André Zeller
André Zeller | |
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Général d’armée | |
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Relations | Léon Zeller (father) Henri Zeller (brother) |
André Zeller (1 January 1898 – 18 September 1979) was a French Army general. He served during World War I, the Franco-Turkish War, and World War II, and served as chief of staff of the French Army during the Algerian War.
Zeller was one of the four generals (the others being Raoul Salan, Edmond Jouhaud, and Maurice Challe) who organized the Algiers putsch of 1961. For his role, Zeller was sentenced to 15 years in prison by a military court. He was released in 1966, and granted amnesty by Charles de Gaulle in 1968.[1]
Biography
Early life
Born on 1 January 1898 in Besançon in eastern France, Zeller had entered the preparatory class at Collège Stanislas de Paris to prepare for the École polytechnique entrance exam when World War I broke out in 1914.
World War I
Zeller enlisted in the
At the end of October 1915, Zeller was assigned to the 8th Artillery Regiment. He took part in the Battle of Verdun in 1916.[2] During the battle, his unit suffered a long and painful ordeal from 1 to 6 June 1916 at Esnes-en-Argonne, 1,500 metres (1,600 yd) from the Germans and in sight of Le Mort Homme, suffering an incessant German artillery bombardment. He was awarded a citation à l'ordre of the regiment. He later took part in the Battle of the Somme in 1916 as part of the 20th Army Corps before being sent back to Fontainebleau for six weeks.
Promoted to second lieutenant, Zeller was assigned to the 27th Artillery Regiment in the 1st Army Corps. He was designated as liaison officer to the infantry. From November 1916 to February 1917, he was in the Champagne sector. Moving to the Aisne sector, he witnessed the disastrous start of the Second Battle of the Aisne on 16 April 1917, a day which saw the annihilation of two of the three battalions of the French 208th Infantry Regiment, destruction in a few minutes of a group of the 13th Artillery Regiment that had advanced in accordance with the operational order, and the destruction of a French tank force at Berry-au-Bac.
Zeller participated in four battles of the 1917 Flanders offensive between 31 July and 23 October 1917. On 1 December 1917, he was again sent to Fontainebleau to take a three-month course for "victory battery commanders."
Returning to the 27th Artillery Regiment in the Aisne sector on 23 March 1918, Zeller was disappointed when he was appointed to the regimental staff as the regiment's signals officer. Between 5 and 15 April 1918, his regiment was placed at the disposal of the 151st Infantry Division of General Pierre des Vallières, engaged north of the Ailette to protect its retreat south of the river during the German spring offensive of 1918. In the last days of April 1918, Zeller was promoted to lieutenant.
Quartered in the
After the failure of the last German offensive in Champagne and on the Marne with the conclusion of the Second Battle of the Marne on 15 July 1918, Zeller participated from 18 to 28 July 1918 in the successful Allied counteroffensive. Meanwhile, he left his 20 telephone operators on 23 July 1918 upon his appointment as an artillery battery commander. His unit then moved to the 10th Army and wandered according to orders for two weeks. Beginning on 15 August 1918, it was involved in the Battle of the Ailette.
On 12 September 1918, Zeller's regiment embarked for a calm sector in the Territoire de Belfort, near his boyhood home. He obtained a leave of eight days to attend the funeral of the youngest of his sisters, who had died of the Spanish flu. He rejoined his regiment while it was en route to the Lorraine front and had the unpleasant surprise of learning that he had to give up his place as commander of the 3rd Battery to a more senior lieutenant. On the day of the armistice with Germany, which brought World War I to an end on 11 November 1918, his regiment passed through Nancy in front of an apparently indifferent population.
On 19 November 1918, Zeller escaped in a cart with two lieutenants to attend the official entry of French forces into Metz and in the early afternoon saw troops of the 10th Army, cheered by a jubilant crowd, parade in front of General Philippe Pétain, who was appointed Marshal of France at noon that day, followed by General Edmond Buat and 25 officers of the French Army's general headquarters.
