Biographie

André Tiffon was born in Paris in 1925. When he finished school, he learned the trade of locksmith.

According to his statements, André Tiffon was picked up during a raid in Paris in the autumn of 1943 and forcibly brought to the German Reich to work in Eschwege. He was to work in aircraft production and repair for the Fieseler factory. However, André Tiffon refused to work several times or deliberately stalled which led to a number of job changes. About three months after his arrival in Germany, when he once again refused to work, an argument ensued with a supervisor and a uniformed person. André Tiffon was beaten and lost several teeth as a result. He was then arrested and sent to the Kassel police prison where he was imprisoned for three to four months. Following this period, André Tiffon was transferred to the Breitenau "work education camp" (AEL) on 7 April 1944. For the entire duration of his imprisonment in Breitenau, he was kept in the single cell wing in the separate cell building (ground floor, second cell on the right). During the day, he was sent to Kassel with a subordinate command to remove debris. On 28 July 1944, André Tiffon was transferred from Breitenau to the Buchenwald concentration camp. There he was put in the so-called "small camp" for about a month. After that, it was be relocated to a subcamp of Buchenwald near Halle where he was made to work at the Seibel aircraft factory. Shortly before the end of the war, this subcamp was dissolved and Tiffon was brought back to Buchenwald until liberation.

After the war, André Tiffon returned to Paris. He did not talk about his experience during the war for many years. However, he happened to recognise recordings from Breitenau during a television report on the TV channel "arte" and began to search for the place. On 23 and 24 May 1995, he visited the Memorial to talk about his experience.