| Original caption: “Acts of revenge after liberation by the Allies: A collaborator has been caught and is beaten.” Holding up his hands in self-defense, a kneeling collaborator tries to shield his face from the backhand blow of an accuser in Rennes. His assailants compelled him to shout, “Vive de Gaulle! and Vive la France!” Bob Landry (April 6, 1913 – August 30, 1960) an American photographer with the American liberators of Rennes. In the August 6, 1944, New York Daily News, Landry’s recollections were published. The articles was nationally circulated. “Nazi Stooge Arrest Stirs Brittany Riot – The sight of a red-haired man being led through the main streets of Rennes by French gendarmes who had arrested him for collaborating with the Germans touched off serious rioting today in the capital of Brittany.” “In the middle of it was Bob Landry, veteran magazine photographer, who told the United Press that he was ‘scared to death’ but shot some of the best mob scenes of his career and helped prevent several murders.” Mob Manhandles Girl “It all started, he said, when several thousand Frenchmen in the public square watching United States Army traffic saw the red haired man being loaded into a van. They pushed toward him, shouting. United States Military Police interfered and were jammed against the van, although they kept the mob from getting the prisoner.” “In the next ten minutes Landry saw a pretty girl being manhandled by the mob. ‘They were slapping her and pulling her hair, those irate men and women,’ he said, ‘and I saw a man knocked down and kicked in the face and body until I couldn’t see how he could take it any longer.” “Another man was on his knees in the middle of the street with a pistol at his head.” “The French were making him say, ‘Vive La France, vive De Gaulle, vive Roosevelt and Churchill,’ Landry added.” “Landry then was pulled along to a courtyard in the gendarmerie with the crowd right with him. Three of Rennes’ big shot collaborators were brought out to be photographed.” “‘My guide urged the shoot the police to shoot the collaborators,’ morator the photographer said. ‘He told them it would make a better picture. They pushed one of the terrified wretches against a rifle, smashed another fellow’s nose until the blood covered his face and started in on the third.’” “‘I couldn’t stand it any longer,’ Landry said, ‘so I beat a hasty retreat while the gendarmes pushed the prisoners into a building.’” Peter J. Carroll (May 7, 1911 – August 27, 1966), another news photographer, also published his experiences with punishing collaborators in Rennes in the Herald Press, Saint Joseph, Michigan, on August 5, 1944. “Freed People of Rennes Rage at Collaborators – The 80,000 people of Rennes cheered the American entry into the city today and raged at French collaborationists. Civilians offered to kill the collaborationists in the streets if we wanted to take pictures. Tanks were rumbling through the city without stopping, but some jeeps and other vehicles stopped and French women and men hysterically threw flowers, kissed the doughboys and offered them wine. I started to take some pictures but had to tear myself free from the people. Any car that stopped was swamped with humanity. I met a young man about 20 years old, and he offered to show us some French collaborationists. All the Germans had left. We went down a side street toward a sort of jail and came across a man kneeling in the street with 2 gendarmes pointing pistols at his head and making him salute the French tri-color. Down the street came some men of the French resistance movement dragging an Italian. They were beating him across the head and kicking him. They would beat him for a while, spit on him and drag him along by the hair, They made him kneel and shout, “Vive la France, vive de Gaulle, vive Churchill.” Then they dragged 2 more collaborationists from the jail. Someone hit 1 in the face, spreading his nose all over his face, and he started to cry. The 2 were then kicked down stairs and lined up against a wall. The French announced they were going to shoot them and we should take pictures. When we tried to argue, saying the men should be tried 1st, the French just shouted, “We have been waiting years for this – tbey are traitors.” Finally, they quieted down, and it looked like they would not shoot them at the moment anyway, and we had to leave. Landry was a technical advisor on the films Story of GI Joe (1945) and Rear Window (1954); he was a photographer for the films Blue Skies (1946) and The Barbarian and the Geisha (1958) after World War II. Carroll remained a news photographer until his death in 1966. | |
| Image Filename | wwii0473.jpg |
| Image Size | 361.20 KB |
| Image Dimensions | 3256 x 714 |
| Photographer | Bob Landry |
| Photographer Title | United Press International |
| Caption Author | Written or Adapted by Jason McDonald |
| Date Photographed | August 4, 1944 |
| Location | |
| City | Rennes |
| State or Province | |
| Country | France |
| Archive | |
| Record Number | |
| Status | Caption ©2026 MFA Productions LLC Please Do Not Duplicate or Distribute Without Permission; Image in the Public Domain |
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