The anonymous heroes of the Dragoon Operation, the WWII Provence landing.

On the anniversary of the World War II, the ceremonies generally honour the clairvoyance of the generals, the strategy of American power with its formidable logistics or the success of the operation. For the men and women who participated in the rebirth of France, the history of their courage remains forever in the shadows. My father, a hero of this period recounted his experience as a liberator. I asked him how did he experience his landing?

 ?I did not kill Germans, but Nazis?.

Picture on the right: Lucien Venard (1925-2002), in officer’s uniform of the Foreign Legion, a few years after his landing in Provence.

Landing in Provence (South of France) was personal revenge for Lucien Venard. His brother died in 1943 and his officer father, wounded in combat, died for France in 1944. Enlisting as a volunteer to celebrate his 18th birthday became an absolute necessity. His plan was to become a medical doctor, but the war made him a Saint-Cyrien officer in the Foreign Legion. He then found himself naturally obliged, by the fate of a defeated nation, to join the thousands of heroes who had stormed their own country. For him it was not about killing “Krauts”, but as he often said, “I didn’t kill Germans, I killed Nazis”.

There was a strange mix of DIY and military professionalism in his landing. The tinkering was also reproached by the American generals to the French: ready to take action with a weak logistics or to rush sometimes in the haste of the action with troops sometimes barely seasoned. How can I not feel like DIY to see all these different uniforms and sometimes poorly matched (my father had an American uniform)? The African army formed a heterogeneous group of Maghrebi soldiers, including the indomitable Moroccan “goumiers” (more than 50% of the total), and the valiant French born in North Africa (called the black feet), which had the highest combat mortality rate of all French troops (30%), elite troops from all colonies (10%) and the rarest metropolitan soldiers from France (8%). This ?DIY? army restored its nobility to the French forces, drawing the admiration of the world, especially of the most sceptical American leaders.

“Courage? It’s to go, even when you’re scared to death.”

The war epic was also a mixture of fear and courage. The landing in the bay of Saint-Tropez in August 1944 was done for my father with the fear in his stomach not to know what awaited him when he stepped on French soil. Fear had been nourished by the laborious wait after embarking at Mers el-Kébir on 8 August. Almost 10 days wandering at sea to deceive the enemy’s vigilance, aware of an imminent landing but without knowing the place.

Picture of the left: Humbert Venard (1894-1944), Captain of Infantry, died for France in 1944, a model for his son (in uniform of Second Lieutenant).

But according to Lucien Venard, ?the courage is not to go unconsciously to the assault of danger like a hothead, it is to go there, even when one is scared to death and never to give up?. His fear vanishes into battle: taking action surrounded by strong warriors, firing at positions, shooting in the heap, running as fast as possible in zigzags to trick enemy shooters, jumping into a makeshift shelter, go back to the fire, clenching their teeth, hearing the cries of comrades touched, killing a ?Nazi? at close range, watching him die, go back without thinking about it, for sordid death always strikes with its sharp sword without warning. 

The landing was also a mixture of waiting and fearlessness. One year of waiting between his commitment and the baptism of fire, dithering before disembarking, waiting before each fight. Rapidity in action, in the improvised bivouacs, in the frantic movement given to the Army of Africa which boldly hit the German troops, freeing at the same time the south of France with weeks ahead of the initial project.

To die in action?

Sent to contact with the German troops on the run, Lucien Venard was tasked with a suicide mission that was almost the last. Launched at full speed on a motorcycle to recognize enemy positions in the Dijon region, he was rushed to the ground by a metallic cable maliciously stretched across the road. Immediately abandoned by his comrade in charge of warning the command, my father fired only against an enemy greater in number. Finally hit, he was thrown to the ground, his arm broken by a bullet, some of the flesh flying in pieces and stunned by the impact. Finally waking up, he saw a French farmer with a pitchfork, who had decided to stab the bloody soldier he thought was a German. As the pitchfork rose to the sky to give it a fatal blow, my father exclaimed: ?I am French!?.