Wine and War,
Don and Petie Kladstrup
Try to think of a countries icon – its most precious
commodity and source of national pride.
For many countries this is a difficult decision, but for the French it
is wine. And the wine and the vineyards
are France. War tears a country apart in
many ways. The threat to the wine is one
of the side stories that seems to pale compared to loss of home, life, and
family. But it ranks right behind them
and the stories that are associated with the wine during WWII capture some of
the drama and pathos of the war.
The introduction begins with the story of finding the
massive wine cave of Hitler by the French forces at the end of the war. All the great vineyards and vintages were
there– “What was so hard to believe was that all this precious wine – sitting
in a cave near the top of a mountain – belonged to a man who could not have
cared less about it. In fact, did not
even like wine.”
The impact of war on the vineyards began in 1914 when the
“French government mounted an extraordinary campaign to help. Winegrowers were granted delays in being
called to active duty, military labor detachments were sent to the vineyards
and farm hosrese of small growers were not to be requisitioned until the
harvest was completed.”
“WWI had rendered vineyards, especially those in Champagne,
practically lifeless. They had been
sliced up by trenches and blown apart by artillery and mortar shells, which
left enormous craters in the ground.
Worse were the chemical shells that leaked into the soil, poisoning the
vineyards for years to come.”
I was really impressed by the story I have never heard
before – how the vineyards survived the
occupation when they had to sell their wines to Germany and the Germans
appointed buyers in each area who set quota and price. Fortunately, many of these buyers were from
the wine industry and had sympathy for the vintners.
The Vineyards and their caves were also a place for the
resistance to hide both people and equipment and the locations of shipments of
champagne were a source of information on German troop placement.
The French sabotaged trains that were loaded with wine for
the Wehrmacht, siphoned wine from barrels leaving them empty or filling them
with water. They tried to send their
worst wines, watered down wines and anything they could to protect the
best. One vineyard placed their bottles
in a pond, but in the morning a German walked to the pond and found it had a
surface floating with labels. Another
vintner hid their wine under their vegetable garden. Another good story was when Germans took over
a wine cave for a night. To avoid
suspicion there were still some wine bottles, but not the best. However, there were bottles with a clear
liquid that the troops thought was gin – it was in fact a laxative!
During the hunger imposed by the Germans who limited French
to 1200 calories a day (the elderly 895) people tried to grow plants and even
raise chickens and goats on their balconies.
The vineyards planted between rows of grapes and sometimes removed the
grapevines. “But the gravelly soil, which
was perfect for vines because it provided good drainage and forced the roots to
grow deep was inhospitable to vegetables.
Whereas vines grew best when they were made to suffer, vegetables needed
to be pampered.”
I also learned about the Champagne Campaign that came after
D-day. A fascinating and
well-coordinated campaign down the Rhine with the French making sure that their
men were on the side of the river with the best vineyards. And based on the way the Americans treated
the gift of great wines at the end of the campaign, by “hopping them up” with
medicinal alcohol, I think the French were right to keep them out of the truly
great vineyards of the region.
The end of the war was the beginning of an overwhelming task
of reviving the vineyards and the heroic task was done for the delight of
France and the entire world. This is a
wonderful history with a very special focal point.
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