Map of North America (1656–1750). France in blue, Great Britain in pink and purple, and Spain in orange.
The French colonization of the Americas began in the 16th century, and continued on into the following centuries as France established a colonial empire in the Western Hemisphere.
France founded colonies in much of eastern North America, on a number
of Caribbean islands, and in South America. Most colonies were developed
to export products such as fish, rice, sugar, and furs.
The
French first came to the New World as travelers, seeking a route to the
Pacific Ocean and wealth. Major French exploration of North America
began under the rule of Francis I, King of France. In 1524, Francis sent Italian-born Giovanni da Verrazzano to explore the region between Florida and Newfoundland for a route to the Pacific Ocean. Verrazzano gave the names Francesca and Nova Gallia to that land between New Spain and English Newfoundland, thus promoting French interests.
In 1534, Francis I of France sent Jacques Cartier on the first of three voyages to explore the coast of Newfoundland and the St. Lawrence River. He founded New France by planting a cross on the shore of the Gaspé Peninsula.
The French subsequently tried to establish several colonies throughout
North America that failed, due to weather, disease, or conflict with
other European powers. Cartier attempted to create the first permanent
European settlement in North America at Cap-Rouge (Quebec City) in 1541 with 400 settlers but the settlement was abandoned the next year after bad weather and attacks from Native Americans in the area. A small group of French troops were left on Parris Island, South Carolina in 1562 to build Charlesfort, but left after a year when they were not resupplied by France. Fort Caroline established in present-day Jacksonville, Florida, in 1564, lasted only a year before being destroyed by the Spanish from St. Augustine. An attempt to settle convicts on Sable Island off Nova Scotia in 1598 failed after a short time. In 1599, a sixteen-person trading post was established in Tadoussac (in present-day Quebec), of which only five men survived the first winter. In 1604 Pierre Du Gua de Monts and Samuel de Champlain founded a short-lived French colony, the first in Acadia, on Saint Croix Island, presently part of the state of Maine, which was much plagued by illness, perhaps scurvy. The following year the settlement was moved to Port Royal, located in present-day Nova Scotia.
Governor Frontenac performing a tribal dance with Indian allies
The French were eager to explore North America but New France
remained largely unpopulated. Due to the lack of women, intermarriages
between French and Indians were frequent, giving rise to the Métis people. Relations between the French and Indians were usually peaceful. As the 19th-century historian Francis Parkman stated:
"Spanish civilization crushed the
Indian; English civilization scorned and neglected him; French
civilization embraced and cherished him"
— Francis Parkman.
To boost the French population, Cardinal Richelieu issued an act declaring that Indians converted to Catholicism were considered as "natural Frenchmen" by the Ordonnance of 1627:
"The descendants of the French who
are accustomed to this country [New France], together with all the
Indians who will be brought to the knowledge of the faith and will
profess it, shall be deemed and renowned natural Frenchmen, and as such
may come to live in France when they want, and acquire, donate, and
succeed and accept donations and legacies, just as true French subjects,
without being required to take no letters of declaration of
naturalization."
Louis XIV also tried to increase the population by sending approximately 800 young women nicknamed the "King's Daughters". However, the low density of population in New France remained a very persistent problem. At the beginning of the French and Indian War
(1754–1763), the British population in North America outnumbered the
French 20 to 1. France fought a total of six colonial wars in North
America (see the four French and Indian Wars as well as Father Rale's War and Father Le Loutre's War).
This irritated the Spanish who claimed Florida and opposed the Protestant settlers for religious reasons. In 1565, Pedro Menéndez de Avilés led a group of Spaniards and founded Saint Augustine, 60 kilometers south of Fort Caroline. Fearing a Spanish attack, Ribault planned to move the colony but a storm
suddenly destroyed his fleet. On 20 September 1565 the Spaniards,
commanded by Menéndez de Avilés, attacked and massacred all the Fort
Caroline occupants including Jean Ribault.
Canada and Acadia
Political map of the Northeastern part of North America in 1664.
The French interest in Canada focused first on fishing off the Grand Banks
of Newfoundland. However, at the beginning of the 17th century, France
was more interested in fur from North America. The fur trading post of Tadoussac was founded in 1600. Four years later, Champlain
made his first trip to Canada in a trade mission for fur. Although he
had no formal mandate on this trip, he sketched a map of the St.
Lawrence River and in writing, on his return to France, a report
entitled Savages (relation of his stay in a tribe of Montagnais near Tadoussac).
Champlain needed to report his findings to Henry IV. He participated in another expedition to New France in the spring of 1604, conducted by Pierre Du Gua de Monts. It helped the foundation of a settlement on Saint Croix Island,
the first French settlement in the New World, which would be given up
the following winter. The expedition then founded the colony of Port-Royal.
In 1608, Champlain founded a fur post that would become the city of Quebec, which would become the capital of New France. In Quebec, Champlain forged alliances between France and the Huron and Ottawa against their traditional enemies, the Iroquois. Champlain and other French travelers then continued to explore North America, with canoes made from Birchbark, to move quickly through the Great Lakes and their tributaries. In 1634, the Normand explorer Jean Nicolet pushed his exploration to the West up to Wisconsin.
Following the capitulation of Quebec by the Kirke
brothers, the British occupied the city of Quebec and Canada from 1629
to 1632. Samuel de Champlain was taken prisoner and there followed the
bankruptcy of the Company of One Hundred Associates. Following the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France took possession of the colony in 1632. The city of Trois-Rivières was founded in 1634. In 1642, the Angevin Jérôme le Royer de la Dauversière founded Ville-Marie (later Montreal) which was at that time, a fort as protection against Iroquois attacks (the first great Iroquois war lasted from 1642 to 1667).
A new map of the north parts of America claimed by France in 1720, according to the London cartographer Herman Moll.
Despite this rapid expansion, the colony developed very slowly. The
Iroquois wars and diseases were the leading causes of death in the
French colony. In 1663 when Louis XIV provided the Royal Government,
the population of New France was only 2500 European inhabitants. That
year, to increase the population, Louis XIV sent between 800 and 900 'King's Daughters' to become the wives of French settlers. The population of New France reached subsequently 7000 in 1674 and 15000 in 1689.
From 1689 to 1713, the French settlers were faced with almost incessant war during the French and Indian Wars. From 1689 to 1697, they fought the British in the Nine Years' War. The war against the Iroquois continued even after the Treaty of Rijswijk until 1701, when the two parties agreed on peace. Then, the war against the English took over in the War of the Spanish Succession.
In 1690 and 1711, Quebec City had successfully resisted the attacks of
the English navy and then British army. Nevertheless, the British took
advantage of the second war. With the signing of the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, France ceded to Britain Acadia (with a population of 1700 people), Newfoundland and Hudson Bay.
Under the Sovereign Council, the population of the colony grew faster.
However, the population growth was far inferior to that of the British Thirteen Colonies
to the south. In the middle of the 18th century, New France accounted
for 60,000 people while the British colonies had more than one million
people. This placed the colony at a great military disadvantage against
the British. The war between the colonies resumed in 1744, lasting until
1748. A final and decisive war began in 1754. The Canadiens and the French were helped by numerous alliances with Native Americans, but they were usually outnumbered on the battlefield.
Louisiana
Louisiana before 1736
On May 17, 1673, explorers Louis Jolliet and Jacques Marquette began exploring the Mississippi River, known to the Sioux as does Tongo, or to the Miami-Illinois as missisipioui (the great river).
They reached the mouth of the Arkansas and then up the river, after
learning that it flowed into the Gulf of Mexico and not to the
California Sea (Pacific Ocean).
In 1682, the Normand Cavelier de la Salle and the Italian Henri de Tonti came down the Mississippi to its Delta. They left from Fort Crevecoeur
on the Illinois River, along with 23 French and 18 Native Americans.
