vashem recognized Marie Sagnier as Righteous Among the Nations.