IN THE summer sunshine, the thoughts of the survivors of the French Resistance, and of the British who helped them, perhaps lingered on memories of friends long gone yesterday when they heard the opening bars of The Song of the Partisans.
“My friend, do you hear the dark flight of the crows over our plains? My friend, do you hear the dulled cries of our countries in chains?” sang the French army choir, accompanied by students from the Lycée Charles de Gaulle in Paris, from words first written in London in 1943.
On June 16th, 1940, and in the days afterwards, the old men and women gathered yesterday in the Royal Hospital in Chelsea to mark the call to arms made by General de Gaulle – the appelas it is known to history – responded to that cry for freedom.
The speech, which happened only because Winston Churchill overruled objectors among his own ranks, was heard by few the first time it was broadcast, but it was repeated and repeated until it was heard.
For President Sarkozy, the appel saved France’s honour: “By welcoming General de Gaulle, by offering him the microphone of the BBC, by recognising his legitimacy and that of Free France, Britain made known its conviction that the only true France – were she represented by one man only – could be that France which had not stooped to betrayal, which had the will to fight on, which did not accept defeat.
“By recognising General de Gaulle’s right to speak and act in the name of France, Britain paid to France the finest tribute she has ever received, because it signified that in British eyes France could only be one and the same with the highest notion of honour,” he told the gathering.
The French came in force yesterday. Seven hundred dignitaries, including Mr Sarkozy’s wife, Carla, travelled on a specially-liveried Eurostar, which was kept on the platform during the ceremony, waiting for their return to St Pancras International.
Amid much talk of mon ami and “fraternal greetings”, Mr Cameron stressed his own distant connections with the events of 1940, pointing out that his father’s great-uncle, Duff Cooper, had been one of those who opposed the attempts to silence de Gaulle.
The anniversary, still celebrated widely in France but rarely more so than this year, helps to downplay the memory of Vichy, Marshal Pétain and collaboration, with one historian, Jean-Pierre Azéma, warning that “history is being used as a political tool in a kind of national story-telling”.
Though keen to remember the past, Mr Cameron, who has spent much time wooing the French president since he took power, and Mr Sarkozy both wanted to use the occasion to stress present and future ties between the two countries, with the British prime minister pointedly drawing a connection between the alliance of 70 years and the military operations today in Afghanistan.
Leaving the event, Mr Cameron stooped to pick up a walking stick dropped by a bemedalled veteran.
The photographers showed more interest, however, in the politicians’ wives, Samantha Cameron and Carla Bruni, particularly when Ms Bruni, wearing a dove-grey knee-length dress, leaned over during Mr Sarkozy’s speech to sweep a buzzing insect from Mrs Cameron’s black and cream outfit.