In April 1682, they arrived at the mouth of the Mississippi; they
planted a cross and a column bearing the arms of the king of France. In
1686 de Tonti left 6 men near the Quapaw village of Osotouy, creating
the settlement of Arkansas Post. De Tonti's Arkansas Post would be the
first European settlement in the Lower Mississippi River valley. La
Salle returned to France and won over the Secretary of State of the Navy to give him the command of Louisiana. He believed that it was close to New Spain
by drawing a map on which the Mississippi seemed much further west than
its actual rate. He set up a maritime expedition with four ships and
320 emigrants, but it ended in disaster when he failed to find the
Mississippi Delta and was killed in 1687.
In 1698, Pierre LeMoyne d'Iberville left La Rochelle
and explored the area around the mouth of the Mississippi. He stopped
between Isle-aux-Chats (now Cat Island) and Isle Surgeres (renamed
Isle-aux-Vascular or Ship Island) on February 13, 1699 and continued his
explorations to the mainland, with his brother Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville to Biloxi.
He built a precarious fort, called 'Maurepas' (later 'Old Biloxi'),
before returning to France. He returned twice in the Gulf of Mexico and
established a fort at Mobile in 1702.
From 1699 to 1702, Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville was governor of
Louisiana. His brother succeeded him in that post from 1702 to 1713. He
was again governor from 1716 to 1724 and again 1733 to 1743. In 1718,
Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville commanded a French expedition in
Louisiana. He founded the city of New Orleans, in homage to RegentDuke of Orleans. The architect Adrian de Pauger drew the orthogonal plane of the Old Square.
The Mississippi Bubble
In
Weigel's map (1719) intended to promote sales of the Mississippi
Company in Germany; most of the present-day United States appears under
the name "Louisiana".
In 1718, there were only 700 Europeans in Louisiana. The Mississippi
Company arranged for ships to bring 800 more, who landed in Louisiana in
1718, doubling the European population. John Law encouraged Germans, particularly Germans of the Alsatian region who had recently fallen under French rule, and the Swiss to emigrate.
Prisoners were set free in Paris in September 1719 onwards, under
the condition that they marry prostitutes and go with them to
Louisiana. The newly married couples were chained together and taken to
the port of embarkation. In May 1720, after complaints from the
Mississippi Company and the concessioners about this class of French
immigrants, the French government prohibited such deportations. However,
there was a third shipment of prisoners in 1721.
A major French settlement lay on the island of Hispaniola, where France established the colony of Saint-Domingue on the western third of the island
in 1664. Nicknamed the "Pearl of the Antilles", Saint-Domingue became
the richest colony in the Caribbean due to slave plantation production
of sugar cane. It had the highest slave mortality rate in the western
hemisphere. A 1791 slave revolt, the only ever successful slave revolt, began the Haitian Revolution,
led to freedom for the colony's slaves in 1794 and, a decade later,
complete independence for the country, which renamed itself Haiti. France briefly also ruled the eastern portion of the island, which is now the Dominican Republic.
France Antarctique (formerly also spelled France antartique) was a French colony south of the Equator, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, which existed between 1555 and 1567, and had control over the coast from Rio de Janeiro to Cabo Frio. The colony quickly became a haven for the Huguenots, and was ultimately destroyed by the Portuguese in 1567.
On November 1, 1555, French vice-admiral Nicolas Durand de Villegaignon (1510–1575), a Catholic knight of the Order of Malta,
who later would help the Huguenots to find a refuge against
persecution, led a small fleet of two ships and 600 soldiers and
colonists, and took possession of the small island of Serigipe in the Guanabara Bay, in front of present-day Rio de Janeiro, where they built a fort named Fort Coligny. The fort was named in honor of Gaspard de Coligny
(then a Catholic statesman, who about a year later would become a
Huguenot), an admiral who supported the expedition and would use the
colony in order to protect his co-religionists.
To the still largely undeveloped mainland village, Villegaignon gave the
name of Henriville, in honour of Henry II, the King of France,
who also knew of and approved the expedition, and had provided the
fleet for the trip. Villegaignon secured his position by making an
alliance with the Tamoio and Tupinambá Indians of the region, who were fighting the Portuguese.
1557 Calvinist arrival
Unchallenged
by the Portuguese, who initially took little notice of his landing,
Villegaignon endeavoured to expand the colony by calling for more
colonists in 1556. He sent one of his ships, the Grande Roberge, to
Honfleur, entrusted with letters to King Henry II, Gaspard de Coligny
and according to some accounts, the Protestant leader John Calvin.
After one ship was sent to France to ask for additional support, three
ships were financed and prepared by the king of France and put under the
command of Sieur De Bois le Comte, a nephew of Villegagnon. They were
joined by 14 Calvinists from Geneva, led by Philippe de Corguilleray,
including theologians Pierre Richier and Guillaume Chartrier. The new
colonists, numbering around 300, included 5 young women to be wed, 10
boys to be trained as translators, as well as 14 Calvinists sent by
Calvin, and also Jean de Léry, who would later write an account of the
colony. They arrived in March 1557. The relief fleet was composed of:
The Petite Roberge, with 80 soldiers and sailors was led by Vice Admiral
Sieur De Bois le Comte.
The Grande Roberge, with about 120 on board, captained by Sieur de
Sainte-Marie dit l'Espine.
The Rosée, with about 90 people, led by Captain Rosée.
Doctrinal disputes arose between Villegagnon and the Calvinists,
especially in relation to the Eucharist, and in October 1557 the
Calvinists were banished from Coligny island as a result. They settled
among the Tupinamba until January 1558, when some of them managed to
return to France by ship together with Jean de Léry, and five others
chose to return to Coligny island where three of them were drowned by
Villegagnon for refusing to recant.
Portuguese intervention
In
1560 Mem de Sá, the new Governor-General of Brazil, received from the
Portuguese government the command to expel the French. With a fleet of
26 warships and 2,000 soldiers, on 15 March 1560, he attacked and
destroyed Fort Coligny within three days, but was unable to drive off
their inhabitants and defenders, because they escaped to the mainland
with the help of the Native Brazilians, where they continued to live and
to work. Admiral Villegaignon had returned to France in 1558, disgusted
with the religious tension that existed between French Protestants and
Catholics, who had come also with the second group (see French Wars of
Religion).
Urged by two influential Jesuit priests who had come to Brazil with Mem
de Sá, named José de Anchieta and Manuel da Nóbrega, and who had played a
big role in pacifying the Tamoios, Mem de Sá ordered his nephew,
Estácio de Sá to assemble a new attack force. Estácio de Sá founded the
city of Rio de Janeiro on March 1, 1565, and fought the Frenchmen for
two more years. Helped by a military reinforcement sent by his uncle, on
January 20, 1567, he imposed final defeat on the French forces and
decisively expelled them from Brazil, but died a month later from wounds
inflicted in the battle. Coligny's and Villegaignon's dream had lasted a
mere 12 years.
Equinoctial France
Equinoctial
France was the contemporary name given to the colonization efforts of
France in the 17th century in South America, around the line of Equator,
before "tropical" had fully gained its modern meaning: Equinoctial
means in Latin "of equal nights", i.e., on the Equator, where the
duration of days and nights is nearly the same year round.
The French colonial empire in the New World also included New France
(Nouvelle France) in North America, particularly in what is today the
province of Quebec, Canada, and for a very short period (12 years) also
Antarctic France (France Antarctique, in French), in present-day Rio de
Janeiro, Brazil. All of these settlements were in violation of the papal
bull of 1493, which divided the New World between Spain and Portugal.
This division was later defined more exactly by the Treaty of
Tordesillas.
History of France équinoxiale
France
équinoxiale started in 1612, when a French expedition departed from
Cancale, Brittany, France, under the command of Daniel de la Touche,
Seigneur de la Ravardière, and François de Razilly, admiral. Carrying
500 colonists, it arrived in the Northern coast of what is today the
Brazilian state of Maranhão. De la Ravardière had discovered the region in 1604 but the death of the king postponed his plans to start its colonization.
The colonists soon founded a village, which was named "Saint-Louis", in honor of the French king Louis IX. This later became São Luís
in Portuguese,[1] the only Brazilian state capital founded by France.
