Guy Moquet

A fascinating article this week in Le Monde about Guy Moquet. He was a 17 year-old executed by the Germans in October 1941 along with many others as a reprisal for the killing of a senior military officer in Nantes. Moquet went down in history because of the letter he wrote to his parents on the eve of his death, in which he asks them to be stoical and says he is glad to lay down his life for a cause. President Sarkozy had the moving epistle read out on his inauguration day, and said it should be recited from now on in every school at the start of the academic year. But according to the Le Monde article, which was written by two historians, all is not quite what it seems. Moquet was from a family of die-hard Stalinists, raised from the cradle in a "culture politique bolchevique." As we know, in 1940 and early 1941 -- while Hitler and Stalin were linked by their pact -- French communists opposed the war with Germany. Indeed they "called more or less openly for sabotage of the war effort". When France was occupied, the communists cooperated with the Germans to ensure the republication of their newspapers. It was in this context that Moquet was arrested by French police in October 1940. The tracts he was handing out at the Gare de l'Est "were in total accordance with the party line and therefore did not call for resistance". A year later Hitler had invaded Russia and the Nazi-Soviet pact was over. The Feldkommandant was killed on October 1941 by three young communists, acting still then against the orders of the party hierarchy. Moquet -- still in jail -- was selected for the reprisal and shot with 26 others in Chateaubriant. Not all were Communists, but the party claimed the tragedy "pour sa seule gloire". As Jean-Marc Berliere and Syvian Bouloque say, "with the blood of the hostages, the Communist Party washed away one of the most troubled and ambiguous episodes of its history, and at the same time put up a moral obstacle against all criticism of its attitude". Moquet had never fired a shot against the Germans. Instead he had been leafletting for a party that called for a policy of pragmatic collaboration. At the time of his death he was undoubtedly fired by a laudable spirit of self-sacrifice, but the story surrounding him is a myth.

Cai Hesen

Continuing our series on historical quirks, how about this from Montargis in central France. This undistingished town -- once known as the birthplace of ther praline but now a classic French mix of mediaeval buildings, hip-hop graffiti and bored youth -- once played a vital role in the Chinese revolution. Come again????? Okay let me explain. In the late 1910s and 20s hundreds of Chinese intellectuals came on work-study programme to France. Many were on the left, and looking at new ideas for reorganising Chinese society. Montargis -- about 70 miles south of Paris -- was a favoured destination because a decade earlier a Chinese expat had set up links there. There was a convenient rubber factory (Hutchinson of the US) as well as lodgings in a former school. Among the earliest to arive in Montargis was a group from Hunan province, numbering several friends of Mao Zedong. He had considered coming but decided not to. The group's leader was Cai Hesen (see above) who led study groups in the gardens behind the Montargis town hall, and in August 1920 sent a letter back to Mao urging the establishment of the Communist party. Apparently it is known as the August 13 letter, and Montargis is in all the Chinese history books. Anyway a year later the Communist party was set up (though if you read the fantastic bio of Mao by Jung Chang and Jon Halliday you can see how from the earliest days Mao was a Moscow entry-ist). Several other famous names from the Chinese Communist party lived in Montargis, including Deng Xiaoping - who many years later recalled being stopped by a French policeman for cycling without a light. Cai Hesen incidentally was later topped by the nationalists. It is all fascinating stuff, and Montargis is trying to capitalise on it by enticing in Chinese tourists. Trouble is there is not much to see. Just the park and a couple of buildings where they stayed. I met a group of visitors the other week. They were there in a semi-official capacity from some city or another. I asked if they had previously ever heard of Montargis. Universal shaking of the head. France yes - they had heard of France. But never Montargis. I fear the town fathers will have a tough job persuading Chinese visitors to forsake the shopping emporia of the Champs Elyees for a couple of dog-eared signposts about a letter no-one has ever heard of. Oh well. Ca vaut le détour dans la tete au moins.

Havrincourt memorial

Just returned from a fascinating couple of days touring the World War I British battlefields. My father's father fought with the 62nd Division, also known as the West Riding Division, which saw its first action in 1917. My father knew nothing of his father's war story, because he never spoke of it. So it was a wonderful piece of research we undertook, tracking the division's path across northern France. They entered the war just after the Somme debacle, and their first fighting was during the German army's withdrawal to the Hindenberg line. They were at the battle of Bullecourt, which is still remembered in Australia because of the massive death toll. And several months later they played a key role at Cambrai, the world's first ever tank battle (though tanks had been used briefly at the Somme and Bullecourt). At Cambrai the 62nd made a monumental advance, taking the village of Havrincourt and sweeping four and a half miles to the north. The feat was even mentioned in the House of Commons. But the effort petered out, and Cambrai went down as yet another allied failure. Less than a year later the 62nd re-took Havrincourt in the push that presaged the end of the war. After a long drive across the bare Picardy fields, my father and I arrived at Havrincourt, whose chateau was rebuilt after the war. We drove down a lane. And there at the foot of a hill -- exactly where the tanks rolled nearly 90 years ago -- was a huge obelisk commemorating the 62nd. It was an unexpected sight, and very moving. The picture I found on the web is of the obelisk's inauguration in 1922.

