Jacques Moreau (Admiral)

Jacques Hector Charles François Moreau (born August 26, 1884 in Fleurey-sur-Ouche , Département Côte-d'Or , † May 5, 1962 in Loches , Département Indre-et-Loire ) was a Vice Admiral in the French Navy .

Life

Training as a naval officer and First World War

Moreau, son of Rear Admiral Paul Moreau and his wife Marie-Thérèse Meyer, began training as a naval officer at the Naval School (École Navale) and on the training ship Duguay-Trouin after attending school in 1900 . He was transferred to the military port of Toulon on October 5, 1903 and on January 1, 1904 on board the armored cruiser Montcalm to the Far East Naval Division (Division navale d'Extrême-Orient) , where on October 5, 1905 he was promoted to lieutenant at sea (Enseigne de vaisseau de deuxième classe) . It was then used again between January 1, 1906 and January 1, 1908 in the military port of Toulon and then on the Aviso Chamois belonging to the pilot school (École des Pilotes) , before being transferred back to the naval port of Toulon on January 1, 1909. After his promotion to Lieutenant Commander (Lieutenant de Vaisseau) on 16 October 1910 he was on 1 January 1911 officer on the submarine Archimède in submarine base Cherbourg . On December 20, 1911, he moved to Port-Vendres as head of the radio communications post , where he was honored with the Knight's Cross of the Legion of Honor .

After the start of the First World War , Moreau became head of the blockade of the Dardanelles in the port of Moudros during the Battle of Gallipoli in 1915 . After various uses on board the two battleships Courbet and France belonging to the Courbet class and the battleship Provence belonging to the Bretagne class , he became an officer in the staff of the 1st Fleet (1ère Armée navale) . He then took on a position as an officer in the 1st Department of the General Staff of the Navy on January 1, 1917 and on January 1, 1918 in the 3rd Department of the General Staff of the Navy, responsible for rearward services, before he was in April 1918 as commander of Brumaire-class submarine Faraday took over its first ship command in the Adriatic Sea .

Post-war period, promotion to vice admiral and World War II

Then Moreau was in January 1919 in command of the Bizerta stationed submarine Volta , which also belonged to the Brumaire class. He then completed between 1920 and January 1921 an officer training course at the Naval Academy (Ecole Superieure de la Marine) and got there on August 1, 1920 he was promoted to Lieutenant Commander (Capitaine de Corvette) . He was then transferred to the armored cruiser Edgar Quinet on January 1, 1921 , where he was adjutant to the commander of the 1st Light Division of the Mediterranean Squadron, Flotilla Admiral Charles-Henri Dumesnil . He was then transferred to the armored cruiser Waldeck-Rousseau , where he earned services in rescuing French nationals after the fire in Izmir on September 13 and 14, 1922. He was promoted to frigate captain (Capitaine de Frégate) on August 25, 1923 and was awarded the Officer's Cross of the Legion of Honor. After serving as vice-chief of the staff of the Mediterranean squadron on their flagship Provence , he became commander of the submarine Jean-Autric and the 3rd submarine squadron in the naval port of Toulon in August 1925 . He then served between February 1927 and 1929 as commander of Torpedoboot- and telecommunications Officers School (Ecole des Officiers torpilleurs et des transmissions) and from 1929 to March 1930 as an officer listeners at the Center for Higher Marine Studies (Center des Hautes Etudes Navales) , where he arrived three December 1929 was promoted to captain at sea (Capitaine de Vaisseau) . Then in March 1930 he became commander of the 1st torpedo boat squadron (1ère Escadrille de torpilleurs) in the naval port of Toulon, which also included the torpedo boats Amiral Sénès , Basque and Mars , and then in 1932 commander of the submarine flotilla (Flottille des sous -marins) .

On January 15, 1936, Moreau was promoted to chief of staff at the Inspector General of the Naval Forces in the Mediterranean and a month later on February 15, 1936 also promoted to flotilla admiral (Contre-amiral) . In July 1937 he took over the post of commandant of the defense sector and, in personal union, as chief of the general staff of the Cherbourg naval base . He then acted between August 1938 and June 1939 as commander of the 2nd submarine flotilla responsible for the Atlantic Ocean (2ème Flottille des sous-marins) . He was then between June and December 1939 in command of the 5th Squadron (5ème Escadre) with the battleship Paris and the light cruiser Duguay-Trouin . In December 1939 he took over the post of commander of the Atlantic patrols at the Brest naval base .

On July 19, 1940 Moreau was naval commander as well as delegate of the Admiralty in Marseille and received as such on July 29, 1940 his promotion to Rear Admiral (Vice-amiral) . In August 1942 he took over the post as naval commander and naval prefect of the 4th region in Algiers and was promoted to Vice-Admiral (Vice-amiral d'escadre) on October 17, 1942 . In this role he was involved in the planning and implementation of Operation Torch , the Allied invasion of French North Africa during World War II . In August 1943 he finally retired from active military service. In 1955 he became president of the Association of Former Naval School Students (Association des anciens élèves de l'École navale) .

Moreau was married twice, from October 16, 1911 until her death in 1932 with Henriette Thénard, whose father Arnould Thénard represented the canton of Sennecey-le-Grand in the general council of the Saône-et-Loire department between 1892 and his death in 1905 . This marriage resulted in six children, including Michel Moreau, who fell as a captain of the infantry during the Indochina War on September 7, 1947 in Tân Hiệp. In his second marriage he married Simone Terré. Moreau was killed in a traffic accident on May 5, 1962 and was buried in Toulon.

publication

• Les derniers jours de Darlan , Éditions Pygmalion, posthumously 1985

Web links

• Entry on the homepage of the naval school
• Entry in Geneanet

Individual evidence

1. ^ Paul Moreau on the homepage of the naval school