On 17 October 1920, the commune of Ly-Fontaine - witness to the combats of the battle of Guise in 1914 - was commended by the army and awarded the French Croix de Guerre (War Cross).

The Courneau military training camp

In 1916, the French military command chose to station the African soldiers on Courneau moor. These men came from the territories of former French West Africa: Senegal, Upper Senegal and Niger (present-day Mali), Mauritania, Guinea, Côte d’Ivoire and Dahomey (present-day Benin). Forming the battalions of Senegalese tirailleurs, they landed in Bordeaux, then made their way to La Teste, where they were given military training and language classes.

In 1916 and 1917, more than 27 000 men followed this route.

Once the land had been drained, many soldiers losing their lives in the process, a camp of 400 huts was built to accommodate up to 18 000 men. Owing to the marshland surrounding the camp, the tirailleurs contracted respiratory illnesses which were sometimes fatal. Courneau was soon nicknamed the “camp of misery”. The dead were buried on site.

In autumn 1917, due to the revolution in Russia, the Russian troops were withdrawn from the front and took the place of the tirailleurs at Courneau. Eight thousand men were sent there. Discipline being practically non-existent, there was much trouble with the local population. In the first months of 1918, the camp was emptied of its occupants. Many of them joined work parties; others enlisted in the Foreign Legion.

In January 1918, the camp was reorganised to accommodate the American contingents, mostly artillery units, who landed in Bordeaux and were stationed temporarily at Courneau. From July 1918 to May 1919, successive units stayed at the camp before going to the front. During that period, 87 American soldiers died of “Spanish flu” and were buried in a cemetery created specially for that purpose on 15 February 1918, in the forest of Natus-de-Bas. After the war, the soldiers’ remains were transferred either to the United States or to the Suresnes American Cemetery in Hauts-de-Seine.

The Natus memorial

On 1 November 1967, a memorial was unveiled to the African soldiers who died at the Courneau camp. Designed by architect Phihl, the monument was built with funding from Le Souvenir Français, the veterans ministry, the President of Côte d’Ivoire, veterans’ associations and local councils around Arcachon Bay.

After several years of research, local remembrance organisations, the town council of La Teste de Buch and the Ministry of the Armed Forces succeeded in ascertaining the identities and origins of the Senegalese tirailleurs. In 2018, as part of the First World War centenary commemorations, the Ministry of the Armed Forces had five stone slabs erected, bearing the names of the 956 African soldiers buried in the cemetery, which were unveiled on 11 November. Another stone is inscribed with the names of the Russian soldiers and two French soldiers who are buried on the site.

The Ministry of the Armed Forces plans to enhance the site by creating a remembrance trail at the heart of the cemetery, to shed light on the lives of the soldiers who lived in the Courneau camp.

Another stone slab in memory of the American soldiers stands outside the camp.

When the fighting in Normandy was over, the bodies of six soldiers who were killed in the Écouves Forest were buried were they fell on private land in a place known as "Les Gateys", in the village of Saint-Nicolas-des-Bois. In 1964, the 2nd DB veterans' association "la Maison des Anciens de la 2e DB" bought this plot of land, where major commemoration ceremonies have frequently been held. They redeveloped the site and transformed it into a small private cemetery.

In 1987, the Orne General Council wanted to bring together the dispersed graves of the men from the 2nd DB killed during the battles to liberate the Orne. The "Maison des Anciens de la 2e DB" donated the land at Les Gateys so that these graves could be transferred here. The bodies of 11 soldiers were reburied here.

This military cemetery, which is now a National Cemetery, contains 17 graves. Two of these each contains the bodies of two soldiers whose mortal remains could not be separated.

Latin crosses cohabit here with stele bearing the Crescent of Islam or the Star of David, reflecting the spirit of unity and fraternity of the 2nd DB.

There are twenty French soldiers from the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871 at rest in an ossuary monument at the cemetery. From WWI, there are 427 French soldiers, 274 Belgian soldiers, nine Russian soldiers and 1 Chinese soldier buried in individual graves. As for WWII, there are 1,355 French soldiers, including 188 in the ossuary, ten Spanish soldiers, one Polish soldier and five Soviet soldiers, one of whom is in the ossuary. Five soldiers who died for France in Indochina are also buried at the cemetery.

