Mila Root

Mila Root, born on September 14th, 1921 with Moscow and deceased on March 30th, 1945 in the camp Mauthausen, is resistant Jewish.

It works in the Resistance from January 5th, 1942 to October 21st, 1943 (Toulouse, Gurs, Saint-Gervais, Nice, Annemasse) under the responsibility of Tony Gryn. Young person of WIZO (International Women Zionist Organization) folded up with Toulouse then with Luchon, it brings assistance to the internees of the camps, especially to Gurs.

In 1942 it gains Saint-Gervais in Haute-Savoie where it directs a local group of the Youth movement Zionist (MJS), which has just been created to come to assistance of the Jews in danger. It leaves then for Annecy. It belongs to the founders of the clandestine die towards Switzerland, of which his/her brother Emmanuel Racine known as " Mola " , which works in close cooperation with Georges Loinger, is the organizer. After the armistice signed by Italy with the Allies in September 1943, the Jews of the alpine zone take refuge in Nice. Mila Racine then undertakes to lead convoys of children and adults towards Annemasse to make them cross the Swiss border.

October 21st, 1943, the convoy which it directs with Roland Epstein is intercepted by the Germans with Saint-Julien-in-Genevese, and is led to Annemasse with the prison of the Hôtel Pax, seat of the Gestapo. The shock of this arrest will paralyze the work of the organization for one long period.

The mayor of Annemasse, Jean Deffaugt, manages to make some release some children, of which a fourteen month old baby. He proposes in Mila a plan of escape, but she refuses, fearing reprisals on the children.
Ayant you his Jewish identity, Mila are imprisoned with Montluc, then off-set via Compiegne towards the camp of Ravensbrück, before being transferred towards Mauthausen to repair the railways destroyed by the allied bombardments.
Le March 30th, 1945, it is killed during a allied bombardment. Roland Epstein will return from deportation.

The memory of Mila Racine is associated with that of Marianne Cohn, which took its continuation in the convoying of the Jews, and knew it also an premature end following these activities.

A crib of Tel-Aviv bears its name.

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