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In autumn 1917, due to the revolution in Russia, the Russian troops were withdrawn from the front and took the place of the tirailleurs at Courneau.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.