These men lie alongside the 170 Corsican Resistance fighters whose work was instrumental in the liberation of the territory. It was the first metropolitan department to be liberated by its inhabitants, French soldiers (many of whom came from the Empire), and the Allied forces.

In the communal cemetery, a military section includes other Catholic graves of French soldiers who died during the battle for the island’s liberation.

Following these operations, Corsica became a strategic asset for the Allies. Nicknamed the “U.S.S. Corsica”, the island was a truly unsinkable aircraft carrier housing twenty-five Allied runways, thereby controlling the sea and air connections in Italy or southern France.

A lime tree was planted in the cemetery in remembrance of Maxime Fischer. His ashes were scattered at the foot of the tree in 2008. Fischer, a lawyer who was struck off the Paris Bar because he was Jewish, became a refugee in Carpentras. He created the Maquis Ventoux with Philippe Beyne, which took in many civilians who refused to be conscripted into forced labour. He was a well-respected leader and member of the Resistance. He passed away in 2008.

Operation Anvil/Dragoon

Two months after the Normandy Landings of 6 June 1944, the Allies landed in Provence.

Despite significant strategic disagreement among the Allies, the principle of a second invasion in the south of France to complement Operation Overlord was agreed upon as early as November 1943. Churchill wanted the focus to be on northern Italy and the Balkans. Stalin was opposed to this, his preference being for the invasion of Provence, which would relieve the Eastern Front. For Charles de Gaulle, this operation would hasten the liberation of France. In the end, President Roosevelt opted in favour of an operation in the south of France.

The wild and rocky Provençal coastline, with its small beaches, was ill suited to a large-scale invasion. But the relatively deep water near the shore meant the ships would be able to come in close, and the proximity of Corsica would enable the massive use of air power. Above all, the liberation of Provence would bring into play the deep-sea ports of Marseille and Toulon, vital for supplying the Allied armies in France.

The 250 000-strong German 19th Army, under General Wiese, defended the South of France. The German troops had abandoned the hinterland and the secondary routes to concentrate on the main supply routes, like the Rhône Valley, and the coast. The navy and air force were very poorly resourced, and the coastal defences were far less impressive than those of the Atlantic Wall, although the ports of Toulon and Marseille, transformed into entrenched camps, were solidly defended. The two ports would not be captured until after the landings, which did not affect them directly, taking place as they did over 50 miles of coastline between Lavandou and Agay.

15 August 1944: the Allies land in Provence

Command of the assault troops was entrusted to American general Alexander Patch, who had won the Battle of Guadalcanal in the Pacific. He commanded the Seventh United States Army, comprised of General Truscott’s VI Corps and General de Lattre de Tassigny’s Army B (future 1st Army). The French naval presence was much greater than in Normandy, with the destroyer Lorraine and ten cruisers, including the Montcalm and Georges Leygues. The French Forces of the Interior (FFI), highly organised in the South of France and in particular in the Alpine massifs, were tasked with facilitating the landings by harassing the German troops in the hinterland.

Comprised of 800 warships and 1 370 other vessels, the Allied fleet set sail from Corsica, Italy and North Africa carrying 500 000 men. It had air support from 1 500 aircraft. On the night of 14 to 15 August, more than 5 000 Allied paratroopers were dropped behind the Maures massif, in the Muy area, while commandos stormed the enemy batteries along the coast. At dawn, a terrible aerial and naval bombardment fell on the coast and, at 8 am, the first American assault waves landed on the beaches of Alpha, Delta and Camel, between Cavalaire and Saint Raphaël. Despite fierce resistance from the enemy in the Saint Raphaël sector, the landing was a total success, and by the evening of 15 August, a bridgehead roughly 50 miles by 20 had been established.

The liberation of Toulon and Marseille

On 17 August, the German 19th Army received the order for general retreat, with the exception of the Toulon and Marseille garrisons. Capitalising on their initial successes, the Americans headed straight for the Rhône Valley and Route Napoleon, leaving to the French the difficult mission of taking the entrenched camps of Toulon and Marseille.

