On Remembrance Day, Prince Albert II and Pierre Casiraghi visited Compiègne to participate in the 106th anniversary of the Armistice of 11 November 1918.
After a lunch at the Hôtel de Ville, the Prince and his nephew attended the official ceremony held at the Clairière de l’Armistice in the Compiègne forest. The solemn event took place in the presence of Philippe Marini, Mayor of the commune and several government officials. Renaud Girard, journalist and geopolitician, was the guest of honour. Military figures, veterans, members of the public and 400 children from Compiègne and Oise also paid tribute to the soldiers and victims of the Great War. At the end of the ceremony, the Sovereign Prince visited the war museum and the Armistice Memorial, where he signed the Golden Books of the city.
“To the city of Compiègne, which history has shaped into one of the great symbols of France, from royalty to the Republic, including the Second Empire. With my gratitude for its renewed welcome, which allows us to remember the centuries-old community of destiny that binds the Principality of Monaco to your country,” wrote Prince Albert II in the Guestbook
City of Compiègne on 11 November 2024.
The Prince also signed the Rethondes Memorial Guestbook: “In the wake of my visit in the centenary year, on December 6, 2018, and as a sign of family loyalty and personal attachment to the memory of the Great War, the matrix of the 20th century, I wanted to attend a commemoration of November 11 in the Rethondes clearing. The power of the date undoubtedly adds to the symbolism of the place of memory.”
In 1973, Princess Grace also signed the Memorial’s Golden Book while passing through the region.
Prince Albert II then travelled to the Memorial in the famous carriage where the 1918 armistice was signed. This carriage is the historic site that marked the end of hostilities in the First World War. Prince Albert II visited this historic site in 2018, during the commemorations of the centenary of the First World War as part of a tour that also took him to Péronne.
At the end of the afternoon, the Prince took part in a ceremony at the Internment and Deportation Memorial, located at the Royallieu Camp, where he laid a wreath in tribute to the victims of internment.
The Sovereign’s great-grandfather, Prince Louis II, had voluntarily joined the French army in 1914 and distinguished himself as a liaison officer within the staff of the 5th Army, notably during the Battle of Chemin des Dames, one of the deadliest episodes of the First World War.