On 8 September, Capuchin friars prayed the first mass, and the soldiers
started building a fortress. An important difference in relation to
France Antarctique is that this new colony was not motivated by escape
from religious persecutions to Protestants (see French Wars of
Religion). The colony did not last long. A Portuguese army assembled in
the Captaincy of Pernambuco,
under the command of Alexandre de Moura, was able to mount a military
expedition, which defeated and expelled the French colonists in 1615,
less than four years after their arrival in the land. Thus, it repeated
the disaster spelt for the colonists of France Antarctique, in 1567. A
few years later, in 1620, Portuguese and Brazilian colonists arrived in
number and São Luís started to develop, with an economy based mostly in
sugar cane and slavery.
French Guiana located in the South American continent.
French traders and colonists tried again to settle a France
Équinoxiale further North, in what is today French Guiana, in 1626, 1635
(when the capital, Cayenne, was founded) and 1643. Twice a Compagnie de la France équinoxiale
was founded, in 1643 and 1645, but both foundered as a result of
misfortune and mismanagement. It was only after 1674, when the colony
came under the direct control of the French crown and a competent
Governor took office, that France Équinoxiale became a reality. To this
day, French Guiana is a department of France.
French Guiana was first settled by the French in 1604, although its earliest settlements were abandoned in the face of hostilities from the indigenous population and tropical diseases. The settlement of Cayenne
was established in 1643, but was abandoned. It was re-established in
the 1660s. Except for brief occupations by the English and Dutch in the
17th century, and by the Portuguese in the 19th century, Guiana has
remained under French rule ever since. From 1851 to 1951 it was the site
of a notorious penal colony, Devil's Island (Île du Diable). Since 1946, French Guiana has been an overseas department of France.
Occupied metropolitan France under Axis control (German zones and Italian zones) after the fall of the Third Republic in June 1940, under Free French control by August 1944.
Charles de Gaulle, a French general and government minister, rejected the armistice being negotiated by Marshal Philippe Pétain and fled to Britain. There he exhorted the French to resist in his BBC broadcast "Appeal of 18 June" (Appel du 18 juin).
On 27 October 1940, the Empire Defense Council (Conseil de défense de l'Empire)
was constituted to organise the rule of the territories in central
Africa, Asia, and Oceania that had heeded the 18 June call. It was
replaced on 24 September 1941 by the French National Committee (Comité national français or CNF). On 13 July 1942, "Free France" was officially renamed Fighting France (France combattante) to mark that the struggle against the Axis was conducted both externally by the FFF and internally by the French Forces of the Interior (FFI). After the reconquest of North Africa, this was in turn formally merged with de Gaulle's rival general Henri Giraud's command in Algiers to form the French Committee of National Liberation (Comité français de Libération nationale or CFNL). Exile officially ended with the liberation of Paris by the 2nd Armoured Free French Division and Resistance forces on 25 August 1944, ushering in the Provisional Government of the French Republic (gouvernement provisoire de la République française or GPRF). It ruled France until the end of the war and afterwards to 1946, when the Fourth Republic was established, thus ending the series of interim regimes that had succeeded the Third Republic after its fall in 1940.
From colonial outposts in Africa, India, and the Pacific, Free
France steadily took over more and more Vichy possessions, until after
the Allied landings in North Africa (Operation Torch) in November 1942 Vichy only ruled over the zone libre in southern France and a few possessions in the West Indies (and nominally over Japanese-occupied French Indochina). The French Army of Africa switched allegiance to Free France, and this caused the Axis to occupy Vichy in reaction.
On 1 August 1943, L'Armée d'Afrique was formally united with the Free French Forces to form L'Armée française de la Liberation [fr]. By mid-1944, the forces of this army numbered more than 400,000, and they participated in the Normandy landings and the invasion of southern France,
eventually leading the drive on Paris. Soon they were fighting in
Alsace, the Alps and Brittany. By the end of the war, they were
1,300,000 strong—the fourth-largest Allied army in Europe—and took part
in the Allied advance through France and invasion of Germany. The Free French government re-established a provisional republic after the liberation, preparing the ground for the Fourth Republic in 1946.
Historically, an individual became "Free French" by enlisting in the
military units organised by the CFN or by employment by the civilian arm
of the Committee. On 1 August 1943 after the merger of CFN and
representatives of the former Vichy regime in North Africa to form the
CFLN earlier in June, the FFF and the Armée d'Afrique
(constituting a major part of the Vichy regular forces allowed by the
1940 armistice) were merged to form the French Liberation Army, Armée française de la Libération [fr], and all subsequent enlistments were in this combined force.
In many sources, Free French describes any French individual or unit that fought against Axis
forces after the June 1940 armistice. Postwar, to settle disputes over
the Free French heritage, the French government issued an official
definition of the term. Under this "ministerial instruction of July
1953" (instruction ministérielle du 29 juillet 1953), only those who served with the Allies after the Franco-German armistice in 1940 and before 1 August 1943 may correctly be called "Free French".
On 10 May 1940, Nazi Germany invaded France and the Low Countries, rapidly defeating the Dutch and Belgians, while armoured units attacking through the Ardennes
cut off the Franco-British strike force in Belgium. By the end of May,
the British and French northern armies were trapped in a series of
pockets, including Dunkirk, Calais, Boulogne, Saint-Valery-en-Caux and Lille. The Dunkirk evacuation was only made possible by the resistance of these troops, particularly the French army divisions at Lille.
From 27 May to 4 June, over 200,000 members of the British Expeditionary Force and 140,000 French troops were evacuated from Dunkirk.
Neither side viewed this as the end of the battle; French evacuees were
quickly returned to France and many fought in the June battles. After
being evacuated from Dunkirk, Alan Brooke landed in Cherbourg on 2 June to reform the BEF, along with the 1st Canadian Division,
the only remaining armoured unit in Britain. Contrary to what is often
assumed, French morale was higher in June than May and they easily
repulsed an attack in the south by Fascist Italy.
A defensive line was re-established along the Somme but much of the
armour was lost in Northern France; they were also crippled by shortages
of aircraft, the vast majority incurred when airfields were over-run,
rather than air combat.
On 1 June, Charles de Gaulle was promoted brigadier general; on 5 June, Prime Minister Paul Reynaud appointed him Under Secretary of State for Defence, a junior post in the French cabinet. De Gaulle was known for his willingness to challenge accepted ideas; in 1912, he asked to be posted to Pétain's regiment, whose maxim 'Firepower kills' was then in stark contrast to the prevailing orthodoxy. He was also a long-time advocate of the modern armoured warfare ideas applied by the Wehrmacht, and commanded the 4th Armoured Division at the Battle of Montcornet. However, he was not personally popular; significantly, none of his immediate military subordinates joined him in 1940.
The new French commander Maxime Weygand
was 73 years old and like Pétain, an Anglophobe who viewed Dunkirk as
another example of Britain's unreliability as an ally; de Gaulle later
recounted he 'gave up hope' when the Germans renewed their attack on 8
June and demanded an immediate Armistice.
De Gaulle was one of a small group of government ministers who favoured
continued resistance and Reynaud sent him to London in order to
negotiate the proposed union between France and Britain. When this plan collapsed, he resigned on 16 June and Pétain became President of the Council. De Gaulle flew to Bordeaux on 17th but returned to London the same day when he realised Pétain had already agreed an armistice with the Axis Powers.
De Gaulle rallies the Free French
In Occupied France during the war, reproductions of the 18 June appeal were distributed through underground means as pamphlets and plastered on walls as posters by supporters of the Résistance. This could be a dangerous activity.
On 18 June, General de Gaulle spoke to the French people via BBC radio, urging French soldiers, sailors and airmen to join in the fight against the Nazis:
"France is not alone! She is not alone! She has a great empire behind her! Together with the British Empire,
she can form a bloc that controls the seas and continue the struggle.
She may, like England, draw upon the limitless industrial resources of
the United States".
Some members of the British Cabinet
had reservations about de Gaulle's speech, fearing that such a
broadcast could provoke the Pétain government into handing the French
fleet over to the Nazis, but British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, despite his own concerns, agreed to the broadcast.