The Battle of Toulon went on from 18 to 28 August. The 1st Free French Division (1st DFL) took Hyères, then advanced along the coast. The 9th Colonial Infantry Division (9th DIC) manoeuvred through the mountains, while the 3rd Algerian Infantry Division (3rd DIA) took Toulon from behind and continued its advance on Marseille. The French troops approached Toulon, with air and naval artillery support. Fierce fighting to take the city’s forts ensued. For General de Lattre, the fighting brought to mind the battles of Douaumont and Thiaumont, in which he had fought in 1916. Entrenched in the Cap Cépet battery on the Saint Mandrier peninsula, the last German soldiers surrendered on 28 August. During the fighting for Toulon, the troops of the 3rd DIA advanced on Marseille. Guided by the Resistance fighters who had started the uprising, the French soldiers pushed through to the heart of the city. After violent street battles, they whittled down the pockets of resistance, liberating the city on 28 August.

Heading up the Rhone Valley and Route Napoleon, the Allies progressed northwards at lightning speed, liberating Grenoble on 22 August, then Lyon on 3 September. On 12 September, at Montbard (Côte d’Or), French troops of the 2nd DB coming down from Normandy met those coming up from Provence.

In the French section lie the bodies of soldiers and sailors who fell during and as a result of World War I, particularly on the Eastern front: 1,024 French, 22 Serb, 18 Greek, 16 Russian and 1 Bulgarian combatant are buried in individual graves. The remains of 777 French combatants have been placed in an ossuary. In 1961, the southeast section was transferred to the Italian government, which placed in a columbarium the remains of 975 soldiers who had perished in the south of France during World War II and whose bodies were not claimed by their relatives.

An eight-metre high pyramid and two sphinxes were erected in September 1810. They serve as a memorial to Vice-Admiral Latouche-Treville, Commander-in-Chief of French Naval Forces in the Mediterranean, who died in Toulon harbour on 17 August 1804.

The tomb of Marie-Nicolas Ravier, captain of the Armée d’Orient who gave his life for France on 8 October 1917 includes the inscription: “In recognition of care given to his son, Marie-Nicolas Ravier de Dounemari bequeathed half of his fortune to the Hôpital de Saint-Mandrier on 8 January 1919”.

Established in July 1943 in Dupleix (Algeria), the Group of Commandos was made up of volunteers from North Africa who had escaped from France or Spain and infantrymen frmo Algeria and Morocco. Before dawn, this unit arrived before Allied waves of assault and would be the first unit to land on French soil. During the early hours of Operation Dragoon, this commando, whose mission was to support the Allied progress, suffered heavy losses in Cap Nègre.

This cemetery covers an area of 220m², making it the smallest of the French national cemeteries.

Five of the nine graves are In Memoriam, meaning they preserve the memory of five soldiers who died for France, whose bodies have been returned to their families. Upon the request of General Bouvet, the head of African Commandos and Mr. Gola, the Mayor of Rayol-Canadel, this cemetery has been preserved by the Ministerial Decision of 22 July 1950.

In the late 1950s, the decision was taken to build a cemetery in Luynes in honour of the soldiers of the French Empire who lost their lives in southeast France in the two world wars.

Work began on Luynes National Cemetery in 1966. It contains the bodies of more than 11 000 French troops killed in the First and Second World Wars: 8 347 in 1914-18, 3 077 in 1939-45.

The bodies buried at Luynes were exhumed from temporary cemeteries in the departments of Aude, Alpes de Haute-Provence, Alpes-Maritimes, Bouches-du-Rhône, Gard, Hérault, Var, Vaucluse and Pyrénées-Orientales. In accordance with the law, families that requested the bodies of loved ones had them returned to them, to be buried in private graves, while the remainder were laid to rest at Luynes: 8 402 in individual graves and 3 022, unable to be identified, in three ossuaries. This process went on until 1968. The cemetery was officially opened on 27 September 1969, by veterans minister Henri Duvillard, a former member of the Resistance, leader of the Corps Francs du Nord du Loiret.
 

