Women’s blue cloth and wood sandals worn by an American internee

Leonie Berthe Roualet (1900-1978) was born in Hammondsport, New York to Leonie (née Calmesse, 1869-1942) and Henry Charles Roualet (1866-?). Leonie and Henry were both originally from France, where they worked as champagne vintners. They immigrated to New York in 1890, where they continued to work as wine merchants. Leonie Berthe was raised Catholic and had two older brothers, Georges (George, 1891-1951) and Andre (Andrew, 1894-1973), and one older sister, Henriette (1898-1969). Georges served in the U.S. Navy during World War I aboard the USS Wisconsin. After the war, the entire family moved from New York to Cleveland, Ohio. In the 1930s, Leonie’s mother, Leonie Calmesse Roualet, returned to France to take care of her ailing brother. While caring for her brother, she too became sick, and in 1939 Leonie traveled to France to take care of her mother and her uncle. On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, and two days later France and Britain declared war on Germany, officially starting World War II. In May 1940, Germany invaded France and occupied the northern half of the country. Leonie’s sister, Henriette, began to worry about the fate of her mother and sister as she struggled to contact them, and she wrote repeatedly to the U.S. State Department for information on their whereabouts. In November, she received a telegram stating that her mother was in a hospital in Bordeaux, while her sister was living with their uncle in Épernay. On December 11, 1941, four days after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Germany declared war on the United States. Following this declaration, German authorities began arresting American citizens in their occupied territories with the hope that they could exchange them with German citizens interned abroad. On September 24, 1942, the Gestapo arrested Leonie as an enemy alien and sent her to a prison in Châlons. From there she was transferred to Frontstalag 194 in the Vittel internment camp. In Vittel, Leonie lived in hotel-like accommodations with running water and heat. She was able to send and receive mail, and accept Red Cross packages. The Germans published propaganda photos and press stories about Vittel to showcase it as representative of conditions in German camps. Despite these improved living conditions in comparison to other German camps, Vittel was still surrounded by barbed wire and constantly patrolled by armed guards. Leonie often suffered from malnutrition while interned in the camp. On September 12, 1944, the Vittel internment camp was liberated by Free French forces. Immediately following liberation, Leonie worked for the Red Cross and helped establish the first displaced persons (DP) camp in Paris. In December 1945, Leonie returned to the United States aboard the S.S. Gripsholm, accompanying a convoy of refugees at the request of the American Embassy. She resettled in Cleveland, reuniting with her sister, Henriette. In Cleveland, Leonie continued working for the Red Cross before becoming the director of the diocesan Catholic Resettlement Council when it was established in 1949. Working for the Council, Leonie helped resettle thousands of refugees from wars and political strife around the world.

The pair of shoes were donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2018 by Mark Roualet, great nephew of Leonie Roualet.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Mark Roualet