NATIONAL Haitians in the two world wars Le Nouvelliste. Posted the: June 05, 2014 × 1 / 1 1 Share on facebook share Share on email Email print Celebrating the seventieth anniversary of the Allied landing of June 6, 1944, which marked the beginning of the end of Hitlers Third Reich. Eleven months after this great event indeed, almost day for day, the Nazi Germany put down arms. Four months later, it was the turn of the imperial to do the same, Japan ending World War II. It is an opportunity to review the presence of Haitians in the two world wars of the 20th century in the fighting forces. When the war broke out between the France and Prussia in 1870, Haitians volunteered to fight the Germans in the french ranks, so the links with the ancient metropolis remained strong in this time there. The independence of Haiti was then less than 70 years. The war was short and the Haitians to join the few French forces. The France was defeated by the Germany and lost Alsace and part of Lorraine. In 1914-1918, the movement was such. Haitians spontaneously joined the French forces. There were a few original German however Haitians who engaged in the Imperial German army. Among the Haitian volunteers that we have personally experienced, there is Mr. Léandre Daniel SR. owner of Cine Magic at Port - au Prince, who died at a very advanced age. Mr. Daniel had fingers burned in 1915 by mustard gas. He was wounded again by a bayonet shot that opened the womb. He was forced to walk a distance taking dirty bowels of Earth by hand before finding relief. His intestines were washed with saline by surgeons military and reinstated in his abdomen. For any medication, he received only an injection of tetanus serum and he returned a few months later in combat. Another time, Mr. Daniel walked with a group of soldiers near a subwoofer of ammunition that they drove to the first lines of the front when he floundered his bayonet scabbard inadvertently and thus fell face down on the ground. Fortunately for him, because at the same time, a German shell struck the subwoofer that immediately made explosion. All soldiers who were standing were killed instantly by the blast except the Haitian who was already accidentally lying on the ground and had so life saves, in the blind spot of the blast, which took the form of an inverted cone, whose Summit is confounded with the subwoofer. Léandre Daniel, due to its horizontal position, was out of this deadly cone. At his death in the 1980s, the Ambassador of France in Haiti came to pay tribute to the mortal remains of Mr. Léandre Daniel father at the funeral of the Ange Bleu company Celcis as a veteran of the first world war. We experienced another Haitian veteran of the first world war. It comes from Mr. Victor Comeau-Montasse, grandson of the Morin Montasse general who was one of our Ministers of war after Muhammad. He lived in a small house in Petion-Ville, in the vicinity of the top of the Alan Street that was not yet paved. It was in 1964. We had ten years old at the time. It took us a summer afternoon visit him at his home. He told us his memories of war and he showed us his decorations won in the front. The decorations were carefully kept in a roll of red velvet. It is thus that we saw such a cross of the Legion of honor with its Red Ribbon without rosette, rank of chevalier, the Médaille Militaire in green and yellow ribbon, the Croix de Guerre 1914-1918 with its Green Ribbon struck fine red lines... The medals bore the inscription: French Republic: Honneur et Patrie. We will never forget our visit to Mr. Victor Comeau-Montasse fifty years ago. The war of 1914 had then also fifty years that it had begun (1914-1964). In the context of our activities to the Ministry of defence, we met recently at the French Permanent Mission to the UN in New York his grandson, Mr. Robert Chauvet, employed in this mission, and we évoquâmes together with heat the memory of his grandfather Victor. Mr. Robert Chauvet french employers didnt even know that their collaborators grandfather had been a Haitian volunteer of world war I in the French armed forces. We also had a child, another fighter of the war of 1914-1918, Mr. Gaston Blanchard, who played bezique with our grandfather Joseph Poujol on Sunday morning at street Duncombe at Dr. Pierre Clermont which well talk about later. Mr. Blanchard died suddenly in 1968. It had about 70 years. His younger brother Marcel Blanchard was killed him during the same war. Are finally reported the case of this young and brave Haitian volunteer whose name do us not unfortunately, who kidnapped a German trench with cries of Vive Salnave! What mit fleeing German soldiers. World War II will have one hundred years that she began this year 2014 in the month of August. The 100th anniversary of the Sarajevo attack which cost the lives of the Archduke of Austria Franz Ferdinand falls on the 28th of the month of June. Haiti finally declared war on imperial Germany on July 12, 1918 and is thus among the victorious Powers parties to the Treaty of Versailles of 1919. For World War II, Haitian volunteers in the french ranks were fewer, as there had been in the meantime the first occupation of 1915-1934 and the links with the ancient metropolis were weakened... There was also the break between Gaullist French and French petainistes. Haitians were Gaullist in their entirety. They were shocked that the France was defeated easily by the Germany and instead to continue the fight from the vast french colonial empire, the Pétain Government, yielding to panic and forgetting the honour, preferred to choose a shameful in June 1940 capitulation. The appeal of 18 June 1940 by general de Gaulle was a breath of fresh air for Haitians and a glimmer of unexpected hope same almost miraculous in this moment of despair. Our mother, then 14 years old and now deceased, says that many young Haitian girls wept with emotion and even joy in hearing the voice of the general to London radio (which was regularly picked up in Haiti) say to the world that the France had lost a battle and not the war, and that the flame of the French resistance would not die out. It was also those who wept tears and heard across the seas the appeal of 18 June. On the official side, the Haitian Government kept its relations with the Vichy regime, which were broken in 1941 after the attack on Pearl Habor. It is on this occasion that all french consulates in the cities of