Lest Innocent Blood Be Shed

Trocmé, the pastor of Le Chambon, was the driving force behind the nonviolent resistance in the village. In many ways, the book is a story of Trocmé’s life and his service to the world around him. The text regularly relates his physical stature and appearance to his personality and the leadership he offered his family and parishioners. Hallie, relating the characterization he received from those who knew Trocmé best, describes him as a “big” man who “moved […] by bursts and leaps” (18). This description of his physicality reveals a man full of energy and passion who threw himself full force into every action he took. However, he was also deeply genuine in all his actions and words. When he visited his flock before and during the occupation, they said that “[i]n the intimacy of a home his excitement and his drivingly penetrating blue eyes drew his parishioners to him” (17). He inspired massive loyalty in all those who came to know him, so much so that the villagers of a sleepy mountain village were willing to defy the laws of the government and even the edicts of the church to stand by him.

His background was also important to his personality and his belief system:

On his father’s side, he was a descendent of a long line of Huguenots (one of his ancestors is rumored in the family to have been one of the original followers of John Calvin in the sixteenth century) […] His energies were immense, whether they took the form of sometimes embarrassing affection or of equally embarrassing anger (19).

Trocmé’s tendency to feel fiery emotions partially shaped his devotion to nonviolence. Because he had felt the temptation to give in to anger and act violently, he saw the redemptive potential in perpetrators of violence and thus advocated against any violence even against seemingly evil people. Although his faith was the primary driving factor in his life from childhood, the death of his son challenged that faith. Additionally, his experiences as leader of Le Chambon effected a change in his personality, and he became more authoritarian and less communitarian after the war.

An Italian woman, Magda was the same age as her husband, André Trocmé. She had dark hair that she wore in braids on her head, likely to keep it out of her way. She worked incredibly hard throughout her life and rarely wavered, even when her body was weary with exhaustion: “[H]er great energies—fully as great as her husband’s—took the form of unending, compulsively scrupulous work on behalf of any person—child or adult—who needed warmth and food” (19). The book describes Magda as practical and pragmatic, with little patience for anyone unwilling to do necessary labor. During the occupation, she regularly put herself and her family at risk to help those in need, but in relating the stories of that time, she refused to engage with questions of morality:

Her ‘principle’ did not involve any abstract theories, but only a feeling of responsibility to particular people—first of all to her husband, and next to anybody who happened to come to the door of the presbytery. And this feeling is not one of overflowing affection; it is practical and abrupt, like Magda herself (153).

Her experience in Italy shaped her relationship with religion, and when she met Trocmé in New York City, she was far more secularly inclined than he was. As a younger woman, she was forced into a convent and saw the potential hypocrisy of religion. Just as she was practical about helping refugees, she was practical about faith and belief. Her husband was a pastor, and therefore she honored his beliefs. However, the death of her son Jean-Pierre destroyed any faith she might have maintained. After his death, she never attended a church service again. However, even though Magda and Trocmé differed in their relationships to faith in God, she had an unerring and unending faith in her husband. They remained happily married until his death, and it was primarily Magda who told Hallie the story of Trocmé and Le Chambon.

The other spiritual leader of Le Chambon, Theis, was a great friend of Trocmé and came to Le Chambon when Trocmé started the Cévenol school to serve as its main administrator. Along with Trocmé and Magda, Theis and his wife were instrumental in creating the organization and network necessary to rescue refugees in Le Chambon. Theis, along with Magda, facilitated Hallie’s interviews and research in Le Chambon. Like Trocmé, he is described as a big man: “the ‘rock of Le Chambon,’ the massive presence with a full, almost round face and big, heavy shoulders” (5). However, whereas Trocmé was fiery, thrusting himself forcefully through the world, Theis was quiet and solid. Though he spoke multiple languages and had served in Africa as a teacher and missionary, he and his wife, Mildred, were both mild-mannered but solidly committed to faith and aid. Notably, Theis spent his time hiding from the Gestapo in service, putting himself at great risk to help refugees escape from France to Switzerland. When Hallie walked with him 30 years later, the man’s calming presence allowed Hallie to imagine how safe other Jews must have felt with him while he led them to safety.