(3rd October 1898: Buenos-Aires, Argentina - 20th November 1944: Champagney, Haute-Saône)

Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, into a family of magistrates from Lyon, Diego Brosset returned to France at the age of two and grew up in the château at Rillieux-la-Pape. Unable to support the confinement of the Jesuit colleges he attended, he finished his studies at the age of fifteen to return to the family home. During the First World War, on the 17th September 1916, he enlisted as a second class soldier in Grenoble with the 28th battalion of foot chasseurs and later in the 68th. In four tours of duty, he was awarded many commendations and was promoted to corporal and later sergeant. A distinguished serviceman, he attended the officer training school at Issoudun and passed the entrance examination for the Saint-Maixent Military infantry academy, which he left in 1921 as a second lieutenant. He chose the colonial infantry and was posted to French West Africa to the 2nd regiment of Sudanese infantrymen. Appointed to a platoon of méharistes (camel mounted cavalry) in March 1922, he spent around fifteen years patrolling in the Sudan (Kati), Mauritania (Chinguetti, Atar and Agaraktem), Southern Algeria (Touat Gourara and Tindouf) and Southern Morocco (Lekdim), interspersed with brief, reluctant returns to France.

With a passion for literature, he made the most of his free time to complete a semi-autobiographical novel, "Il sera beaucoup pardonné", for the publication of which he requested the patronage of François Mauriac. In February 1928, promoted to the order of Cavalier of the Legion of Honour, he was posted to the 23rd colonial infantry regiment at Coulommiers. At the Châlons camp, he met Jean Bruller (alias Vercors), starting a long literary friendship between the two men. Promoted to captain in 1930, he returned to France and in August 1931 he married Jacqueline, the daughter of General Mangin. He returned to Morocco in 1933 for four years, during which time he fought alongside General Giraud at the head of the 29th Goums. A tireless writer, he competed several times, unsuccessfully, for the grand prix for Colonial literature. He overcame his disappointments by studying for the entrance examination for the Ecole supérieure de Guerre, where he was admitted in January 1937, having obtained a degree in oriental languages. Awarded the 59th Promotion in August 1939, he was appointed to the general staff of the colonies.

On the 3rd September, diplomacy gave way to canons. Brosset rejoined his unit on the Lorraine front. In December he accepted a position at the 2nd bureau of the colonial army corps, received his commander's stripes and then applied to take part in a military expedition to Columbia. His application was successful and the Brossets arrived in Bogota in May 1940. News of the armistice reached South America on the 23rd June. As a man of action, Diégo could not come to terms with it. On the 27th June he sent a letter to General de Gaulle expressing his complete support and became an "ambassador" for the Free French (France Libre) in his writing, through his expedition to Columbia, which was soon to be cancelled. Brosset refused to carry out the orders of the Vichy government, which sentenced him to death in his absence, informing his superiors of his decision to take orders from General de Gaulle. On the 8th December, he was finally able to obtain support from London, where he was promoted to Lieutenant-colonel at the 2nd bureau before taking part in the General's colonial expedition in his capacity of staff officer: in Freetown, Brazzaville, Fort-Lamy, Cairo and Eritrea where he was for a time Chief of Staff to General Catroux: the Horn of Africa then became an important strategic issue with the arrival of the Afrika Korps in the Tripoli area. From June 1941 until December 1942, he was involved in the fratricidal struggle between General Legentilhomme's France Libre troops and those of General Dentz in Syria, who remained loyal to Pétain, a situation which would only be resolved by the armistice of Saint-Jean d'Acre. His long experience of the desert earned him his mission in the East of Syria before a new posting in January 1943 to the 2nd brigade at Marsa Matrouh in Cyrenaica. Brosset reorganised his unit, driving it across the Libyan desert to Gambut (Tobrouk) and leading it, between the 9th and 11th May, to the victory of Takrouna by pushing enemy lines back three kilometres. Appointed Brigade General on the 1st June, he received the Liberation Cross directly from General de Gaulle and then took command of the 1st division of the Free French (the division française libre or DFL) in August, renamed the "motorised infantry division" ("division motorisée d'infanterie" or DMI). He rearmed and reorganised his company of troops with all his characteristic energy. On the 11th April 1944 the retaking of Europe could finally begin: leaving from Bône and Bizerte, his men arrived in Italy. Brosset took part in rupturing the Gustav, Dora and Hitler lines at the battle of Garigliano, marched on Rome and, at the end of June, liberated Tuscany, before opening a new front in the south of France alongside General de Lattre de Tassigny. He landed with his division in Provence on the 16th August 1944, taking back Toulon, capturing Mont Redon and Hyères (20-21st August), Le Touar and La Garde (22-23rd August) and fighting in the countryside around Lyon. Still involved in the action, the newly promoted Division General marched at the head of the 1st DFL-DMI at the battle of the Vosges (20th September - 19th November 1944). The push to the Rhine could begin. On Monday, November 20th the attack on Giromany was launched. General Diégo Brosset, left at dawn for the front. He pressed on with his ordinance, taking unsecured routes. He visited a few camps, jumping from jeep to jeep. In this way he approached the bridge at Rahin (Champagney, Haute-Saône). He set off across it and his vehicle overturned into the river... His body, recovered on the 23rd November, would be buried in the national necropolis in Rougemont (Doubs). " In him France lost a shining power who was, only wanted to be and only ever was of service to her" (General Koenig).

(21st January 1867: Brussels - 28th January 1965: Paris)

Maxime Weygand was born in Brussels of unknown parents. His origins continue to intrigue journalists and historians: was he the natural child of Countess Kosakowska, the illegitimate son of Léopold II of Belgium, the result of the union between Colonel Van der Smissen and Empress Charlotte of Mexico or of the latter with an Indian from Mexico? The file remains open. Entrusted at the age of six to David Cohen de Léon, a Jewish leather merchant from Marcheille, he took the name of the country of his tutor and, after an exemplary education at the Vanves, Louis-le-Grand and Henri-IV high schools, in 1885 he was admitted to Saint-Cyr as a foreign entrant under the name of Maxime de Nimal. Graduating in 1887, he chose the cavalry and was trained at Saumur before being sent to the 4th Dragoon Regiment. Aged twenty, he was officially adopted by his tutor's accountant, François Weygand, and was granted French nationality. He moved between garrison towns (Chambéry, Saint-Étienne, Lunéville, Saumur, Niort and Nancy) and received his Captain's stripes in 1896. Punished "for having taken, a stance that might have a political nature" in favour of Colonel Henry during the Dreyfus affair, he married in 1900 and pursued his career as an officer with the 9th Dragoon Regiment. As Lieutenant-Colonel in 1912, he was noticed for his qualities as an instructor at the Saumur Cavalry School and joined the Centre of higher military studies. He was promoted to the dignity of Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur in 1913.

In 1914 at the head of the 5th Regiment of Hussars, he took part in the Battle of Morhange. On the 28th August, promoted to Colonel, he was assigned to Foch, the Chief of Staff. Promoted to Brigade General in 1916, he remained faithful to Foch during his ostracism, putting himself in a favourable position to return to his side in 1917 following the failure of the Nivelle plan. At the Rapallo conference (6th and 7th November), he worked on the constitution of a higher inter-allied command, which became effective from the Doullens conference (26th March 1918) with the appointment of Foch at its head and Weygand in the role of Major General. The two men negotiated the terms of the armistice in November. In 1920, he was General of the army corps, carrying out a mission to Poland as military advisor to Marshal Pilsudski in his fight against Soviet Russia. In 1923, he rose to the rank of Army General, replacing Gouraud as High Commissioner in Syria. On returning to France, he was appointed to the Upper War Council and then to the management staff of the Centre of Higher Military Studies, writing the biographies of Foch (1929) and Turenne (1930). In 1931, Weygand succeeded Foch at the Académie Française, publishing a work about the 11th November (1932) and, on retiring from active management in 1935, he devoted himself to writing the military history of Méhémet-Ali and his sons (1936), Comment élever nos fils? (How should we raise our sons?) (1937), La France est-elle défendue? (Is France well defended?) (1937) and Histoire de l'armée française (History of the French Army) (1938).

On the outbreak of the Second World War President Daladier recalled him to command French troops in the Middle East with the title of Head of Theatre of Operations of the Eastern Mediterranean and the mission of coordinating the action of the men in the Levant and the Balkans. In May 1940, Reynaud, the President of the Council, recalled him to Paris to succeed General Gamelin in supreme command of the French army due to the crushing defeat of the French army in the East. He tried to establish a counter-offensive with the Belgian and British armies but the plan was abandoned on the 24th May, as Franco-British troops were surrounded at Dunkirk. The following day, during an extraordinary meeting at the Elysée, the possibility of an armistice was suggested. On the 11th June, during the Briare conference and in the light of Churchill's decision not to schedule any large-scale attacks on the front line by the Royal Air Force, the position of the French high command began to take shape: to carry on with the struggle in the empire or decide to request an armistice? Weygand and Pétain considered that the government could not leave French territory and that an armistice would preserve its military honour. The pace of events quickened? The flood of refugees, swelled by the army beating its retreat, compounded the general confusion. The government, which had moved to Bordeaux, still hesitated over the policy to adopt. On the 17th June, a consensus was reached through the vice-president of the Council, Camille Chautemps, and the request for an armistice was made to the German authorities. Pétain replaced Reynaud and Weygand was appointed Minister of National Defence. However, although he made sure that armament contracts between France and American manufacturers were transferred to benefit the British allies and that deliveries were redirected to British ports, he disapproved of General de Gaulle's attitude and demoted him to the rank of colonel, having him sentenced to death in his absence.

