ABSTRACT
Introduction Over three days in October 1940, Marcel M’Fam, a thirty-three-year-old Gabonese first-class guard in the French colonial army, decided to go home and spend time with his wife rather than return to his post. His desertion, along with that of a comrade, created a minor stir in the Gabonese Army during the fall of 1940, at a time when Vichy and Gaullist forces battled for control of the African territory. Throughout his journey, M’Fam was presented with orders from French authority figures from both camps.1 His reactions to these authorities, and his explanations in the colonial archive, provide valuable insight into African perceptions of the French Empire and highlight the largely ambivalent attitude African soldiers had towards the French state. M’Fam’s decisions demonstrated little concern for the national or political affiliations of the Europeans competing for his obedience. Instead, his actions addressed his own concerns and desires. M’Fam was one of approximately 30,000 troops under French command throughout sub-Saharan Africa in 1940. Most of France’s African forces (the famed but misnamed tirailleurs sénégalaises) remained in the metropole, where they had been concentrated since the declaration of war in 1939. Once Germany defeated France in June 1940, the tirailleurs sénégalaises found themselves trapped in Europe. Consequently, France’s military strength in sub-Saharan Africa constituted mere “sovereignty forces,” totaling approximately 17,500 soldiers, 86 percent of them African “natives.”2 France’s partial occupation meant uncertainty as to who governed its empire abroad. At the behest of the fleeing French government, Marshal Philippe Pétain established a new government at Vichy and signed armistices with Axis powers. Rather than accept this new government, on June 18 a little-known general, Charles de Gaulle, made an appeal over the BBC to Frenchmen everywhere. De Gaulle claimed that he represented the legitimate French government, which rejected Pétain’s agreement with Axis powers. This “Gaullist” call created a dilemma for French colonials throughout French Equatorial and West Africa, particularly those neighboring British territories. They were forced to decide whether they should accept the legitimacy of de Gaulle’s movement and continue cooperating with Britain against Italy and Germany, or demobilize in
accordance with Vichy’s armistice. Conflict over which to support generated profound political divisions throughout the French Empire. While de Gaulle’s vacuous claims to authority inspired Frenchmen across French Equatorial Africa (AEF ) to rally to him, those in Gabon did not. On August 26, 1940, French Guyana-born Félix Éboué supported the French colony of Chad when its military announced their alliance with Charles de Gaulle.3 At two o’clock the following morning, less than thirty Gaullist Frenchmen landed at Douala in Cameroon. With a few key allies, they seized control of the city and proclaimed themselves in control of the entire colony, announcing that it would henceforth be aligned with Free France.4 On August 28, 1940, another Gaullist envoy crossed from Léopoldville (now Kinshasa) in the Belgian Congo to Brazzaville in the French Moyen-Congo and ousted its pro-Vichy governor.5 The next day, the governor of Oubangui-Chari (now the Central African Republic) announced that his territory would also align with de Gaulle, prompting a brief battle with a pro-Vichy army officer for control of the capital.6 By August 29, Gaullist rallies across AEF left only Gabon under Vichy control. However, by November 1940, Gabon would also come under the banner of Free France. Outside France and Central Africa, few have heard this early chapter in World War II, and it has generated almost no historical scholarship in English, with the exception of Eric Jenning’s Free French Africa in World War II (2015). Even within French literature and the limited English-language historiography, more has been written about Pétain’s Vichy government in French West Africa (AOF ).7 Furthermore, Jérôme Ollandet’s singular history of Brazzaville under the Gaullists laments the fact that, although there is a history of these Gaullist rallies (at least in French), “the portion of the history of this era which remains unwritten is that of the natives.”8 While historians of Gabon have done excellent work constructing events and processes from African perspectives, their research has not examined the events of 1940 in significant detail.9 Like many AEF rallies, the Gabon campaign has had scant coverage, with only brief overviews included in the recent historiography.10 Gabon’s story appears, at least superficially, to be told in the context of a European war that was taking place on African soil by happenstance. While it is a story about Europeans’ actions in European-ruled colonies, African actors pervade the story, especially as soldiers.11 Without an African perspective of the events between August and November 1940, we lose the voices of the majority of those involved and affected. Therefore, Marcel M’Fam’s story-which is well documented but rarely historically analyzed-provides an African’s perspective, albeit filtered through colonial interlocutors, of broader geopolitical shifts. By October 1940, the Gabonese town where M’Fam was stationed was occupied by Gaullist forces. The Gaullists’ arrival forced M’Fam to decide which French officers to obey-those of the Vichy government, or the newly arrived Gaullists. This chapter focuses on the few times when M’Fam had the power to exercise his own agency and decide which group to obey. At these junctures, M’Fam obeyed orders selectively as long as possible, using this leeway to pursue his own agenda while showing antipathy for both Vichy and Gaullist authority.