1914-18: the Empire comes to France’s aid

Right from 1914, France called on its empire to support the war effort, by providing troops, workers (nearly 200 000 men) and raw materials. A total of 600 000 soldiers were mobilised from across the Empire: tirailleurs, spahis and zouaves from North Africa; tirailleurs from sub-Saharan Africa and Madagascar; and troops from Indochina, the Antilles and the Pacific. From the Marne to Verdun, Champagne to the Aisne, these men fought on the main fronts, including the Eastern Front.

The soldiers from the colonies arrived in metropolitan France via Marseille, while others passed through the port city on their way to the Eastern Front. The camp of Sainte-Marthe was set up in 1915 to accommodate the colonial troops.

Unaccustomed to the cold climate, these soldiers were susceptible to respiratory illnesses and frostbite. The violence of the fighting, the bad weather conditions and the poor hygiene of the trenches caused the deaths of more than 78 000 of them.

In winter, the colonial soldiers were withdrawn from the front and sent mostly to the South of France. The French Army’s many wounded and sick who were evacuated from the different fronts, and in particular the colonials, were also treated in the south. Despite the treatment they received, several thousand died in hospitals of the region and were initially buried in local cemeteries. Some 8 347 bodies (2 626 of them in ossuaries) were reburied at Luynes.
 

1939-45: the French Empire in the war

As in the First World War, France called on the troops of its Empire in September 1939, when France mobilised and declared war on Nazi Germany. Alongside their French comrades, the colonial soldiers distinguished themselves in many battles. Among them, the Senegalese tirailleurs (who despite their name came from across sub-Saharan Africa) fought particularly fiercely. Besides sustaining severe losses, they sometimes suffered reprisals at the hands of German troops who, exasperated by their resistance, hounded them relentlessly. Thus, they were the victims of summary executions, for instance at Chasselay (Rhône) or Chartres, where survivors of the 26th Regiment of Senegalese Tirailleurs were massacred, a crime denounced at the time by prefect Jean Moulin.

From July 1940 onwards, as certain territories of the Empire came out in support for Free France (in particular, French Equatorial Africa), countless volunteers from all backgrounds enlisted in General de Gaulle’s Free French Forces. They particularly distinguished themselves at the Battle of Bir Hakeim (Libya), in June 1942, against Rommel’s Italian and German troops.

After the Anglo-American landings in North Africa (November 1942), the French Army of Africa made its re-entry into the war against Germany and Italy. It took part in the Tunisian campaign, which culminated in enemy surrender in May 1943, liberated Corsica in September and, from November, played an active role in the Italian campaign, as part of the French Expeditionary Force commanded by General Juin. The North African tirailleurs, spahis and goumiers distinguished themselves on the slopes of Mount Belvedere (February 1944) and opened up the road to Rome during the victorious Garigliano campaign, in May 1944.

On 15 August 1944, two months after Operation Overlord in Normandy, the Allies landed in Provence. General de Lattre de Tassigny’s Army B (the future French First Army) consisted predominantly of African soldiers. Following violent fighting, on 28 August 1944 they liberated the ports of Toulon and Marseille. These deep-water ports were crucial to maintaining supplies to the Allied armies in France. Ascending the Rhone valley, the French First Army took part in the Battle of the Vosges and the offensive against Belfort (Autumn 1944), where goums and tirailleurs sustained major losses, owing to enemy resistance and bad weather. Even so, during the winter of 1944-45, these men liberated Alsace. Crossing the Rhine, on 31 March 1945, the First Army drove deep into Nazi Germany and entered Karlsruhe and Stuttgart.

Most of the soldiers killed in the Second World War and buried at Luynes (3 077 men) died in the fighting to liberate Provence, following the landings of 15 August 1944. 
 

On 21 July 1944, through the “Bettina” operation, the German general Karl Pfaum enlisted over 15,000 men supported by an air wing. The massif was surrounded on all sides. The Luftwaffe dropped three waves of gliders over Vassieux and surrounding hamlets. The Resistance fighters were caught off guard.

After a week of fighting, the Vercors was on its knees. Over 600 Resistance fighters and a hundred Germans were killed. The civilian population paid a heavy price – 201 people were killed, 41 others were deported and 573 houses were destroyed. For all this suffering, on 4 August 1945, Vassieux-en-Vercors was named a ‘fellow Liberation city’ by decree. This rare honour has been awarded to four other French cities - Paris, Nantes, Grenoble and the Ile de Sein.

