David Saint: Finedon Hall’s secret French connection

County Tales
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It was interesting, a week or so ago, to read of President Emmanuel Macron’s visit to London to commemorate the 80th anniversary of former French president Charles de Gaulle’s appeal to the French to resist the Nazi occupation during World War Two.

While here, he awarded the Légion d’honneur to London.

It was a shame he did not extend his trip by making a journey to Northamptonshire! We would have made him most welcome.

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Perhaps he did not realise that General de Gaulle came here several times during World War Two.

You see, during the war years, Finedon Hall was used as a rehabilitation centre for injured soldiers of the Free French.

The partly Elizabethan mansion has had a fascinating and rather colourful history, but none more heroic than during those troubled times.

Over the front door of Finedon Hall is a stone tablet bearing the inscription: “To young and old, to rich and poor, Faith, Hope and love this counsel give: Who, through all time may pass this door, live thou to die, then die to live.”

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A fine message, I wonder if the members of the Free French read or understood it.

Oddly enough, at one time in the 1920s, it was in the hands of the Bishop of Portsmouth, who intended it to be used as a retirement home for clergy, in which case the inscription would have been heartily endorsed!

However, this never happened and the hall – the family home since the 15th century of the Mulso family, then the Mackworth-Dolbens – was sold in 1912.

It remained empty and unused until, at the suggestion of General Charles de Gaulle, Colonel Pierre Baranger, professor of chemistry at the Sorbonne, housed the soldiers of the Free French and, at the same time, set up laboratories for his research into the treatment of tropical diseases.

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An article in The Picture Post of October 1942 included a photograph of de Gaulle with soldiers living in the hall. It proclaimed that “men of the Fighting French, who have been severely wounded in battle, are being made whole again in new surroundings”.

It continued: “Every man works as he pleases. In the laboratory, Col. Baranger continues his research into malaria, helped by several of his pupils.

“In the library, many men continue the studies the war interrupted. Others are involved in building, carpentry, shoemaking and farming. All of them are involved in the general upkeep of the hall.”

It was on several occasions during those years that de Gaulle paid secret visits to the hall. So secret, in fact, that a strange encounter was recorded in the Wellingborough Post.

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It read: “Private ‘H’ of the VDF (Home Guard) was on duty at Finedon crossroads on a foggy winter night. He heard footsteps in the direction of Thrapston.

“As they got closer, he challenged the unseen individual. No reply. He again issued the challenge. Again, no reply. Raising his rifle, he shouted again.

“A tall man, with a large nose and dressed in French uniform, appeared. It was General Charles de Gaulle, leader of the Free French.”

Zut alors!

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