Post by Diarist on Feb 7, 2015 10:27:08 GMT 1
Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle was born on 22 November 1890 in the industrial region of Lille in the Nord departement, the third of five children. He was raised in a family of devout Roman Catholics who were patriotic, royalist and traditionalist, but also quite progressive. His father, Henri de Gaulle, was a professor of history and literature at a Jesuit college who eventually founded his own school.
Officer cadet
De Gaulle spent four years studying and training at the elite military academy, Saint-Cyr. While there, and because of his height, high forehead, and nose, he acquired the nicknames of "the great asparagus".
He did well at the academy and received praise for his conduct, manners, intelligence, character, military spirit and resistance to fatigue. However, he often quarrelled with his company commander and other officers that there was a lack of preparation for war with Germany, and that the French training and equipment were inadequate to deal with a numerically superior adversary. Graduating in 1912 in 13th place out of 210 cadets, his passing out report noted that he was a highly gifted cadet who should go on to make an excellent officer. Preferring to serve in France rather than far away in North Africa or Indochina, he joined the 33rd infantry regiment of the French Army, based at Arras and commanded by Colonel Philippe Pétain..
While at Arras, and in the build-up to the Great, de Gaulle developed a good rapport with his commanding officer, Pétain, with whom he shared a number of ideas on French military affairs, and was often seen on exercise and in officers' quarters with his superior debating great battles and the likely outcome of any coming war. Both men agreed that the invention of the machine gun and rapid-firing artillery rendered cavalry virtually obsolete and would require a shift to semi-static positions from which attacks would be made under the protection of a heavy barrage of artillery fired at the enemy positions.
The Great War
When war finally broke out in France in early August 1914, the 33rd Regiment, considered one of the best fighting units in France, was immediately thrown into checking the German advance at Dinant. However, the traditionally minded French Fifth Army commander, General Charles Lanrezac threw his units into pointless bayonet charges with bugles and full colours flying against the German artillery, incurring heavy losses.
Promoted to platoon commander, de Gaulle was involved in fierce fighting from the outset and was among the first to be wounded. In hospital, he grew bitter at the tactics used, and spoke with other injured officers against the outdated methods of the French army. Yet, with General Joseph Joffre's decision to stop the retreat and counter-attack, favoured by the arrival of British units and by changes in the command structure, the rapid German advance was eventually stalled by mid September at the First Battle of the Marne. Returning to find many of his former comrades dead, he was put in charge of a company. De Gaulle's unit gained recognition for repeatedly crawling out into no-mans-land to listen to the conversations of the enemy in their trenches, and the information he brought back was so valuable that in January 1915 he received a citation for his bravery. After a more serious wound which incapacitated him for four months, he was promoted to captain in September 1915. Taking charge of his company, he narrowly escaped death shortly afterwards when he was injured by a mine, leaving him with a wound in his left hand which later obliged him to wear his wedding ring on his right hand.
At the Battle of Verdun in March 1916, while leading a charge to try to break out of a position which had become surrounded by the enemy, he received a bayonet wound to the leg after being stunned by a shell and, passing out from the effects of poison gas, was captured at Douaumont, one of the few survivors of his battalion. He spent 32 months in a German prisoner of war camp, where his treatment was satisfactory.
In captivity de Gaulle acquired yet another nickname, Le Connétable ("The Constable"). This came about because of his reading German newspapers (he had learned German at school and spent a vacation in the Black Forest region) and giving talks on his view of the progress of the conflict to fellow prisoners. These were delivered with such patriotic ardour and confidence in victory that they called him by the title which had been given to the commander-in-chief of the French army during the monarchy.
While a prisoner of war, de Gaulle wrote his first book, co-written by Matthieu Butler, L'Ennemi et le vrai ennemi (The Enemy and the True Enemy), analysing the issues and divisions within the German Empire and its forces; the book was published in 1924.
In all, he made five unsuccessful escape attempts, being moved to higher security accommodation and punished on his return with long periods of solitary confinement and with the withdrawal of privileges such as newspapers and tobacco. In his letters to his parents he constantly spoke of his frustration that the war was continuing without him, calling the situation "a shameful misfortune" and compared it to being cuckolded. As the war neared its end, he grew depressed that he was playing no part in the victory, but despite his efforts, he remained in captivity until the German surrender. On 1 December 1918, three weeks after the armistice, he returned to his father's house in the Dordogne to be reunited with his three brothers, who had all served in the army and survived the war.
Post-war period
After the armistice, de Gaulle continued to serve in the army, and was with the staff of the French Military Mission to Poland as an instructor of Poland's infantry during its war with Communist Russia (1919–1921). He distinguished himself in operations near the River Zbrucz and won a high Polish military decoration. He returned to France, where he taught at the École Militaire. Although he was a protégé of his old commander, Marshal Philippe Pétain, de Gaulle believed in the use of tanks and rapid maneuvers rather than trench warfare.
De Gaulle served with the Army of Occupation in the Rhineland in the mid-1920s. As a commandant ("major") by the late 1920s, he briefly commanded a light infantry battalion at Trier (Treves) and then served a tour of duty in Syria, then a French protectorate under a mandate from the League of Nations. During the 1930s, now a lieutenant-colonel, he served as a staff officer in France. In 1934 he wrote Vers l'Armée de Métier (Toward a Professional Army), which advocated a professional army based on mobile armored divisions. Such an army would both compensate for the poor French demography, and be an efficient tool to enforce international law, particularly the Treaty of Versailles, which forbade Germany from rearming. He proposed mechanization of the infantry, with stress on the wholesale use of tanks. The book sold only 700 copies in France, where Pétain advocated an infantry-based, defensive army, but 7,000 copies in Germany, where it was studied by Adolf Hitler.
