Private Life
Charles de Gaulle married Yvonne Vendroux on 7 April 1921. They had three children: Philippe (born 1921), Élisabeth (1924), who married General Alain de Boissieu, and Anne (1928–1948). Anne had Down's syndrome and died of pneumonia at the age of 20. De Gaulle always had a particular love for his handicapped daughter; one Colombey resident recalled how he used to walk with her hand-in-hand around the property, caressing her and talking quietly about the things she understood.
Like her husband, Yvonne de Gaulle was a conservative Catholic, and campaigned against prostitution, to stop pornography from being sold in newsstands and sex and nudity from being shown on TV, for which she earned the nickname "Tante ("Auntie") Yvonne." Later she unsuccessfully tried to persuade de Gaulle to outlaw miniskirts in France.
Charles de Gaulle had an older brother Xavier (1887-1955) and sister Marie-Agnes (1889-1983), and two younger brothers, Jaques (1893-1946) and Pierre (1897-1959). He was particularly close to the youngest, Pierre, who so resembled him that Presidential bodyguards often saluted him by mistake when he visited his famous brother or accommpanied him on official visits.
One of Charles de Gaulle's grandsons, also named Charles de Gaulle, was a member of the European Parliament from 1994 to 2004, his last tenure being for the National Front. Another grandson, Jean de Gaulle, was a member of the French Parliament until his retirement in 2007.
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Famous quotes related to private life:
“Denouement to denouement, he took a personal pride in the
certain, certain way he lived his own, private life,
but nevertheless, they shut off his gas; nevertheless,
the bank foreclosed; nevertheless, the landlord called;
nevertheless, the radio broke,
And twelve o’clock arrived just once too often,”
—Kenneth Fearing (1902–1961)
“The others ‘acted’ a role; I was the role. She who was Mary Garden died that it might live. That was my genius ... and my sacrifice. It drained off so much of me that by comparison my private life was empty. I could not give myself completely twice.”
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“As in private life one differentiates between what a man thinks and says of himself and what he really is and does, so in historical struggles one must still more distinguish the language and the imaginary aspirations of parties from their real organism and their real interests, their conception of themselves from their reality.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)