GETTING THERE
ment that represents the pyre and the flames; questionable taste, but extraordinary architecture. There’s even an interactive exhibition where you can take part in the saint’s trial, while shops sell les larmes de Jeanne d’Arc — tear-shaped chunks of chocolate-covered almonds.
We may have been the town’s only visitors to turn a blind eye to the usual tourist spots and focus on the Jewish sites. During the Second World War, just under 900 Jews from Normandy were arrested — the youngest just a few weeks old and the oldest aged 84. Of the 740 Jews from Rouen deported to Auschwitz only one woman, Denise Holstein, is still alive, and has written about her experience.
By the synagogue entrance there is a commemorative plaque and memorial services are held every year. Today, there are around 200 Jews still living in Rouen. The impressive shul has roughly ten regulars, so getting a minyan is always touch and go. From those regulars there are five Cohanin. On the Shabbat we were in town, the community’s delight at having visitors was mitigated by the slight disappointment that I was yet another Cohen
As so often in France, security is tight, so email beforehand if you want to attend services. However we were made very welcome, invited to Friday night dinner at the Rabbi’s apartment above the shul where he returns every weekend to build the community; with no kosher shops in Rouen, on weekdays, he and his family live in Paris.
Rouen’s famous Jewish monument is the Maison Sublime, an ancient building in the foundations of the law courts thought to have been a yeshiva at the time of the grandsons of Rashi. Closed for refurbishment until next month, we saw an extraordinary temporary collection of medieval Jewish artefacts at the Museum of Antiquities.
THE ferry from Newhaven to Dieppe costs from £73 one way for four with a car with DFDS (dfds. co.uk) and from £159 one way from St Malo to Portsmouth with Brittany Ferries (brittany-ferries.co.uk)
Then onwards to Brittany, for one more Jewish pilgrimage, stopping en route at two more keys sites. The Bayeux Tapestry for our two knightobsessed boys — there are child-friendly audioguides, although an arrow in the eye is a fairly harrowing image for kids, however you present it — and the town of Arromanches and its D-Day museum. The experience was more moving than my wife and I had expected. EDITED BY CATHY WINSTON cwinston@thejc.com
For places to stay and more information, visit www.normandytourism.org and brittanytourism.com
We found the sight of our children playing on the beaches on which so many sacrificed their lives in June 1944 almost unbearably poignant.
Our destination: Rennes, with its link to the retrial of Captain Alfred Dreyfus in 1899.
With grand, tree-lined boulevards and imposing Hausmann-esque buildings it feels like Paris on a quiet day. In fact, large parts of the city were
designed by the Parisian architects in an attempt to rival the capital.
The compact and walkable city, the smallest in the world with a Metro network, bears few traces of the upheaval which overtook it during the infamous retrial of Captain Dreyfus. There are no plaques or monuments but the excellent Museum of Brittany dedicates a large space to the story of the Jewish officer falsely accused of espionage.
It holds a huge collection of documents relating to his life and trial, although the permanent exhibition shows less than 100: a very well curated display of contemporary letters, newspapers, antisemitic flyers and cartoons, original dolls and models. A short French-language film relates the story while the audience perch on jury-style benches.
In 2019 the lease on the old Rennes prison will expire and, drawing on the legacy of the Dreyfus trials, a small group is campaigning to convert it to a national museum of justice.
Leaving countryside which reminded me of Cornwall and Devon — but with fantastic boulangeries, selling the traditional buttery sugar-laden pastries called kouign amann — we braved the marathon six-hour channel crossing from St Malo to Portsmouth.
Longer than the quick outward route from Newhaven to Dieppe, our kids were kept so entertained that it was just as easy, especially compared with the drudgery of airports.
And much easier to return with our bag of deliciously oozing pastries and holiday joie de vivre intact.