Sylvain Eugène Raynal
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Sylvain Eugène Raynal (3 March 1867 – 13 January 1939) was a French military officer.


Biography

The
Fort Vaux Fort Vaux (), in Vaux-Devant-Damloup, Meuse (department), Meuse, France, was a polygonal fort forming part of the ring of 19 large defensive works intended to protect the city of Verdun. Built from 1881 to 1884 for 1,500,000 francs, it housed ...
was commanded by Raynal who started the war in charge of the 7th Regiment of Algerian Tirailleurs. He was injured in the shoulder by a bullet from a machine gun in September 1914, and then severely injured in December when his command post was hit by an artillery shell. After ten months in hospital, Raynal came back to the front 1 October 1915, to be again injured in the leg by shrapnel a few days later; he was then promoted to officer of the
Legion d'Honneur The National Order of the Legion of Honour ( ), formerly the Imperial Order of the Legion of Honour (), is the highest and most prestigious French national order of merit, both military and civil. Currently consisting of five classes, it was ...
. Not being able to walk properly seemed to end his military career; however, later in 1916, the Ministry of War in France decided that officers who could not serve on the front line could instead take command of fortresses and other fortifications. Raynal volunteered himself for the
Battle of Verdun The Battle of Verdun ( ; ) was fought from 21 February to 18 December 1916 on the Western Front (World War I), Western Front in French Third Republic, France. The battle was the longest of the First World War and took place on the hills north ...
, where he was posted commander of the Fort Vaux, which would be attacked by the Germans on 2 June 1916. He led a stout defense of Vaux over six days of brutal combat, with his eventual surrender forced by his men literally dying of thirst. The defense was so heroic that the commander of the German army opposing him,
Crown Prince Wilhelm Wilhelm, German Crown Prince, Crown Prince of Prussia (Friedrich Wilhelm Victor August Ernst; 6 May 1882 – 20 July 1951) was the eldest child of the last German emperor, Wilhelm II, and his consort Augusta Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein, an ...
, honored him with a sword to replace the one lost during the battle.G.J. Meyer, « A World Undone: The Story of the Great War «, 2006 After being taken prisoner on 8 June 1916, Raynal was placed in captivity 11 June 1916 at the Mainz Citadel. He was then moved to
Brodnica Brodnica () is a town in northern Poland with 28,574 inhabitants . It is the seat of Brodnica County in the Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship. The nearby Brodnica Landscape Park, a protected area, gets its name from Brodnica. History The first r ...
(''Strasburg in Westpreußen'' or ''Strasburg an der Drewenz'') on 5 November 1917. He was then interned at
Interlaken Interlaken (; lit.: ''between lakes'') is a Swiss town and municipality in the Interlaken-Oberhasli administrative district in the canton of Bern. It is an important and well-known tourist destination in the Bernese Oberland region of the Swiss ...
in
Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...
on 30 March 1918, but liberated 4 November 1918. After the First World War, he was the military commander of the city of Mayence. Major Raynal was also filled with strong civic engagement: before the war, he had supported the action of Jaurès and Socialist Party. Near the Commander Rossel
Captain Henry Gerard Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader or highest rank officer of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police depa ...
collaborator Jaurès The new Army and Military section of'' Humanity'', he was particularly invested in animation the socialist camp "Grand Air" (See: Gilles Candor and Prochasson "Jaurès and the mid Republican officers"), ''Cahiers Jaurès'', ''3'' in 1994 and ''The People'', 19 June 1916.


References

Translated from fr.wp * ''Le Drame du Fort de Vaux'', journal du Commandant Raynal.


See also

* Le Vaillant


External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Raynal, Sylvain-Eugene 1867 births 1939 deaths Military personnel from Bordeaux French Army officers French military personnel of World War I Recipients of the Legion of Honour Recipients of the Croix de Guerre 1914–1918 (France)