GAULLE Charles de. 2 L. A. S., 11 and 29 July 1916, to his mother Jeanne de Gaulle; 6 pages in-12 each in pencil with German ink stamp (slight defects: marks, folds, a few tiny marginal tears). Letters from captivity, in which Captain de Gaulle recounts his assault and pays tribute to his fallen commander. 11 July. "There's nothing new for us here. Our physical condition and morale are excellent. I told you in my last letter that the Germans were not distributing the parcels sent to us. They are doing so now and I suppose they will continue to do so. But how our hearts are beating at the moment with those of all the French. How closely mine is united with yours, with those of Xavier, of Jacques, of my dear cousins, of Pierre perhaps one of these days. We are well informed here because we receive all the enemy newspapers we ask for and so far they have published all the communiqués from France and her allies. You have asked me several times what I knew about Commandant Cordonnier's death. I was not with the Commandant on the day of the battle of Douaumont, in the sense that he was at the eastern end of the village and I was at the western end. But then I saw his battalion adjutant, Adjutant Bacro (I don't know where he is now in Germany), and I can't tell you exactly. During the unbelievable bombardment to which we were subjected before the assault by the German infantry, the Commandant remained at his command post, with admirable calm and courage, encouraging in the very rare moments when he could make the few men around him see and hear him. He did everything he had to do, apart from setting an example, and tried to get in touch with the colonel several times, without ever succeeding, of course, because all the liaison officers sent were killed before they had got ten paces. I have already written that the enemy infantry came at us first from our right (i.e. on the side of our line where the Commandant was), and by surprise in that they appeared twenty metres from the survivors of the bombardment and covered them with grenades before most of them could come to their senses. As soon as the Commander saw the enemy, he grabbed a dead man's rifle and fired one or two rounds at the attackers. He was immediately hit by several bullets at point-blank range, one of which pierced his head. He was killed quickly and without agony. After the hand-to-hand combat, the imprisoned Warrant Officer Bacro recommended the Commandant's body to the German infantrymen who were there. But, of course, even if they had wanted to, they could not have done anything for him, because as soon as we lost the village our own bombardment of the attackers began, and since then they have had other things to worry about on the same ground. Perhaps they have since found a way to bury at least some of the thousands of corpses piled up there. If so, they will have done so in the immediate vicinity of the village debris. [...] In the days leading up to the battle of Douaumont, our Regiment was engaged in a great deal of dangerous work in which Major Cordonnier showed himself to be the man of duty and discipline that he was above all else. 29th July. He talks about his captivity and is reassuring about his health: "Don't worry at all about my physical and moral health. I'm in the best health in the world and I see the future as rosy as can be! He goes on to praise the "recent glories" of his brothers Jacques and Xavier, who have re-enlisted. He can't "stop thinking about them and envying them". He ends by detailing some of the minor vexations imposed by his situation, and even makes a little joke: "If they haven't deprived us of dessert, it's because they've never given us any". As for the guards, "in the German army, as in all the others, those who guard the prisoners are very rarely the ones who make them...". LNC, i, p. 260-261 and 263-264. An L. A. S. from Henri de Gaulle to his son Captain Charles de Gaulle, prisoner at the Offizierkriegsgefangenenlager in Osnabrück, Paris 23 April 1916 (3 p. in-8, ink stamp P12). He read with emotion the details of the battle and copied the Army's order of the day concerning Charles: 'Company commander renowned for his high intellectual and moral value; while his battalion, undergoing a terrible bombardment, was decimated, and the Germans were reaching his company from all sides, took his men in a furious assault and fierce hand-to-hand combat, the only solution he considered compatible with his feelings of military honour. Fell in the melee. An outstanding officer in every respect.