As a Minister and then General Representative of the Vichy government in Africa, Weygand tried to maintain the balance between the Allies, the demands of the Reich and his fidelity to the only government he believed to be legitimate: he refused to hand over the facilities in North Africa to Germany (July 1940 and May 1941), applied the legislation of Vichy, negotiated the conditions of supplies with the American Murphy (February 1941) and demanded that soldiers from the African army swear allegiance to the Marshal following the campaign to Syria. His behaviour embarrassed Berlin and the Vichy government recalled him to the mainland in November 1941. In November 1942, following the Anglo-American landing in North Africa and the total occupation of the mainland by German and Italian troops, Weygand was arrested by the Germans and placed under house arrest under the authority of the camp of Dachau.

Freed on the 5th May 1945, he was arrested two days later. Detained for acts of collaboration at Val-de-Grâce until May 1946, the case was dismissed in 1948.

He spent the last years of his life working: as president of the Jeanne d'Arc association, on reworking the memoirs of Philippe Pétain, publishing opinion columns in Le Monde, and pursuing his career as a writer, at the same time settling the score with de Gaulle and Reynaud: Foch (1947), Le Général Frère (General Frère) (1949), Mémoires (Memoirs), 1950-1957, Forces de la France (Forces of France)(1951), Et que vive la France! (And long live France) (1953), En lisant les mémoires du Général de Gaulle (On reading General de Gaulle's memoirs) (1955), L'Arc de Triomphe de l'Étoile (1960), Histoire de l'armée française (History of the French Army) (1961), Maxime Weygand, L'Armée à l'Académie (Maxime Weygand, The Army to the Academy) (Maxime Weygand, (1962), Lettres inédites relatives aux testaments de Leurs Majestés le roi Louis XVI et la reine Marie-Antoinette (Previously unpublished letters regarding the testaments of Their Majesties King Louis XVI and Queen Marie-Antoinette) (1965).

Maxime Weygand died on the27th January 1965 of complications to a fractured femur. He was buried in the Saint-Charles cemetery in Morlaix, in Finistère.

(20th September 1872: Paris - 18th April 1958: Paris)

Maurice Gamelin was the son of an officer and army controller general wounded at the Battle of Solferino in 1859 and a mother from the Alsace, the daughter of Quartermaster General Ulrich and the niece of the military Governor of Strasbourg in 1870. From an early age he showed an aptitude for military skills and matters. After winning the national prize for philosophy, he continued his studies at the Ecole du Louvre and then decided to take the entrance examination for Saint-Cyr. Admitted in October 1891, he graduated top of his year in 1893 to be appointed to the 3rd regiment of Algerian tirailleurs (infantrymen) and then to the Topographic Section in Tunisia. Between 1896 and 1899, the young officer used his drawing skills in the army's geographic department in Paris. Achieving eighth place in the Ecole de Guerre's competitive examination, he soon came to the attention of his teachers, notably Foch and Lanrezac. Promoted to captain in 1901 in the 15th battalion of foot chasseurs, the following year he joined General Joffre at his headquarters. In 1906 he published a philosophical study of the art of warfare, a work that elevated him into the ranks of great military thinkers of his time, although he was only the generalissimo's ordnance officer in the 6th infantry division. He remained at his side in the 2nd army corps (1908) and in the Upper War Council, before taking command of the 11th battalion of Alpine chasseurs (Annecy) for two years from 1911. Head of the Chief of staff's 3rd Bureau, he chose to join General Joffre once again in March 1914.
It was as head of his military office that Gamelin took part in the operations of the Great War. Confidant to the generalissimo and a well-informed tactician, he led the 2nd half-brigade of foot chasseurs along the Linge (Alsace) and in the Somme, drafted the 2nd order that was at the root of the victory of the Marne (25th August 1914) and wrote the 6th order which triggered its offensive. As temporary Brigade General in December 1916, he was posted to the 16th infantry division, before being recalled to Joffre's HQ at the beginning of 1917. When Joffre was replaced by Nivelle, he requested a command position. In April/May, he was given the 9th infantry division with whom he distinguished himself on the Argonne, at Verdun, in the Aisne, around Noyon in March 1918 and halted the advance of German troops along the Oise. Promoted to Brigade General in September 1919, he was sent as head of the French military mission to Brazil and in 1921 published "Trois étapes de l'avant-guerre" (The three stages of the pre-war period) (Les oeuvres libres, no.13).

On his return to France in 1925, the young Division General took command of the French troops in Syria as Deputy to the High Commissioner Jouvenel (September 1925 to February 1929), with the mission of repressing the Djebel Druze rebellion alongside General Sarrail, a duty that he carried out brilliantly and which earned him the honour of being elevated to the dignity of officer of the Légion d'honneur (16th September 1926) and his General's stripes in the army corps (November 1927). Posted to the 20th army corps in Nancy, he became the second in command to the General Chief of Staff of the army before replacing Weygand as General Chief of Staff of the army on the 9th February 1931. Awarded the Grand Croix of the Légion d'honneur on the 14th July 1932, he held the vice presidency of the Upper War Council (January 1935) and was decorated with the military medal (31st December 1935). As General Chief of Staff of the national defence (21st January 1938), he took command of the allied forces in France in September 1939. However, his tactical ideas were outdated: he refused to make large-scale use of armoured weapons and the air force, preferring a defensive strategy relying on the Maginot line and showed a tendency to delegate command on the front; the French army could only put up futile resistance - "we are all, more or less inevitably, men of a certain time and background, even when we try to react against some parts of it", he would write in his memoirs as if to justify himself. On the 19th May 1940, General Gamelin was relieved of his command and placed under arrest by the Vichy regime on the 6th September. Imprisoned at the fort in Portalet with Blum, Daladier, Mandel and Reynaud, he was tried on the 19th February 1942 in front of the high court in Riom, which he forced to adjourn (11th April) by refusing to take part in the proceedings - "the trial became in fact one of "lack of preparation"", he would note in his memoirs. On the occupation of the free zone by the Wehrmacht, the Generalissimo was imprisoned in Buchenwald in March 1943 and then in Itter, in the Austrian Tyrol, until his liberation by American troops on the 5th May 1945. Returning to Paris, Maurice Gamelin devoted himself to writing his volumes of "Servir" memoirs, published in 1946, which he completed in 1954 with the story of his experience of the Great War and the manoeuvre that led to the victory of the Marne.

Joseph-Simon was born on the 24th April 1849 in Saint-Béat. He was the son of Lieutenant Gallieni, an Italian who had enlisted in a foreign regiment in 1829 and become a neutralised French citizen in 1841, before commanding the garrison at Val d'Aran. A student at the Prytanee Military Academy in La Flèche, he then attended the Special Military School of St Cyr in 1868. On the 15th July 1870, four days before the beginning of the Franco-Prussian war, he was assigned as a sub-lieutenant to the 3rd regiment of marine infantry. On the 30th August he received the order to defend the Hauts-de-Meuse between Mouzon and Carignan. Taken prisoner in September and imprisoned for seven months alongside the members of his unit who had survived the Battle of Bazeilles, he was held in Ingolstadt prison and then in Magdebourg and released on the 12th March 1871. On returning from captivity, he was posted to Paris and then to Rochefort, before embarking for the island of Reunion on the 1st April 1872, where he served for three years as a lieutenant. In June 1875, he returned to metropolitan France and joined the 1st Regiment of Marine Infantry in December 1876. Posted to Goree Island, he later became commander of Thiès where he distinguished himself through his diplomatic and strategic qualities and his desire to "reach the souls of the people". At headquarters in Senegal, General Brière de l'Isle assigned him to exploration missions to the valleys of the Senegal and Niger rivers and in the Sudan. On the 29th March 1880, through the treaty of Bafoulabe, he established the French protectorate on Mali. The following year he negotiated the French protectorate treaty on the Niger with Sultan Ahmadou.

In June 1881, on leaving the 3rd Infantry Regiment, he returned to Paris before taking up his duties as Chief of Battalion in Toulon in March 1882. After three years spent in Martinique (1883-1886), in May 1886 Lieutenant Colonel Gallieni set off for the Sudan, where he was appointed Superior Commander on the 20th December, in order to re-establish order in the upper valley of the Senegal. In July 1888 he was Commander of the 4th Regiment of Marine Infantry in Toulon, followed by the 8th Regiment in April 1890. A graduate of the École de guerre (war academy), in March 1891 he was promoted to Colonel at the headquarters of the Marine Infantry. From September 1892 to August 1896, he took part in the pacifying campaigns in Tonkin at the head of the 3rd regiment of Tonkinese tirailleurs. Supported by Commander Lyautey, he pursued pirates on the China Sea and laid the foundations of the French colonial system. As Brigade General in 1896, at the request of the Minister for the colonies André Lebon, Gallieni was sent to Madagascar, becoming Governor General there in September. He forced Queen Ravanalo the Third to abdicate and established the island's economic development programme. Promoted to Division General in 1899, his duties brought him back to Paris before his return to Madagascar in June 1900. Gallieni was appointed Commander in Chief of the troops of the Eastern Africa group in 1903, two years before returning to France and resigning from his post of Governor General.

