François de La Rocque

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Colonel François de La Rocque.

François de La Rocque (6 October 1885 – 28 April 1946) was the leader (1930-1936) of the right-wing French Croix de Feu (Cross of Fire) Movement, referred to as both "an ex-servicemens' organisation"[1] and "the relatively respectable ancien combatant and only vaguely Fascist movement in France."[2].

Life

The son of a general, Rocque was from a long line of career officers. After graduating from the prestigious military academy of Saint-Cyr (1916), he served with distinction in World War I and was on the staff of Marshal Ferdinand Foch. After tours of duty in Poland (1922–24) and Morocco (1924–28), he resigned from the army. In 1931 Rocque became president of the Croix de Feu (“Cross of Fire”), originally an organization of veterans decorated at the front, which espoused ultranationalistic views with vaguely fascist overtones. Rocque displayed a particular talent for mob oratory.[3]

1934

De La Roque was involved in the so-called conspiracy of Cabinet Minister Eugene Frot who Daladier had declared had been trying to form a party of his own. At the committee of enquiry on 9 March 1934, Colonel de la Rocque said that he had been approached on January 6th to join the 'team' who would engage in some sort of government take-over. He said that Frot had previously approached him for support as well as that of the Croix de Fue. De la Rocque declined the invitation as "hardly in keeping with constitutional traditions", and "ridiculous".[4]

The Croix-de-feu took part in the massive Paris rallies of 6 February 1934, with over 100,000 people in the Place de la Concorde alone. La Rocque himself refused to engage in the rally, although parts of the Croix-de-Feu disagreed with him and had circled the Palais Bourbon and remained grouped several hundred metres away from the other rioting leagues. The riots led to serious bloodshed and the toppling of the second Cartel des gauches (Left-Wing Coalition) Daladier government. Colonel de la Rocque announced that "the first objective had been attained".[5]. During the riots the police had opened fire on the crowds resulting in many deaths and injured.[6]

During the first few months of the new Doumergue government, the Croix de Feu were rapidly becoming a vital force in France and their meetings in 1934 even praised as having a "fine human quality". La Rocque was praised and cheered at these meetings, at one saying:

"Before there is a new order of things, an end must be put to disorder, and the idea of authority must be restored. The men of the United Front who call us rioters, reason like Asiatics. We stand above little party combinations and electoral intrigues. We are patriots among patriots, nous sommes de sociaux parmi les sociaux."[7]

La Rocque referred to the new Doumergue government as "a poultice on a gangrenous leg" and during 1934 the Croix de Feu became the rallying point for the Conservative youth of France, and they laid the foundations for those 'lightening mobilizations' which became the regular practice of the Croix de Feu in 1935, and alarmed The Left so much. The Croix was at this time claiming adhérents of about two million.[8] When the short-lived Doumergue government fell on November 8th some young Croix de Feu men afterwards claimed that it was the greatest opportunity they had ever had to march on the Chamber and to seize power, an opportunity that La Rocque had missed.[9]

Incendiary speech

In the middle of 1935, the Croix de Feu became more aggressive than they had been before. They held a great rally during the twin cabinet crises at Cambrai, north of Paris. In Paris they fly-posted hundreds of posters asking Frenchmen to support their movement and to attack the combined forces of the 'Capitalist and Marxist Internationals' who had over thrown the last (Bouisson) government in less than twenty four hours. On 7 July 1935 Colonel de la Rocque made one of the most incendiary speeches of his life, declaring he 'no longer cared about legality' and prophesied that the Croix de Feu would soon take power. The Movement would meet again on the 14th. Some of the London newspapers were full of panic stories of how a civil war might break out in Paris that day. However the Bastille-Nation procession of The Left, with a staggering 300,000 to 400,000 people, passed off perfectly smoothly. At the other end of town the 30,000 Croix de Feu men & women lit the flame on the tomb of the Unknown Warrior and sang Vive La Rocque! Vive La Rocque! La France aux Francais!. At no moment had La Rocque's prestige stood higher. By the end of the year the Croix de Feu had 712,000 paid-up members.[10]

The Left in France, always a force to be reckoned with, demanded the government crush the Croix de Feu. The socialist newspaper Populaire then ran a sensational (false) story that the Croix de Feu had a plan to occupy Paris on October 20th. On December 6th, exactly twenty-two months after the Sixth of February riots, M.Ybarnégarat, a distinguished Right-wing member of Parliament, mounted the tribune of the Chamber in a defence of La Rocque and the Croix de Feu. Parliament aftewards passed a Bill dissolving the para-military wings of all the Leagues.[11]

French Social Party

Mistakenly, La Rocque and the Croix de Feu decided not to run candidates in the 1936 Elections. A serious error.[12] Colonel de la Rocque made a final eve-of-the-Poll statement to try and swing voters, with some saying it was the most openly 'Fascist' statement he had made for a long time. The Communists made tremendous headway in the urban constituencies, and, above all, in Paris and its suburbs, where the "Fascist menace" was highlighted by The Left. After the Election the Croix de Feu were in low spirits and feeling was running high against Colonel de la Rocque who had failed so completely in his election 'arbitration' strategy.

