Solange Alexandre, one of the last figures of the French Resistance, has died aged 104. Her story matters because she was not simply attached to a Resistance network: she helped create one and commanded it.
According to the BBC, Alexandre, born Solange Dubuisson in Sarthe in 1922, became a courier in 1941 under the code name Corlay. She travelled by bicycle around the Le Mans area, gathering information and carrying messages during the German occupation.
In April 1944, she and her future husband, Guy Déliot, founded the Pas-de-Boeuf network near Ruillé-sur-Loir. The BBC reported that about 30 men were under her command. The group carried out sabotage operations, sheltered Allied airmen and joined the fighting against occupying German forces after the Normandy landings. Alexandre later took part in the liberation of Tours in September 1944 and ended the war as a sub-lieutenant in the French Interior Forces.
That record gives the public tribute to her death a sharper meaning. Women’s participation in the Resistance is too easily cast as supportive work alone; Alexandre’s documented responsibilities included courier work, organisation and command. Her career does not stand for every woman in the Resistance, but it makes clear why leadership should not be edited out of its history.
President Emmanuel Macron paid tribute on social media after her death was announced. The BBC report does not give a date or cause of death, nor does it report memorial arrangements. What it does provide is a specific account of a wartime leader whose death brings a dwindling generation of direct witnesses back into public view.
Sources
- BBC Europe — France coverage · Source date: 2026-11-10
Independent editorial content. WUA is not affiliated with any political party. 2026-11-11