Son of a French noble family with title coming from Forez and Lyon (de Boissieu), Alain de Boissieu was a pupil at
École Spéciale Militaire de Saint-Cyr (French military academy) in 1936 and
Saumur (French cavalry school) in 1938. He was a
cavalry officer during World War II and, with horses and sabre, made a successful
charge (one of the last in cavalry history) against German troops on 11 June 1940. A prisoner of the Germans, he managed to escape to the
Soviet Union in March 1941. However
Joseph Stalin was, at this time, an ally of
Hitler. He was then sent for a while to a Soviet internment camp. Finally, after Germany
invaded the Soviet Union in mid-1941, he joined General de Gaulle and the
Free French Forces (FFL) in London. As a Free French, Alain de Boissieu was involved in several military operations over
Bayonne (Easter 1942) and Dieppe (
Dieppe Raid, August 1942), in
Madagascar and
Djibouti with the FFL. He fought in the
Battle of Normandy from 30 July 1944, as an officer of the famous
2nd Armored Division () under General
Philippe Leclerc de Hauteclocque, and was wounded on 12 August. He fought for the
Liberation of Paris (25 August 1944). In 1946, Alain de Boissieu married de Gaulle's daughter Élisabeth. They had one daughter Anne born in 1959 In 1956, he fought in the
Algerian War. On 22 August 1962 he was in the same car as his father-in-law during the terrorist attack of
Petit-Clamart planned by the
Organisation armée secrète, when he saved the life of Charles de Gaulle. As a general, he commanded the French military academy of Saint-Cyr, and of l'École militaire interarmes de Coëtquidan (1964). He was
Chief of Staff of the French Army (French: "chef d'État-major de l'Armée de Terre") from 1971 to 1975. Alain de Boissieu became Grand Chancelier de l'ordre de la
Légion d'Honneur and Chancelier de l'
Ordre National du Mérite (1975–1981) and Chancelier de l'
Ordre de la Libération (2002–2006). He resigned from the first two positions in 1981 in order not to be obligated to swear allegiance to, and present the Grand Necklace of the
Légion d'Honneur to, newly elected French President
François Mitterrand, who had called his father-in-law, Charles de Gaulle, a "dictator" in the 1960s. == Books by Alain de Boissieu ==