The rain stopped, luckily, just when the French President, Prince Charles and his wife, Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, reached the statue of General de Gaulle, erected in front of 4, Carlton Gardens, the ex -Headquarters of Free France, close to Buckingham Palace and Trafalgar Square.
Emmanuel Macron came to celebrate Thursday, June 18 in London, the 80th anniversary of the appeal of June 18, 1940. The occasion for the Head of State, who is making his first visit abroad since the beginning of the pandemic of Covid-19, to hand over the Legion of Honor to the City of London and to pay tribute to the British without whom this founding speech of the French Resistance could not have been made.
The famous call, then broadcast on the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), was read by a British soldier, Major Johanna Majilette, in almost un accented French:
"I, General de Gaulle, currently in London, I invite the French officers and soldiers who are on British territory or who would come to be there, with their weapons or without their weapons, I invite the engineers and the workers specialized in the armaments industries who are on British territory or who would come to be there, to get in touch with me. "
June 18, 1940, de Gaulle "Was only a French officer out of business", continues Emmanuel Macron, alongside Prince Charles. "The rebel in London had nothing, was nothing", However, "In his bundle of exiles, he had carried the French spirit". In London, he found the assistance of Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who offered him asylum and recognition, despite the reluctance of his cabinet and the doubts of the Foreign Office.
A year dedicated to the memory of the General
"It was Albion who welcomed Marianne with open arms" and "The British monarchy which became the refuge of the French Republic", adds the president, not masked, like all British officials. London was "The cradle of free France", insists the president, after recalling "Immense bravery" of the British people at the time, a country, the United Kingdom, which was "Spearhead of the liberation of the world" in front of "Nazi barbarism".
For Emmanuel Macron, this London stage is the second in a year that he has chosen to devote to the memory of the General. The head of state still intends to honor the 50e anniversary of his death – November 9 in Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises (Haute-Marne), where the first president of the V is buriede Republic. On May 17, he had already given a speech devoted to "The spirit of resistance", at Montcornet, in Aisne, where Colonel de Gaulle, in May 1940, at the head of an armored division, had led the only French counterattack against the Wehrmacht.
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