Julien Reppel - 1917 - 1945
Julien was born in the Alsatian village of Mussig on July 19th, 1917. Julien was the 3rd of 6 sons and 1 daughter born to René and Elise Reppel.
Julien's father owned the village bakery/store. As was common in those days, in addition to running the bakery, René worked his land and kept animals including cows, pigs and chickens. Julien and his brothers were required to help with the family business, including the bakery, the fields and caring for the animals.
When Julien came of age, he was sent to the local school to learn to read and write. He went to the local Catholic church to receive his religious education.
Julien must have shown some aptitude for the bakery trade. His parents decided the train Julien as a baker and destined Julien to inherit the family bakery. It may sound strange that as the third of six sons that his parents selected Julien to inherit the family bakery. His oldest brother Marcel was a scholar and was sent to off to college. Maurice, the second eldest, showed appitude with the field work and was being trained to be a farmer.
To prepare Julien to inherit the family bakery, he needed to learn the bakery trade. In October 1933 at the age of 16, he began a 2 year apprenticeship.
He studied the trade under the tutelage of his his father René, a Master Baker. He successfully passed the journeyman exam on 16 September 1935 at the age of 18.
Less than one year later, his father René, a 51 year old baker, ill for some time, died on July 19th, 1936 at Colmar where he had been hospitalized. Julien along with his mother Elise assumed responsibility for the continued operation of the family bakery.
As required by law, Julien performed two years of military service in the French army between 1937 and 1939. During this time his younger brothers manned the ovens to bake the bread. Prior to modern equipment, making bread required physical strength and the young lads were up to the challenge.
In the 1930’s international tension continued to rise as Hitler and the Nazis came to power. At the end of summer 1939 the storm broke. On September 1st: Germany invaded Poland. On September 2,, France issued a general mobilization decree before declaring war on Germany the following day.
Julian along with the other young Frenchmen was recalled to active duty in September 1939. According to his brother Edmond, Julien was engaged in the fighting on the coast of Sedan and Verdun. He was taken prisoner, and spent a fortnight in prison camps before being released as Alsatian-Lorrain at the beginning of summer in 1940.
After his release, Julien returned home to Mussig. I’m sure he hoped life would return to normal. But life under the Nazis was barely tolerable. The Nazi’s believed the Alsatians would be glad to be German rather than French. They sought to systemically remove all signs of France.
In July of 1940, names of businesses were converted from French to German. The family bakery Boulangerie became a Bäckerei. In August of 1940, the Germans changed personal names from the French to German. At that point Julien became Julius. Being a trained French baker and baking French bread resulted in a series of harassments for the family. The Reppel family was consider to be Francophiles and politically unreliable.
By the middle of 1942, the war had taken a toll on the German army; the Nazis felt the need for additional troop on the Eastern Front. On August 25, 1942, the regional governor announced mandatory military service for young Alsatian men.
Julien’s younger brother Edmond was the first of the family to receive the dismal fate. He was called into the RAD (Reich Labor Service) in October 1942, and was sent to the Wehrmacht (German Army) in January 1943. In January 1943, the Nazis decreed to the conscription of classes 1934 to 1939 into the Wehrmacht (German Army). This order applied to Julien and his older brother Maurice. The two brothers left home on April 19th, 1943, along with many other Alsatians and villagers. They traveled by train from Sélestat (Schlettstadt) to Chemnitz in Saxony via Strasbourg and Karlsruhe. From there they were transferred to Poland for military training.
What little we know about Julien’s military service was reconstructed from letters to and from his family members. Maurice, Julien and Edmond all wrote home, but only the Maurice’s letters were preserved. Maurice’s letters were the essential source for reconstructing Julien’s history. There are also two letters that Julien sent to his mother in October and November 1944.
From Maurice’s letters we know that on May 7, 1943 Julien was on the train from Dresden to Poland. He his destination was Krakow.
In November 1943, Julien was in Galicia, Poland; he sent a postcard to his brother that featured a couple getting married in traditional dress.
At some point Julien was sent to war, probably to the eastern front. In March 1944, Maurice wrote that Julien had been wounded and was not transportable. By April Julien wrote to his brother from a military hospital. When he was released in May he was sent to hearing specialist. Several other letters stated Julien received permission to go to Mussig, and stayed in a military hospital in Selestat.
In June 1944, Julien was released from the hospital and sent a reserve battalion in Naumburg ( a unit for convalescents) where he was worked as a prison guard in a prison camp. He was still there in October and November 1944. On October 18, Julien wrote to his mother and sister Helene from Naumburg.
October 18 1944
Dear mamma and Helene,
I wanted to write to you and let you that I'm doing well. I hope that it is the same with you. Will you be healthy soon, mama? I hope so, because we need you. This will pass and hopefully not last much longer. We are very busy, enough to drive me crazy. We hardly have time to eat. I would sometimes prefer to be at the front. But this too will pass and I lose neither courage nor hope.
Maurice and Robert have also written to me. They are still doing well. Maurice gave me two addresses where I can go in case I get leave and I can’t go home. I hope to get leave soon.
The food is alright, I still have ration tickets for bread and jam and other products. I'll send you the addresses where I’m going, or else where I'll write, if I cannot write you anymore ..."
Addressed: Gefreiter J. Reppel, Grenadier Ersatz Battalion 53; Marsch Kompanie 2b. Naumburg a/S.
12 November 1944
Dear mamma, dear sister,
I received your letter yesterday; I rejoice that the mail is so fast and that you are again healing. I'm still fine. The weather is very bad with rain and snow. The leave request is again denied, but this is not serious. Our training will be completed in three weeks and followed by leave. The adjutant informed us that the request has already been made. Robert and Maurice will return soon, do not worry about me; I'll get out of it. If only everything goes well with you and the war ends soon. We have had enough of this war. I read that the hammer no longer cools, it will suffer too. But we want to endure all this, provided the war spares you, otherwise everything will be destroyed. I'm going to sleep again, because I'm tired. I embrace you tenderly.
Julian.
Did he get one last leave? We don't know. If he did, he couldn’t go home; the Americans were in Sélestat, which was partially liberated on December 2 while the Germans remained solidly occupying the nearby forest.
After the war was officially over, all of Julien’s brothers returned home, one by one, but there was no word from Julien. Like his brothers, Julien hoped to return alive from this horrible war. No one knows exactly what happened to Julien.
Julien's mother Elise contacted the Ministry of Veterans Affairs on 13 February 1947 asking for information regarding her missing son. Julien was listed as Missing in Action on June 2, 1947. After a 5-year waiting period, the Civil Court of Colmar declared Julien dead on July 10, 1951, and fixed the date of his death as February 3, 1945.
Still profoundly affected by the loss of her son, Julien's mother Elise wrote to the Association of Deserters, Evades and Forced Incorporation and asked them to research her missing son. She received a reply dated 26 September 1952 that stated a German witness who was assigned to the same unit as Julien recognized him from a photograph. The witness stated he saw Reppel on 21 April 1945 in Kottbus, with their the unit, on the road to Madlov, 3 km south of Kottbus. On April 21, the witness was wounded and removed from the unit.” (The town of Kottbus, now Cottbus, is about 80 km northeast of Dresden.)
Julien's name will be remembered forever; it was engraved on the monument to the war dead in the cemetery of his native village. His memory forever remained in the hearts of those who knew and loved him.
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