Odette Nilès, communist resistance fighter and "fiancée" of Guy Môquet, died at the age of 100

Europe 1 with AFP 15:42 p.m., May 27, 2023, modified at 15:43 p.m., May 27, 2023

The communist resistance fighter Odette Nilès, the "fiancée" of Guy Môquet and last survivor of the Choise camp, died at 100 years old on the night of Friday to Saturday, announced the PCF. "Odette Nilès represented a century of commitment and freedom. We will continue to carry his work of memory, "paid tribute Emmanuel Macron, on Twitter, on this anniversary of the creation of the National Council of Resistance.

"We are losing a friend and comrade we cherished. The France loses a great figure of the Resistance," the national secretary of the Communist Party Fabien Roussel said in a statement.

Resistance fighter at the age of 15, "fiancée of Guy Môquet" in Châteaubriant, communist and tireless fighter, Odette Nilès represented a century of commitment and freedom. We will continue to carry his work of memory.

— Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) May 27, 2023

Born on December 27, 1922 in Paris and a member of the Communist Youth from 1940, she distributed leaflets and participated in demonstrations from the beginning of the war. She was arrested by the French police on August 13, 1941 on her way to one of them. Transferred to the Choisel camp in Châteaubriant (Loire-Atlantique), she met Guy Môquet, "at the barrier", the boundary between the men's camp and that of women, and promised him a "skate". But Guy Môquet was shot the next day, October 22, 1941, and his final message was for Odette: "I will die (...) without having what you promised me," that kiss.

Women's rights activist

For nearly three years, the young woman was interned in several camps. Until that of Mérignac (Gironde), from where she escaped in 1944, joining the Resistance in Bordeaux. It was there that she met Maurice Nilès, a young FFI (French Forces of the Interior) commander who would become her husband. After the war, he was deputy (1958-1985) and PCF mayor (1959-1997) of Drancy. Odette Nilès remained faithful to her communist ideal all her life and campaigned for women's rights.

"She has never ceased to transmit to the children her story, our history, and the values of these women and men to whom we owe our freedom as a nation," added Fabien Roussel.