Thread by @TheGrigoryan

A thread about French-Armenian resistance leader, #ArmenianGenocide survivor, poet, activist, French #ArmenianHero MissakManouchian 🧵⤵️🇫🇷🇦🇲

1. A talk with @SilvanDiepen reminded me about this amazing WWII personality, a hero, a refugee, a romantic, a poet, an intellectual, a resistance leader who sacrificed his life for his new homeland #France. This poster in popular Envalides Miltry museum in Paris is how I met him

2. In 1925 Missak moved to France from an orphanage in #Lebanon, where he ended fleeing from the #ArmenianGenocide. He was active in communist Armenian literary circles. During World War II he was the leader of a significant resistance group consisting of European immigrants...

3. ...including many #Jews. It carried our significant sabotage missions against Nazi targets in the region of Paris & was known as the most active French Resistance group. Nazi occupying forces were actively hunting for the group & eventually arrested them in Nov 1943.

4. Manouchian (along with many of his comrades) was executed by Nazis in Fort Mont-Valérien on 21.02.1944, at the age of 38. His final letter to the love of his life Milena the day before is a popular piece of history & literature in France. He is a hero of the French Resistance.

5. Many streets & squares in 🇫🇷 bear his name. The large wall mural, an outstanding piece of street art at the corner of rue Darcy in 20th arrondossement is particularly impressive. There are monuments of him in city of #Marseilles & military cemetery of Ivry-sur-Seine, #Paris.

6. His bust in #Marseilles has been vandalized by turks, names of the three architects of the #ArmenianGenocide were spraypainted on it... dzovinar.blogspot.com/2017/02/profan…

7. Missak was born in 1906 in ottoman turkey. His parents were killed during #ArmenianGenocide. He & his brother survived, settled in #AGBU-run orphanage in Lebanon. In 1925 he settled in #Paris. 1935-37 he edited 🇦🇲-language left-wing weekly Zangou named after a river in Armenia

8. Manouchian wrote poetry and co-founded two literary magazines, Tchank (Effort) and Mechagouyt (Culture), published articles on 🇫🇷 literature & 🇦🇲 culture, translated poetry of Baudelaire, Verlaine & Rimbaud making many of these works available in Armenian for the first time.

9. Missak enrolled at Sorbonne for courses in literature, philosophy, economics & history. He was elected secretary of Relief Committee for #Armenia, an organization associated with the Immigrant Workforce Movement. Where in 1935, he met his love & future wife Mélinée Assadourian

10. Mélinée Assadourian saved him securing his release from prison camp at Compiègne, after his arrest within an anti-communist round-up in #Paris on 22 June 1941.
In 1943 he assumed the leadership of about 50 saboteurs.

11. The Manouchian group is credited with the assassination on of General Julius Ritter & almost 30 successful attacks on German interests aug-nov 1943. World famous singer Charles Aznavour & his family were members of the Manouchian group.

12. Aznavour family were recognized after the war for rescuing Jews and Armenians from Nazi persecution. The singer was honored & awarded by the Roul Wallanberg Foundation. raoulwallenberg.net/press/2017-2/c…

13. 2007 - exhibition dedicated to Manouchian at Musée Jean Moulin in #Paris, within Year of 🇦🇲 in 🇫🇷France.
2014 - 70th anniversary of his execution, commemoration ceremony held at Fort Mont-Valérien, attended by Prez Hollande, FM Nalbandyan & Aznavour

14. On 13 March 2014, the Missak Manouchian Park was opened in the central of #Armenian capital #Yerevan , attended by Presidents Sargsyan and Hollande.

There is a sizeable respected Armenian Diaspora in #France because of #ArmenianGenocide & exhodus from their ancestral lands by Turkey. Notable Armenians in 🇫🇷 cultural & political life include Aznavour, Verneuil, Sapritch, Fiori, Ségara, Légitimus, Jackie Nercessian, Devejian..

Sources:
1. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missak_Ma…
2. alchetron.com/M%C3%A9lin%C3%…
3. dzovinar.blogspot.com/2017/02/profan…
4. raoulwallenberg.net/press/2017-2/c…
5. littlearmenias.com/listings/manou…