In February 1906 he was commander of the 13th army corps in Clermont-Ferrand and then promoted to Military Governor of Lyon in June and appointed at the head of the 14th Army Corps. Assigned to the Upper War Council and the Presidency of the provisional council for the defence of the colonies in 1908, he carried out inspection visits in North Africa. Elected to the Upper Council for National Defence in 1911, he gave Joffre the opportunity to become Commander in Chief of the French Army. Reaching the upper age limit in April 1914, the General was recalled on the 26th August by Viviani's government to take command of the armies' entrenched Paris camp. He totally reorganised the defence of the capital and secured reinforcements from Maunoury's 6th Army, the 45th Algerian Division and the 4th Corps of the 3rd Army. On the 2nd September, he received full civilian and military powers. He provided a new impetus for national defence, most notably by requisitioning all automobiles and horse drawn vehicles, as well as the Parisian taxis which would play a decisive role in the counter-offensive that liberated Paris from the threat of the army of the Reich. On the 8th September, Maunoury returned under Joffre's orders. Gallieni however retained his authority over Paris throughout the month of November and dissolved his civilian cabinet on the 7th December. On his return to government, Aristide Briand offered him the portfolio of War Minister on the 29th October 1915. It was a difficult task: to improve the effectiveness of the High Command and reorganise the operation of its administration. On the 2nd December the post of Commander in Chief of all the armies was created and given to him. Challenged by the President of the Council following his suggestion to reform the High Command on the 7th March 1916, he resigned three days later for health reasons. He was admitted to hospital in Versailles in April 1916 and died on the night of the 27th to 28th May. Following a state funeral, the "Saviour of Paris" was buried at the Saint-Raphaël cemetery. Joseph Gallieni was posthumously made Marshal France on the 6th May 1921. He held the Great Cross of the Légion d'honneur and the Military Medal.

Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel (15th November 1891: Heidenheim - 14th October 1944: Herrlingen)

Erwin Rommel was born in Heidenheim on the 15th November 1891. He was from a middle-class background, the son of a maths teacher. He joined the army in 1910. In 1914, at the beginning of the First World War, he was just 23 years old but very quickly proved to be an excellent soldier and leader of men. Decorated with the Order of Merit, after the war he became an instructor at the Potsdam War Academy and was then appointed director of the Wiener-Neustadt War Academy. Sympathetic to the National Socialists, in 1938 he was appointed Chief of Staff by Hitler at his headquarters and, a year later, made head of his personal guard. He was promoted to the rank of Division General on the 1st August 1939. After the campaign in Poland, he commanded the 7th tank division during the invasion of France, between May and June 1940, although he had no practical experience of tank warfare. His division rapidly advanced on Lille before taking the Maginot Line from the rear, capturing part of it. It was called the "Phantom Division", because nobody ever knew exactly where it was, but it would always appear when least expected, most notably in the breach of the Meuse on the 13th May, which was a tactical feat. Erwin Rommel was then appointed Commander of the German military forces of the Afrika Korps, in order to come to the aid of the Italians struggling in Libya against the British.

He succeeded in turning around the situation in Africa, where he was nicknamed the Desert Fox by both friends and enemies, because he was crafty and constantly improvising in order to change the outcome of the fighting. Appointed Army General on the 30th January 1942, he was to conquer Tobruk on the 21st June. Two days later, he was promoted to the dignity of Marshal. On the 3rd September 1942, Rommel fell ill and returned to Germany. When he came back to Africa, the British had already advanced considerably. The British General Montgomery managed to capture the town of El Alamein forcing the Afrika Korps and the Italians to retreat before taking them in a pincer movement using Anglo-American troops, who had been landing in Algeria and Morocco since the 8th November. Rommel managed to regroup the German forces along a front line in Tunisia known as Mareth, but it was a delicate operation as there was a lack of men and equipment.

On the 5th March 1943, he was recalled by Hitler and left Africa. He therefore did not witness the final defeat of the Afrika Korps in Tunisia on the 13th May 1943. He then took a command position in Italy and was later made responsible for inspecting the Atlantic Wall, as well as commanding the B group of armies located in Normandy under the orders of Feldmarschall von Runstedt with whom there was constant friction. His task was to defend the beaches from an allied invasion. During a discussion with General Bayerlein, Rommel told him: "It's no longer a question of crushing the attack from the fanatical hordes (the Russians) driven forward in masses with no regard for their losses... we must face up to an enemy who applies all his intelligence to use his technical resources... with no expense spared on equipment. Enthusiasm and tenacity are not enough to make a soldier, he must be intelligent enough to make the most of the situation and that is precisely what our adversary knows how to do.... "(The War without Hate, Rommel's personal papers published in 1953 by the English historian Liddell Hart, p 417).

Rommel was aware that the first hours of the allied assault would be critical. However, on the 6th June 1944, he found himself in Germany to celebrate his wife's birthday, as all the intelligence in his possession clearly indicated that there would be no landing before the 15th. Within a day he returned to his command post at la Roche-Guyon and tried to repel the forces landing by sea, but he knew it was already too late. On the 17th July 1944, he was seriously wounded in an air attack above the village of Vimoutier. On the 20th July 1944 there was an assassination attempt on Hitler. Rommel, who was unable to take part personally but was strongly implicated, was relieved of his post and Hitler left him no other choice but suicide, guaranteeing the safety of his family in return.

Four days after his death on the 14th October, Germany held an extravagant funeral in honour of this military leader, who was much valued by the people and whose execution would have tarnished the image of the State and the party. He was buried in Herrlingen.

(24th October 1899: Port-au-Prince, Haiti - 20th November 1962: Cormeilles-en-Parisis, Val-d'Oise)

Philippe Kieffer was Alsatian by birth through his teacher father, whose family had fled from Otterswiller to Jamaica following the German annexation of 1870, and British through his mother. Having only just completed his studies as a reserve officer in 1918, nothing short of a literally Rhinian throwback to shed his blood for his homeland could have predisposed him for a career in the armed services. A graduate of the Upper College of Business Studies, he had followed a career as a banker in North America until the age of forty. However, he volunteered as a reserve officer at the beginning of the Second World War. On the 10th September 1939 he was a sub- lieutenant in the navy after a first tour of duty in the land army, carrying out the role of interpreter on board the battleship Courbet. At Dunkirk, assigned to Admiral Nord's general staff, he witnessed the invasion of the Wehrmacht in May 1940 and on the 19th June decided to support General de Gaulle in London. He joined the ranks of the Free French (France Libre) Naval Forces on the very day they were created, the 1st July 1940. As an Interpreter and Cipher Officer, he understood the importance of British commandos and set up a unit of French Naval Fusiliers in Portsmouth in May 1941: the 1st Company of the Battalion of Marine Fusilier Commandos (1re compagnie du bataillon de fusiliers-marins commandos or BFMC). Trained at the commando training centre in Achnacarry, it did not take long for the twenty or so volunteers to become involved in the operations of the 2nd Unit of British Commandos: promoted to Ship-of-the-Line Lieutenant on the 1st July 1942, Kieffer led his men to Dieppe on the 19th August 1942. The BFM, increased by a company, took part in preparatory raids in Normandy with a view to landing in 1943, covering themselves with even more glory the following year in Lieutenant Colonel Dawson's famous 4th British Commandos belonging to General Lord Lovat's 1st Brigade. On the 6th June, his Green Berets landed on "Sword" beach in Ouistreham, breaking through in Colleville, Saint-Aubin-d'Arquenay, Amfreville and Bavant to join up with British airborne troops at Benouville (Pegasus Bridge). Wounded at the beginning of the assault, the Lieutenant Commander remained with his comrades in arms for a further two days before being evacuated, rejoining his unit on the 13th July for the advance on Honfleur.

From Normandy, he rushed to Paris with two of his men and was the first to enter the city. In October 1944, his battalion, increased by a company, was sent to the Netherlands for an assault on the island of Walcheren. His marine fusiliers took Flessinge, the key to the port of Anvers, continuing the liberation of the Dutch islands through concerted operations with British commandos. At the end of the war, he was on the inter-allied general staff before leaving active service to work on the reconstruction of the country on the 1945consultative committee, becoming involved on a local level with terms in office as General Councillor for the Calvados region (September 1945 - June 1946) and Town Councillor for Grandcamp-les-Bains. He published his book of memoirs, Béret vert (Green Beret) in 1948 and was appointed Captain of Frigate six years later in 1954. He was an advisor for the film The Longest Day in 1965 before he died on the 20th November the same year. He was laid to rest in the cemetery at Grandcamp-les-Bains. In homage to this servant of France, the 6th Battalion of Commandos, established on the 6th June 2008, bears the name of Marine Commando "Kieffer". Located in Lorient, this company specialising in new technologies is a strong maritime unit belonging to the force of marine fusiliers and commandos (force des fusiliers marins et commandos or FORFUSCO).

