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Descartes
Indre-et-Loire Centre Pont Henri IV |
Monument aux mortsWar Memorial |
Paulette Richon
date? |
Signed: Richon
During the Second World War [the Pont Henri IV] had an important role to play: in fact on 22nd June 1940 the retreating French troops mined one part of the bridge. Two arches were destroyed on the Indre-et-Loire side (Descartes). On 31st August 1944 the Forces Françaises de l'Intérieur (F.F.I.) blew up the bridge on the Vienne side (Buxeuill), perhaps saving La Haye-Descartes from the massacre identical to the one at Maillé. The leader of this act of resistance was Henri Blanchet, a member of the local Conty-Freslon network. The Quai Couratin immortalises the memory of one of his young companions-in-arms who was killed during the liberation of the town. This monument sculpted by Madame Paulette Richon is dedicated to the partisans killed during these battles in 1944. After the Liberation a temporary footbridge was put up, and it wasn't until 1958 that the Pont Henri IV was restored to its present condition.The Conty-Freslon Network was named after the two leading resistance fighters, Michel Conty and Emile Freslon. Both these heros of the Liberation were captured in a Nazi ambush, tortured and killed in the woods of Kerleroux at Dolus-le-Sec (north of Descartes and to the East of Manthelan) on 27th July, 1944.
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