January 26, 2014

GEORGES MANDEL (1947)

Real name LOUIS-GEORGES ROTHSCHILD.

French political leader noted for his hostility to Nazi Germany.

A member of a prosperous Jewish family, though not related to the Rothschild banking dynasty, he served on the personal staff of Premier Georges Clemenceau from 1906 to 1909 and again from 1917 to 1920 contributing at the same time to Clemenceau´s journals L´Aurore, L´Homme Libre and L´Homme Enchainé.

He also served as a deputy in the National Assembly from 1919 to 1924 and from 1928 to 1940. He was opposed to the proGerman policies of many conservatives between World Wars I and II and in May and June 1940 he supported Premier Paul Reynaud who advocated continuing to fight the Germans from the French colonies in Africa.

He was among the political leaders who vowed to refuse an armistice and on June 21, 1940 sailed from Bordeaux to Africa aboard the Massilia. Arrested in Morocco he was transported to France and imprisoned at a chateau (Sept. 9, 1940). He was among the former ministers arraigned by the collaborationist Vichy government at the Riom trials (October 1941-April 1942). After a stay at the concentration camps of Oranienburg and Buchenwald he was sent back to Paris on July 4, 1944.

Three days later he was shot on orders of Joseph Darnand head of police of the Vichy government.

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