Anne DeGaulle

Charles DeGaulle (1890-1970) was the French president between 1959 and 1969. With his wife Yvonne, he had three children, Philippe, Elisabeth and Anne, who was a Down Syndrome child. De Gaulle's relatives all testified that the General, who was normally undemonstrative and stoic in his affections for his family, was more open and extroverted with Anne. De Gaulle would entertain her with songs, dances, and pantomimes. Every evening, when they put her to bed, Yvonne would often ask her husband, ‘Charles, why wasn’t she like all the others?’ Anne died of pneumonia on February 6, 1948, aged 20. She could only say one word clearly: "Papa". At her funeral, after the priest recited the last prayers, everyone left slowly, but Yvonne remained by the grave. Charles approached her and said:’ Come on Yvonne, we can go now. Anne is now like all the others.’ On August 22, 1962, Charles de Gaulle was the victim of an attempted assassination at Petit-Clamart. He later said that the potentially fatal bullet had been stopped by the frame of the photograph of Anne that he always carried with him; placed this particular day on the rear shelf of his car. When he died in 1970, he was buried in the cemetery of Colombey beside his beloved daughter.