Annette Lajon died on Wednesday August 16 at the age of 91. She was a figure of the Norman resistance during the Second World War, and among the youngest resistant: only daughter, Annette Lajon had decided to enlist at the age of 11, in 1942, alongside her father and his mother. The girl then hid false identity cards under her dolls in the family home during searches by the German army in Normandy.
“The fight for the values ??of France has no age: in 1942, Annette Lajon was eleven years old when she decided to resist against the Nazis in Normandy. His death urges us to take up his transmission torch,” President Emmanuel Macron posted on X (ex-Twitter) on Thursday.
The fight for the values ??of France has no age: in 1942, Annette Lajon was eleven years old when she decided to resist against the Nazis in Normandy. His death urges us to take up his torch of transmission. Thoughts to all his loved ones. pic.twitter.com/o7wPm8epP0
“Entrant in resistance from the age of 11, hiding her equipment behind her dolls, Annette Lajon had become a tireless witness of the Norman Resistance. She died at age 91. His legacy will live. We will continue to carry his work of memory, “posted for his part the Minister of the Armed Forces, Sébastien Lecornu.
Annette Lajon had decided to follow the path of her parents who had refused the armistice of 1940 and had joined the Resistance. Undaunted, the little girl told her parents, “I know you’re resisting, I want to fight with you!” “Despite my young age, I was well aware that an unfortunate word could cost the lives of others and myself. Absolute secrecy had to be kept,” she told reporters a few years ago. She had recounted the visit of Gestapo chief Richard Reinhardt to Orne in February 1944, for a proper search.
Her parents made, in particular, false identity cards and hid stamps, weapons, plastic bars and equipment parachuted by the English, such as the tire blasters that the young girl was going to place on the roads, one night on two with his mother in order to block German convoys.
“We have been, on several occasions, very lucky, like the day of this search. At the entrance to the room, there were my toys and dolls on the floor. Seeing this, Reinhardt signaled to his men not to search there, and yet, it was in this room above the ceiling, that the material for false identity cards was… At my age, I I was above all a liaison officer. The Germans had no idea that such a young girl could resist,” she explained with a smile on her face.
