Villa Gillet - Rhône-Alpes - recherches contemporaines

Before being enlarged and co-opted by the Vichy Regime, the youth camps created in the summer of 1940 and maintained until the end of World War II welcomed more than 400,000 young men living in the southern zone. Replacing military service, these camps combined education, the transmission of national values, work, and communal living. Though most were installed in rural areas, there were camps in a few cities, such as Lyon and Clermont-Ferrand. Working from exceptional documents, Olivier Faron has completed the first study of this controversial institution, seeking to answer questions such as whether the youth camps protected young men, or made it possible to prepare the Resistance.