TUESDAY AUGUST 15, 1944 late morning the tenant farmer from the ferme de MONTLEDIER rides up the D54 with his mule and cart loaded with milk cans he has just delivered to MAZAMET. He hears violent gunfire. As he nears the bend before the current cemetery, he spots a vehicle on fire on the left. He waits a little and approaches. He then sees several bodies on the road burning.
The tenant farmer later learned that the Germans, very nervous after the Maquis attacksat RIALET on August 12 and at VENTENAC on August 14, wanted to protect the convoys that continued to evacuate the VINTROU depot. On that day, they banned all vehicular traffic on the D54. When one of their trucks loaded with supplies, equipped with a machine-gun on the cab roof and heading down the road towards MAZAMET, encountered a heavily laden pickup truck on a bend going slowly uphill, an automatic weapon burst nailed the suspect vehicle in place. The 7 maquisards are killed without any possible riposte, and their van bursts into flames. They were transporting for the CORPS FRANC DU SIDOBRE a cargo of fuel recovered that morning from Ets. DUCO in SAIX near CASTRES.
The tenant farmer waits for the flames to subside and, helped by a resident of PONT DE L'ARN who ran to the sound of the shooting, takes out all the bodies left in the van to lay them out on the road. He recovers for his family the signet ring of Emile BONNET, whose body he has recognized. The unfortunate maquisards will be buried in the PONT DE L'ARN cemetery
(Testimony Odette ESTRABAUD, née BALFET, former MONTLEDIER-2006 resident)
Contribution and photo credit: Raphaël Mégard
Contribution and photo credit: Raphaël Mégard
