State Funeral
Jean de Lattre de Tassigny was buried in a state funeral lasting five days, in what LIFE magazine described as the "biggest military funeral France had seen since the death of Marshal Foch in 1929". The Marshal's body was conveyed through the streets of Paris in a series of funeral processions, with the coffin lying in state at four separate locations: his home, the chapel at Les Invalides, the Arc de Triomphe and before Notre Dame. Those marching in the funeral processions, following the gun carriage on which the tricolor-covered coffin was carried, included members of the French cabinet, judges, bishops, and Western military leaders. The pallbearers included other Allied generals of World War II, such as Bernard Montgomery and Dwight D. Eisenhower. The route included the Rue de Rivoli and the Champs-Élysées, and the processions went from the Arc de Triomphe to Notre Dame, and then from Notre Dame to Les Invalides. The stage of the journey from the Arc de Triomphe to Notre Dame took place in the evening, and cavalrymen from the Garde Républicaine flanked the coffin on horseback bearing flaming torches. Walking behind the soldiers marching in the funeral processions was the lone figure of the Marshal's widow, Simonne de Lattre de Tassigny, dressed in black and praying as she walked. Thousands of people lined the funeral route, forming crowds standing ten-deep. The pageantry included the tolling of bells, and flags being flown at half-mast. The final stage of the funeral was a journey of 250 miles to the Marshal's birthplace of Mouilleron-en-Pareds in western France. In attendance there was the Marshal's 97-year-old father, Roger de Lattre. Aged and blind, and the last of the de Lattres, he ran his hands over the ceremonial accoutrements on the coffin, which included the posthumously awarded marshal's baton and his son's kepi. Then the coffin was lowered into the ground and the Marshal was laid to rest beside his only son, Bernard, who had been killed fighting under his father's command in Indochina some eight months previously.
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