Henri-Philippe Pétain

April 24, 1856
Cauchy-a-la-Tour, France
July 23, 1951
Port-Joinville, France

Military and political leader

Henri-Philippe Pétain had already lived a full life before historic events made him first a hero and then a traitor to the homeland he had loved and served. World War I broke out in Europe as Pétain was nearing the age of sixty and thinking of retirement from his military career. He postponed retirement to lead his troops, and his victories made the people of France love him. Decades later, as World War II (1939–45) raged, France again called on the aging Pétain, and he became premier (position like that of prime minister) of a French republic at war against Hitler's Germany. Positive the Germans could not be defeated, Pétain made a peace with the Germans—a peace that many called surrender. He not only allowed the Germans to occupy France, but his government cooperated with and helped the Germans. Many French citizens could not and still cannot forgive Pétain for this.

From Peasant to Soldier

Henri-Philippe Omer Pétain was born on April 24, 1856, the son of peasant farmers who had lived for centuries in the small village of Cauchy-a-la-Tour in northern France. His young mother died shortly after the birth of her fifth child, when Pétain was only a year old. By the time Pétain was three, his father had remarried, but Pétain's stepmother was cold to her stepchildren, and Pétain spent much of his childhood living in his grandparents' house, right next door to his own. He was closest to two relatives on his mother's side: his uncle, who was a teacher, and his great-uncle, a priest who in his youth had been a soldier under French emperor Napoléon Bonaparte (1769–1821).

In 1867, Pétain became a student at the school where his uncle taught, the Collège Saint-Bertin. The little town of Saint-Omer, where the school was located, also was home base for a battalion of light-infantry soldiers, and young Pétain was impressed by the uniformed lieutenants he saw there. He decided he would be a soldier himself, a member of the light infantry. After he finished at Saint-Bertin, he spent a year at the more advanced Collège Albertle Grand, then two years at the Special Military School of Saint-Cyr near Paris, graduating as a second lieutenant in 1878.

Pétain served actively for almost ten years, then enrolled in the École Supérieure de la Guerre (War College) for advanced military training. He was a hardworking student and dedicated soldier, but he did not have either the driving ambition or the flashy style that might have led to quick promotions. His climb up the military ranks was slow. Though he was handsome and a success at social events, his fellow officers often found him cold and unpleasant. During his career, he was sent to various French military bases and also returned to the War College several times to teach military strategy.

Pétain received praise and promotion for his work as a teacher. Influenced by the battles he had studied at the military school at Saint-Cyr, he developed a strategy for modern warfare. Because more powerful guns and artillery weapons were continually being developed, Pétain was convinced that these weapons should be used not for fierce attacks, but for a powerful defense, behind strong fortifications. Many disagreed with Pétain's defensive approach to warfare, including the commander of the War College, Ferdinand Foch (1851–1929).

A War Hero

Pétain's defensive strategy would prove to be a success at an important time: When World War I began, Pétain was promoted from colonel to brigadier general and given command of an infantry division in the north of France. He used artillery and fortifications for his defensive approach to battle, and his tactics were successful. One of his most famous victories came at the town of Verdun, where Pétain's troops turned back a German offensive in 1916.

As the war dragged on, some French soldiers became unhappy and mistrustful of the men who were leading them. They began to mutiny, that is, they refused to follow their officers' orders. The soldiers who served under Pétain, however, loved and respected him because he was concerned about their welfare; he planned his strategies carefully to avoid casualties. In 1918, Pétain was appointed commander in chief of the army, in the hopes that he could control the rebellious soldiers. He punished some of the leaders of the mutinies, but he also made improvements in the soldiers' food and made sure they had breaks from battle so they could rest and recover. In 1918, Pétain was honored with the high rank of marshal of France. The men who had served under him would be his strongest supporters for the rest of his life.

