Louis Nouveau

In December 1940 the Nouveaus met Ian Garrow at a tea party. Garrow was a British soldier who had begun work in Marseilles to organise the escape to Britain of British soldiers and airmen stranded in France. Nouveau offered his help and was turned down by Garrow. However, Garrow soon realized that he needed Nouveau's help to raise money to finance the escape line's operations.^[4] Nouveau donated money and would raise five to six million francs (more than $400,000 in 2024 U.S. dollars) for Garrow and the escape line. Most of the money was in loans to be paid back after the war ended. A major expense was to pay guides to lead escapers across the border from France to Spain, a highly hazardous undertaking. Garrow's incipient escape line became what is known as the Pat O'Leary Line which helped more than 600 soldiers and airmen escape France.^[5][6]

Besides fund raising, the Nouveaus sheltered 145 escaping airmen and soldiers and eleven French refugees between May 1941 and February 1942 in their luxurious apartment. This number is precise because Nouveau recorded details about each in the hinge of volume 44 of his 70 volume edition of Volaire's works. Nouveau also wrote about the 42 journeys he undertook for the Pat Line. He was instrumental in establishing branches of the Pat line in Brittany, Pas de Calais, and Normandy which involved finding safe houses and recruiting couriers and guides.^[7][8]

Working for the escape lines became more dangerous after the Germans occupied Vichy France in November 1942. At the same time the numbers of downed airmen needing evacuation to Spain was increasing as more allied bombers were shot down over western Europe. Renée Nouveau fled France and spent the rest of the war working for Charles De Gaulle's Free France organization in London. Louis refused to leave and moved to Paris to supervise operations there. The Pat Line was soon destroyed by the Germans with many of its operatives arrested. Nouveau was arrested by the Germans near Tours in February 1943 while accompanying a group of five American airmen by train from Paris to Toulouse. He was betrayed by Roger Le Neveu who he had recruited as a guide for the Pat Line.^[9][10] Nouveau was sent to Buchenwald concentration camp where he spent the duration of the war.^[11]

After his liberation from the concentration camp in April 1945, Louis Nouveau moved back to Marseilles and resumed his business ventures. He was given the George Medal by the United Kingdom for his wartime work. His wife Renée was awarded the MBE. He died in 1966;^[12] Renée was still alive in the early 1980s and living in Aix-en-Provence.^[13]