Jean Louis (or Jean-Louis) Léon Bauer, also known as ‘Poulouche’, was born on 20 July 1930 in Bordeaux, France. Together with members of his family, he was interned in four different detention camps in German-occupied France from 1940 to 1945. His father, Antoine Bauer (1910–1944), was one of 65 Sinti and Roma deported to Sachsenhausen concentration camp on 24 January 1943. Jean-Louis Bauer devoted a large part of his life to bearing witness to the persecution endured by himself and his family.
Internment of the Family and Deportation of the Father
Antoine Bauer, who came from a Kale family, and his wife Jeanne Ziegler (1912–2003), a Manouche (Sinti), had three children: Jean-Louis Bauer, Rose Bauer (1931–2010) and Louis Bauer (1938–1996). Before World War II, the Bauer family travelled by caravan through the departments of Gironde, Deux-Sèvres and Vienne, earning their living through activities such as horse trading and basket weaving.
On 17 November 1940, the family was arrested in Langoiran (Gironde) by the gendarmerie of La Bastide. In early December 1940, on the orders of the German Field Command in Bordeaux—without judicial warrant, and with the stated reason for arrest being ‘Nomade’—they were transferred to the detention camp in Mérignac (Gironde). Following the temporary closure of the Mérignac camp, the family was transferred to the detention camp in Poitiers (Vienne) on 10 December 1940. Around ten members of the paternal family were also interned, including Jean-Louis Bauer’s grandmother Marie Herlemann (1875–unknown).
On 13 January 1943, Antoine Bauer, together with 64 other individuals classified as ‘Nomades’, was transferred to the transit camp of Compiègne-Royallieu (Oise). On 24 January 1943, he was deported to Sachsenhausen to perform forced labour. His last message to his family dates from 29 June 1944.
Antoine‘s wife and children were transferred to the detention camp of Montreuil-Bellay (Maine-et-Loire) on 29 December 1943 and to Jargeau (Loiret) in January 1945. In a speech given by Jean-Louis Bauer in April 1996 on the former site of the Montreuil-Bellay camp, he recalled the final months of internment: ‘When the war was over, we were not liberated. In January 1945, we were still in Montreuil-Bellay. Then my mother, my siblings and I were taken to another camp, to Jargeau in the Loiret department. It was not until Christmas Eve 1945 that we were released. We were thrown out onto the street and had to walk back to Poitiers. We had nothing left; all that remained were illnesses from which we still suffer today.’1Sigot, “Un camp pour les Tsiganes à Poitiers,” 12. Translation into English: Emanuel Marx. After their release on 24 December 1945, the family settled in Poitiers, hoping to find Antoine Bauer, who never returned.
Commitment to Remembrance
In 1984, Jean-Louis Bauer contacted Jacques Sigot (1940–2024), who had published a book about the Montreuil-Bellay detention camp. Together, they funded the first memorial stele, which was erected on 4 September 1985 at the former site of the Poitiers camp. Jean-Louis Bauer also initiated the unveiling of a memorial stele at the former site of the Montreuil-Bellay camp on 16 January 1988. He also spearheaded the inauguration of a memorial stele on 7 December 1991 on the grounds of the Collège Clos Ferbois in Jargeau, which had been built on the former camp site.
In 1993, he founded the Union nationale des victimes et des familles de victimes tsiganes [National Union of Gypsy Victims and their Families], of which he served as president for many years. In 2002, Jean-Louis Bauer was included by the Association française pour l’hommage aux Justes parmi les Nations [French Association for the Honouring of the Righteous Among the Nations] in the list of people who had helped Jews during the German occupation of France. The same association honoured Jean-Louis Bauer with the title Gardien de la vie [literally: Guardian of Life], which was conferred upon him as a representative of the Romani community in France. The award recognised the commitment of the Sinti and Roma held in Poitiers who had assisted Father Jean Fleury (1905–1982) in organising the escape of Jewish internees. Until his death in 2007, Jean-Louis Bauer, as both a survivor of internment and the son of a deportee, devoted himself tirelessly to bearing witness.
His son, Tony Maumont-Bauer (born 1956), assumed the presidency of the Union nationale des victimes et des familles de victimes tsiganes in 2009, thereby continuing the remembrance work begun by his father. On 18 July 2010, an avenue was inaugurated in honour of Jean-Louis Bauer near the camp on the Route de Limoges in Poitiers.
