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The Guardian, Tuesday 9 May 2000  the second world war, Henriette Gilles, who has died aged 79, worked for the French resistance as a radio operator in charge of allied parachute jumps, and survived imprisonment in Sachenhausen concentration camp.
In 1939, Gilles, who came from a middle-class Protestant background, was working for the Red Cross in her native city of Lyons. Being in unoccupied France, having a strong republican tradition, and lying conveniently close to neutral Switzerland - and thus to information about the course of the war - Lyons became a resistance centre. Gilles was naturally influenced by this, but was particularly affected by her meeting with Raymond Fassin, a schoolteacher who had joined Free France in London, and been parachuted back to France in January 1942. He was with Jean Moulin and, under the orders of General de Gaulle, was in the mission to unite the forces of the resistance in southern France.
Gilles joined the team improving London-Lyons wireless communications. Fassin was known as SIF, and Gilles as SIF 5. She was in touch with the Gaullist intelliegence group, the Bureau Central de Renseignements et d'Action, and with the British Special Operations Executive. Her work also involved finding sites where RAF Lysanders and Hudsons could land. One famous contact that she made was with the Chateau of Villevieu, east of Lyons, the home of three elderly sisters, who allowed their spacious fields to be used for aircraft landing.
It was from Villevieu that Gilles organised the flight of Jean Moulin and General Delestraint to London in January 1943. Like many flights, it was delayed by bad weather, but it became one of the most successful missions. De Gaulle entertained the Frenchmen at his home in Hampstead, and Moulin was given the go-ahead for the formation of the National Council of the Resistance, whilst Delestraint was confirmed as commander of the secret army.
In March 1943, Gilles also organised the flight to London of Henri Queuille, a prominent radical politician. His presence strengthened the political position of de Gaulle, often accused of having dictatorial ambitions.
But, on June 21 1943, Moulin and other resistance leaders were arrested by the Gestapo in Caluire, a suburb of Lyons. The man appointed to be Moulin's chief assistant, Serreulles, arrived late and escaped capture, but was at a loss to know what had happened and what he should do. It was not until he made contact with Gilles that he was able to tell London.
Gilles's main preoccupation, after helping Serruelles, was to destroy documents that might be useful to the Germans, and to flee from Lyons. She went to Paris, and from there made contact with Fassin, who had become the regional resistance military delegate. Using the name "Carolle", she joined him in Lille. But Gilles and Fassin were given away by a French informer. Fassin was killed, but she survived in Sachsenhausen until liberated at the end of 1944 by the allied armies.
After the war, as an army lieutenant, Gilles worked in French intelligence, and, in 1948, she married a former resistance fighter, Jean- Dominique Christiani. She ended her career working in the decoding department of the French Ministry for Foreign Affairs and was awarded the Croix de guerre (with palms) and the Medaille de la Resistance (with rosette).
She leaves a husband and three sons.
Henriette Gilles-Cristiani, resistance fighter, born October 15 1920; died April 20 2000
Jacques Ghémard le dimanche 20 septembre 2009 - Demander un contact Recherche sur cette contribution | |
