Georges Mandel

Georges Mandel , of his true name Louis Georges Rothschild (without relationship with the Family Rothschild, bankers), born the June 5th 1885 with Chatou (Seine-et-Oise) and assassinated the July 7th 1944 in the Forest of Fontainebleau, is a resistant Politician and French.

Biography

Born in 1885 from a father tailor, in a Jewish family having fled the Alsace in 1871 to remain French, it engages very young person in favor of Alfred Dreyfus and becomes journalist. Preserving convictions and nationalist, it enter at 21 years to the Dawn , the newspaper of Georges Clémenceau which made appear the “I show” Emile Zola.

When Georges Clémenceau becomes president of the Council in 1906, Georges Mandel seizes opportunity of taking part in the government action, which it carries out quickly. He will become the principal private secretary of the “Tiger” during the First World War. He is elected appointed of the Gironde during vague “blue horizon” of the right , then loses his station in 1924 vis-a-vis the Cartel of the lefts. re-elected in 1928 and 1932 re-elected in 1936 until 1940 is carried in 1932 with the presidency of the group independent of the House of Commons In 1934, Georges Mandel becomes Minister for the Stations. It is noticed there for its firmness; under its aegis is diffused the first official emission of French Télévision, the April 26th 1935.

In the Years 1930, it raises its voice to inform dangers of the Germany Nazi. It obtains in 1935 the judgment by the Société of the Nations of the re-establishment of the Military service obligatory by Adolf Hitler then is opposed to Pierre Laval on the question of the war of aggression carried out against the Ethiopia by the Italy of Benito Mussolini.

After the victory of the Popular front, he criticizes the social reforms carried out by this one, given that they are likely - according to him - to weaken the French productivity, vis-a-vis the threat of the Nazi Germany in full rearmament, whose workmen do not hesitate to provide an increased work. After the fall of the Popular front, it is named Minister for the Colonies. This man of the right then proposes an alliance with the Soviet Union to face the threat hitlérienne, whose danger to France appears paramount to him, then protests against the Accords of Munich.

Minister of Interior Department in the government of Paul Reynaud right before the arrival of Philippe Pétain with the capacity in 1940, it makes very to dam up the spirit of rout which falls down on France, and considers a “Breton tiny room”, then a fold on the North Africa for the French forces. Unfavourable with the Armistice and the authoritative capacity in the process of constitution, it is stopped the June 17th 1940 on the order of Pétain, hardly promoted president of the Council, on the basis of charge false, then is released. He seeks to organize the departure for North Africa of the President of the Republic, of the presidents of the National Assembly and the Sénat and many members of Parliament, in order to continue the fight. In fact, only Georges Mandel and twenty-five other deputies embark on the Massilia the June 21st.

It is necessary to also record the importance which it had in the determination of the de Gaulle general, on June 14th, 1940, of going to London to represent free France. This episode is reported by de Gaulle himself in her " Memories of Guerre".

The August 8th, Georges Mandel is stopped with the Morocco, is submitted at the court of Riom and is led to the Château of Chazeron where are already Paul Reynaud, Edouard Daladier and the general Maurice Gamelin. They are all four transferred in a hotel from Vals and condemned to the Life imprisonment by the emergency court wanted by the Pétain marshal the November 7th 1941. They are imprisoned with the Portalet. Following the invasion of the “free Zone” by the German army, Georges Mandel and Paul Reynaud are given to the Nazis and transferred in November 1942 in a camp from the Gestapo to Oranienburg. George Mandel is then imprisoned close to Buchenwald where already Leon Blum is. Brought back to the Prison of Health to Paris and delivered to the Militia the July 4th 1944, it is assassinated of a blow of machine-gun in the back the July 7th in the forest of Fontainebleau, in response with the assassination by the Résistance of the Minister for the Propagande Philippe Henriot.

It is buried with the Cimetière of Passy. A monument with its memory, realized by the sculptor François Knocked, was set up at the place where he was assassinated, at the edge of the road leading of Fontainebleau to Nemours (N7).

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