"The Hotel Lutetia is a Paris institution, the only grand hotel on the city's bohemian Left Bank." Starting in 1933, the capital cities of Europe began receiving thousands fleeing the new Nazi regime. "The roll call of those forced out of Germany in those early days reads like the guest list of a particularly distinguished university conference." Because the Lutetia is on the Left Bank, it attracted a more cerebral clientele. Authors, artists, and dancers predominated. But the French had no particular love for Germans or Jews and were not very accommodating. The hotel, on the other hand, welcomed all and was considered the "Switzerland of Paris" for its acceptance of diversity. A new French government led by Socialist Leon Blum issued identification certificates to all German refugees. However, the new optimism was short-lived because of the Spanish Civil War, the Anschluss, and Munich. The Soviets allied with Germany, and WWII began.
The Germans arrived on June 14, 1940, and occupied all the fine hotels on the Right Bank. Soon thereafter, the Abwehr requisitioned the Lutetia and converted it into a headquarters. They conducted their counterintelligence work until early 1944, when Himmler absorbed all of their functions. The staff continued to treat the invaders as guests and reveled in the fact that the manager hid all of the hotel's great wines from the Germans. Germany's invasion of the USSR altered the dynamics of the occupation, as the communists turned to sabotage and the city's Jews were rounded up. The year 1942 saw the French police help the Germans send away more of the city's Jews. Between 1942 and 1944, 75,000 Jews, mostly foreign, were deported. After Stalingrad and the successful Allied bombings and invasion of Italy, it was obvious to all but die-hard Nazis that Germany would lose. After D-Day, the Germans in Paris waited, and on August 14, the last occupier left the Lutetia.
The year after liberation, the hotel received a new kind of guest—returning displaced persons. The Ministry of Prisoners, Deportees, and Refugees began its work. When they realized how sick "the missing" were, they requisitioned the Lutetia, and it became the main repatriation center. When the first trains arrived in April 1945, the lice-ridden skeletons stepped onto the platform, and the welcomers broke down in tears. The average returnee weighed 106 pounds and needed time to recover, while some just walked right out. By the first of September, the last deportees left the Lutetia.
The survivors struggled with momentous issues. For many, living until liberation was what drove them, and they could not make the transition. For the rest, families and friends were gone, lives were disrupted by an experience that absolutely no one else could comprehend. For those sent away by their fellow Frenchmen, de Gaulle's narrative of national resistance did not reasonate. Later in the century, France began to deal with its collaboration and acknowledged its failure. The Lutetia was remodeled in 2018, and today is once again a grand luxury hotel.
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