The son of Prince Philippe, Count of Flanders (the brother of King Léopold II) and Princess Marie of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, Albert I was Prince of Belgium, Duke of Saxony and Prince of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. On the 2nd October 1900, he married Elisabeth, the Duchess of Bayern, with whom he would have three children: Léopold, who would become Léopold III, Charles-Théodore, Regent of the kingdom from 1944 to 1951 and Marie-José who would become Queen of Italy for just three months from the 9th May to the 13th June 1946. Albert I was sworn in on the 23rd December 1909, becoming the third King of the Belgians after Léopold I and Léopold II, sovereigns not of a kingdom, but of a nation (in the same way as Louis-Philippe I was "King of the French people" in 1830). Succeeding his uncle, King Léopold II, he discovered an opulent country with two communities, the Flemish and the Walloons, with the latter predominating, and endowed with a rich colony, the Congo. In 1914, Albert I rejected the ultimatum issued by Emperor Wilhelm II to secure the free passage of his troops across Belgian soil. On the 4th August, the Germans invaded Belgium, whose army, following fierce fighting at Liege and Anvers, took up position behind the Yser river on the 15th October.

Calm, modest and almost self-effacing, King Albert was to demonstrate his power by insisting on exercising his constitutional prerogative to take command of the army. He refused to follow the Belgian government in exile in Sainte-Adresse, on the outskirts of Le Havre, setting up his general headquarters in La Panne in Western Flanders and living alongside his soldiers for the duration of the war. He was admirably supported by his wife, Queen Elisabeth (1876-1965). Bavarian by birth (née Von Wittelsbach) and the niece of Empress Elisabeth of Austria, the wife of Emperor Franz Josef, she devoted herself to caring for the wounded and refugees, founding a hospital in La Panne, where she worked as a nurse. Their son, Prince Léopold, Duke of Brabant, enlisted in 1915 as a simple soldier in the 12th regiment in Ligne, at the age of 13. In September 1918, Albert I actively took part in the decisive offensive launched by Foch to conquer the Flanders ridge (29th September) and the battle of Torhout-Tielt (14th - 18th October), which resulted in the reconquering of Bruges. On the 22nd November 1918, accompanied by Queen Elizabeth and his children, Albert I finally returned triumphantly to Brussels. The nobleness of his demeanour at the head of his army earned him the nickname of the "Knight King". In the period after the war, he represented Belgium at the peace negotiations at Versailles, defending his country's interests whilst also trying, in vain, to oppose the policy of excessive humiliation of Germany. An ardent climber, he died climbing one of the Marche-les-Dames rocks near Namur in the Meuse valley on the 17th February 1934.

William Ridell Birdwood was born in Kirkee in India on the 13th September 1865.

After studying at Clifton College in Bristol and at the royal military college at Sandhurst, in 1883 he began his career in the Royal Scots Fusiliers. Appointed to the cavalry in 1885, he served with the 12th lancers, the 11th lancers and the Viceroy's Bodyguard in India, where he took part in operations on the North-Western border. In 1899, he was posted to South Africa and General Kitchener's general staff, during the Boer war led by the colonists against the British sovereignty. Returning to India, he was promoted to Major General in 1911 and became Department Secretary in the Indian army the following year. In November 1914, Kitchener, then the British Minister of War, put him in charge of training an army corps of Australian and New Zealander troops, who underwent training in Egypt before being sent to the Western Front. This corps, known as Anzac (Australian and New-Zealand Army Corps), took part in its first operation on landing on the Gallipoli peninsula on the 25th April 1915, with the objective of taking control of the Dardanelles straits linking the Aegean Sea and the Black Sea via the Bosporus straits. During the campaign, he briefly replaced Ian Hamilton at the head of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force, before being promoted to Lieutenant General in mid-November 1915 and taking command of the British army in the Dardanelles, then comprising Anzac, the 8th British corps and the 9th corps.

In March 1916, following changes within Anzac, he took command of the 1st Anzac corps, formed from the 1st and 2nd Australian divisions and the New Zealand division, which was sent to the French front. Made General on the 23rd October 1917, he was in charge of the Australian corps when, at the turning point of 1917-1918, the five Anzac divisions were combined into a single corps. He took command of the 5th British Army on the 31st May 1918, and led them in the last offensives, which gave victory to the Allies. At the end of the conflict, he commanded the Northern Army in India until 1925, when, promoted to the dignified position of Marshal he became Commander in Chief of the British army in India. On retiring from the army in 1930, he had aspirations of becoming Governor General of Australia, but was never to achieve the position. He died on the 17th May 1951 at Hampton Court Palace. In 1916, he was made Baron Birdwood of Anzac and Totnes in Devon and became a Peer in 1919. For services rendered during the First World War, he was a holder of the Cross of War and the Belgian Cross of War; he was decorated with the Order of the Crown by Belgium and the Order of the Nile by Egypt.

Hindenburg, who came from a long line of Prussian army officers, was born in Posen (today Poznan) on 2 October 1847 to Robert von Beneckendorff und von Hindenburg, a lieutenant in the 18th infantry, and Louise Schwickart. Hindenburg was a cadet at the Wahlstatt military academy and in Berlin. In 1859 he was a second lieutenant in the Prussian Guard's 3rd infantry regiment and in 1866 took part in the Austro-Prussian War, fighting in particular at Rosberitz and Königgrätz. He participated in the 1870-1871 campaign against France at Saint-Privat in August and in the siege of Paris. On 16 January 1871 he was present at the proclamation of the German Empire at the chateau of Versailles. Hindenburg was admitted to the War Academy in 1873 and pursued his training with the general staff. He was a captain on the general staff of the 2nd army corps in Stettin in 1878 and of the 1st division in Königsberg in 1881. He was the head of a company of the 58th infantry regiment in 1884 before becoming a major in the operations section of the general staff led by von Schlieffen. In 1890 he became a war ministry department head.

Hindenburg was promoted to colonel in 1893 and headed the 91st infantry regiment in Oldenburg. In 1896 he became a brigadier general. He was the chief of staff of the 8th army corps in Koblenz before being appointed major general in command of the 28th division in Karlsruhe in 1900 and taking over as head of the 4th army corps in Magdeburg in 1903. He retired in 1911. On 23 August 1914 Hindenburg was called to command the 8th army and stopped the Russian offensive in East Prussia by defeating Samsonov at Tannenberg that month and Rennenkampf at the Mazurian Lakes in September. He was the Eastern front commander-in-chief in November 1914. The battles he won in Poland and Lithuania from 1914 to 1916 made the field marshal a national hero and Falkenhayn's successor as general chief of staff in August 1916. With Ludendorff as second in command, he took over as head of general military operations on all fronts. Hindenburg adopted a defensive stance in the West marked by the construction of a huge complex of fortified positions (the Hindenburg Line) and focused all efforts on Romania and Russia on the Eastern front, supported the Austrians on the Italian front and decided to wage unrestricted submarine warfare. In addition to military authority, Hindenburg and Ludendorff also had strong political clout and brought about the resignation of Bethmann-Hollweg, who disagreed with certain aspects of the conduct of the war, in July 1917. In 1918 the resumption of German offensives on the Western front failed. Beefed up by American units, the allied forces inexorably pushed back the German troops. Hindenburg urged the government to request an armistice. Hindenburg was demobilised in July 1919 and published his memoirs, Aus meinem Leben, the following year. In 1925 Hindenburg was elected president of the German Republic. In 1932 he ran again, this time against Adolf Hitler, whom he defeated but named chancellor the following year. On 2 August 1934 Hindenburg died in Neudeck, East Prussia.

On 9 April 1865 Erich Ludendorff was born to a family of shopkeepers in Kruszewnia, in the province of Posen (today Poznan, Poland). Ludendorff was a cadet at the schools of Pl½n and Lichterfeld from 1877 to 1882, second lieutenant in the 57th infantry regiment in Wessel and lieutenant in the 2nd marine battalion in Kiel-Wilhemshaven and 8th grenadiers in Frankfurt-am-Oder before entering the War Academy in Berlin, graduating in 1895 with the rank of captain. He was assigned to the general staff, where he headed the operations section from 1908 to 1912 and participated in drawing up the plan for the invasion of France under Schlieffen's and Moltke's orders. This period was interspersed with more or less brief stints at the head of an infantry company in Thorn and on the general staffs of the 9th infantry division in Glogau and the 5th army corps in Posen. He was promoted major in 1900, lieutenant-colonel in 1907 and colonel in 1911.

Ludendorf was assigned to the 39th infantry regiment in Düsseldorf in late 1912. He took command of the 85th infantry brigade in Strasbourg in April 1914 while continuing to participate in many general staff activities. In August 1914 Ludendorff was quartermaster of the 2nd army commanded by von Bülow and actively participated in taking Liege during the invasion of Belgium, which earned him the appointment of chief of staff of the 8th army on the Eastern front on 21 August 1914. After the victory of Tannenberg he became commander-in-chief Hindenburg's chief of staff. When Hindenburg succeeded Falkenhayn as the German armies' general chief of staff in summer 1916, Ludendorff became first quartermaster general, dealing with supply issues, drawing up military plans and directing operations. He advocated total war and ardently defended unrestricted submarine warfare, which brought him into conflict with Chancellor Bethmann-Hollweg, causing the latter to step down in July 1917. Ludendorff was also one of the main negotiators of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (3 March 1918), which took Poland, the Baltic States, Finland and Ukraine away from Russia. Despite fierce fighting, his major Western front offensives in spring 1918 failed to prevent Germany's defeat. In late September he urged the government to request an armistice but retracted the decision.