In France, de Gaulle's "Appeal of 18 June" (Appel du 18 juin) was not widely heard that day but, together with his BBC broadcasts
in subsequent days and his later communications, came to be widely
remembered throughout France and its colonial empire as the voice of
national honour and freedom.
Armistice
On
19 June, de Gaulle again broadcast to the French nation saying that in
France, "all forms of authority had disappeared" and since its
government had "fallen under the bondage of the enemy and all our
institutions have ceased to function", that it was "the clear duty" of
all French servicemen to fight on.
This would form the essential legal basis of de Gaulle's government in exile,
that the armistice soon to be signed with the Nazis was not merely
dishonourable but illegal, and that in signing it, the French government
would itself be committing treason. On the other hand, if Vichy was the legal French government as some such as Julian T. Jackson have argued, de Gaulle and his followers were revolutionaries, unlike the Dutch, Belgian, and other governments in exile in London.
A third option might be that neither considered that a fully free,
legitimate, sovereign, and independent successor state to the Third Republic
existed following the Armistice, as both Free France and Vichy France
refrained from making that implicit claim by studiously avoiding using
the word "republic" when referring to themselves, even though republicanism had been a core ideological value and central tenet of the French state ever since the French Revolution—and especially since the Franco-Prussian War. In Vichy's case those reasons were compounded with ideas of a Révolution nationale about stamping out France's republican heritage.
On 22 June 1940, Marshal Pétain signed an armistice with Germany, followed by a similar one with Italy on 24 June; both of these came into force on 25 June. After a parliamentary vote on 10 July, Pétain became the leader of the newly established authoritarian regime known as Vichy France, the town of Vichy being the seat of government. De Gaulle was tried in absentia in Vichy France and sentenced to death for treason.
He, on the other hand, regarded himself as the last remaining member of
the legitimate Reynaud government and considered Pétain's assumption of
power to be an unconstitutional coup d'état.
Despite de Gaulle's call to continue the struggle, few French forces
initially pledged their support. By the end of July 1940, only about
7,000 soldiers had joined the Free French Army in England. Three-quarters of French servicemen in Britain requested repatriation.
France was bitterly divided by the conflict. Frenchmen everywhere
were forced to choose sides, and often deeply resented those who had
made a different choice. One French admiral, René-Émile Godfroy,
voiced the opinion of many of those who decided not to join the Free
French forces, when in June 1940, he explained to the exasperated
British why he would not order his ships from their Alexandria harbour
to join de Gaulle:
"For us Frenchmen, the fact is that a government still exists in
France, a government supported by a Parliament established in
non-occupied territory and which in consequence cannot be considered
irregular or deposed. The establishment elsewhere of another government,
and all support for this other government would clearly be rebellion."
Equally, few Frenchmen believed that England could stand alone. In
June 1940, Pétain and his generals told Churchill that "in three weeks,
England will have her neck wrung like a chicken". Of France's far-flung empire, only the French domains of St Helena (on 23 June at the initiative of Georges Colin, honorary consul of the domains) and the Franco-British ruled New Hebrides
condominium in the Pacific (on 20 July) answered De Gaulle's call to
arms. It was not until late August that Free France would gain
significant support in French Equatorial Africa.
Unlike the troops at Dunkirk or naval forces at sea, relatively few members of the French Air Force
had the means or opportunity to escape. Like all military personnel
trapped on the mainland, they were functionally subject to the Pétain
government: "French authorities made it clear that those who acted on
their own initiative would be classed as deserters, and guards were
placed to thwart efforts to get on board ships." In the summer of 1940, around a dozen pilots made it to England and volunteered for the RAF to help fight the Luftwaffe.
Many more, however, made their way through long and circuitous routes
to French territories overseas, eventually regrouping as the Free French Air Force.
The French Navy
was better able to immediately respond to de Gaulle's call to arms.
Most units initially stayed loyal to Vichy, but about 3,600 sailors
operating 50 ships around the world joined with the Royal Navy and formed the nucleus of the Free French Naval Forces (FFNF; in French: FNFL). France's surrender found her only aircraft carrier, Béarn,
en route from the United States loaded with a precious cargo of
American fighter and bomber aircraft. Unwilling to return to occupied
France, but likewise reluctant to join de Gaulle, Béarn instead sought harbour in Martinique,
her crew showing little inclination to side with the British in their
continued fight against the Nazis. Already obsolete at the start of the
war, she would remain in Martinique for the next four years, her
aircraft rusting in the tropical climate.
Composition
The Free French forces included men from the French Pacific Islands.
Mainly coming from Tahiti, there were 550 volunteers in April 1941. They
would serve through the North African campaign (including the Battle of Bir Hakeim), the Italian Campaign
and much of the Liberation of France. In November 1944, 275 remaining
volunteers were repatriated and replaced with men of French Forces of
the Interior to deal better with the cold weather.
The Free French forces also included 5,000 non-French Europeans, mainly serving in units of the Foreign Legion. There were also escaped Spanish Republicans, veterans of the Spanish Civil War. In August 1944, they numbered 350 men.
The ethnic composition of divisions varied. The main common
difference, before the period of August to November 1944, was armoured
divisions and armour and support elements within infantry divisions were
constituted of mainly white French soldiers and infantry elements of
infantry divisions were mainly made up of colonial soldiers. Nearly all
NCOs and officers were white French. Both the 2e Division Blindée and 1er Division Blindée were made up of around 75% Europeans and 25% Mahgrebians, which is why the 2e Division Blindée was selected for the Liberation of Paris. The 5e Division Blindée was almost entirely made up of white Frenchmen.
Records for the Italian campaign show that both the 3rd Algerian Infantry Division and 2nd Moroccan Infantry Division were made up of 60% Mahgrebians and 40% Europeans, while the 4th Moroccan Infantry Division was made up of 65% Mahgrebians and 35% Europeans.
The three North African divisions had one brigade of North African
soldiers in each division replaced with a brigade of French Forces of
the Interior in January 1945. Both the 1st Free French Division and 9th Colonial Infantry Division contained a strong contingent of Tirailleurs Sénégalais brigades. The 1st Free French Division also contained a mixed brigade of French Troupes de marine and the Pacific island volunteers.
It also included the Foreign Legion Brigades. In late September and
early October 1944, both the Tirailleurs Sénégalais brigades and Pacific
Islanders were replaced by brigades of troops recruited from mainland
France.
This was also when many new Infantry divisions (12 overall) began to be
recruited from mainland France, including the 10th Infantry Division
and many Alpine Infantry Divisions. The 3rd Armoured Division was also
created in May 1945 but saw no combat in the war.
The Free French units in the Royal Air Force, Soviet Air Force, and British SAS were mainly composed of men from metropolitan France.
Additionally, according to French historian Jean-François
Muracciole, between the creation of the Free French forces in the Summer
1940 and the merger with the Army of Africa in summer 1943, 73,100 men
fought for Free France. This included 39,300 French (from metropolitan
France and colonial settlers), 30,000 colonial soldiers (mostly from
sub-Saharan Africa) and 3,800 foreigners.
Cross of Lorraine
The Free French naval jack and French naval honour jack. The argent rhomboid field is defaced with a gules Lorraine cross, the emblem of the Free French.
In his general order No. 2 of 3 July 1940, Vice admiralÉmile Muselier, two days after assuming the post of chief of the naval and air forces of the Free French, created the naval jack displaying the French colours with a red cross of Lorraine, and a cockade, which also featured the cross of Lorraine. Modern ships that share the same name as ships of the FNFL—such as Rubis and Triomphant—are entitled to fly the Free French naval jack as a mark of honour.
The Free French Memorial, looking out over the Firth of Clyde
A monument on Lyle Hill in Greenock,
in the shape of the Cross of Lorraine combined with an anchor, was
raised by subscription as a memorial to the Free French naval vessels
which sailed from the Firth of Clyde to take part in the Battle of the Atlantic. It has plaques commemorating the loss of the Flower-class corvettesAlyssa and Mimosa, and of the submarine Surcouf. Locally, it is also associated with the memory of the loss of the destroyer Maillé Brézé which blew up at the Tail of the Bank.
