GAULLE Charles de. Autograph manuscript for L'Unité, [ca. 1950]; 9 leaves in-4. Set of drafts for the second volume of the Mémoires de guerre, "L'Unité". [As early as 1946, General de Gaulle, having relinquished power, began to write his memoirs, initially in the form of fragments on a particular affair or episode; he worked on them continuously from the early 1950s onwards. The second volume, L'Unité, was published in June 1956]. These are manuscripts from the very first draft, where the pages, written on the front, are entirely covered, without margins, with a small cursive handwriting in midnight blue ink, and overloaded with erasures and corrections, with important passages crossed out; on certain pages, not a single line has not been crossed out and rewritten. Some places and dates have been left blank in the heat of the writing process. These fragments are very different from the final version. One leaflet deals with the problem of General Giraud: "The obstacle represented by General Giraud himself has never been of great importance. I say this without any pejorative intention towards this old and very brave soldier whose military career is so rich in brilliant deeds. But, after Darlan, he was inevitably, without fully realising it, the instrument of President Roosevelt's policy, which, willy-nilly, Mr W. Churchill and the British government were supporting. [...] But, whatever the intentions of our allies, their initiative risked pushing the French people into a state of division so serious that they would have lost self-determination even after their 'liberation'. Indeed, it was quite certain that after the collapse of Germany, the two very great powers, Soviet Russia on the one hand and the Anglo-Saxon bloc on the other, would find themselves face to face, with their ambitions, their claims and their opposing doctrines. If the French people had not first rallied around themselves, on their own behalf, there would be every reason to believe that each of the foreign masses would want to secure its support by using the party ready to serve it. For one, as for the other, this party was found in advance. Moscow had our Communists who had joined the resistance [...]. Washington could enlist the help of a large number of French people who had hitherto followed Vichy, but who saw the American intervention as an opportunity to turn against the Germans, who were now doomed to defeat". A series of 6 sheets concerns General Giraud and the Anfa conference (January 1943). "The very day I learned of Darlan's death, I telegraphed General Giraud to propose a meeting. I asked for it to take place between Frenchmen on French soil, either in Algiers or in Fort Lamy. The idea was to study together the basis on which union could be achieved under a single government. [...] At Anfa, I found myself faced with a game that had already been played. General Giraud told me that he intended to head the joint government. He saw it as being run by a sort of three-headed 'consulate', of which he himself would be the first. He offered to make me the second. As for the third, he suggested that General Georges, who was in France at the time but whom the Allies were proposing to bring in, would be the best possible choice. President Roosevelt was both very gracious and very reserved towards me. I did not fail to show him the same attitude. We chatted casually without getting to the heart of the matter. He tried to make me feel that the question was already decided, because he had decided it. Me, delicately pointing out to him that this French affair belonged only to the French, and that I had no worries whatsoever about the outcome. Basically, we had both immediately judged that we could not agree, but that with a view to the future it was important that we should not clash head-on so as not to assert between us an opposition of principle which it might be difficult to iron out later. On the contrary, Mr Churchill, with his customary ardour, charged at me at full speed. He invited me, in the most urgent manner and in the sharpest tone of voice, to join immediately the system set up in Algiers around General Giraud"... Etc. De Gaulle recounted the end of the conference, the photo session where he shook hands with Giraud; then he returned to London... Several merchant ships joined the Free French. Volunteers crossed dangerously into Spain to reach North Africa and Free France, which provoked hostility in the Anglo-Saxon press... De Gaulle received a visit from the Archbishop of New York [Mgr Spellman], sent by Roosevelt: "I asked the Archbishop of New York to reply to the man who had sent him that the position he had taken with regard to French affairs could not be maintained for long, that I deplored, out of consideration for himself, that he had put himself in the position of soon being forced to give in to events, but that in my opinion his attitude towards the French National Committee and its leader, however unfortunate, could only be episodic and that as soon as he had rectified it he would find me ready to discuss amicably with him in the name of France the cooperation of our two countries in the war and later, God willing, in peace". One page is devoted to the rallying and support of the French: "Independently of what we could read between the lines of the newspapers or hear on the radio in the two zones, we had a very complete range of information provided by the reports of our networks, the reports of certain men in place, who were already laying the groundwork, statements made by emigrants as they passed through Madrid, Lisbon, Tangiers and New York, information from diplomatic posts, letters sent to Free Frenchmen by their family or friends, which a thousand tricks and combinations managed to get through to them. As a result, I had an up-to-date picture of events and feelings. [...] But what emerged was the degradation of Vichy. The illusions on which the regime was based were finally dissipating. First of all, Germany's victory, which had been proclaimed to be a foregone conclusion in order to justify the capitulation, became implausible as soon as Russia was involved in the struggle, the United States entered the fray and England and Free France held out. The pretence of "saving the furniture" by surrendering to the enemy was proving derisory, since our 1,500,000 prisoners were not returning, the Germans had practically annexed Alsace and held the north of the country [...]"... Finally, one page castigates the communists: "You would have to be very naïve or very tendentious to refuse to see that the so-called conflicts of ideology are, still and always, only conflicts of power. When revolutionary France marched towards the Rhine, it did so under the guise of new formulas, but, like France as always, it was marching towards the Rhine. When Hitler's Germany claimed to be conquering its vital space, it wore Nazi colours, but it was aiming for exactly the same geographical, political and military goals as Wilhelm II had once had. When today's Russia presents itself to the world draped in economic and social doctrines, it is nonetheless pursuing exactly the same goals as the Czars. How many generations has Russia been able to dominate Poland, Finland, the Balkans, the Straits, the Orient and Manchuria? [...] This is the dreadful ambiguity that grips our communists, this is the unacceptable abuse they are committing against the fatherland. To support, in any case, as they do, the external action of Soviet Russia is to support, not at all one doctrine against another doctrine, but a foreign power. It is to serve as its auxiliaries"...