In October 1918 he resigned and fled to Sweden, blaming Germany's civilian leaders for losing the war. In spring 1919 he went to Bavaria and got involved in politics, growing close to the National Socialists and supporting Hitler in his failed 1923 putsch. In May of the following year he was elected to the Reichstag. In March 1925 he stood for president as the nationalists' candidate but won few votes, losing the election to Hindenburg. In 1926 he founded his own party, the Tannenberg Bund. In 1935 he rejected Hitler's offer to raise him to the dignity of marshal. In addition to his war memoirs (1919), he was the author of many military works and political writings. He died in Tutzing, Bavaria on 20 December 1937.

Wilhelm II, the son of Emperor Frederick and Empress Victoria, the grandson of Wilhelm I of Hohenzollern on his father's side and Queen Victoria of England on his mother's, was born in Potsdam on the 27th January 1859. After studying at the secondary school in Kassel, he took a two year course at the university of Bonn and began his military training in the Guards. He was made Lieutenant in the 1st regiment of Foot Guards in 1877 and Captain in 1880, Commander of the Guard's Hussars in 1881 and then of the 1st battalion of the 1st regiment of Foot Guards in 1883. He was promoted to Colonel, in charge of the hussars, in 1885 and appointed General in 1888. In the meantime, in 1881 he married Princess Augusta-Victoria, the daughter of Frederick Augustus of Schleswig-Holstein. In May 1844, he travelled to Russia to consolidate the alliance of the three Emperors (Germany, Austria and Hungary) in accordance with Chancellor Bismarck's orders. Crowned king of Prussia and Emperor of Germany on the 15th June 1888, following the three month reign of Frederick III, it was his intention to begin to exercise real political power. However, his involvement fluctuated wildly, depending on the state of his mental health.

His differences of opinion with Bismarck, most notably regarding social matters, relations with Russia and colonial policies became more frequent and, in 1890, the latter resigned. To replace him, Wilhelm II appointed Leo von Caprivi who would be succeeded in 1894 by Prince Chlodwig zu Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, in 1900 by Prince Bernhard von Bülow and in 1909 by Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg. Responsible for the development of the military power and wealth of the German Empire, he embarked on a policy of commercial, colonial and maritime expansion. Germany witnessed great rapid economic development, gradually becoming the top industrial power in Europe. The impact on a social level was manifold but tensions were no less frequent. The social democrats continued to gain ground, securing the greatest representation in the Reichstag in 1912. On a domestic level, however, the country was also up against its minority groups: the Polish in Posen, the Danish in Schleswig and those from the Alsace and Lorraine region who refused to accept the policy of Germanisation. In Europe, Germany's growth as well as its foreign policy caused worry. Competition to seek out commercial opportunities, interventions in the Near East and the Balkan countries were just some of the subjects of disagreement, especially as the Emperor kept changing his position, first siding with one and then another of the other four great European powers (Great Britain, France, Austro-Hungary and Russia). He did not renew the mutual assistance treaty with Russia in 1890, concentrating his efforts on strengthening the Triple Alliance (Triplice) between Germany, Austria and Italy, which was renewed in 1892, 1902 and 1912, but not without a few attempts at bridge-building with Great Britain and France (who signed the treaty of Entente cordiale between themselves in 1904) and with Russia herself. However, Anglo-German relations continued to deteriorate. The defensive with Russia (the 1905 treaty of Björkö) was a failure. Similarly, the attempt at reconciliation with France following the Agadir affair (1911) did not succeed. Germany became increasingly diplomatically isolated. Wilhelm II stepped up the reinforcement of his army and navy.

As Commander in Chief of the armies during the conflict that broke out in 1914, he retained the power to make appointments to the highest positions, as well as his role of coordination and arbitration between politicians and the military. However, he had to hand over the management of operations to Hindenburg and Ludendorff, who had become very popular following the success at Tannenberg and the Mazures lakes in August and September 1914 and who were appointed in charge of the High Command in the summer of 1916. Confronted with German defeat and the revolutionary troubles of November 1918, the emperor abdicated on the 9th. He took refuge in the Netherlands, who refused the extradition request from the Allies seeking to apply sanctions against him as prescribed by the treaty of Versailles. He then devoted himself to writing and in 1922 and 1927 published his memoirs: Ereignisse und Gestalten, 1878-1918 and Aus meinem Leben, 1859-1888. He died in Doorn, in 1941.

Adolphe Thiers, historian and statesman, was symbolic of the emerging Third Republic, the "executioner of the Commune" and founder of the Republic. Marie-Louis-Joseph-Adolphe Thiers was born in Marseille into a middle-class family. Helped by the extravagance of his father, the young Adolphe had a brilliant education by means of a scholarship. After studying law in Aix-en-Provence, he settled in Paris in 1821, where he moved in liberal society, embarking on a career as a journalist at Le Constitutionnel, before founding Le National on the 3rd January 1830 with Auguste Mignet and Armand Carrel, opposing through their articles the sovereignty of Charles X. In 1824, with his friend Auguste Mignet, he began a historical account of the Revolution of 1789. Thiers then devoted himself to Napoleon and was the first to provide a complete account, albeit partisan, of his career in his History of the Consulate and the Empire, published between 1845 and 1862 - in addition, in 1936 and 1940, he requested the return of Napoleon's ashes. His works earned his election to the French Academy in December 1834. Politically, Thiers was a "liberal", a man of progress, with a belief in the principle of national sovereignty, expressed through free elections and through representatives controlling the executive.

He played an active role in the July revolution in organising the resistance of those journalists threatened by the "Four Orders" (laws aimed at "muzzling" the press), going so far as to support Louis-Philippe when he came to power. The latter called him into his government as Under-Secretary of State for Finance, Minister of the Interior and then Minister of Agriculture and Trade. He was thus in permanent opposition with legitimists, republicans and the supporters of Bonaparte. During the Second Republic (1848-1851) Thiers worked with a regime that he was to consider "disappointing", as it was too conservative. As a member of parliament, Thiers laid down Proudhon's socialist theses, writing at the time a short treaty for the general public on Property, supporting the Falloux law and the Rome expedition. He was even to go so far as to support the candidate Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte during the presidential elections, but was to oppose the coup d'état of the 2nd December 1851, a stance that was to see him exiled to England, Italy and then Switzerland. Thiers therefore disappeared from the political scene in Napoleon the Third's 's first year in power. He returned to politics to oppose the left under the liberal Empire (1860-1870). "Thiers, who was even classed as an "Orléanist" because of his past from 1830-48, was, in fact, the leader of the handful of royalists who remained faithful to liberalism." (M. Aguhlon). He accepted the Crimean expedition but remained very critical of Napoleon the Third's foreign policy, which he considered too liberal and unsuitable for the Italian peninsula and Germany; he demanded the liquidation of the Mexican expedition.

On the fall of the Second Empire Thiers, who had been elected in the previous Empire elections in 1869, participated in the Government of National Defence, which he ended up managing, having actively contributed since the 10th September 1870 in peace preparations: the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jules Favre, asked him in the name of the government to moderate the offensive policies of the European powers, in particular the ambitions of Bismarck - so, from 1873 until 1875 Thiers carried out a lengthy tour of all the European capitals. Following the signing of the armistice on the 28th January 1871, Thiers was elected head of the new government in the elections of the 8th February 1871. As head of the executive power, he brought the communard movement to an end in a bloodbath in the spring of 1871; he was known as the "executioner of the Commune". The suppression of the Parisian uprising, the "Federates" movement, was led by Thiers with an army of "men of Versailles", the government having then established itself in Versailles. He was at the head of the 63,500 men, reinforced by the 130,000 liberated French prisoners of war and supported by Bismarck, who, between March and June 1871, besieged Paris and the neighbouring villages. The fighting would account for around thirty thousand dead from the ranks of the Federates. Up until 1874, four emergency courts passed judgement on the "Communards": 13,804 sentences were pronounced, including several for the labour camps of Guyana and New Caledonia - there would be no amnesty until July 1880. On the 24th May 1873, the parliamentary right, who had brought him to power, but were hostile to the republican orientation that Thiers gave to the Government, secured his resignation and replaced him with Mac Mahon. Adolphe Thiers died on the 3rd September 1877. Despite the refusal of his family to hold a state funeral, a funeral cortège with 384 wreaths, followed by Gambetta and Hugo, was to turn the final journey of this multi-faceted statesman into a national affair.

Sources: AGUHLON (Maurice), "Adolphe Thiers", in: Célébrations nationales 1997, Paris, Direction des Archives de France. MOURRE (Michel), Dictionnaire encyclopédique d'histoire, Paris, Bordas, 1996 (1978).