Mers El Kébir and the fate of the French Navy
After the fall of France, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill
feared that, in German or Italian hands, the ships of the French Navy
would pose a grave threat to the Allies. He therefore insisted that
French warships either join the Allies or else adopt neutrality in a
British, French, or neutral port. Churchill was determined that French
warships would not be in a position to support a German invasion of
Britain, though he feared that a direct attack on the French Navy might
cause the Vichy regime to actively ally itself with the Nazis.
A very modern Dunkerque-classbattleship battleship commissioned in 1937, Strasbourg was potentially a quite substantial threat to British control of the sealanes were she to fall into Axis hands.
Submarine Rubis. With 22 ships sunk (12 of them German men-of-war) on 22 operational patrols, she achieved the highest kill number of the FNFL.
On 3 July 1940, Admiral Marcel-Bruno Gensoul was provided an ultimatum by the British:
It is impossible for us, your
comrades up to now, to allow your fine ships to fall into the power of
the German enemy. We are determined to fight on until the end, and if we
win, as we think we shall, we shall never forget that France was our
Ally, that our interests are the same as hers, and that our common enemy
is Germany. Should we conquer we solemnly declare that we shall restore
the greatness and territory of France. For this purpose we must make
sure that the best ships of the French Navy are not used against us by
the common foe. In these circumstances, His Majesty's Government have
instructed me to demand that the French Fleet now at Mers el Kebir and Oran shall act in accordance with one of the following alternatives;
(a) Sail with us and continue the fight until victory against the Germans.
(b) Sail with reduced crews under our control to a British port. The reduced crews would be repatriated at the earliest moment.
If either of these courses is adopted by you we will restore your
ships to France at the conclusion of the war or pay full compensation
if they are damaged meanwhile. (c) Alternatively if you feel bound to stipulate that your ships
should not be used against the Germans lest they break the Armistice,
then sail them with us with reduced crews to some French port in the West Indies—Martinique
for instance—where they can be demilitarised to our satisfaction, or
perhaps be entrusted to the United States and remain safe until the end
of the war, the crews being repatriated.
If you refuse these fair offers, I must with profound regret, require you to sink your ships within 6 hours. Finally, failing the above, I have the orders from His Majesty's
Government to use whatever force may be necessary to prevent your ships
from falling into German hands.
Gensoul's orders allowed him to accept internment in the West Indies, but after a discussion lasting ten hours, he rejected all offers, and British warships commanded by Admiral James Somerville attacked French ships during the attack on Mers-el-Kébir in Algeria, sinking or crippling three battleships.
Because the Vichy government only said that there had been no
alternatives offered, the attack caused great bitterness in France,
particularly in the Navy (over 1,000 French sailors were killed), and
helped to reinforce the ancient stereotype of perfide Albion. Such actions discouraged many French soldiers from joining the Free French forces.
Despite this, some French warships and sailors did remain on the
Allied side or join the FNFL later, such as the mine-laying submarine Rubis, whose crew voted almost unanimously to fight alongside Britain, the destroyer Le Triomphant, and the then-largest submarine in the world, Surcouf. The first loss of the FNFL occurred on 7 November 1940, when the patrol boat Poulmic struck a mine in the English Channel.
Most ships that had remained on the Vichy side and were not scuttled with the main French fleet in Toulon, mostly those in the colonies that had remained loyal to Vichy until the end of the regime through the Case Anton Axis invasion and occupation of the zone libre and Tunisia, changed sides then.
In November 1940, around 1,700 officers and men of the French
Navy took advantage of the British offer of repatriation to France, and
were transported home on a hospital ship travelling under the international Red Cross. This did not stop the Germans from torpedoing the ship, and 400 men were drowned.
In total
during the war, around 50 major ships and a few dozen minor and
auxiliary ships were part of the Free French navy. It also included half
a dozen battalions of naval infantry and commandos, as well as naval aviation squadrons, one aboard HMS Indomitable and one squadron of anti-submarine Catalinas. The French merchant marine siding with the Allies counted over 170 ships.
Struggle for control of the French colonies
With
metropolitan France firmly under Germany's thumb and the Allies too
weak to challenge this, de Gaulle turned his attention to France's vast
overseas empire.
African campaign and the Empire Defence Council
De
Gaulle was optimistic that France's colonies in western and central
Africa, which had strong trading links with British territories, might
be sympathetic to the Free French. Pierre Boisson, the governor-general of French Equatorial Africa, was a staunch supporter of the Vichy regime, unlike Félix Éboué, the governor of French Chad, a subsection of the overall colony. Boisson was soon promoted to "High Commissioner of Colonies" and transferred to Dakar,
leaving Éboué with more direct authority over Chad. On 26 August, with
the help of his top military official, Éboué pledged his colony's
allegiance to Free France. By the end of August, all of French Equatorial Africa (including the League of Nations mandate French Cameroun) had joined Free France, with the exception of French Gabon.
A Chadian soldier fighting for Free France
With these colonies came vital manpower – a large number of African colonial troops,
who would form the nucleus of de Gaulle's army. From July to November
1940, the FFF would engage in fighting with troops loyal to Vichy France
in Africa, with success and failure on both sides.
In September 1940 an Anglo French naval force fought the Battle of Dakar, also known as Operation Menace, an unsuccessful attempt to capture the strategic port of Dakar in French West Africa.
The local authorities were not impressed by the Allied show of
strength, and had the better of the naval bombardment which followed,
leading to a humiliating withdrawal by the Allied ships. So strong was
de Gaulle's sense of failure that he even considered suicide.
There was better news in November 1940 when the FFF achieved victory at the Battle of Gabon (or Battle of Libreville) under the very skilled General Philippe Leclerc de Hauteclocque (General Leclerc).
De Gaulle personally surveyed the situation in Chad, the first African
colony to join Free France, located on the southern border of Libya, and
the battle resulted in free French forces taking Libreville, Gabon.
By the end of November 1940 French Equatorial Africa was wholly under
the control of Free France, but the failures at Dakar had led French
West Africa to declare allegiance to Vichy, to which they would remain
loyal until the fall of the regime in November 1942.
On 27 October 1940 the Empire Defence Council
was established to organise and administrate the imperial possessions
under Free French rule, and as an alternative provisional French
government. It was constituted of high-ranking officers and the
governors of the free colonies, notably governor Félix Éboué of Chad. Its creation was announced by the Brazzaville Manifesto that day. La France libre was what de Gaulle claimed to represent, or rather, as he put it simply, "La France"; Vichy France was a "pseudo government", an illegal entity.
In 1941–1942, the African FFF slowly grew in strength and even expanded operations north into Italian Libya. In February 1941, Free French Forces invaded Cyrenaica, again led by Leclerc, capturing the Italian fort at the oasis of Kufra. In 1942, Leclerc's forces and soldiers from the British Long Range Desert Group captured parts of the province of Fezzan. At the end of 1942, Leclerc moved his forces into Tripolitania to join British Commonwealth and other FFF forces in the Run for Tunis.
Asia and the Pacific
Insigna of the Free French Forces in the Far East (French Indochina), Langlade Mission
France also had possessions in Asia and the Pacific, and these
far-flung colonies would experience similar problems of divided
loyalties. French India and the French South Pacific colonies of New Caledonia, French Polynesia and the New Hebrides joined Free France in the summer 1940, drawing official American interest. These South Pacific colonies would later provide vital Allied bases in the Pacific Ocean during the war with Japan.
From June 1940 until February 1943, the concession of Guangzhouwan
(Kouang-Tchéou-Wan or Fort-Boyard), in South China, remained under the
administration of Free France. The Republic of China, after the fall of
Paris in 1940, recognised the London-exiled Free French government as
Guangzhouwan's legitimate authority and established diplomatic relations
with them, something facilitated by the fact that the colony was
surrounded by the Republic of China's territory and was not in physical
contact with French Indochina. In February 1943 the Imperial Japanese Army invaded and occupied the leased territory.