Zeller entered Germany with his regiment via the Saarland and paraded on 14 December 1918 before General Charles Mangin in Mainz. His regiment then returned to the right bank of the Rhine and spent two months housed in small villages in the Taunus.
Franco-Turkish War
On 20 February 1919, Zeller arrived reluctantly at the École polytechnique preparation center set up in Strasbourg. In the summer of 1919 he failed the entrance examination, but he remained in the army and joined his regiment in garrison first at Saint-Omer, then at Bailleul. He was then assigned to the 60th Artillery Regiment in Strasbourg.
In July 1920, Zeller was designated for assignment in an overseas
On 22 November 1920, Zeller embarked on the
, and 350 horses and mules.After the departure of General Goubeau and elements of the 4th Division of the Levant, which had reinforced French forces for three weeks during the siege of Aïntab, Zeller was appointed to command the 3rd Battery of the 273rd Artillery Regiment, armed with Model 1897 75-millimetre (2.95 in) field guns. At the beginning of 1921, he took part in the siege and capture of Aïntab from the Turks. During the rest of 1921, he participated in various operations along the Euphrates.
Interwar
Promoted to
World War II
Zeller subsequently served in the army of Vichy France. Transferred at his request to French North Africa, he arrived in Algiers on 26 September 1940 assigned to duty as military director of transport. Promoted to lieutenant colonel in August 1942, he became chief of ctaff to General Charles Mast, commanding the Algiers Division, a few days before the beginning of Operation Torch, the Allied amphibious landings in French North Africa, on 8 November 1942. After the cessation of hostilities between French forces French North Africa on 11 November 1942, French forces in Africa switched to the Allied side in the forces of Free France. As chief of staff of the Algiers March Division, he took part in the Tunisian campaign from November 1942 to May 1943.
From December 1943 to July 1944, Zeller was the deputy chief of staff of the
Post-World War II
As director of artillery and second in command of the
Algerian War
While Zeller was serving at Rennes, the Algerian War broke out in November 1954. In 1955 the Minister of Defence, General Marie-Pierre Kœnig, appointed Zeller chief of staff of the French Army, and with the appointment came a promotion to général de corps d’armée. Zeller resigned from his post in February 1956 to protest against a decision by the Government of France to reduce the workforce in Algeria.
On 19 December 1957, Zeller was appointed to the rank of
Algiers putsch of 1961
Zeller took part in the
Death
Zeller died in Paris on 18 September 1979. His grave is in the cemetery at Menetou-Salon.[6] His wife, born Élisabeth Siméon, died at the age of 100 in 2009.
Decorations
- Grand Officer of the Legion of Honour
- Croix de guerre 1914–1918
- Croix de Guerre 1939–1945
- Croix de guerre des théâtres d'opérations extérieures
- Cross for Military Valour
Works
- Les Hommes de la Commune (English: The Men of the Commune) (Librairie Académique Perrin, 1969)
- Dialogues avec un lieutenant (English: Dialogues with a Lieutenant) (Editions Plon, 1971)
- Dialogues avec un colonel (English: Dialogues with a Colonel) (Editions Plon, 1972)
- Dialogues avec un général (English: Dialogues with a General) (Editions des Presses de la Cité, 1974)
- Soldats perdus (English: Lost Soldiers) (Librairie Académique Perrin, 1977)
References
- ^ "André Zeller (1898-1979)". Bibliothèque nationale de France. Retrieved June 5, 2016.
- ^ "L'enfer de Verdun, un témoin raconte" (in French), Histoire (magazine), 26 February 1964.
- ^ "1961 : pourquoi le putsch d'Alger de militaires français contre la politique du général de Gaulle a échoué" (in French), atlantico.fr, 5 April 2014.
- ^ Pierre Abramovici, Le Putsch des Généraux. De Gaulle contre l’Armée 1958-1961 (in French), Fayard, March 2011.
- ^ "Putsch d'Alger: dans la tête des généraux" (in French), Emmanuel Hecht et Grégoire Kauffmann, lexpress.fr, 29 March 2014.
- ^ Vue de la tombe (in French)