#Story
Gay-Lussac high school: a hub of student resistance
Gay-Lussac High School became home to a group of students known as the "17th Bar" in 1942—a spontaneous, naive, yet courageous alliance of about forty teenagers. In a matter of hours in April 1943, they transitioned from childhood to adulthood by joining the Resistance. The school had been a center of resistance since the start of the 1940 academic year. 45.83067608429898, 1.26223062629698
Joseph Storck, the headmaster of Alsatian origin, saved numerous Jewish boarding students by providing them with false identities printed in his clandestine workshop. He systematically expelled Jewish students on trivial grounds to protect them from Gestapo registration. He hid them during Milice raids and placed endangered youth with host families.
In late 1942, students Gabriel Judde, Félix Champarnaud, Claude Cahen, and Jacques Fourneau formed a resistance network called the "17th Bar." To support the Maquis, they broke into the Limoges Youth Work Camps uniform depot on April 7, 1943. Many members of the network were arrested. On August 26, 1943, 37 high school students and young workers were tried by the Special Section of the Limoges Court of Appeal for "demonstrations against the French people or their government." The youngest were sent to the Nexon camp, while adults were imprisoned in Limoges. Headmaster Storck’s intervention secured some releases but could not prevent the deportation of many. After the war, Joseph Storck was honored as Righteous Among the Nations. A plaque in the school’s entrance hall pays tribute to him.
Just before the Liberation, the Petit Quartier was requisitioned by the Milice as a barracks. Many resistants and Jews, including future writers Robert Giraud and André Schwarz-Bart, were tortured there.