Henryk Jan Jabłoński (Polish pronunciation: [ˈxɛnrɨk jaˈbwɔɲskʲi]; 27 December 1909 – 27 January 2003) was a Polish historian and politician. After 1948, he became a politician of the ruling Polish United Workers' Party, as well as a historian and professor at Warsaw University. He served as head of state of the People's Republic of Poland between 1972 and 1985.
Canon Félix Kir (22 January 1876 - 26 April 1968) was a French Catholic priest, resistance fighter and politician.
Marcel Moore (born Suzanne Alberte Malherbe, 19 July 1892 – 19 February 1972) was a French illustrator, designer, and photographer. She, along with her romantic and creative partner Claude Cahun, was a surrealist writer and photographer.
Odette Marie Léonie Céline Hallowes, (née Brailly; 28 April 1912 – 13 March 1995), also known as Odette Churchill and Odette Sansom, code named Lise, was an agent for the United Kingdom's clandestine Special Operations Executive (SOE) in France during the Second World War. She was the first woman to be awarded the George Cross by the United Kingdom and was awarded the Légion d'honneur by France. The following information relating to her war service uses 'Sansom' as this was her surname during this period.
The purpose of SOE was to conduct espionage, sabotage, and reconnaissance in occupied Europe against the Axis powers, especially Germany. SOE agents allied themselves with resistance groups and supplied them with weapons and equipment parachuted in from England.
Sansom arrived in France on 2 November 1942 and worked as a courier with the Spindle network (or circuit) of SOE headed by Peter Churchill (whom she later married). In January 1943, to evade arrest, Churchill and Sansom moved their operations to near Annecy in the French Alps. She and Churchill were arrested there on 16 April 1943 by spy-hunter Hugo Bleicher. She spent the rest of the war imprisoned in Ravensbrück Concentration Camp.
Her wartime experiences and endurance of a brutal interrogation and imprisonment, which were chronicled in books and a motion picture, made her one of the most celebrated members of the SOE and one of the few to survive Nazi imprisonment.
Charles Exbrayat (5 May 1906 – 8 March 1989) was a French fiction writer. He published over 100 novels and short stories, most of them humorous thrillers. They were very popular and a considerable number were turned into films.
While living in Nice with his parents, he was studying to becoming a medical doctor, but then found his true calling as a writer.
His debut novel was Aller sans Retour (single fare, no return), written while in Geneva, before going to Paris. He was one of the most famous French authors of the illustrious "le Masque" collection. He wrote a number of novels set in Scotland (Imogene series) and in Italy. His other interests included gourmet food and fine wines.
Raymond Triboulet (3 October 1906 – 26 May 2006) was a French politician. He was a leading World War II resistance fighter who helped U.S., Canadian, and British troops invade France, which was then occupied by Nazi Germany.
Michel Soulié (10 February 1916 - 15 September 1989) was a French politician.
Soulié was born in Saint-Étienne. He represented the Radical Party in the National Assembly from 1956 to 1958.
Eugène Claudius-Petit was a French politician. He participated in many governments under the Fourth Republic and was a proponent of Firminy Vert. He later added his pseudonym from the Resistance, "Claudius", to his name.
Auguste Champetier de Ribes (French pronunciation: [oɡyst ʃɑ̃ptje də ʁib]; 30 July 1882 – 6 March 1947) was a French politician and jurist.
A devout Catholic, he was an early follower of Albert de Mun and social Christianity. Wounded in the First World War, he was elected to the Chamber of Deputies from the Basses-Pyrénées as a Christian Democrat (PDP) from 1924 to 1934. He was Senator from 1934 to 1940. He served as a junior minister or minister in various governments led by André Tardieu, Édouard Daladier, Paul Reynaud, and Pierre Laval.
In 1940, he was among the 80 parliamentarians who refused to give Pétain full powers (see The Vichy 80) and served in the Combat resistance movement. An early supporter of Charles de Gaulle, he was named by the Provisional Government of the French Republic as the French representative during the Nuremberg Trials, during which he delivered the closing statement from the French Prosecution. Upon his return, he was elected President of the Council of the Republic (now known as the French Senate) by the benefit of age. He had tied Communist Georges Marrane, but was elected because he was older than Marrane. Two days later, he was the defeated MRP candidate in the 1947 French presidential election. His health prevented him from assuming his role as President of the Council and he died in office.
Jean Berthoin (January 12, 1895 in Enghien-les-Bains, Val-d'Oise – February 25, 1979 in Paris) was a French politician. As Minister of National Education under Charles de Gaulle, he instituted a policy of compulsory education for all children, both French and foreign citizens, until the age of sixteen, building on the earlier reforms of 1936. Implemented in 1959, this was known as the Berthoin Ordinance. He also suggested that the baccalauréat be abolished, prompting a significant backlash in the Parisian press.Prior to World War II, Berthoin had been the director of national security (Sûreté) in the French Interior Ministry.