Who is Héléna Fournier, the resistance fighter who gives her name to a street in Tours | The mail

Héléna Fournier, resistant survivor of the death camps and Nazi barbarism now has a street named following her in Tours. Who is she ? (©Collection Carole Toulousy-Michel)

Saturday, December 4, 2021the inauguration ceremony of the rue bearing the name ofHelena Fournier will be held in the Sainte-Radegonde district in the north of Tours.

At 11 o’clockthe plaque will be unveiled in the presence of Carole Toulousy-Michel, her granddaughter who lives in the United States.

The decision was adopted during the municipal Council of November 9, 2020.

Who is Helena Fournier?

Born Pellault in 1904 in Cussay, Touraine, Héléna Fournier held a groceries with her husband Raphaël on rue Febvotte in Tours.

Héléna married at the age of years with Raphaël Fournier, five years her senior.
Héléna married at the age of 18 with Raphaël Fournier, five years her senior. (©Collection Carole Toulousy-Michel)

From the union of the couple is born a girlLiliane, and 1926.

Remote resistant

She joined the Resistance with her husband before being denounced to the Gestapo in 1942. She was part of the ” convoy of 31,000 along with 250 other women deported to Auschwitz. They will enter the camp singing the Marseillaise.

After Auschwitzshe will know the camps of Ravensbrück and of Mauthausenshe survived and returned to her native Touraine in 1945, sole survivor of the group of women arrested and deported with her.

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Héléna Fournier photographed at Auschwitz-I, February 3, 1943. Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, Oświęcim, Poland.
Héléna Fournier photographed at Auschwitz-I, February 3, 1943. Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, Oświęcim, Poland. (©Live Memory Collection. All rights reserved.)

The testimony of his experience in the camps

After her return to her family, she will take it to heart to announce the death of the 19 other deported Tourangelles to their families, and will dedicate her life to testify tirelessly of his experience.

His commitment will earn him the Legion of Honor delivered in 1966 from the hands of Jean Meunier. She will be elevated to the rank of officer in 1985 and medalist of the Voluntary Combatant of the Resistance.

Jean Meunier awarded the Legion of Honor to Héléna Fournier in 1966.
Jean Meunier awarded the Legion of Honor to Héléna Fournier in 1966. (©Collection Carole Toulousy-Michel)

She died in 1994

The street that now bears his name

Rue Héléna Fournier is located between rue Daniel Meyer and rue Ronsard. If it is currently a dead end, the municipality specifies that it is not completed and that it will be extended by an alley.

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