Paris — The final of the 177 elite French troops who joined the Allies’ harrowing seashore landings in Normandy in 1944 has died. Leon Gautier was 100, and he died lower than a month after he returned to the now-quiet seashores for a commemoration ceremony led by French President Emmanuel Macron.
Gautier’s loss of life was introduced by the mayor of Ouistreham, a French neighborhood on the English Channel coast the place Allies landed on June 6, 1944, D-Day, and the place Gautier lived his final years.
LUDOVIC MARIN/POOL/AFP/Getty
Initially from Rennes in northern France’s Brittany area, Gautier joined the battle towards Nazi Germany in 1940 on the age of simply 17 when he enlisted within the French Navy.
As German forces seized a lot of his nation Gautier fled to London with different troops and ultimately joined the elite cadre of the “Commando Kieffer” unit beneath Gen. Charles de Gaulle, who would go on to steer France after the battle.
On the 79th anniversary D-Day commemoration providers on June 6 this 12 months, he was the final man alive from the small contingent of French troops that sailed from the shores of southern England with 1000’s of British and American forces to land on the seashores of Normandy.
The brazen Allied assault on Nazi-held northern France would show pivotal in turning the tide towards Germany within the last chapters of World Conflict II.
Gautier met Macron on the ceremony final month and informed reporters he would always remember that June sixth, nor the buddy who was killed simply toes away from him. He warned that peace remained fragile and mentioned it should not be misplaced once more.
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