Léon Gautier, the final surviving member of an elite French unit that joined Allied forces within the D-Day invasion to wrest Normandy from Nazi Germany’s management, has died at 100.
The dying was introduced on Monday by Romain Bail, the mayor of Ouistreham, an English Channel coastal group the place Allied forces landed on June 6, 1944, and the place Mr. Gautier lived out his remaining a long time. He had been hospitalized with lung bother, Mr. Bail mentioned.
Mr. Gautier, a nationally recognized determine, met with President Emmanuel Macron final month as a part of commemorations for the 79th anniversary of D-Day.
In France, he was a voice of reminiscence of World War II, and of warning. “The younger generations have to be told — they need to know,” he informed The Associated Press in 2019. “War is ugly. War is misery — misery everywhere.”
Mr. Gautier devoted a lot of his life after the battle to giving interviews, collaborating in commemorations and serving to put collectively a museum in Ouistreham that commemorates the French commandos who helped liberate Normandy.
“He was a father to us, a grandfather to us, an important figure of daily life,” the mayor mentioned. “He was the hero of 1944, the hero of June 6, but also the little old guy that everyone knew.”
Léon Gautier was born on Oct. 27, 1922, in Fougères, a village in Brittany, and grew up amid bitter reminiscences of World War I. He joined the French navy in 1940 at 17. When France fell in June that 12 months to the German blitzkrieg, he shipped off to Britain, the place Gen. Charles de Gaulle of France was rallying his countrymen.
On D-Day, Mr. Gautier and his comrades within the Kieffer Commando unit had been among the many first waves of Allied troops to storm the closely defended seashores of occupied northern France, starting the liberation of western Europe. In an enormous invasion drive made up largely of American, British and Canadian troopers, Capt. Philippe Kieffer’s commandos ensured that France had feats to be happy with too, after the dishonor of its Nazi occupation, during which some selected to collaborate with Adolf Hitler’s forces.
“For us it was special,” Mr. Gautier recalled within the 2019 article. “We were happy to come home. We were at the head of the landing. The British let us go a few meters in front.” He added, “For us it was the liberation of France, the return into the family.”
The commandos got here ashore on what was code-named Sword Beach, carrying 4 days’ value of rations and ammunition. As they sprinted up the seashore, they minimize by barbed wire below a hail of bullets. They spent 78 days on the entrance strains, in ever-dwindling numbers. Of the 177 who had waded ashore, simply two dozen escaped dying or damage.
Their preliminary goal was a closely fortified bunker a number of miles away, and it took the commandos 4 hours of combating to get there and take it. “When we arrived near the walls of the bunkers, we threw grenades in through the slits,” Mr. Gautier recalled. He later injured his left ankle leaping off a prepare and needed to sit out a lot of the remainder of the battle. His ankle remained painfully swollen for the remainder of his lengthy life.
Mr. Gautier met his spouse, Dorothy, when he was stationed in Britain, and so they had been married for greater than 70 years. After the battle, he labored constructing automotive our bodies after which coaching mechanics, dwelling in Britain, Nigeria and Cameroon earlier than returning to France.
Mr. Gautier mentioned he didn’t like speaking in regards to the battle. “The older you get, you think that maybe you killed a father, made a widow of a woman,” he mentioned, including, “It’s not easy to live with.”
He constructed an in depth friendship with a former German soldier who had settled in Normandy, Johannes Borner, and the 2 typically spoke collectively in regards to the horrors they noticed. In a press release, Mr. Macron mentioned Mr. Gautier had “united the virtues of a warrior and those of a peacemaker.”
Mr. Gautier is survived by many descendants, together with a great-great-grandson who was born on June 6, 2017 — precisely 73 years after D-Day.
Source: www.nytimes.com