North America
In North America, Saint-Pierre and Miquelon (near Newfoundland) joined the Free French after an "invasion" on 24 December 1941 by Rear Admiral Emile Muselier and the forces he was able to load onto three corvettes and a submarine of the FNFL. The action at Saint-Pierre and Miquelon created a serious diplomatic incident with the United States, despite this being the first French possession in the Americas to join the Allies, which doctrinally objected
to the use of military means by colonial powers in the western
hemisphere and recognised Vichy as the official French government.
Mainly because of this and of the often very frosty relations between Free France and the USA (with President Roosevelt's
profound distrust of de Gaulle playing a key part in that, with him
being firmly convinced that the general's aim was to create a
South-American style junta and become the dictator of France), other French possessions in the new world were among the very last to defect from Vichy to the Allies (with Martinique holding out until July 1943).
In June 1941, during the Syria-Lebanon campaign
(Operation Exporter), Free French Forces fighting alongside British
Commonwealth forces faced substantial numbers of troops loyal to Vichy
France – this time in the Levant.
De Gaulle had assured Churchill that the French units in Syria would
rise to the call of Free France, but this was not the case. After bitter fighting, with around 1,000 dead on each side (including Vichy and Free French Foreign Legionnaires fratricide when the 13th Demi-Brigade (D.B.L.E.) clashed with the 6th Foreign Infantry Regiment near Damascus). General Henri Dentz and his Vichy Army of the Levant were eventually defeated by the largely British allied forces in July 1941.
The British did not themselves occupy Syria; rather, the Free French General Georges Catroux was appointed High Commissioner of the Levant, and from this point, Free France would control both Syria and Lebanon
until they became independent in 1946 and 1943 respectively. However,
despite this success, the numbers of the FFF did not grow as much as has
been wished for. Of nearly 38,000 Vichy French prisoners of war, just 5,668 men volunteered to join the forces of General de Gaulle; the remainder chose to be repatriated to France.
Despite this bleak picture, by the end of 1941, the United States had entered the war, and the Soviet Union had also joined the Allied side, stopping the Germans outside Moscow
in the first major reverse for the Nazis. Gradually the tide of war
began to shift, and with it the perception that Hitler could at last be
beaten. Support for Free France began to grow, though the Vichy French
forces would continue to resist Allied armies—and the Free French—when
attacked by them until the end of 1942.
Creation of the French National Committee (CNF)
Reflecting the growing strength of Free France was the foundation of the French National Committee [fr] (Comité national français, CNF) in September 1941 and the official name change from France Libre to France combattante in July 1942.
The United States granted Lend-Lease support to the CNF on 24 November.
Throughout 1942 in North Africa,
British Empire forces fought a desperate land campaign against the
Germans and Italians to prevent the loss of Egypt and the vital Suez canal. Here, fighting in the harsh Libyan desert, Free French soldiers distinguished themselves. General Marie Pierre Koenig and his unit—the 1st Free French Infantry Brigade—resisted the Afrika Korps at the Battle of Bir Hakeim in June 1942, although they were eventually obliged to withdraw, as Allied forces retreated to El Alamein, their lowest ebb in the North African campaign. Koenig defended Bir Hakeim from 26 May to 11 June against superior German and Italian forces led by Generaloberst Erwin Rommel, proving that the FFF could be taken seriously by the Allies as a fighting force. British General Claude Auchinleck
said on 12 June 1942, of the battle: "The United Nations need to be
filled with admiration and gratitude, in respect of these French troops
and their brave General Koenig". Even Hitler was impressed, announcing to the journalist Lutz Koch, recently returned from Bir Hakeim:
You hear, Gentlemen? It is a new evidence that I have
always been right! The French are, after us, the best soldiers! Even
with its current birthrate, France will always be able to mobilise a
hundred divisions! After this war, we will have to find allies able to
contain a country which is capable of military exploits that astonish
the world like they are doing right now in Bir-Hakeim!
First successes
From 23 October to 4 November 1942, Allied forces under general Bernard Montgomery, including the FFI, won the Second battle of El Alamein,
driving Rommel's Afrika Korps out of Egypt and back into Libya. This
was the first major success of an Allied army against the Axis powers,
and marked a key turning point in the war.
Soon afterwards in November 1942, the Allies launched Operation Torch in the west, an invasion of Vichy-controlled French North Africa. An Anglo-American force of 63,000 men landed in French Morocco and Algeria.
The long-term goal was to clear German and Italian troops from North
Africa, enhance naval control of the Mediterranean, and prepare an
invasion of Italy in 1943. The Allies had hoped that Vichy forces would
offer only token resistance to the Allies, but instead they fought hard,
incurring heavy casualties.
As a French foreign legionnaire put it after seeing his comrades die in
an American bombing raid: "Ever since the fall of France, we had
dreamed of deliverance, but we did not want it that way".
After 8 November 1942 putsch by the French resistance that prevented the 19th Corps
from responding effectively to the allied landings around Algiers the
same day, most Vichy figures were arrested (including General Alphonse Juin, chief commander in North Africa, and Vichy admiral François Darlan). However, Darlan was released and U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower finally accepted his self-nomination as high commissioner of North Africa and French West Africa, a move that enraged de Gaulle, who refused to recognise his status.
Henri Giraud, a general who had escaped from military captivity in Germany
in April 1942, had negotiated with the Americans for leadership in the
invasion. He arrived in Algiers on 10 November, and agreed to
subordinate himself to Admiral Darlan as the commander of the French
African army.
Later that day Darlan ordered a ceasefire and Vichy French forces
began, en masse, to join the Free French cause. Initially at least the
effectiveness of these new recruits was hampered by a scarcity of
weaponry and, among some of the officer class, a lack of conviction in
their new cause.
After the signing of the cease-fire, the Germans lost faith in
the Vichy regime, and on 11 November 1942 German and Italian forces
occupied Vichy France (Case Anton), violating the 1940 armistice, and
triggering the scuttling of the French fleet in Toulon on 27 November
1942. In response, the Vichy Army of Africa joined the Allied side. They fought in Tunisia for six months until April 1943, when they joined the campaign in Italy as part of the French Expeditionary Corps in Italy (FEC).
Admiral Darlan was assassinated on 24 December 1942 in Algiers by the young monarchist Bonnier de La Chapelle. Although de la Chapelle had been a member of the resistance group led by Henri d'Astier de La Vigerie, it is believed he was acting as an individual.
After these successes, Guadeloupe and Martinique in the West Indies—as well as French Guiana
on the northern coast of South America – finally joined Free France in
the first months of 1943. In November 1943, the French forces received
enough military equipment through Lend-Lease to re-equip eight divisions
and allow the return of borrowed British equipment.
Creation of the French Committee of National Liberation (CFNL)
The Vichy forces in North Africa had been under Darlan's command and
had surrendered on his orders. The Allies recognised his self-nomination
as High Commissioner of France (French military and civilian
commander-in-chief, Commandement en chef français civil et militaire)
for North and West Africa. He ordered them to cease resisting and
co-operate with the Allies, which they did. By the time the Tunisia
Campaign was fought, the ex-Vichy French forces in North Africa had been
merged with the FFF.
After Admiral Darlan's assassination, Giraud became his de facto
successor in French Africa with Allied support. This occurred through a
series of consultations between Giraud and de Gaulle. The latter wanted
to pursue a political position in France and agreed to have Giraud as
commander in chief, as the more qualified military person of the two. It
is questionable that he ordered that many French resistance leaders who
had helped Eisenhower's troops be arrested, without any protest by
Roosevelt's representative, Robert Murphy.
Later, the Americans sent Jean Monnet to counsel Giraud and to press him into repeal the Vichy laws. The Cremieux decree,
which granted French citizenship to Jews in Algeria and which had been
repealed by Vichy, was immediately restored by General de Gaulle.
Democratic rule was restored in French Algeria, and the Communists and
Jews liberated from the concentration camps.
Giraud took part in the Casablanca conference
in January 1943 with Roosevelt, Churchill and de Gaulle. The Allies
discussed their general strategy for the war, and recognised joint
leadership of North Africa by Giraud and de Gaulle. Henri Giraud and
Charles de Gaulle then became co-presidents of the French Committee of National Liberation (Comité Français de Libération Nationale, CFLN), which unified the territories controlled by them and was officially founded on 3 June 1943.
