It was fairly brutal in the immediate aftermath. Between four - ten thousand perceived collaborators were killed during the Occupation and immediately afterwards, but it is difficult to differentiate them between acts of war and vigilante justice. Often women thought to have slept with the enemy had their heads shaved and swastikas painted on their foreheads, and then were forced to parade around the streets. Members of groups like the dreaded Milice were often summarily executed.

This period is known as the épuration sauvage, essentially a low-scale civil war in France. Afterwards the new French government halted the purge and began to try collaborators for their crimes. A few thousand were executed, like the Vichy head of government Pierre Laval. Far more were imprisoned or lost civic rights, and Petain himself was exiled.