Yesterday we talked about the French Foreign Legion, Légion étrangère, mentioning Susan Travers, the only woman to have served with them.
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| Susan Travers during WW2 |
Susan Mary Gillian Travers was born in London on 23rd
September 1909. Her father, Admiral Francis Eaton Travers and her mother, Eleanor
Catherine were austere and distantly cold parents.
When she was 12, the family moved to the south of France for her father’s health and
there, Susan entered the world of a rich and carefree young socialite.
“It was a wonderful time to be on the Riviera. Parties and champagne, and tangos and Charlestons and of course lots of young men - well, lovers really.”
In later years, her ghost
writer-biographer, Wendy Holden said, ‘there were rather a lot of lovers, even
a Russian Prince but we had to leave some of them out!’
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| Author Wendy Holden and Susan |
On a generous monthly allowance from an aunt, young Susan lived an easy life, drifting between chateaux, country house parties and the smartest hotels.
She was staying in the luxurious Poitiers home of a divorced friend when Britain declared war on Germany.
She was almost 30 and along with many thousands of other young women applied to join the French Red Cross; completed training as a nurse but decided a more exciting life could be had as an ambulance driver.
In this role, she sailed from Liverpool with the 13th Demi-brigade of the French Foreign Legion, as driver to one of the Legion's doctors.
Tragically, he was soon killed when his truck hit a landmine.
His replacement, Colonel Marie-Pierre Koenig for whom Susan was also the official driver, subsequently became her lover, some say the love of her life.
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| Koenig |
In May 1942, 1st Free French Brigade was posted to Bir Hakeim in Libya, under constant attack from Axis forces.
During one bombardment, a shell took off the roof of Koenig's car but Travers and a Vietnamese driver fixed it.
With Stukas, Panzer tanks and heavy artillery, the Germans expected to take the fort in minutes. The Free French held it for 15 days.
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| Legionnaires at Bir Hakeim |
For most of that time, Susan Travers lay in a small hole in the ground, dug out by her Legionnair comrades. Temperatures reached 51C but she refused to leave her Legion friends and her lover.
As water and ammunition ran out, Koenig decided to evacuate and as they left Bir Hakeim, their column ran into minefields and German machine gun fire but Travers was ordered to drive at the front of the column, “The rest will follow” Koenig told her". And follow they did.
Reminiscing year later, Susan
Travers said, ‘It’s a delightful feeling, going as fast as you can in the dark.
My main concern was that the engine would stall.”
When they got to the British lines the next day, her vehicle
had 11 bullet holes and the shock absorbers and brakes were totally useless.
Koening, promoted to General was transferred but Travers remained with the Legion, who had nicknamed her ‘La Miss’, and went on to drive a self-propelled anti-tank gun in the Italian Campaign.
She saw further action in Germany and France before being posted to Vietnam during the First Indo-China War. . She was wounded when she too drove over a land mine.
After the war, her military status with the Legion became official and she was formally enrolled in the Légion Étrangère, as an Adjutant-chef.
“I had to make my own uniform because there wasn't one for a woman.” She was sent on service to Tunisia, “where I had to go buy a barrel of red wine for the mess every day, and bring it back on the back of a mule.”
After the war, she married Legion Adjudant-chef Nicolas Schlegelmilch, who had also fought at Bir Hakeim. They retired to lived a quiet, unexceptional life in France, raising two sons.
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| Showing their many medals for outstanding bravery |
Madame Susan Schlegelmilch waited until all the main figures
in her remarkable life were dead before she agreed to tell her story.
In in 2000, aged 91 and assisted by author Wendy Holden, she wrote, “Tomorrow to Be Brave: A Memoir of
the Only Woman Ever to Serve in the French Foreign Legion.”
The title came from a poem once read to her by her beloved Koening:
“Distrust yourself, and sleep before
you fight. 'Tis not too late tomorrow to be brave."
“I do hope they make it (my life story) into a film," she told Holden, "I should quite like my grandchildren to
see what their naughty old grandma got up to”.
She died in a Paris nursing home in 2003
Her medals:
Médaille commémorative 1939-1945 with clasp - "Afrique" - "Italie"- "Libération"
Médaille Coloniale, du mérite syrien de 4e classe
Croix de libération finlandaise
Officier de l'Ordre du Nichan Iftikhar
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| Le Croix de Guerre |
