Date of birth:

December 30th, 1900 (Armentières, France)

Date of death:

April 11th, 1945 (Sandbostel, Germany)

Nationality:

French

Bachelor, he anticipated the call and enlisted for the duration of the war at the age of 17.

Demobilized as a reserve officer, he remained attached between the two wars to the study of military questions and to the practice of refresher courses.

In 1929, he became general agent of the insurance company "La Nationale" in Puy in Haute-Loire.

Recalled to serve in 1939 as a reserve lieutenant in the 8th GRDI in Moulins, he served there as an intelligence officer and distinguished himself in several numerous actions in combat in May and June 1940. He received the Croix de Guerre and two citations.

Demobilized in August 1940, he returned to Le Puy, in Haute-Loire, where he resumed his profession with the company "La Nationale".

In 1941, Henri Chas came into contact with a British intelligence service (Antoine-Ventriloquist Buckmaster Network) headed in the region by the commandant of Vaumecourt (alias Gauthier). He ensures the reception of agents and parachuted equipment until November 1942, when his team is decimated by several arrests.

Shortly after, he got in touch with the United Resistance Movements (MUR) and was appointed head of the Secret Army (AS) of Haute-Loire. In October 1943, he succeeded in organizing the escape of a British agent who was in the hospital in Le Puy. Following this escape, his wife and children were arrested and questioned by the police for 48 hours. He is therefore obliged to go underground.

In January 1944, under the pseudonym "Charlieu", he became head of the MUR maquis in the Limoges region.

In May 1944, he was appointed head of the Free Corps of the Liberation (CFL) of the R 5 region (Dordogne, Corrèze, Haute Vienne, Indre) and extended his action to Creuse. It endeavors to set up a disciplined and efficient paramilitary organization whose action it coordinates; it also strives to maintain links with the various maquis in order to coordinate their engagement. Henri Chas is in close contact with Colonel Rousselier (known as "Rivière"), FFI regional leader and with Eugène Déchelette, Regional Military Delegate (DMR).

In July 1944, a German column occupied part of the Creuse to carry out a cleaning operation. Charlieu, who is in the region of Bourganeuf, in the castle of Péreuse, seat of a maquis, is attacked on July 16 by a battalion. He manages to escape at first, but refuses to leave the area until the operation is completed.

On July 22, he was arrested in Vieilleville by the Germans. Taken to Clermont-Ferrand, he was deported on August 20, 1944 to Dachau, via the Natzweiler-Struthof camp.

Then transferred to Neuengamme, Henri Chas died on April 11, 1945 during the evacuation of the camp to Sandbostel, a former prisoner of war camp, located to the west of Hamburg, the XB stalag, which had become Neuengamme's "death house".

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• - Henri CHAS | L'Ordre de la Libération et son Musée