Since Wednesday evening, Missak Manouchian and his wife Mélinée have been resting at the Pantheon after a ceremony paying tribute to the group of resistance fighters led by this Armenian by birth who died for his adoptive homeland, France, just 80 years ago.
Carried by soldiers of the Foreign Legion, the coffins of Missak Manouchian and his wife Mélinée entered the Pantheon this Wednesday evening. This is the first time that France “pantheonized” a communist resistance fighter of Armenian origin.
In the presence of the current Armenian Prime Minister, this republican ceremony was also intended to be a tribute to the 22 other members of the Manouchian group, all executed by the German occupation army.
Before the arrival of the coffins at the Pantheon, a procession went up the street leading to the monument. On this route, the life, fight and death of Missak Manouchian were evoked during three stages punctuated by songs, readings and dances.
The resistance fighter was shot on February 21, 1944 at Mont-Valérien, near Paris with his comrades. Two days before his execution he was able to write a last, and very moving, letter to his wife which she would discover much later. This missive was read by the French actor and singer Patrick Bruel.
This last message will inspire Aragon. His poem, first published in 1955 in Humanitywill then be set to music by singer Léo Ferré in a song entitled “L’Affiche rouge”, a reference to the Nazi propaganda poster plastered on the walls of many cities in France in the days following the execution and which had helped to establish as heroes those whom History will rename the Manouchian group.
The end of the ceremony ended with the speech of the French president. A tribute from which Emmanuel Macron took advantage of to reaffirm the republican ideal within a Europe that is now pacified.
