Claude Lepeu (March 3, 1921, in Paris – July 11, 2016, in Paris), was a French resistance fighter, a companion of the Liberation in 1942.[1]
Claude Lepeu | |
|---|---|
| Born | 3 March 1921 Paris, France |
| Died | 11 July 2016 (aged 95) Paris, France |
| Alma mater | HEC Paris |
| Occupations | Companion of the Liberation |
Biography
editClaude Lepeu is the son of an industrialist.
At the start of the Battle of France in May 1940, Lepeu was in elementary mathematics and HEC Paris preparatory classes at the Janson-de-Sailly high school. He left Paris before the Germans entered. He went south of the Loire, then, after hearing Marshal Pétain's speech on June 17, he decided to leave France. He thought about going to Spain, then decided instead to embark, with Roger Touny, in Saint-Jean-de-Luz on a Polish boat, the Sobieski, on June 21. It was then that he learned that General de Gaulle had delivered the appeal of June 18 in London. He then joined him there, and signed his commitment to the Free French Forces on June 29.[2]
Lepeu joined the 1st artillery battery of the Free French, based at Aldershot camp. He participated in the battle of Dakar, then in the landing in Douala. He then made the Syrian campaign in June–July 1941.
At the end of 1941, he joined the 1st artillery regiment under the orders of Jean-Claude Laurent-Champrosay. He participated, in January 1942, in the fighting at Halfaya Pass, then in the battle of Bir Hakeim where he defended the Allied positions from May 27 to June 10, 1942. On the night of June 10 to 11, during the exit of position, he was seriously injured by a tracer bullet. He was repatriated to Alexandria, then to the Maurice Rottier hospital in Beirut, where he received, on his bed and from the hands of General de Gaulle, the Cross of Liberation; he is then given extreme unction.[3]
After a long convalescence, accompanied by numerous operations, he received an assignment to the commissary of the Levant. Returning to Paris in January 1945, he joined the War Ministry, and left the army in June of the same year with the rank of second lieutenant.[4]
He then started a business with his wife manufacturing and selling children's clothing. He was asked to run in the legislative elections, but he declined all requests because, he said, “it is contrary to my freedom”.
He was a member of the council of the Order of Liberation from January 2007 until its suppression in November 2012.[5]
He is buried in Chaon.
Awards
edit- Commander of the Legion of Honour
- Order of Liberation Companion of the Liberation by decree of September 9, 1942
- Croix de Guerre 1939–1945