World War I ended in 1918, but Pétain was not to remain at peace for long. In 1925, he went to Morocco to lead the joint Spanish-French army that fought against Moroccan rebel Abd elKrim. After that, Pétain finally did retire from active military duty, but he continued to serve the government as marshal of France and as inspector general of air defense. In 1934 he was appointed minister of war, and in 1939 he went to Spain as an ambassador to the government of dictator Francisco Franco.

Collaborator!

In 1940, with the world once more at war, Pétain was called back to France. The heavily fortified defenses that had been Pétain's strategy during World War I had not worked against the Germans this time, and France was being over-whelmed by German troops. At the age of eighty-four, Pétain was made vice-premier of France in the hopes that, as a beloved war hero, he could encourage the French people to resist the German invasion.

But Pétain did not believe that France could stop the Germans. On June 16, 1940, he became premier of the republic and made an agreement with Germany to stop the fighting. While the Germans occupied much of France by actively moving troops in, Pétain became the head of a new occupational government (a government controlled by a foreign military force), with its headquarters in the town of Vichy. In an effort to gain the French people better treatment from German occupiers, Pétain's government collaborated with the Germans. In wartime, collaboration means supporting and working together with the enemy. The Vichy government agreed to assist the Germans by rounding up French Jews and sending them to concentration camps; it also agreed to pay large amounts of money to the German government and send French workers to Germany. Though Pétain later insisted that he cooperated with the Germans because it was the only way to save France, many people think that he sympathized with the Nazis and wished to help them win the war. (The Nazis were a German political movement led by Adolf Hitler that promoted racism and the expansion of state power.)

When the Allied forces attacked the Germans in France on June 6, 1944, Pétain left France and fled to Switzerland. Once the war was over, he was brought back to his homeland and, at eighty-nine years old, tried for treason. He was convicted and sentenced to death, but Charles de Gaulle, the new leader of France, reduced Pétain's sentence to life imprisonment. Already a very old man, Pétain, once the glorious war hero, spent the last years of his life in a prison on the island of Yeu. He died on July 23, 1951.

For More Information

Books

Griffiths, Richard. Pétain: A Biography of Marshal Philippe Pétain of Vichy. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1972.

Lottman, Herbert R. Pétain, Hero or Traitor: The Untold Story. New York: William Morrow, 1985.

Smith, Gene. The Ends of Greatness: Haig, Pétain, Rathenau, and Eden: Victims of History. New York: Crown, 1990.

Web sites

"Henri Pétain, French General." Museum of Tolerance Online Multimedia Learning Center. [Online] http://motlc.wiesenthal.com/pages/t060/t06012.html (accessed April 2001).

"Pétain, Henri-Phillippe Benomi Omer Joseph." [Online] http://www.historybookshop.com/articles/people/soldiersmilitary/petainhenri.asp (accessed March 2001).

The Long, Slow Victory at Verdun

The bloody Battle of Verdun began on February 21, 1916, when German troops attacked the fortress town of Verdun, hoping to force the French army to waste precious lives and supplies defending the town. The battle was the longest of the war, lasting three hundred days and resulting in eight hundred thousand killed or wounded.

Verdun, in the north of France, had been a center of trade and transportation since the days when the Roman Empire ruled France. Close to the German border and equipped with fortifications, Verdun came to symbolize France's protection from German attack. But when the German army, descended on Verdun, the French forces could not hold them back. Within a few days the Germans had captured the nearby forts of Douaumont and Hardaumont. It seemed impossible to stop their advance.

Desperate to defend Verdun and protect the rest of France, Marshal Joseph Joffre, commander in chief of the French army, sent for a general who specialized in defensive maneuvers, Philippe Pétain. Pétain reinforced the town's defenses and called in constant supplies of new troops to replace those who were tired and battered by the fighting. He improved and protected the road leading south from Verdun so that troops and supplies could reach the battle.

"They shall not pass!" This was Pétain's promise to the French at Verdun, and he kept it. Pétain's armies stopped the German advance and lifted the mood of the entire country by holding the fortress at Verdun. However, the battle raged on, and it was not until December that the French regained all the territory around Verdun that had been lost to the Germans.