The CFLN set up a temporary French government in Algiers, raised
more troops and re-organised, re-trained and re-equipped the Free French
military, in co-operation with Allied forces in preparation of future
operations against Italy and the German Atlantic wall.
Eastern Front
FAFL Normandie-Niemen Yak-3 preserved at the Paris Le Bourgetmuseum
The Normandie-Niemen Regiment, founded at the suggestion of Charles de Gaulle, was a fighter regiment of the Free French Air Force that served on the Eastern Front of the European Theatre of World War II with the 1st Air Army.
The regiment is notable for being the only air combat unit from an
Allied western country to participate on the Eastern Front during World
War II (except brief interventions from RAF and USAAF units) and the only one to fight together with the Soviets until the end of the war in Europe.
The unit was the GC3 (Groupe de Chasse 3
or 3rd Fighter Group) in the Free French Air Force, first commanded by
Jean Tulasne. The unit originated in mid-1943 during World War II.
Initially the groupe
comprised a group of French fighter pilots sent to aid Soviet forces at
the suggestion of Charles de Gaulle, leader of the Free French Forces,
who felt it important that French servicemen serve on all fronts in the
war. The regiment fought in three campaigns on behalf of the Soviet Union
between 22 March 1943, and 9 May 1945, during which time it destroyed
273 enemy aircraft and received numerous orders, citations and
decorations from both France and the Soviet Union, including the French Légion d'Honneur and the Soviet Order of the Red Banner. Joseph Stalin awarded the unit the name Niemen for its participation in the Battle of the Niemen River.
Tunisia, Italy and Corsica
The
Free French forces participated in the Tunisian Campaign. Together with
British and Commonwealth forces, the FFF advanced from the south while
the formerly Vichy-loyal Army of Africa advanced from the west together
with the Americans. The fighting in Tunisia ended in July 1943 with an
Allied victory.
During the campaign in Italy during 1943–1944, a total of between 70,000 and 130,000
Free French soldiers fought on the Allied side. The French
Expeditionary Corps consisted of 60% colonial soldiers, mostly Moroccans
and 40% Europeans, mostly Pied-Noirs. They took part in the fighting on the Winter Line and Gustav Line, distinguishing themselves at Monte Cassino in Operation Diadem. Some elements of these colonial troops, the Moroccan Goumiers, were responsible for mass rape and killings of civilians in an incident during those operations (see Marocchinate) and were subsequently withdrawn from the Italian front.
Forces Françaises Combattantes and National Council of the Resistance
Picture of Jean Moulin and his iconic scarf. He was probably tortured to death by Klaus Barbie personally.
The French Resistance gradually grew in strength. General de Gaulle set a plan to bring together the fragmented groups
under his leadership. He changed the name of his movement to "Fighting
French Forces" (Forces Françaises Combattantes) and sent Jean Moulin back to France as his formal link to the irregulars throughout the occupied country to co-ordinate the eight major Résistance groups into one organisation. Moulin got their agreement to form the "National Council of the Resistance" (Conseil National de la Résistance). Moulin was eventually captured, and died under brutal torture by the Gestapo.
De Gaulle's influence had also grown in France, and in 1942 one
resistance leader called him "the only possible leader for the France
that fights".
Other Gaullists, those who could not leave France (that is, the
overwhelming majority of them), remained in the territories ruled by
Vichy and the Axis occupation forces, building networks of
propagandists, spies and saboteurs to harass and discomfit the enemy.
Later, the Resistance was more formally referred to as the "French Forces of the Interior" (Forces Françaises de l'Intérieur, or FFI). From October 1944 – March 1945, many FFI units were amalgamated into the French Army to regularise the units.
Charles de Gaulle speaks as president of interim government to the population of Cherbourg from the city hall's balcony on 20 August 1944
Opening a "Second Front" was a top priority for the Allies, and especially for the Soviets to relieve their burden on the Eastern Front. While Italy had been knocked out of the war
in the Italian campaign in September 1943, the easily defensible
terrain of the narrow peninsula required only a relatively limited
number of German troops to protect and occupy their new puppet state in northern Italy. However, as the Dieppe raid had shown, assaulting the Atlantic Wall was not an endeavour to be taken lightly. It required extensive preparations such as the construction of artificial ports (Operation Mulberry) and an underwater pipeline across the English Channel (Operation Pluto), intensive bombardment of railways and German logistics in France (the Transportation Plan), and the wide-ranging military deception such as creating entire dummy armies like FUSAG (Operation Bodyguard) to make the Germans believe the invasion would take place where the Channel was at its narrowest.
By the time of the Normandy Invasion, the Free French forces numbered more than 400,000 strong. 900 Free French paratroopers landed as part of the British Special Air Service (SAS) Brigade; the 2e Division Blindée (2nd Armoured Division or 2e DB)—under General Leclerc—landed at Utah Beach in Normandy on 1 August 1944 together with other follow-on Free French forces, and eventually led the drive toward Paris.
In the battle for Caen,
bitter fighting led to the almost total destruction of the city, and
stalemated the Allies. They had more success in the western American
sector of the front, where after the Operation Cobra breakthrough in late July they caught 50,000 Germans in the Falaise pocket.
The invasion was preceded by weeks of intense resistance activity. Coordinated with the massive bombardments of the Transportation Plan and supported by the SOE and the OSS, partisans systematically sabotaged railway lines, destroyed bridges, cut German supply lines,
and provided general intelligence to the allied forces. The constant
harassment took its toll on the German troops. Large remote areas were
no-go zones for them and free zones for the maquisards so-called after the maquis shrubland that provided ideal terrain for guerrilla warfare. For instance, a large number of German units were required to clear the maquis du Vercors, which they eventually succeeded with,
but this and numerous other actions behind German lines contributed to a
much faster advance following the Provence landings than the Allied
leadership had anticipated.
The main part of French Expeditionary Corps in Italy which had been fighting there was withdrawn from the Italian front, and added to the French First Army—under General Jean de Lattre de Tassigny—and joined the US 7th Army to form the US 6th Army Group. That was the force that conducted Operation Dragoon
(also known as Operation Anvil), the Allied invasion of southern
France. The objective of the French 2nd Corps was to capture ports at Toulon (France's largest naval port) and Marseilles
(France's largest commercial port) in order to secure a vital supply
line for the incoming troops. Most of the German troops there were
second-line, consisting mainly of static and occupation units with a
large number of Osttruppen volunteers, and with a single armoured division, the 11. Panzer-Division.
The Allies sustained only relatively light casualties during the
amphibious assault, and were soon in an all-out pursuit of a German army
in full retreat along the Rhône valley and the Route Napoleon.
Within 12 days the French forces were able to secure both ports,
destroying two German Divisions in the process. Then on 12 September,
French forces were able to connect to General George Patton's Third Army. Toulon and Marseille were soon providing supplies not only to the 6th Army Group but also to General Omar Bradley's
12th Army Group, which included Patton's Army. For its part, troops
from de Lattre's French First Army were the first Allied troops to reach
the Rhine.
While on the right flank the French liberation army was covering Alsace-Lorraine (and the Alpine front against German-occupied Italy), the centre was made up of US forces in the south (12th Army Group) and British and Commonwealth forces in the north (21st Army Group). On the left flank, Canadian forces cleared the Channel coast, taking Antwerp on 4 September 1944.
Liberation of Paris
After the failed 20 July plot against him, Hitler had given orders to have Paris destroyed should it fall to the Allies, similarly to the planned destruction of Warsaw.
Mindful of this and other strategic considerations, General Dwight D. Eisenhower was planning to by-pass the city. At this time, Parisians started a general strike
on 15 August 1944 that escalated into a full-scale uprising of the FFI a
few days later. As the Allied forces waited near Paris, de Gaulle and
his Free French government put General Eisenhower under pressure. De
Gaulle was furious about the delay and was unwilling to allow the people
of Paris to be slaughtered as had happened in the Polish capital of Warsaw during the Warsaw uprising.
De Gaulle ordered General Leclerc to attack single-handedly without the
aid of Allied forces. Eventually, Eisenhower agreed to detach the 4th US Infantry Division in support of the French attack.