In April 1935 he was transferred to TRADOC.
Source: Wikipedia - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_de_Gaulle
Officer cadet
De Gaulle spent four years studying and training at the elite military academy, Saint-Cyr. While there, and because of his height, high forehead, and nose, he acquired the nicknames of "the great asparagus".
He did well at the academy and received praise for his conduct, manners, intelligence, character, military spirit and resistance to fatigue. However, he often quarrelled with his company commander and other officers that there was a lack of preparation for war with Germany, and that the French training and equipment were inadequate to deal with a numerically superior adversary. Graduating in 1912 in 13th place out of 210 cadets, his passing out report noted that he was a highly gifted cadet who should go on to make an excellent officer. Preferring to serve in France rather than far away in North Africa or Indochina, he joined the 33rd infantry regiment of the French Army, based at Arras and commanded by Colonel Philippe Pétain..
While at Arras, and in the build-up to the Great, de Gaulle developed a good rapport with his commanding officer, Pétain, with whom he shared a number of ideas on French military affairs, and was often seen on exercise and in officers' quarters with his superior debating great battles and the likely outcome of any coming war. Both men agreed that the invention of the machine gun and rapid-firing artillery rendered cavalry virtually obsolete and would require a shift to semi-static positions from which attacks would be made under the protection of a heavy barrage of artillery fired at the enemy positions.
The Great War
When war finally broke out in France in early August 1914, the 33rd Regiment, considered one of the best fighting units in France, was immediately thrown into checking the German advance at Dinant. However, the traditionally minded French Fifth Army commander, General Charles Lanrezac threw his units into pointless bayonet charges with bugles and full colours flying against the German artillery, incurring heavy losses.
Promoted to platoon commander, de Gaulle was involved in fierce fighting from the outset and was among the first to be wounded. In hospital, he grew bitter at the tactics used, and spoke with other injured officers against the outdated methods of the French army. Yet, with General Joseph Joffre's decision to stop the retreat and counter-attack, favoured by the arrival of British units and by changes in the command structure, the rapid German advance was eventually stalled by mid September at the First Battle of the Marne. Returning to find many of his former comrades dead, he was put in charge of a company. De Gaulle's unit gained recognition for repeatedly crawling out into no-mans-land to listen to the conversations of the enemy in their trenches, and the information he brought back was so valuable that in January 1915 he received a citation for his bravery. After a more serious wound which incapacitated him for four months, he was promoted to captain in September 1915. Taking charge of his company, he narrowly escaped death shortly afterwards when he was injured by a mine, leaving him with a wound in his left hand which later obliged him to wear his wedding ring on his right hand.
At the Battle of Verdun in March 1916, while leading a charge to try to break out of a position which had become surrounded by the enemy, he received a bayonet wound to the leg after being stunned by a shell and, passing out from the effects of poison gas, was captured at Douaumont, one of the few survivors of his battalion. He spent 32 months in a German prisoner of war camp, where his treatment was satisfactory.
In captivity de Gaulle acquired yet another nickname, Le Connétable ("The Constable"). This came about because of his reading German newspapers (he had learned German at school and spent a vacation in the Black Forest region) and giving talks on his view of the progress of the conflict to fellow prisoners. These were delivered with such patriotic ardour and confidence in victory that they called him by the title which had been given to the commander-in-chief of the French army during the monarchy.
While a prisoner of war, de Gaulle wrote his first book, co-written by Matthieu Butler, L'Ennemi et le vrai ennemi (The Enemy and the True Enemy), analysing the issues and divisions within the German Empire and its forces; the book was published in 1924.
In all, he made five unsuccessful escape attempts, being moved to higher security accommodation and punished on his return with long periods of solitary confinement and with the withdrawal of privileges such as newspapers and tobacco. In his letters to his parents he constantly spoke of his frustration that the war was continuing without him, calling the situation "a shameful misfortune" and compared it to being cuckolded. As the war neared its end, he grew depressed that he was playing no part in the victory, but despite his efforts, he remained in captivity until the German surrender. On 1 December 1918, three weeks after the armistice, he returned to his father's house in the Dordogne to be reunited with his three brothers, who had all served in the army and survived the war.
Post-war period
After the armistice, de Gaulle continued to serve in the army, and was with the staff of the French Military Mission to Poland as an instructor of Poland's infantry during its war with Communist Russia (1919–1921). He distinguished himself in operations near the River Zbrucz and won a high Polish military decoration. He returned to France, where he taught at the École Militaire. Although he was a protégé of his old commander, Marshal Philippe Pétain, de Gaulle believed in the use of tanks and rapid maneuvers rather than trench warfare.
De Gaulle served with the Army of Occupation in the Rhineland in the mid-1920s. As a commandant ("major") by the late 1920s, he briefly commanded a light infantry battalion at Trier (Treves) and then served a tour of duty in Syria, then a French protectorate under a mandate from the League of Nations. During the 1930s, now a lieutenant-colonel, he served as a staff officer in France. In 1934 he wrote Vers l'Armée de Métier (Toward a Professional Army), which advocated a professional army based on mobile armored divisions. Such an army would both compensate for the poor French demography, and be an efficient tool to enforce international law, particularly the Treaty of Versailles, which forbade Germany from rearming. He proposed mechanization of the infantry, with stress on the wholesale use of tanks. The book sold only 700 copies in France, where Pétain advocated an infantry-based, defensive army, but 7,000 copies in Germany, where it was studied by Adolf Hitler.
In April 1935 he was transferred to TRADOC.
Source: Wikipedia - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_de_Gaulle