Underground media in Nazi-occupied Europe

By 1942, Nazi Germany occupied much of the European landscape.^[1] This widespread German occupation saw the fall of public media systems in Northern France, Belgium, Poland, Norway, Czechoslovakia, Northern Greece, and the Netherlands. All press systems were put under the command of Joseph Goebbels, the German Minister of Propaganda.^[2]

With the suppression of local, national or world news, Nazi occupied populations gave birth to underground newspapers, anti-Nazi pamphlets^[3] and radio broadcasts.^[4] Underground (also known as clandestine) forms of media allowed for information sharing amongst the oppressed, helping them build solidarity, strengthen morale, and in some cases, stage uprisings (most notably in the Netherlands).

Underground media in France (1940-1944)

France was divided in half: the North, occupied by Germany, and the Vichy in the south, a “neutral” French run government allied with and dependent on Germany.^[2]

On June 5, 1940, the Germans began their invasion of France.^[5] French leader Marshal Henri-Philippe Petain negotiated an armistice with Germany that resulted in the separation of France into two zones. The North of France was to be occupied by the Germans, while most of the South became Vichy, a French government that was considered to be a puppet state.^[6]

The unrest and frustration with both the German occupation of the North and Vichy government in the South gave birth to the French Resistance. The French Resistance was comprised of many underground groups which fought against the Nazi occupation and Nazi-propaganda. When Germany had replaced the French media systems with Nazi-friendly media, there was a need for the French voice to be heard. This was accomplished by the inception of illegal underground newspapers, radio broadcasts and disguised anti-Nazi pamphlets.^[6]

They primarily used newspapers to send coded messages and communicate instructions to other groups and members of the resistance.^[6] During the Nazi occupation of France, taking part in illegal forms of media such as illegal radio broadcasts (the BBC), illegal newspapers, or any form of anti-Nazi media/propaganda was punishable by death.^[7] Nevertheless, the French Resistance (also known as the French Underground) relied on these clandestine and illegal media systems to survive and thrive.

The two major clandestine newspapers during the German occupation were Défense de la France and Résitance. Défense de la France was founded by a group of parisian students in the summer of 1941.

Underground media in the Netherlands

Underground media also played a significant role in the Nazi occupied Netherlands. Much like the other Nazi occupied countries in Europe, the Dutch experienced an overhaul of their public media system. After the German blitzkrieg invasion of the Netherlands in May 1940, the Germans demanded that the Dutch hand in their radios and forfeit their newspapers to Nazi Officials.^[8]

There were a number of underground Dutch newspapers, the first and most notable, however, was Het Parool. Het Parool was founded in February 1941 by Frans Goedhart, who went by the pseudonym "Pieter 'T Hoen" (Peter the Chicken). The first issue of ''Het Parool (August 1941) saw a circulation of 6,000, a number that never significantly rose due to security issues. In 1943, Frans Goedhart was captured by Nazi officials and tried in a German court. To conceal his secret identity as Pieter 'T Hoen, writers at Het Parool periodically published articles under his pseudonym. In August 1943, Goedhart was sentenced to death. He escaped three days before his execution, with the help of Dutch officials. Upon his escape, Goedhart returned to his position of editor at the newspaper Het Paroo. Het Parool's main objective was to raise national moral and organize the Dutch people against Nazi rule. After the Germans began their occupation, working on an illegal newspaper was punishable by immediate jail time, and in the latter years of the war, death. Before the end of the war, four editors at Het Parool were sentenced to death, while two escaped to ally countries.^[9]

Fearing that Dutch exposure to allied radio programming (primarily English and American) would turn the Dutch against them, the Nazis called for the confiscation of all radio transmitters. By May 1943, they had confiscated nearly 80% of Dutch radios. With the Nazi’s grip on media tightening, many Dutch households hid their radios, receiving illegal broadcasts from the BBC and Radio Oranje (Dutch Radio) that kept them up to date on allied forces and their accomplishments on the war front - and in some cases messages that helped them resist Nazi rule.

Allied radio broadcasts were so important to the Dutch people that many people began building crystal radios. Crystal radios were fairly easy to build and could be made quickly in bulk quantities. The main advantage of the crystal radios was that they required no batteries and could only be heard by those operating them, however were very hard to control or tune.^[10] During the Dutch famine of 1944 (also known as the "Hongerwinter"), many people smuggled crystal radios to farmers in exchange for fresh produce.^[8]

Underground media in Poland (1939-1945)

In the Second World War, in occupied Poland there were thousands of underground publications by the Polish Secret State and the Polish resistance. The Tajne Wojskowe Zakłady Wydawnicze (Secret Military Printing Works) was probably the largest underground publisher in the world.^[11] The founder of this Secret Printing Organization was Jerry Rutkowski from its creation in late 1940 to disbandment in early 1945.^[12]

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