User:TSventon/sandbox/Premier corps de pilotes militaires féminins

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The Premier corps de pilotes militaires féminins (First corps of female military pilots) was created in France by decree of 27 May 1940, just before the defeat of June 1940, it was abolished after the armistice, on 1 September 1940.[1] At the Liberation, Charles Tillon, appointed Air Minister in the first Charles de Gaulle Government on 9 September 1944, recreated the Female Auxiliary Pilot Corps on 9 September 1944. This corps was disbanded in the first months of 1946, and it was not until 1976 that the Air Force started recruiting female pilots again.

Creation[edit]

During the Second World War, female pilots served in various capacities in the armed forces of some belligerent countries: as transport pilots in the ATA in the United Kingdom, and in the WASP in the United States. Soviet Russia, on the other hand, had three initially all-female air regiments, created by Marina Raskova.[2]

In France, Albert Lebrun authorised the recruitment of "100 female auxiliary pilots, responsible for ferrying low-power aircraft into service in flight schools and training centres". The decree of 27 May 1940 defined the status of female auxiliary pilots in the Air Force, who are financially treated as second lieutenants, but who must have completed 100 flight hours and submit to military constraints, have neither rank nor rank in the military hierarchy (which provokes the anger of Hélène Terré, who criticised the army for being "an old carcass frozen in its past, glorious, certainly, but outdated".[3] This body was however dissolved on September 1st of the same year[4].

These examples abroad led Charles Tillon to propose to Charles de Gaulle the creation of a flight school for women for which it was expected that two hundred students would be recruited. De Gaulle accepted the idea immediately.[5].

Janine Elissetche, former officer of the French Air Force who joined the group late, recalled that the idea of a body of female pilots came from Maryse Bastié[6].

The latter had opened up about it in the press as early as May 1939 speaking of the creation of a female phalanx within the Air Force only to immediately regret that the idea was not investigated by the Air Ministry[Notes 1].

Training[edit]

The first course began in November 1944 near Châteauroux, with 13 women (including some in their forties who had not flown for 5 years): Andrée Dupeyron, Élisabeth Lion, Yvonne Jourjon, Maryse Bastié, Maryse Hilsz, Paulette Bray-Bouquet, Suzanne Melk, Geneviève Lefebvre-Sellier, Yvette Grollet-Briand, Anne-Marie Imbrecq, Gisèle Gunepin, Françoise Marzellier and Élizabeth Boselli.

They were "aviatrices of great renown [who] would be selected"[7]. "All holders of a civilian license between the wars, these renowned airwomen were quickly designated by nicknames such as the "13 Amazons of the air" or the "13 Graces" "[8]. The group was quickly divided: Bastié and Hilsz were assigned to two other groups, and five students were sent to Morocco to the school of Kasba Tadla (Paulette Bray-Bouquet, Andrée Dupeyron, Gisèle Gunepin, Élisabeth Lion and Yvonne Jourjon)[9], the others are sent to the Tours base.

The following autumn, 6 other young women in their twenties (Janine Elissetche, Paulette Desamere, Évelyne Boisnard, Suzanne Millet, Colette Favret, and Denise Gaudineau)[10] were recruited and began their internship in Tours. The death of Maryse Hilsz on 30 January 1946 led to the end of this experiment: three weeks later, without explanation, the students were expelled[5]. There was no graduation ceremony for the students of the first group: gendarmes brought them their military pilot's licence at home.[10]. All "with the notorious exception of Maryse Bastié who worked in the Air Force until her death in 1952" refused the positions offered to them in administrative or secretarial functions, for the reason that they would rather experience it as a sanction[11].

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ On 5 May 1939, Maryse Bastié was interviewed by Jacques Pauliac for Le Journal. The article is titled: "Flying is wonderful says Maryse Bastié but why am I not a man" . She talked about the creation in case of war of a "feminine phalanx" within the Air Force. The next day, 6 May, Clément Vautel returned to the interview in his section "my film" which he titled /f1.item.zoom Les Amazones de l'Air where he essentially said that women have better things to do than go to war. Stung to the quick, Maryse Bastié used a right of reply on 15 May 1939 which is published in extenso in the section "My film" [https:// gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k76346675/f1.item. Women and war].

References[edit]

  1. ^ Villatoux, Marie-Catherine. "Femmes et pilotes militaires dans l'armée de l'Air Une longue quête" [Women and military pilots in the Air Force The long quest]. Revue historique des armées (in French). Translated by Dougthy, Robert A. Archived from the original on 4 April 2021. Retrieved 17 July 2023.
  2. ^ The 586th Fighter Interception and Air Defense Regiment, the 587th Bombardment Regiment in dive and the 588th night bombardment regiment. The 588th regiment is the only one to have remained exclusively female until the end of the war, in "Conquérantes de l'air", Icare, n° 205, June 2008, p. 157
  3. ^ Sébastien Albertelli (2020). Elles ont suivi De Gaulle : L'histoire de la première unité militaire féminine de l'armée française [They followed De Gaulle: The story of the first female military unit of the French army] (in French). Place des éditeurs. ISBN 978-2-262-08548-3.
  4. ^ As evidenced by the mention specified on the historique.sga.defense.gouv.fr/sites/default/files /2019-10/Claire_Roman.pdf military file of Claire Roman [dead link]
  5. ^ a b aviation-feminine Feminine aviation, website of the Ministry of Armed Forces [dead link]
  6. ^ Comment je suis devenue lieutenant colonel "le", 1960 and 1991, La Bruyère editions.
  7. ^ Massé, Xavier (2009). Women in Aeronautics (in French). Nouvelles Éditions latines. ISBN 978-2-7233-2076-4. Retrieved 2018-08-02..
  8. ^ "06 Press releases". www.traditions-air.fr. Retrieved 2019-01-08.
  9. ^ Raymond Caire, La femme militaire, 1981, p. 138: "Paulette Bray-Bouquet, Andrée Dupeyron, Gisèle Gunepin, Élisabeth Lion and Yvonne Jourjon were admitted to the transformation school of Kasba-Tadla to be reconverted on light twins.”
  10. ^ a b Women and pilots soldiers in the Air Force, [1].
  11. ^ Marie-Catherine Villatoux, “Women and military pilots in the Air Force”, Revue historique des armees, 272, 2013, posted online on November 22, 2013, accessed 08 January 2019, §27

Further[edit]

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