The Emperor

A fascinating new phenomenon is taking shape in France. Not for the first time, it is a trend that is long-established in the US and Britain but which is only now finding an outlet over here. It is the growth of what might be called "black history" -- the past as seen through the eyes of Africans and other victims of colonialism. Or should that be "victims of colonialism"?

Till recently this kind of "communautarisme" -- community-based identity -- was taboo in France, where the dogma of equality for all imposed a unified vision of the world. There are no black studies departments in French universities, for example. But times are changing. There is a new restlessness among black French people -- many from the Caribbean territories -- who feel their specific experience of France's imperial glory has been written out of the books.

The symbolic coming-of-age of this movement was the recent publication of a book called "Napoleon's crime." In it Claude Ribbe seeks to establish that the emperor was a racist dictator, who was not just disdainful of blacks but actively connived in their elimination. He even instituted the first gas-chambers, Ribbe argues, which were used to kill black slaves in the holds of ships.

Many Napoleon experts have pooh-poohed his findings as inflammatory and exaggerated. But they have touched a nerve. And the media furore has been further inflated by a row over a ludicrous new law passed by parliament in February.

The law as a whole is innocuous enough -- bearing principally on measures to help French citizens who had to flee Algeria in 1962. But one obscure clause added in an amendment by a private member -- and overlooked by practically everyone at the time -- is breathtaking in its idiocy. It states that "school programmes should recognise in particular the positive role of France's presence overseas."

As every historian of note has said, arguments over the good or bad sides of colonialism are perfectly legitimate. It is perfectly fair to make the case that France brought new standards of medicine and health care to north Africa. But that this version of the past should be enshrined -- however obliquely -- in law is of course another matter entirely.

The row has only fuelled the determination of, and support for, the "black history" school of academics --which is presumably the last thing the sponsors of the law ever wanted.

The chateau at Aubigny

Hands up who has heard of Aubigny-sur-Nere. As I thought, absolutely no-one. Which is good news for visitors to this blog, because you will be among the first to discover a lost historical jewel. Aubigny is in a forgotten corner of central France and its claim to fame is simple: for 250 years it belonged to the Scots. In 1419 the future King Charles VII -- at that time still a beleaguered dauphin -- invoked France's century-old alliance with Scotland to help kick out the English. John Stuart of Darnley, cousin of the Scottish king, arrived with several thousand men at La Rochelle and in 1421 scored a signal victory over the Duke of Clarence at the battle of Bauge. He led the French army for eight more years before dying outside Orleans. Joan of Arc then picked up the baton. To reward him for his services, Charles gave John Stuart the fiefdom of Aubigny, which stayed in the Stuart family till the end of the 17th century. And the story doesn't end there because at this point King Charles II, himself a Stuart via his grandfather King James, claims Aubigny for his own. Louis XIV demurs but instead grants it to Charles's mistress, the courtesan Louise de Keroualle. She had been sent over by the Sun King to seduce Charles and was the conduit for French funds secretly made over to the English crown to keep it out of France's European wars. Louise was hated by the English but adored by Charles who made her Duchess of Portsmouth, and their illegitimate children started the line of Dukes of Richmond and Lennox. There is an Irish connection here because a century later the aristocratic patriot and rebel Lord Edward Fitzgerald spent part of his childhood at Aubigny. He was later executed by the Brits after the failure of the 1798 uprising. Princess Diana was also a descendant of Louise de Keroualle. There. Dpon't say you don't learn anything new when you visit the Champs-Elysees website.
What is left of the Scottish connection in Aubigny is not a great deal, it must be admitted. The museum is a joke (tailors' dummies in mediaeval dress and a CD recording of the local "ghost" retelling the story). But it is a lovely spot for all that. The 16th century castle is now the town hall, and Louise de Keroualle's gardens extend to one side. The mayor Yves Fromion has sensibly realised that the Scottish connection -- long forgotten -- can put the town back on the map. It is twinned with Haddington and its July 14 festivities every year are now billed as the Fetes Franco-Ecossaises. Haggis was on the menu for the open-air banquet last week and I am pleased to say that -- President Chirac's recent remarks notwithstanding -- locals were actually enjoying it.