Daniel Huillier, 95, hopes that the unprecedented tribute which will be paid on Tuesday by the president will allow “young people to realize what their grandparents and great-grandparents did for” them.
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“It is a recognition which, for me, is justified and honors those who sacrificed themselves for the freedom of France,” greets Tuesday April 16 at the microphone of France Bleu Isère Daniel Huillier, one of the last resistance fighters of the Vercors maquis still alive, while an unprecedented tribute to the maquis must be paid on Tuesday. Emmanuel Macron is expected in Vassieux-en-Vercors (Drôme), where the maquis was attacked on April 16, 1944 by the French militia before a final assault by German troops. He will launch the D-Day commemorations there.
95-year-old Isérois, Daniel Huillier considers the moment important, especially since there “never had an official visit from a President of the Republic” previously. “We’ve been waiting for this for 80 years”, he assures. For Daniel Huillier, the arrival of Emmanuel Macron is therefore “a just return that will honor the friends who fell” in 1944. This tribute “brings balm to the heart” of this resistance fighter who, “80 years later (…) remembers everything that these people from Vercors and France did for the Liberation of our country”.
“If we forget our past, it’s difficult to build the future”
Daniel Huillier is aware that today in France they are not “more numerous to have experienced this period” of the Second World War. He therefore considers this tribute all the more important because he hopes that it will allow the “youth to realize what their grandparents and great-grandparents did for” She. “If we forget our past, it’s difficult to build the future”he adds.
