Adolphe Guillaumat

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Marie Louis Adolphe Guillaumat (Bourgneuf, January 4, 1863- Nantes, May 18, 1940) was a French Army general during World War I.

Adolphe Guillaumat had married Louise Bibent from Toulouse on July 17, 1906 and had two sons: Louis who became an Ophthalmologist and Pierre who became a Civil servant. General Guillaumat was a practising Catholic and an admirer of Frédéric Bastiat.

Adolphe Guillaumat graduated first from his class of 1884 at the Saint-Cyr military academy. After a career partly spent in the French Colonies (Algeria, Tunisia, Tonkin, China), he was appointed Brigadier General in October 1913.

At the start of World War I he was chief of Minister of War Adolphe Messimy's military cabinet.; when the latter left office, he was appointed at the head of the 33th Infantry Division on August 30, 1914 and then of the 4th infantry division on December 9, 1914. He led the 1st Corps d'Armée From February 25, 1915, and on December 15, 1916 he replaced Robert Nivelle as commander of the Second Army, when the latter was made commander-in-chief of the French Army.

He was sent to replace general Sarrail as commander of the French Forces in Salonika in December, 1917. He laid the plans later executed by his replacement, general Franchet d’Esperey, and rebuilt the relations with France's allies somewhat damaged by his predecessor. Guillaumat was recalled to Paris on 17 June 1918 and replaced with Franchet d’Esperey.

There, he replaced Auguste Dubail as military governor of Paris. After the success of the Second Battle of the Marne he was appointed to the Supreme War Council. He then returned to active command as commander of the Fifth Army, which he led through the Ardennes at the end of the war.

After the war, he served as Commander in chief of Allied occupation forces in Germany, then was a Minister of War in a short-lived (June 23-July 19, 1926) government led by Aristide Briand, who had been his 1-year elder at the Nantes Lycée. (His son Pierre served as a Minister of the Armies of General De Gaulle after the latter's return to power from June 1, 1958 to February 5, 1960).