Charles
André Joseph Marie de Gaulle was born on 22 November 1890
in Lille in the Nord department, the third of five
children. He was raised in a devoutly Catholic and traditional family. His
father, Henri de Gaulle, was a professor of history and literature at
a Jesuit college and eventually founded his own school.
Henri
de Gaulle came from a long line of parliamentary gentry from Normandy (northern France) and Burgundy (east-central France). De Gaulle's mother,
Jeanne (born Maillot), descended from a family of wealthy entrepreneurs from
Lille. She had French, Irish, Scottish, and German ancestry.
De
Gaulle's father encouraged historical and philosophical debate between his
children at mealtimes, and through his encouragement, de Gaulle grew familiar
with French history from an early age. Struck by his mother's tale of how she
cried as a child when she heard of the French capitulation to the Germans
at Sedan in 1870, he developed a keen interest in military strategy. He
was also influenced by his uncle, also named Charles de Gaulle, who was a
historian and passionate Celticist who wrote books and pamphlets
advocating the union of the Welsh, Scots, Irish, and Bretons into one
people. His grandfather Julien-Philippe was also a historian, and his
grandmother Josephine-Marie wrote poems which impassioned his Christian faith.
In 1909
Charles de Gaulle joined the army
and served in the ranks
for one year. In 1910 he entered the military academy at Saint-Cyr. His first
assignment to the 33rd Infantry Regiment brought him in contact with a Colonel
Henri Pétain. Pétain would later rise to the rank of marshal of the army and become
the savior of France at Verdun during World War I. De Gaulle credited Pétain
with teaching him the art of command. During World War I de Gaulle learned
firsthand the harsh reality of combat. He was wounded three times and spent the
last 32 months of the war as a prisoner at Verdun. He graduated
from Saint-Cyr in 1912.
Charles
de Gaulle was a French army officer and statesman who led Free
France against Nazi Germany in World War II. During
the interwar period, he advocated mobile armoured divisions. During the
German invasion of May 1940, he led an armoured division which counterattacked
the invaders; he was then appointed Undersecretary for War. Refusing to accept
his government's armistice with Germany, de Gaulle fled to England and
exhorted the French to resist occupation and to continue the fight in
his Appeal of 18 June. He led the Free French Forces and later headed
the French National Liberation Committee against the Axis.
Despite frosty relations with the United States, he generally
had Winston Churchill's support and emerged as the undisputed leader
of Free France. He became chaired the Provisional Government of the
French Republic in June 1944, the interim government of France
following its liberation. As early as 1944, de Gaulle introduced a dirigiste economic
policy, which included substantial state-directed control over a capitalist
economy which was followed by 30 years of unprecedented growth, known as
the Trente Glorieuses. Frustrated by the return of petty partisanship in
the new Fourth Republic, he resigned in early 1946 but continued to be
politically active as founder of the Rassemblement du Peuple
Français (RPF; "Rally of the French People"). He retired in the
early 1950s and wrote his War Memoirs, which quickly became a
staple of modern French literature.
In
1958, he came out of retirement when appointed President of the Council of
Ministers (Prime Minister) by President René Coty. He rewrote
the Constitution of France and founded the Fifth
Republic after approval by referendum. He was elected President
of France later that year, a position to which he
was reelected in 1965 and held until his resignation in 1969, after
losing a referendum in which he proposed more decentralisation.
Charles
de Gaulle died a year later, 9th November, 1970 from a Ruptured
Blood Vessel
at his residence in Colombey-les-Deux-Églises, leaving his presidential
memoirs unfinished. He was married to Yvonne Vendroux on
7 April 1921 in Église Notre-Dame de Calais. They had three
children: Philippe (born 1921), Elizabeth (1924–2013),
and Anne (1928–1948)
