Pierre Sévigny

Joseph Pierre Albert Sévigny PC , OC (born September 12, 1917 in Québec , † March 20, 2004 in Montreal ) was a Canadian politician , businessman , officer and professor . Sévigny belonged to the Progressive Conservative Party and was Deputy Secretary of Defense in the cabinet of John Diefenbaker from 1958 to 1963 . In 1966 he was at the center of the Munsinger affair .

biography

The son of the House of Commons and Minister Albert Sévigny studied at Laval University and Columbia University . After unsuccessful efforts to start an acting career, he worked as a real estate agent, building contractor and import / export trader. Using the pseudonym Peter Maple , he wrote articles for the Saturday Evening Post .

Sévigny served as a soldier in the Canadian Army during World War II and was promoted to colonel . For his services in the Battle of Hill in 262 he received the Polish order Virtuti Militari and the French Croix de guerre . Together with the 1st Polish Armored Division , he had prevented German tanks from breaking through the Falaise pocket. He lost a leg during the battle in the Reichswald . He wrote the book Face à l'ennemi about his war experiences , for which he was awarded the Prix ​​de Ferrières by the Académie française in 1948 . In 1965 he wrote a second book, This Game of Politics .

On the side of the progressive-conservative party , he ran in the general election in 1958 and was elected in the constituency Longueuil-Pierre-Boucher. He was Deputy Secretary of Defense in John Diefenbaker's cabinet . In the election in 1962 he succeeded in re-election, while he was in the election in 1963 deselected.

Between 1958 and 1961, Sévigny had a love affair with Gerda Munsinger , an alleged prostitute from Germany who was suspected of spying for the Soviet Union . The Royal Canadian Mounted Police informed Attorney General Davie Fulton that they were talking to a fellow cabinet member. Sévigny was identified after investigators found the strange noise on the surveillance footage was his prosthesis falling to the floor . The Munsinger affair was discovered in 1966 and caused weeks of media hype. The then Prime Minister Lester Pearson ordered an investigation that Diefenbaker criticized for his leniency, but could not prove any wrongdoing in Sévigny regarding breach of security regulations.

From 1967 Sévigny taught administrative science at Columbia University, where he was an assistant professor. In 1978 he founded the Les Démocrates party in the province of Québec , but it disbanded two years later. In 1994 he received the Order of Canada .

Web links

• Pierre Sévigny - biographical information on the website of the Canadian Parliament (English)
• Obituary from The Guardian newspaper