Maurice (Paul-Emmanuel) Sarrail was born in Carcassonne on 6 April 1856, entered Saint-Cyr military academy in 1875, chose the infantry and served in Algeria and southern Tunisia, where he took part in many campaigns. He was admitted to the War Academy in 1883 and trained with the general staffs from 1885. In 1900, as the passions stirred by the Dreyfus affair were still running high, General André, the minister of war, choose him as aide-de-camp: that is when he began developing friendships in leftist political circles, which often furthered his career as well as earned him enemies. He was commander of the Saint-Maixent school, where he championed democratic ideas. He was commander of the Chamber of Deputies for several years before being called from 1907 to 1911 to the position of director of infantry at the War Ministry. In 1911 he was a major general, commanding the 6th army corps early in the war. On 2 September he replaced General Ruffey as head of the 3rd army and took a glorious part in the Battle of the Marne. His army, which was located between the fortress of Verdun and Sainte-Menehould gorge, led a successful push against the German forces.

When ordered to retreat, the troops pulled back approximately 50km without losing contact with Verdun, enabling them to repel the Kronprinz's army when the general offensive resumed. If Verdun had fallen then, it would have jeopardized the victory of the Marne. Like Galliéni, who was defending the fortified camp of Paris, and Foch, in the Saint-Gong marshes, Sarrail was an architect of the victory of the Marne, which saved France. In late 1915 General Sarrail became commander-in-chief of the Allied Armies of the Orient. In difficult conditions, he organised the defence of Salonica and ordered the offensive that led to the taking of Monastir in November 1916. He was relieved of his command on 14 December 1917. Sarrail did not have the time to personally harvest the fruits of his two years of perseverant efforts, but left his successors, General Guillaumat and, later, General Franchet d'Esperey, a sound situation that served as the foundation for the final push. In April 1918 General Sarrail became a reserve officer. The following year he made a bid for office in the legislative elections, hoping to represent Paris, but lost. Later he was reintegrated into the officer corps despite being over the age limit, a reward granted to all the generals who had served as commanders-in-chief before the enemy. In November 1924 he was appointed High Commissioner of the French Republic in Syria and replaced General Weygand as commander-in-chief of the Army of the Levant. After the Druze uprising and the violent way he quelled it, he was recalled to France. Henry de Jouvenel replaced him in Beirut. He returned to Paris in late 1925 and ended his military career. He died in Paris of a lung infection on 23 March 1929 and was buried in the Invalides.

Distinctions: Grand-croix de la Légion d'honneur Médaille Militaire with the Croix de Guerre.

Douglas Haig was born in Edinburgh (Scotland) in 1861 to a family of whisky-makers. His father, John, made him study the classics. With a degree from Clifton College and Brasenose College, Oxford, he enrolled at the Royal Military College in Sandhurst in 1864 and was commissioned into the 7th Regiment of Hussars. Douglas Haig did his training in India in 1886, where he received his first promotion. He was then sent on active service to the Sudan (1898) before taking part in the Boer War (1899-1902) under the command of Major-General Sir John French. Promoted to the rank of colonel, Haig returned to India in 1903, where he carried out various administrative roles (as colonel and inspector general of the cavalry) beside Lord Kitchener. Showing particular aptitude for a career in the military, Douglas Haig became the youngest ever Major General in the British army when, in 1906, he was appointed Director of Military Training at the War Office. He thus worked closely with the Secretary of State for War, R. B. Haldane, establishing a territorial army, as well as a British expeditionary force.

As Army General in 1914, he took command of the 1st Army corps of the BEF in France and Belgium, where he distinguished himself during fighting at Mons and Ypres. Hitherto second in command of the British forces in France under the orders of General French, he took control of the expanded BEF in December 1915, with French taking supreme command of the British forces. After February 1916, he was subjected to pressure from the French high command to speed up preparation for the offensive planned on the Somme for the summer of 1916, and thus create a diversion for the Verdun front. Between July and November 1916 he was sent with his troops to fight in the battle of the Somme, where he actively participated in the allied breakthrough over 12 km of the front, operations that caused the loss of 420,000 men from the ranks of the British army and earned him the nickname "the butcher of the Somme", and later in the bloody assaults around Passchendaele in 1917 (the third battle of Ypres), which enabled him to obtain his Marshall's baton and to be described by Pershing as "the man who won the war".

In 1918, Douglas Haig was the instigator of the British victory on the western front (the fronts of the Somme and the Aisne). As a member of the Armistice military council convened in Senlis by Foch, he gave his approval to the military conditions for the armistice with the central empires. However his costly military successes won him some post-war critics for his policies, such as David Lloyd George, the British prime Minister and some British media organisations who called the 1st July 1916 "the bloodiest day for the British army". On his return from the front and until his retirement in 1921, Douglas Haig was commander in chief of the British Home forces. After ceasing active service and having been awarded the title of count, he devoted a great deal of his time to veterans through the Royal British Legion. He died at his London home in 1928 and was given a state funeral.

The son of a cavalry officer in the African Chasseurs, Louis Franchet d'Esperey was born in Mostaganem on the 25th of May 1856. On leaving the Saint Cyr military academy in 1876, he served in North Africa in the first regiment of Algerian Fusiliers. He was accepted to study at the Higher Military School in 1881, but did not attend until the following year, so that he could take part in the Tunisian expedition against the Kroumirs. On leaving the school, he joined Tonkin for two years, taking part in the battles of Lang Son and Lao Qay. On returning to France in 1886, he was posted to army headquarters and then to the Cabinet office of Freycinet, the minister for war, before commanding a battalion in Toul and later the 18th Foot Battalion of Nancy. In 1900, commanding the French zone in Peking, he took part in the Chinese expedition against the Boxers. Returning to France, he commanded the 69th Infantry Regiment in Nancy followed by the 77th Infantry Brigade in Toul. Promoted to colonel in 1903, he commanded the 60th Infantry Regiment in Besançon.

In 1912, Major General Franchet d'Esperey served close to Lyautey as commander of the troops occupying western Morocco and took part in various peacekeeping operations in the Tadla, Chaouïa and Grand Atlas sectors. When war was declared, he was in command of the 1st army corps in Lille. During the Battle of the Frontiers he was at Charleroi in Belgium and then led a victorious counter attack against German troops along the Oise river. On the 3rd of September, Joffre entrusted him with the 5th army, which was a deciding factor in the victory of the Marne. He commanded groups of the eastern armies in 1916 and then the northern armies in 1917. In June 1918, he replaced General Guillaumat as head of the allied armies in the Orient, leading them to the ultimate victory. His victorious Moglena offensive in the Balkans, marked by the capture of Dobro Polje, forced the Bulgarians to sign the armistice in September 1918. Within a few weeks this led to the collapse of Turkey and Austro-Hungary and the German armistice request.

At the end of the conflict and until 1920, whilst in command of occupation troops in Constantinople, he led operations in the Ukraine and in Bessarabia. In 1921, General Franchet d'Esperey was promoted to the esteemed rank of Marshall of France. As Inspector General of the North African troops, he devoted his time and skills to the African Army. He also undertook the creation of trans-Saharan railway lines and on the 19th of March 1933 was seriously injured in Gabès, in an automobile accident whilst carrying out a study of a link between Tunisia and Morocco via the south. During this time, whilst representing France at official ceremonies and carrying out missions in central Europe and Africa, he started writing his memoirs and published various reports. Elected to the French Academy in 1934, he founded "les Amitiés africaines" (African friendships), a social group responsible for the "Dar el Askri" (servicemen's homes), which bring together and come to the aid of ex-servicemen. In 1940, he retired to the Tarn area, to Saint-Amancet, where he died on the 8th of July 1942. He was buried on the 24th of October 1947 in the crypt of the church of Saint-Louis-des-Invalides in Paris. He was awarded the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour and held the military medal and the Cross of War for the 1914-1918 war.

John Joseph Pershing was born on the 13th of September 1860 in Linn Country, a village in Missouri. His family was originally from the Alsace - one of his ancestors had emigrated to America in the middle of the 18th century. At the age of 22, after having been a teacher, he went to the West Point Military Academy. He left in 1886 and then followed a classic military career: as sub-lieutenant in Arizona, an instructor in military science and tactics at the University of Nebraska (1891) where he also studied law and in the 10th Cavalry Regiment in Montana. As a lieutenant in Washington (1897), he took part in the Cuban war and then in the suppression of the Moros uprising in the Philippines. In 1901, Captain Pershing was military attaché in Tokyo and closely followed the Russo-Japanese war. In 1906, he was appointed Brigadier General and carried out a new mission in the Philippines before taking a post in Europe, where he studied French and in 1914 he took charge of the Western Division in San Francisco. He took part in suppressing the revolt by Pancho Villa in Mexico. In August 1915, his wife and three of his children died in a fire in San Francisco. On the 10th of May 1917, President Wilson appointed him as commander of the American Expeditionary Corps in Europe. On the 13th of June 1917, General Pershing arrived in Paris.