province closed with the exception of those in Cap-Haitien and Jacmel that reopened after the end of the war. The regime of president Lescot approached the free Frances general Charles de Gaulle, and again France and Haiti fell into the same camp and were road together. It is in this context that through cooperation between Ambassador Antoine Bervin of the Haitian delegation at the San Francisco Conference in 1945 and his old friend Joseph Paul-Boncour, Member of the French delegation at the same Conference, that the french was adopted as one of the five official languages of the United Nations and became one of its two working languagesthe other being English. Ambassador Labbi (died 1979) calma apprehension of Mr. Paul-Boncour and fit appropriate with many fellow Latin American lobbying he knew personally in order to constitute a majority of votes in favour of the french. The Haitian war effort on the side of the Allies do not stopped there. If there were no troops Haitian to fight on the ground (the Brazil was the only Latin to have American State), airport of the Bowen Field in Port - au Prince now disappeared had been extended and paved to allow American planes to land in the context of the air bridge connecting Florida to North Africa via the Caribbean, South America and the South Atlantic to refuel Allied troops who were fighting against Rommels Afrikakorpswho will the war in Italy, and who will disembark in Provence in 1944. Under the lend-lease Act, the Haitian Navy was reinforced by several units and the size of its increased staff. Artillery of the guard of Haiti service was organized and an artillery unit was installed in the St. Nicholas Mole with several guns which had repeatedly to open fire on German u-boats that crossed the channel of the wind sailing on the surface, forcing them to dive but not flowing No. Many airstrips were built by the René Lerebours surveyor through the country which one of Anse-a-Pitres, the Caiman hole or enlarged as Belladère. Road Port - au-Prince/Malpassé/Jimani was also built in 1943 for a reliable road link between Haiti and the Dominican Republic. For the Haitian volunteers in the French armed forces during the second world war, there were quite a few, given the very different context of 1939-1945 of the context of 1914-1918. We had made visiting friends who lived in a house in the Petit-Four in the 1970s and they showed us a photo of a young Haitian related to them which was voluntary in the french ranks during World War II and was killed during the conflict. We have not retained its name. It is related to the Haitian revolutionary Jules Artbuthnot, who died at the siege of Miragoâne. One must also mention the case of Dr. Pierre Clermont (1917-1973), orthopedic surgeon, who voluntarily enlisted in the French army in the last years of the war. He made the campaign of Germany in the army of general Jean de Lattre de Tassigny and he left active duty at the rank of captain after the victory to go to the Canada to improve orthopedic and back to Haiti to open his clinic. There were Frédéric Auxila, son of Pierre Auxila, who enlisted in the French forces during the second world war and settled in Metz after the war. He never returned to Haiti. Examples include the case of the only son of Admiral Henri Laraque aka TOM (half-brother of Dr. Rosalvo Bobo) which fought come pilot of the British Royal Air Force. One cannot forget the Franco-haitien Philippe Kieffer who fought heroically in the landing of June 6, 1944. He was at the head of the only small French unit that participated in that landing. Commander Kieffer is retained by history as the winner of the battle of the Casino of Ouistreham which was conquered fought on the Germans who were holed up in the casino (not play). He was wounded twice during the action and despite this, he refused to evacuate, continuing to fight. Commander Kieffer was born in Port - au-Prince on October 24, 1899, Alsatian french father and Haitian mother. His parents had held a large trade in Port - au-Prince House who had declared bankruptcy later. Philippe Kieffer was a senior officer of the Royal Bank of Canada in Haiti before the war. He married a Lady of the Scott family. Volunteer at age 40 from September 2, 1939, after the incredible French defeat of 1940 that he lived very badly as many people in Haiti, he was one of the first to respond to the call made by general de Gaulle and he joined the free 19 June 1940 French naval forces, and he returned never to Haiti even after the end of the conflict. He is the creator courtesy of Admiral Émile Muselier, Chief of the Naval Forces of France Libre, commandos of the French Navy, the famous Green Berets. He died in France on November 20, 1962. Born in Haiti, 18-year-old son who had just returned in the Resistance, was killed in 1944 by the Germans. Nowadays, Haitians rather engage American forces most avid financial benefit from actual military glory. Other times, other customs! Today, they are found in all branches of American forces. They fought in large numbers to the Viet Nam, Iraq and Afghanistan. Some are killed in combat. They came to participate in the 2nd and the 3rd U.S. military intervention in Haiti in 1994 and 2004. The french author Emmanuel Todd, in his book After the Empire, notes the similarity between the American army from the beginning of the 21st century and the Roman army of the time of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius, where indigenous peoples constitute a significant part of the workforce of these two military forces in two millennia of interval. Dr. Georges Michel former Professor of military history and war studies at the Military Academy of Haiti Respond to this article TOP OF PAGE MOST READ Haitians in the two world wars 32512 Failure of the discussions of Best Western, Martelly brandit article 12 of the agreement of El Rancho 19935 After 178 years, the first Baptist Church of Port - au-Prince in danger 18178 A man between life and death, after saving lives! 9764 TortugAir presents its flight Fort Lauderdale - Cap-Haïtien on baptismal fonts 8647 Convene the people in its tribal: Martelly gives Senators a few days 8191 Pacha Vorbe has the support of Fanmi Lavalas, Group Jean Vorbe opts for a just society and non-violent 7995 Thousands of demonstrators are calling for elections 6590
Posted on: Sun, 08 Jun 2014 04:21:21 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015