The Allied High Command (SHAEF) requested the Free French force in question to be all-white, if possible, but this was very difficult because of the large numbers of black West Africans in their ranks.
General Leclerc sent a small advance party to enter Paris, with the
message that the 2e DB (composed of 10,500 French, 3,600 Maghrebis and about 350 Spaniards in the 9th company of the 3rd Battalion of the Régiment de Marche du Tchad made up mainly of Spanish Republican exiles) would be there the following day. This party was commanded by Captain Raymond Dronne, and was given the honour to be the first Allied unit to enter Paris ahead of the 2e Division Blindée. The 1er Bataillon de Fusiliers-Marins Commandos formed from the Free French Navy Fusiliers-Marins that had landed on Sword Beach were also amongst the first of the Free French forces to enter Paris.
The military governor of the city, Dietrich von Choltitz, surrendered on 25 August, ignoring Hitler's orders to destroy the city and fight to the last man. Jubilant crowds greeted the Liberation of Paris. French forces and de Gaulle conducted a now iconic parade through the city.
Provisional republic and the war against Germany and Japan
Re-establishment of a provisional French Republic and its government (GPRF)
The Provisional Government of the French Republic (gouvernement provisoire de la République Française
or GPRF) was officially created by the CNFL and succeeded it on 3 June
1944, the day before de Gaulle arrived in London from Algiers on
Churchill's invitation, and three days before D-Day. Its creation marked
the re-establishment of France as a republic, and the official end of
Free France. Among its most immediate concerns were to ensure that
France did not come under allied military administration, preserving the sovereignty of France and freeing Allied troops for fighting on the front.
After the liberation of Paris on 25 August 1944, it moved back to
the capital, establishing a new "national unanimity" government on 9
September 1944, including Gaullists,
nationalists, socialists, communists and anarchists, and uniting the
politically divided Resistance. Among its foreign policy goals was to
secure a French occupation zone in Germany and a permanent UNSC seat. This was assured through a large military contribution on the western front.
Several alleged Vichy loyalists involved in the Milice (a paramilitary militia)—which was established by SturmbannführerJoseph Darnand who hunted the Resistance with the Gestapo—were made prisoners in a post-liberation purge known as the épuration légale (legal purge or cleansing). Some were executed without trial, in "wild cleansings" (épuration sauvage). Women accused of "horizontal collaboration"
because of alleged sexual relationships with Germans during the
occupation were arrested and had their heads shaved, were publicly
exhibited and some were allowed to be mauled by mobs.
On 17 August, Pierre Laval was taken to Belfort by the Germans. On 20 August, under German military escort, Pétain was forcibly moved to Belfort, and on 7 September to the Sigmaringen enclave in southern Germany, where 1,000 of his followers (including Louis-Ferdinand Céline)
joined him. There they established a government in exile, challenging
the legitimacy of de Gaulle's GPRF. As a sign of protest over his forced
move, Pétain refused to take office, and was eventually replaced by Fernand de Brinon.
The Vichy regime's exile ended when Free French forces reached the town
and captured its members on 22 April 1945, the same day that the 3rd Algerian Infantry Division took Stuttgart. Laval, Vichy's prime minister in 1942–1944, was executed for treason. Pétain, "Chief of the French State" and Verdun hero, was also condemned to death but his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.
By September 1944, the Free French forces stood at 560,000 (including
176,500 White French from North Africa, 63,000 metropolitan French,
233,000 Maghrebis and 80,000 from Black Africa). The GPRF set about raising new troops to participate in the advance to the Rhine and the invasion of Germany, using the FFI as military cadres and manpower pools of experienced fighters to allow a very large and rapid expansion of the Armée française de la Libération.
It was well equipped and well supplied despite the economic disruption
brought by the occupation thanks to Lend-Lease, and their number rose to
1 million by the end of the year. French forces were fighting in Alsace-Lorraine, the Alps, and besieging the heavily fortified French Atlantic coast submarine bases that remained Hitler-mandated stay-behind "fortresses" in ports along the Atlantic coast like La Rochelle and Saint-Nazaire until the German capitulation in May 1945.
Also in September 1944, the Allies having outrun their logistic tail (the "Red Ball Express"),
the front stabilised along Belgium's northern and eastern borders and
in Lorraine. From then on it moved at a slower pace, first to the Siegfried Line and then in the early months of 1945 to the Rhine in increments. For instance, the Ist Corps seized the Belfort Gap in a coup de main offensive in November 1944, their German opponents believing they had entrenched for the winter.
The French 2nd Armoured Division, tip of the spear of the Free French
forces that had participated in the Normandy Campaign and liberated
Paris, went on to liberate Strasbourg on 23 November 1944, thus fulfilling the Oath of Kufra made by its commanding officer General Leclerc almost four years earlier. The unit under his command, barely above company size when it had captured the Italian fort, had grown into a full-strength armoured division.
The spearhead of the Free French First Army that had landed in Provence was the Ist Corps. Its leading unit, the French 1st Armoured Division, was the first Western Allied unit to reach the Rhône (25 August 1944), the Rhine (19 November 1944) and the Danube
(21 April 1945). On 22 April 1945, it captured Sigmaringen in
Baden-Württemberg, where the last Vichy regime exiles, including Marshal
Pétain, were hosted by the Germans in one of the ancestral castles of
the Hohenzollern dynasty.
They participated in stopping Operation Nordwind, the very last German major offensive on the western front in January 1945, and in collapsing the Colmar Pocket in January–February 1945, capturing and destroying most of the German XIXth Army. Operations by the First Army in April 1945 encircled and captured the German XVIII SS Corps in the Black Forest, and cleared and occupied south-western Germany. At the end of the war, the motto of the French First Army was Rhin et Danube, referring to the two great German rivers that it had reached and crossed during its combat operations.
In May 1945, by the end of the war in Europe, the Free French forces comprised 1,300,000 personnel, and included around forty divisions making it the fourth largest Allied army in Europe behind the Soviet Union, the US and Britain. The GPRF sent an expeditionary force to the Pacific to retake French Indochina from the Japanese, but Japan surrendered before they could arrive in theatre.
At that time, General Alphonse Juin was the chief of staff of the French army, but it was General François Sevez who represented France at Reims on 7 May, while General Jean de Lattre de Tassigny led the French delegation at Berlin on V-E day, as he was the commander of the French First Army. At the Yalta Conference,
Germany had been divided into Soviet, American and British occupation
zones, but France was then given an occupation zone in Germany, as well
as in Austria and in the city of Berlin.
It was not only the role that France played in the war which was
recognised, but its important strategic position and significance in the
Cold War as a major democratic, capitalist nation of Western Europe in holding back the influence of communism on the continent.
Approximately 58,000 men were killed fighting in the Free French forces between 1940 and 1945.
A point of strong disagreement between de Gaulle and the Big Three
(Roosevelt, Stalin and Churchill), was that the President of the
Provisional Government of the French Republic (GPRF), established on 3
June 1944, was not recognised as the legitimate representative of
France. Even though de Gaulle had been recognised as the leader of Free
France by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill back on 28 June 1940,
his GPRF presidency had not resulted from democratic elections.
However, two months after the liberation of Paris and one month after
the new "unanimity government", the Big Three recognised the GPRF on 23
October 1944.
In his liberation of Paris speech, de Gaulle argued "It will not
be enough that, with the help of our dear and admirable Allies, we have
got rid of him [the Germans] from our home for us to be satisfied after
what happened. We want to enter his territory as it should be, as
victors", clearly showing his ambition that France be considered one of
the World War II victors just like the Big Three. This perspective was
not shared by the western Allies, as was demonstrated in the German
Instrument of Surrender's First Act. The French occupation zones in Germany and in West Berlin cemented this ambition.
The Free French Memorial on Lyle Hill in Greenock, in western Scotland,
in the shape of the Cross of Lorraine combined with an anchor, was
raised by subscription as a memorial to sailors on the Free French Naval
Forces vessels that sailed from the Firth of Clyde to take part in the
Battle of the Atlantic.
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