This moving presentation, tells the little-known story of Oradour sur Glane, a village in France that was tragically destroyed by a detachment of an SS division one Saturday afternoon a few days after the DD landings in June 1944. 

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Oradour was in many ways, a typical small French village that had existed for over a thousand years. A rural community was surrounded by a detachment of SS soldiers who acting on false information supplied by Vichy forces laid the village waste. Very few people managed to escape, but Paul Robbins tells the story of how some of them, including an incredibly brave lady and the inspirational tale of how two Jewish children survived that day thanks to the actions of their parents. 

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The talk explains what happened to those responsible for the massacre in the immediate aftermath and the outcome of the search for justice after the war. 

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Oradour was never rebuilt after the war and has been left as a moving monument to the villagers lost that day. There is a new Oradour built close by to the site of the ruins of the old, including the village Church that was the scene of the worst part of the massacre. 

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Oradour is ultimately a story of hope and illustrates why the lessons of History must be learned if we are to avoid repeating them in the future. We learn why the village was never rebuilt as a memorial to the victims and how it has become a time capsule to the horrors of War. This presentation is fully illustrated adding to the impact of what happened on Saturday the 10th of June 1944.