Pierre Brossolette
Pierre Brossolette | |
|---|---|
Brossolette in 1943 | |
| Born | 25 June 1903 Paris, French Third Republic |
| Died | 22 March 1944 (aged 40) Paris, Occupied France |
| Resting place | Panthéon, Paris |
| Other names | Pedro, Brumaire, Bourgat, Bernier, Baron, Boutet, Briant |
| Education | Agrégé in History |
| Alma mater | École Normale Supérieure |
| Occupation(s) | Journalist Politician |
| Title | Commandant (Major) |
| Political party | French Section of the Workers' International |
| Spouse | Gilberte Brossolette (m. 1926) |
| Children | Anne Brossolette-Branco, Claude Pierre-Brossolette |
| Awards | |
| Website | www |
Pierre Brossolette (French: [pjɛʁ bʁɔsɔlɛt]; 25 June 1903 – 22 March 1944) was a French journalist, politician and major hero of the French Resistance in World War II.
Brossolette ran a Resistance intelligence hub from a Parisian bookshop on the Rue de la Pompe, before serving as a liaison officer in London, where he also was a radio anchor for the BBC, and carried out three clandestine missions in France. Arrested in Brittany as he was trying to reach the UK on a mission back from France alongside Émile Bollaert, Brossolette was taken into custody by the Sicherheitsdienst (the security service of the SS). He committed suicide by jumping out of a window at their headquarters on 84 Avenue Foch in Paris as he feared he would reveal the lengths of French Resistance networks under torture; he died of his wounds later that day at Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital.
On 27 May 2015, his ashes were transferred to the Panthéon with national honours at the request of President François Hollande, alongside politician Jean Zay and fellow Resistance members Germaine Tillion and Geneviève de Gaulle-Anthonioz.