Violette Lecoq
{{Short description|FRENCH NURSE , ILLUSTRATOR AND RESISTANCE MEMBER}}
{{use dmy dates|date=May 2021}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Violette Lecoq
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| birth_date = {{Birth year |1912}}
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| death_date = {{Death year and age |2003|1912}}
| death_place = Paris
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| nationality = French
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| occupation = Nurse, illustrator
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| known_for = her drawings from the Ravensbrück concentration camp, which were also used as evidence at the Hamburg Ravensbrück trials in 1946.
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Violette Lecoq (1912 – 2003) was a French nurse, illustrator, and a resistance member during World War II. She is known for her drawings from the Ravensbrück concentration camp, which were also used as evidence at the first Ravensbrück Trials in 1946.
World War II
At the outbreak of World War II Lecoq worked as a nurse with the Red Cross. She was also affiliated with the French resistance movement. She was arrested in 1942 and held one year in isolation, and then brought to the Ravensbrück concentration camp in 1943, as a Nacht und Nebel prisoner. She worked as a nurse at block ten, the block for tuberculous and mentally ill. From this hut she witnessed the murder of women who were not longer capable of working. Lecoq managed to organize pencil and paper, and made several illustrations from the life in the camp, with the intention of publishing the drawings some day.
She was evacuated with the Swedish Red Cross in April 1945.{{cite web |title=Kunst als Zeugnis. Violette Lecoq |language=de |url=http://www.arbeitskreis-konfrontationen.de/Kunst_als_Zeugnis/Biographien/Violette_Lecoq |access-date=31 October 2010}} In 1946, she was a witness at the Ravensbrück Trials in Hamburg, along with Odette Sansom, Irène Ottemard, Jaqueline Hereil, Helene Dziedziecka, Neeltje Epker and others.{{cite book |last=Salvesen |first=Sylvia |author-link=Sylvia Salvesen |year=1947 |title=Tilgi – men glem ikke |publisher=Aschehoug |location=Oslo |language=no |pages=272–307, 322–323}} Her drawings were used as evidence at the trials.{{cite web |title=Zeichnungen einer Häftlingsfrau |language=de |publisher=Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung |url=http://www.bpb.de/themen/DAVU3I,0,0,Zeichnungen_einer_H%E4ftlingsfrau.html |access-date=31 October 2010}}
In 1948 she published Ravensbrück, 36 dessins à la plume, a collection of her drawings from the Ravensbrück camp. The drawings are pencil sketches from the "everyday life" in the camp. Examples are the series "-Welcome...",{{cite web |last=Lecoq |first=Violette |title=Welcome |url=http://www.bpb.de/popup/popup_bild.html?guid=5NMQF6 |access-date=31 October 2010}} and "Deux heures après",{{cite web |last=Lecoq |first=Violette |title=Deux heures après |url=http://www.bpb.de/popup/popup_bild.html?guid=5BTWZ4 |access-date=31 October 2010}} showing individual women entering the camp, and the transition two hours later. The drawing "{{lang|fr|La loi du plus fort...}}" (in {{langx|en|The law of the strongest}}) shows the humiliation of the prisoners by brutality from the staff.{{cite web |last=Lecoq |first=Violette |title=La loi du plus fort |url=http://www.bpb.de/popup/popup_bild.html?guid=V0E6ZU |access-date=31 October 2010}}
Several of her illustrations had been included in Sylvia Salvesen's book Tilgi – men glem ikke from 1947.{{sfn|Salvesen|1947|pp=66, 107 135, 144, 218, 232}} Some of the illustrations were later included in Kristian Ottosen's book on Ravensbrück from 1991.{{cite book |last=Ottosen |first=Kristian |author-link=Kristian Ottosen |year=1995 |title=Kvinneleiren. Historien om Ravensbrück-fangene |orig-year=First published 1991 |publisher=Aschehoug |location=Oslo |language=no |pages=84–86, 209, 264, 304}}
Lecoq was awarded the French Resistance medal, and the French Croix de guerre. She died in Paris in 2003.
Selected works
- Ravensbrück, 36 dessins à la plume (1948)
References
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Category:French Resistance members
Category:French women illustrators
Category:Ravensbrück concentration camp survivors
Category:Recipients of the Croix de Guerre 1939–1945 (France)