Stamp - Chasseneuil-sur-Bonnieure National Necropolis

On a hill overlooking the small commune of Chasseneuil-sur-Bonnieure, in the Charente department, stands a white monument over twenty meters high, combining the "V" of Victory with the Lorraine cross. The work of Charente architect and former Resistance fighter François Poncelet, the Chasseneuil Resistance Memorial pays tribute to the soldiers shot by the Nazis or killed in action against the occupying forces. Construction of the memorial began in 1945 on the initiative of Colonel Chabanne and future Senator-Mayor of Chasseneuil Guy Pascaud, surviving members of the Bir Hacheim maquis: in 1943, Claude Bonnier gave this name to the group of Charente maquis he had just reorganized, in tribute to the heroic struggle of the Allied forces against the Germans during the battle of Bir Hakeim in May-June 1942. The monument stands opposite the Cherves-Châtelars forest, which was home to the Bir Hacheim maquis during the Second World War. Inaugurated on October 21, 1951 by French President Vincent Auriol, the Chasseneuil-sur-Bonnieure memorial is surrounded by a two-hectare military cemetery. This national necropolis is not only home to the remains of members of the Charente Resistance: a total of 2,255 graves of servicemen who died for France line their white crosses at the foot of the monument. The memorial thus preserves the memory of the martyrs of the Bir Hacheim maquis, but also more broadly that of the colonial soldiers who fell during the French campaign in 1940, as well as resistance fighters from other regions whose bodies were initially scattered in various cemeteries throughout the south-west. Beyond the Charente maquis, the entire French Resistance is honored in this way. Jean Yves Le Naour

Création et gravure André Lavergne d'après photo © Stéphane Méril, © Fernand Poncelet architecte.