Wine And War: The French, The Nazis, And The Ba... -

: Nazi officials like Hermann Göring were particularly active in acquiring prestigious collections. After the war, French soldiers famously reclaimed a massive cache of stolen wine from Hitler’s "Eagle's Nest" mountain retreat. Ingenious Acts of Resistance

The book also addresses the sensitive reality of collaboration during the occupation.

Immediately after the fall of Paris in 1940, the Nazi leadership began a widespread campaign to pillage French wine, which they viewed as one of the country's most valuable national assets. Wine and War: The French, the Nazis, and the Ba...

: The Reich dispatched official German wine merchants, known as weinführers , to every major wine region (such as Burgundy, Bordeaux, and Champagne) to coordinate the massive collection and resale of fine vintages at a profit.

For the French, protecting their wine was about defending the very "spirit of France". Winemakers employed various daring and creative tactics to thwart the occupiers: : Nazi officials like Hermann Göring were particularly

: Winemakers sometimes mislabeled their worst wines as "Grand Cru" to fool German buyers, while others joined the active Resistance to attack trains transporting wine back to Germany.

: Some figures, like Bordeaux merchant Louis Eschenauer, were convicted and imprisoned after the war for doing extensive business with the enemy. Immediately after the fall of Paris in 1940,

: Beyond protecting bottles, some vignerons used their vast cellar networks to hide Jewish refugees and smuggle members of the Resistance across the Demarcation Line inside wine barrels. The Moral Complexity: Collaboration