Thirteen days later, the first American troops landed at Saint-Nazaire. Until the 11th of November 1918, General Pershing continually strove to create a vast autonomous American army along the French front. General Pershing left France on the 1st of September 1919; on the 29th of September, American Congress stated that his country could be proud of him. Just after the war, Pershing was appointed Commander in Chief of the American Army (1921). In 1924 he became a reserve officer. He thus retired from public life, only becoming involved in an official capacity for commemorative ceremonies, in which he participated every year as the founding chairman of the "American Battle Monuments Commission", the organisation that manages American graves and memorials in Europe. In 1937 he also took part in the inauguration of his own statue at Versailles. He came back to France for the last time in May 1939. He published "My Experiences in the World War" in 1931, a work that was to be awarded a Pulitzer Prize the following year (published in France by librairie Pion). On the 4th of August 1940, he addressed the American people for the last time via a radio message in which he took a stance against Hitlerism. In 1944, he was admitted to the Walter Reed hospital in Washington; that is where he was to receive General de Gaulle in July of the same year. John J. Pershing died on the 15th of July 1948 and was buried at the Arlington national cemetery in the presence of President Harry S. Truman.

Woodrow Wilson was the twenty eighth president of the United States. He committed his country to the First World War in April 1917, following three years of neutrality and at the end of the war strove for the reconciliation of the European countries, which earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1919. Woodrow Wilson was the son of a Presbyterian pastor who raised him with strictness and commitment to his values. Following studies in law at Princeton University, he became a lawyer (Atlanta 1882-1883) and professor of political sciences at various institutions (1890-1910). Elected Democrat Governor of the State of New Jersey in 1910, he was chosen by the Democratic party as its candidate for the presidential elections of the 5th November 1912, which he won thanks to the rift between his republican opponents, Theodore Roosevelt and William Taft. Wilson was in favour of strong executive power and set in place an ambitious democratic and economic programme. He reduced customs rights, reformed the banking system by creating a federal reserve facilitating credit and strengthened the antitrust law authorising strike and boycotting action by workers. On a political level, he had a law voted in banning child labour, introduced the woman's right to vote, established income tax and a pension system for federal employees and reduced the working day to 8 hours.

In overseas politics, Wilson was not in favour of interventionism but nevertheless expanded active diplomacy and strengthened American dominance on the continent by trying to impose American style democracy there. But he did not want the United States to become involved in European conflicts, as per the Monroe doctrine, which prevented the United States from intervening in Europe and meddling in international problems. On the 4th August 1914, he declared American neutrality in the conflict by stating "this war is not ours". He would, however, be re-elected for a second term in November 1916, most notably because "He kept us out of the war", indicating nevertheless in his inauguration speech that this position would probably be very difficult to maintain. So, falling victim to the all-out submarine warfare waged once again by the Germans - it had been suspended following the death of a hundred American citizens in the torpedoing of the liner Lusitania, on the 7th May 1915 - and outraged by German manoeuvres to coax Mexico into war against the United States - a telegram from Zimmermann, the German Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs - President Wilson asked Congress for permission to enter into the war against Germany, a request that was approved on the 6th April 1917. A month later on the 18th May, he reintroduced compulsory military service which had been abolished at the end of the American Civil War (1865).
Wilson coordinated the war effort and provided the Allies with equipment and military and moral support (In October 1918, around two million American soldiers under the command of General Pershing landed to fight in France). He also sought to take political control of the coalition and defined the Allies' war aims. On the 8th January 1918, in a speech to Congress, he set out a fourteen point defining the peace objectives. These Fourteen Points advocated the end of colonialism, the abandonment of economic barriers between nations, the guarantee of freedom of the seas, nations' rights to self-determination and the creation of a League of Nations with a view to providing "mutual guaranties of political independence and territorial integrity for both large and small nations". Some of the points in his programme would serve as the basis for the Treaty of Versailles in 1919.
On returning to the United States, Wilson himself presented the Treaty of Versailles for ratification by Congress, but he ran up against a powerful isolationist tide that refused to sign a treaty obliging them to intervene in a new conflict. Congress twice rejected the Treaty of Versailles, in November 1919 and in March 1920, and declared itself against joining the LON. Repudiated by Congress and the majority of the American people, Wilson thus witnessed the ultimate irony of seeing his own country refuse to join the League of Nations, whilst his efforts at reconciling the countries of Europe nevertheless earned him the Nobel peace Prize in 1919 (received in 1920). Physically exhausted by the effort he had put into establishing peace, he suffered a stroke which left him practically paralysed. He would remain shut away in the White House until 1921, after the crushing victory of the conservative republican candidate, Warren Harding. He then retired to his home in Washington where he died on the 3rd February 1924. He is buried in Washington cathedral.

Born in the village of Bazorkino in Georgia (the Shida Kartli region), Dimitri Amilakvari was a Prince of the House of Zedguinidze and Grand Master of the Horse to the Georgian Crown. The Brest-Litovsk treaty and the Revolution sounded the death knell for Tsarist Russia and allowed the Kartvel nation to declare independence on the 26th May 1918. However, the young social democratic republic did not take long to falter under pressure from the Russian Bolsheviks and the threat from Turkey on the South West border (Erzurum). On the 25th February 1921, the Red Army finally took over Transcaucasia and the Federation of Soviet Socialist Republics (Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia) was created. The tsarist and republican elite were hunted down. The Amilakvari family thus went into exile: to Constantinople and then France; Dimitri was then only about ten years old. As a descendent of the titled Georgian nobility (his grandfather, Ivane was a General and his father, Prince Giorgi was a colonel in the army of the Democratic Republic of Georgia), Dimitri Amilakvari was admitted to the Saint-Cyr military academy in 1924.

He left two years later and enlisted in the Foreign Legion: first posted to the 1st RE in Sidi-Bel-Abbès and then in 1929 to the 4th RE in Marrakech, with whom he took part in the High Atlas campaign, distinguishing himself in May 1932 during the battles of Ait Attou. He was cited again the following year during the battles of Jebel Baddou. Promoted to captain of the 1st RE of Sidi-Bel-Abbès in 1939 and then of the 2nd high mountain battalion group in February 1940, he then took French nationality. It was with the 13th Half-brigade of the Foreign Legion that he saw action in the Second World War. He took part in the operations of the expeditionary corps in Norway, as commander of the company of accompaniment of the 2nd battalion. A valorous soldier, Dimitri Amilakvari won three more citations, which earned him promotion to the dignity of Chevalier of the Légion d'Honneur.

A man of honour and strong convictions, "Bazorka", as he liked to be called, in honour of the village where he was born, decided in June 1940 to take up the fight alongside General de Gaulle. Three days after returning to the Brittany coast, on the 19th June, he set sail from Saint-Jacut de la Mer with a few men from the 13th, reaching England on the 21st via the island of Jersey. Dimitri Amilakvari returned to Dakar in September 1940 as a Legionnaire in the FFL to take part in operation "Menace", before leaving to try to conquer the Pétanist AOF (Gabon and Cameroon), to rally Eritrea and then the Levant territories. "Bazorka" joined the Eastern Brigade at the beginning of 1941 and took part, at the head of the company of accompaniment of the 1st Battalion of the Foreign Legion, in the victory of Keren (March 1941) and the taking of Massaouah (8th April). He distinguished himself once again during the Syrian campaign in June 1941 and was promoted to Head of Battalion. On the 16th September he took command of the 13th DBLE and, a week later, was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel. A valiant soldier and leader of men, he reorganised his troops, training them for war in the desert, for which on the 19th October 1941 he would be presented the flag of the 13th by General Catroux at Homs.

Involved from the start of the Libyan campaign, "Bazorka" commanded a Jock column: a tactical group comprising units of motorised infantry, a battery of towed artillery, a platoon of automatic machine gunners, a section of 75 mm anti-tank canons and light DCA engineering and radio communications units. He proved his audacity and bravery alongside General Koenig (1st BFL) during the battle of Bir-Hakeim (26th May - 11th June 1942). General de Gaulle personally awarded him the Liberation Cross at the El Tahag camp (Egypt) on the 10th August 1942. At the beginning of October 1942, Lieutenant Colonel Amilakvari and his two battalions faced divisions of Rommel's Afrika Korps in the El Alamein area of Egypt. They were sent on ahead for the attack on the 80 metre high Himeimat peak. This mission was accomplished on the morning of the 24th October, when German panzers led a counter-offensive. His units beat a retreat under enemy fire through the middle of a minefield. "Bazorka", with his machine gun on his arm, was hit in the head by a shell. At El Alamein, on the very spot where he died, a white cross reminds us of the courage and sacrifice of this Franco-Georgian Prince, a mythical figure of the Foreign Legion and the godfather of the 143rd class to graduate from St Cyr. On Sunday the 19th November 2006, the 100th anniversary of his birth, Georgians and French attended the inauguration rue Amilakvari in the provincial town of Gori, as well as a room in the local ethnographic museum.

An exceptional man, a soldier who rose through the ranks who "will belong forevermore belong to history" (Michel Debré) ...

From an old family from the Alsace and the son of an organ maker, Pierre Koenig was born on the 10th October 1898 in Caen (Calvados). He was educated by the brethren of the Christian Schools. With his baccalaureate in his pocket, he enlisted voluntarily to serve his country and on the 17th April 1917 was appointed to the 36th infantry regiment (régiment d'infanterie or RI). Completing his training in 1918, he took part in the Battle of Flanders in May, the Battle of Matz in June and July, followed by the Oise offensive in August and September and the clash on the Ailette the following month. An exemplary soldier, he was cited in the Order of the Army on the 26th September 1918 and received the military medal. Once the war was over, Pierre Koenig decided to take up a career in the armed forces. He joined the 15th battalion of Alpine Chasseurs, serving in High Silesia and in the Ruhr (1919 to 1922), earning his lieutenant's stripes in 1920, before being transferred to the Alps (1922-1923). He then served as an information officer at the headquarters of the 40th and 43rd infantry division of occupation troops in Germany until 1929. After two years in the 5th RI in Paris, he was sent to Morocco as company commander of the 4th Foreign Regiment (1931-1934) to lead peacekeeping operations in the protectorate. On detachment to General Catroux in Marrakech, Captain Koenig led various inland operations when war broke out in September 1939.

