Hubert Germain, a Freemason

On 21 September 2021, Hubert Germain died, the last of the "Compagnons de la Libération", an order created by General de Gaulle in 1944 to honour the fighters of Free France. Best known for his involvement in the Free French Forces, then for his political commitment after the Liberation, Hubert Germain was also a Freemason. Did Freemasonry influence Hubert Germain's commitments, or was his initiation into Freemasonry the crowning glory of a life of commitment ? This is what we will try to understand as we set out to discover the little-known Freemason that Hubert Germain was.

The early years and the Second World War 

Hubert Germain was born in Paris on 6 August 1920. His father was General Maxime Germain (1881-1953), a senior officer in the French colonial forces. Because of his father's duties, Hubert Germain began his secondary education in Damascus, continued it in Hanoi and finished it in Paris. Wishing to follow in his father's footsteps, he sat the competitive examination for the École Navale in June 1940, but as the German army had occupied Paris on 14 June 1940, he submitted a blank paper in order to avoid serving in an army that was about to be subjugated by a foreign power.

When the armistice was signed on 22 June 1940, Hubert Germain refused to accept it and went to London to join the Free French Forces. His father, on the other hand, continued to serve in the army of the Vichy regime, although his lukewarm collaboration with the occupying forces led to his arrest by the Gestapo in 1944.

Hubert Germain trained as a naval officer on the battleship Courbet, which had joined the Free French Forces. In 1941, he was assigned to the staff of General Paul Legentillhomme (1884-1975) and ended up in Palestine, where he took part in the Syrian campaign. In 1942, he joined the 13th half brigade of the Etranger Legion, with which he fought in North Africa (notably at Bir Hakeim and El Alamein). Wounded on 24 June 1944 during the Italian campaign, General de Gaulle awarded him the Cross of the "Compagnons de la Libération". In August 1944, he took part in the landings in Provence, moved up the Rhône Valley with the 1st Division of the Free French Forces and fought in Alsace, Moselle, the Vosges and the Authion Massif (Alpes-Maritimes). After the German surrender on 8 May 1945, he was appointed aide-de-camp to General Pierre Koenig (1894-1970), commander of the French occupation forces in Germany. He remained in this post until his demobilisation in 1946.

After the war 

On 3 October 1945, Hubert Germain married Simone Millon and the couple had three children. In 1950, he joined the Cinzano company as a manager, before working for the Swiss chemical and pharmaceutical company Geigy. 

A member of the Gaullist political movement, he was elected mayor of Saint-Chéron (in today's Essonne), a post he held from 1953 to 1965. Elected three times to the French National Assembly (1962, 1968 and 1973), he served from 1960 to 1968 as chief of mission and then technical adviser to Pierre Messmer (1916-2007), then Minister of the Armed Forces.

Hubert Germain also held ministerial posts in the three Messmer governments from 1972 to 1974. He was Minister of Posts, Telegraphs and Telephones (PTT), Minister for Relations with Parliament and then again Minister of Posts, Telegraphs and Telephones. From 1975 to 1982, he was Chairman of "Société Française de Télédistribution", which was dissolved on 1 January 1983 and replaced by "France Télévision Distribution" in 1990.

Since 2010, Hubert Germain has been a member of the "Conseil de l'Ordre de la Libération", and on 25 November 2020, as the last member of the Order, he was promoted to honorary chancellor.

Hubert Germain, the last "Compagnon de la Libération".

Hubert Germain died on 12 October 2021 at the age of 101. He was buried in the crypt of the Mémorial de la France combattante on Mont-Valérien. With him went the Order of the Liberation.

Masonic career 

Unlike Pierre Brossolette, whom we mentioned in a previous article, Hubert Germain was not a Freemason before the war. In fact, he was only 20 when the armistice was signed in 1940. He did not become one in the immediate post-war period either, being initiated into the Grand Lodge of France in 1975. He was one of the founders of the "Pierre Brossolette-Compagnon de la Libération" Lodge of the Grand Lodge of France and continued his Masonic journey within the Supreme Council of France, reaching the 33rd and final degree of the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite.

He was initiated in 1975 at the age of 55, with most of his career behind him. It was not the Masonic ideal that guided Hubert Germain's career ; on the contrary, it was his love of freedom that led him, in middle age, to recognise himself in the ideal of Freemasonry.