On June 18th, a Decree of the Far-Left government of Leon Blum dissolved the Croix de Feu and some other Leagues.[13] This was a major blow to the Colonel's prestige.[14]

A few weeks later, de la Rocque formed the nationalist French Social Party (Parti Social Francais), touring France in the hope of reviving the faltering spirits of real conservatives. A mass-meeting was called for on October 2nd at the Vélodrome d'Hiver in Paris, but at the last moment the Minister of the Interior prohibited it. Many felt that Colonel de la Rocque had failed them and drifted away to Jacques Doriot's new Parti Populaire Francais.[15]

Harder times

In the summer of 1937, Colonel de a Roche was negotiating the purchase of the Petit Journal newspaper, with a view to turning it into the daily organ of the P.S.F. The Jour, the Action Francais and other papers of the Right which were catering to the very public de la Rocque was hoping to conquer, started a campaign against the Colonel culminating in two spectacular libel actions in the course of which André Tardieu, a former Premier, who had been won over by M. Bailby of the Jour, struck a devastating blow at de la Rocque who had in his writings and speeches never failed to denounce with a great display of ancien combattant righteousness the graft and corruption of the parliamentary regime. Tardieu claimed that when he was Premier he used to subsidise Colonel de la Rocque heavily and regularly out of the secret funds, and that he passed 'his good servant' on to his successor, Laval. The Colonel sued, flatly denying the charge, but lost, his prestige damaged.[16]

Colonel François de La Rocque threw himself into the editing of his recently-purchased newspaper the Petit Journal in which he supported wholeheartedly the proposals for the Munich Agreement:[17]

The role our country has played in these last weeks will have been one of the wonders of our history. In spite of the pressure of the revolutionary warmongers, and of the [?] pacifists, our Ministers have known how to defend both our national honour and the peace of the world..... Eternal France alone was qualified for such and act of arbitration. Such is the noble tradition, the great destiny, the magnificent fortune of our country.[18]

WWII

"At first La Rocque wholeheartedly supported Petain but was later deported to Germany as an American spy".[19]

He apparently changed his original position by declaring, "Collaboration was incompatible with Occupation". He is claimed to have entered into contact with the Réseau Alibi, which was tied to the British Intelligence service. It is also claimed that he then formed the Réseau Klan Resistance network with some members of the PSF. La Rocque rejected the French State laws on the Service du travail obligatoire(STO), by which young Frenchmen had to do terms of work in Germany due to labour shortages caused by the war, and he also threatened to expel any member of the PSF who joined Joseph Darnand's Milice or the LVF. Needless to say he was soon arrested in Clermont-Ferrand on 9 March, 1943, by the SiPo-SD German police along with 152 high ranking PSF members in Paris, because he had been trying to convince Marshall Pétain to go to North Africa, something which the Marshall had, from 1940, persistently refused to do. He was deported first to Eisenberg Castle in Bohemia, then to Itter Castle in Austria, where he found former Premier Édouard Daladier and Generals Maurice Gamelin and Maxime Weygand interned.

He became ill and was moved to a hospital in Innsbruck in March 1945, and was freed by US soldiers on 8 May 1945. He returned to France the following day and then found himself placed under administrative internment (house arrest) by The Left who had now taken control in France, allegedly to keep him away from political negotiations.

Death

Colonel François de La Rocque died in April 1946.

References

  1. ↑ Werth, Alexander, France in Ferment, 3rd impression, Jarrold's, London, 1935, p.138-9.
  2. ↑ Werth, Alexander, France 1940-1955, London, 1957, p.122.
  3. ↑ François de La Rocque, Encyclopædia Britannica
  4. ↑ Werth, 1935, p.139-140.
  5. ↑ Werth, Alexander, The Twilight of France 1933-1940, Harper & Brothers (USA) 1942, 1966 New York reprint, p.16.
  6. ↑ Werth, 1942/1966, p.18.
  7. ↑ Werth, 1942/1966, p.24-5.
  8. ↑ Werth, 1942/1966, pps:26 &341.
  9. ↑ Werth, 1942/1966, p.31.
  10. ↑ Werth, 1942/1966, pps: 50 & 58.
  11. ↑ Werth, 1942/1966, pps: 56-7.
  12. ↑ Werth, Alexander, France and Munich, Hamish Hamilton, 1939/Howard Fertig, New York, 1969, p.265n.
  13. ↑ Werth, 1942/1966, pps: 71, 84 & 110.
  14. ↑ Werth, 1969, p.265n.
  15. ↑ Werth, 1942/1966, p.112-3.
  16. ↑ Werth, 1969, p.266n.
  17. ↑ Werth, 1942/1966, p.228-9.
  18. ↑ Werth, 1969, p.266.
  19. ↑ Werth, 1957, p.148.
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