In February 1940, he participated, along with detached units of the 13th brigade of the Foreign Legion (brigade de la Légion étrangère or DBLE) from North Africa, in the Norwegian expeditionary corps where he distinguished himself during the battles of Namsos. On returning to France, he witnessed the arrival of the Wehrmacht in Brest on the 15th June 1940. Not accepting the surrender of the French army, he decided to go to London with a few comrades from the 13th. He set sail on the 19th June from Saint-Jacut de la Mer, reaching the British coast on the 21st.

Promoted to Head of Battalion on the 1st July, he took part in the unsuccessful Dakar expedition with his comrades from the 13th DBLE and then in operation "Menace", taking back Gabon from the allies of the Vichy government in November, before being appointed Commander of Cameroon in December 1940. "Mutin", to use his war name, joined the FFL in the English-speaking Sudan the following month before taking the Levant territories at the beginning of 1941. Now Lieutenant Colonel, he was General Legentilhomme's Chief of Staff during the Syrian campaign and appointed as a delegate for the Free French at the Saint-Jean d'Acre Armistice Commission, following the surrender of General Dentz. Temporarily promoted to Brigade General, he worked on reorganising the Free French troops of the Levant.

Commander of the 1st light division of the FFL (or the 1st BFL), he joined the 8th British Army, fought in Libya, at Halfaya (December 1941 and January 1942), at Mechili (February 1942) and Bir-Hakeim (February-June 1942). He carried out his mission in the face of Rommel's Afrika Korps to "hold out at all costs, until our victory is decisive" (the message from Koenig to his troops on the morning of the 3rd June) for 14 days, from the 27th May until the 10th June 1942, allowing the British army to regroup at Alexandria: "by stopping the German advance, they [Pierre Koenig and his men] bought us some time, allowing us to bring troops from Palestine and cover Egypt" Winston Churchill acknowledged. General de Gaulle awarded him the Liberation Cross for this great wartime feat.

Preceded by his reputation, Koenig took part in the victory over troops of the axis at El Alamein in October 1942. Then, supporting General de Larminat, he led his troops in the conquest of Libya and Tunisia. At the beginning of August 1943, he carried out the role of Deputy chief of staff of the army in Algiers. His mission was to bring unity, easing the tensions between the North African and Free French troops. From March 1944, General Koenig arrived on the political and diplomatic scene: he was appointed as delegate for the temporary government of the French Republic (le Gouvernement provisoire de la République française or GPRF) alongside General Eisenhower, the Superior Commander of the French forces in Great Britain and Commander of the French Forces of the interior (Forces françaises de l'intérieur or FFI).

He was responsible in particular for persuading the Allies to parachute in weapons to the FFI in preparation for the Normandy landings, thus contributing to the coordination of the regular troops and the guerrilla action of the Résistance. Appointed General of the army corps on the 28th June 1944, he became the first military Governor of Paris in liberated France on the 25th August.

Commanding the French Forces in Germany (July 1945 to August 1949), he received his army general's stars on the 20th May 1946 and was then promoted to the dignity of Grand-Croix de la Légion d'Honneur. Inspector of the land, sea and air forces of North Africa and Vice President of the Upper War Council, he was elected to the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences and a member of the European consultative assembly in 1951. Keen to participate in republican activities, Pierre Koenig was elected MP for the Bas-Rhin region in 1951 (he would be re-elected in 1956), and accepted the presidency of the National Defence Committee of the National Assembly (August 1951 to June 1954). He then joined Mendès-France's government, for whom he took the portfolio of the Department of Defence from June to August 1954, a position he would occupy again in Edgar Faure's cabinet (February - October 1955). He left political life in 1958.

Pierre Koenig died on the 2nd September 1970 at the American Hospital in Neuilly-sur-Seine. He was buried in the Montmartre cemetery in Paris following a state funeral at the Eglise Saint-Louis des Invalides. An exceptional man and member of the council of the Order of the Liberation, Pierre Koenig was posthumously promoted by decree to the dignity of Marshall of France on the 6th June 1984.

A 16-year-old student at Lycée Victor Hugo in Besançon, Henri Fertet was arrested by the Germans on 3 July 1943 and sentenced to death for resistance activities by the Feldkommandantur 560 military court. He was executed on 26 September 1943.

Henri Fertet was born on 27 October 1926 in Seloncourt, Doubs, into a family of schoolteachers.

Once he had completed primary school, he left his home town in 1937 to attend Lycée Victor Hugo in Besançon. He was a gifted, hard-working student who was interested in archaeology and history. Living under the yoke of the Nazis since the armistice of June 1940, Fertet was inspired by the example of the subjects of his studies and joined the group led by Marcel Simon, secretary of the Catholic Rural Youth movement in Larnod, in the summer of 1942.

In February 1943, the Simon group joined the Franc-Tireurs et Partisans, calling itself the Groupe-Franc “Guy Mocquet”. It carried out underground actions.

Fertet (registered as Émile - 702) led three operations:

• an attack on the guardhouse at Fort de Montfaucon on 16 April 1943 to seize an explosives magazine, killing a German sentry;
• the destruction of a high-voltage pylon at Châteaufarine, near Besançon, on 7 May; and
• an attack on the German customs commissioner, Rothe, on the Besançon-Quingey road on 12 June 1943, to steal his weapon, his uniform and the papers he was carrying.

Fertet shot the commissioner, mortally wounding him, but was unable to steal the documents as a motorcycle pulled up. The members of the group were actively sought and were successively arrested starting in June 1943.

Fertet was arrested by the German forces on 3 July 1943: it was three in the morning and the young man was sleeping at his parents’ home at the Besançon-Velotte school. The youngest of the accused at just 16 years of age, he was sent to La Butte prison in Besançon. He appeared before the Feldkommandantur 560 military court and was sentenced to death on 18 September 1943. After 87 days of captivity and torture, this “soulmate” of Guy Mocquet was executed on 26 September 1943 in the Besançon citadel.

Like Mocquet, he sent his parents one last letter:

“My dear Parents, 

My letter is going to cause you great suffering, but I have seen your tremendous courage and I am sure that you will continue to be courageous, if only out of love for me. 

You cannot know how much I have mentally suffered in my cell, how I have suffered from not seeing you, from only feeling your tender kindness from a distance. For these 87 days in my cell, I have missed your love more than your packages, and I have often asked for your forgiveness for the suffering I have caused you, all the suffering I have caused you. Have no doubt as to how much I love you today because, before, I loved you more out of routine, but now I understand everything you have done for me and I think I have achieved true filial love, real filial love. Maybe a comrade will talk to you about me, about the love I told him about. I hope he will fulfil this sacred mission. 

Please thank everyone who has been thinking about me, especially our closest friends and relatives; tell them how confident I am in eternal France. Give a kiss to my grandparents, my uncles, aunts and cousins, Henriette. Shake Mr Duvernet’s hand for me; say hello to all. Tell our priest that I have been thinking of him and his family in particular. I would like to thank Monseigneur for the great honour he gave me, I hope I have been worthy of it. As I fall, I also send my regards to my schoolmates. Talking of whom, Hennemann owes me a packet of cigarettes, Jacquin my book on prehistoric man. Please return “The Count of Monte Cristo” to Émourgeon, 3 Chemin Français, behind the station. Give Maurice André, of La Maltournée, the 40 grams of tobacco I owe him.

I leave my little library to Pierre, my schoolbooks to my dear daddy, my collections by my dear mummy, but she should be careful with the prehistoric hatchet and the Gaulish sword sheath. 

I am dying for my motherland. I want a free France and a happy French people. Not a proud France, the leading nation in the world, but a working France, hard-working and honest. 

May the French people be happy, that is what counts most. In life, you have to know how to enjoy your happiness.

As for me, do not worry. I will keep my courage and my good humour to the end, and I will sing “Sambre et Meuse” because you, my dear mummy, taught it to me.

Be strict and tender with Pierre. Check his work and make him work hard. Do not accept any slacking. He must be worthy of me. Of three children, he is the only one left. He must succeed. 

Papa, please pray. Think that, if I die, it is for my own good. What more honourable death could there be? I die gladly for my motherland. The four of us will see each other again, soon, in Heaven.  What is a hundred years?

Mummy, remember: 

“And these avengers will have new defenders who, after their death, will have successors.”

Farewell, death is calling me. I do not want to be blindfolded or bound. I send my love to you all. Still, it is hard to die.

Love to you. Long live France! 

Sentenced to death at age 16 

H. Fertet

Forgive the spelling mistakes, no time to reread. 

From: Henri Fertet, in Heaven, with God.”

Source: Ordre de la Libération - MINDEF/SGA/DMPA