The Vassieux-en-Vercors National Cemetery is home to the graves of 187 Resistance fighters and civilians who died for France during the fighting that took place on the Vercors plateau in July 1944.

This cemetery was built in 1948 on the initiative of the Vercors National Society of Pioneers and Veterans, and holds the bodies of battle victims from 1944 that were buried in a temporary cemetery located in Pouyettes, to the north of the village of Vassieux. The cemetery is State property and is home to 187 individual graves where 80 Resistance fighters, 58 Vassieux locals and 49 unidentified bodies are buried.

Outside the cemetery, there are the metal structures of two types of gliders used by the Luftwaffe – a DFS 230 and a 242 Gotha.

Next to the cemetery, a Memorial Hall preserves the memory of all victims of the Vercors where a plaque shows that the body of Sergeant Raymond Anne, a Resistance fighter from Vassieux, lies in the crypt of Mont-Valérien. He was considered a true symbol of the sacrifice of all deaths of French Resistance fighters.

Nearby, the Vassieux-en-Vercors Museum of the Resistance and the memorial of the Resistance in Col de la Chau, provide insight into the events that took place during World War II in the Vercors region.

The spirit of Glières

The Haute-Savoie was liberated by Resistance forces, acting alone, on 19th August 1944.

Glières was glorified by Free France radio in London as the true image of the France to be liberated in contrast to the subservient, corrupt France of the Vichy regime. With men from different Resistance forces and with forced labour evaders from all over France, from all backgrounds, of all persuasions and of every religion, with their motto “live in freedom or die”, the men of Glières restored France’s scorned and betrayed values, movingly illustrated by the Morette necropolis, with its stars of David among the Latin crosses and the cockades of the Spanish Republic alongside the French cockade.

Keeping the spirit of Glières alive

Today, with the support of the Association des Glières, staff from the heritage and citizenship department of the Haute-Savoie council welcome and guide the thousands of visitors who come every year.

Among them, the citizenship education of thousands of schoolchildren who come to Morette and the Glières plateau under their teachers’ supervision is enhanced by these inspiring sites, which show them what France represents and how we should live together despite our differences: the France of liberty, equality and fraternity.

Within the walls of the national cemetery is a memorial lantern, which serves as the commune's war memorial. In 1921, after having granted - in November 1920 - the principle of a permanent plot for the soldiers of the commune who had died for France, the Morvillars municipal council decided to erect the commune's war memorial within the walls of the military cemetery. This memorial, in the form of an 8 metre lantern, was inaugurated in 1923. Crowned by a Greek cross, this monument therefore carries the names of the 32 natives of Morvillars who died in 1914-1918 and those of the five who died in 1939-1945. Twelve graves of soldiers originating from Morvillars surround this monument, arranged in a semi-circle.

In 1914, the fortified town of Belfort was a major part of France's defence. The 14 forts controlled a gap between the Swiss border and the Vosges. During the first days of the war, a new occupation such as the ones of 1814 and 1871 was feared. That is why a state of siege was put in place by the governor. More than 20,000 women, children, elderly, sick people and foreigners were evacuated to neighbouring departments. Equipment, supplies, buildings...everything was requisitioned as part of the war effort.

However, during the entire conflict, Belfort remained untouched by the major offensives. The front was 20 kilometres away. Daily life was however marked by bombings and the flow of convoys of the wounded. As the war continued and the combats became increasingly violent, the number of wounded continued to rise. Because of such an influx, the 500-bed military hospital was quickly overwhelmed.  The health services had to adapt, and requisitioned public and private buildings. And so the Dollfus Mieg et Compagnie spinning mill, schools in the Montbéliard area and the Rue de Châteaudun as well as the Sainte-Marie secondary school were transformed into temporary hospitals. Adolphe Pégoud, the French fighter ace with six victories under his belt, was transferred to one of these structures after being shot down over Petit Croix on 31 August 1915. He was buried on 3 September in the cemetery at Brasse, where he remained before being exhumed in 1924, when he was buried at the Montparnasse cemetery in Paris.