Word: douaumont
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Since the bizarre theft occurred only two weeks before France's parliamentary elections, the caper had distinct political overtones. If Pétain's body were to be found before the elections, there would be considerable public clamor to bury it in the national military cemetery at Douaumont near Verdun; in 1971 a public-opinion poll, taken for the Bordeaux newspaper Sud-Ouest, showed that 72% of the French people favored such a move. The "nou-velle affaire Pétain," as the French were calling the caper, revived old political quarrels over the sensitive issue of national...
...highway leading from the Atlantic coast toward Verdun, where the culprits-who were presumed to be ultra-rightists-might be planning to bury the corpse. All trucks capable of hauling the 450-lb., zinc-lined oak coffin were stopped and systematically searched. Police also circled the sprawling cemetery at Douaumont, where workers dug up graves in which they thought the corpse might have been concealed...
...Assembly and a veteran of the Algerian war, held a press conference in Paris at which he boasted that he alone knew where the body was. "I will keep my secret," he said, "until the President of the Republic rehabilitates Pétain, and his remains are transferred to Douaumont...