French Foreign Legion information. An online project dedicated to the famous Foreign Legion.
Learn about an infantry regiment of the French Army consisting of foreign volunteers that served as the predecessor to the current French Foreign Legion. It was constituted by a 1815 royal decree, after the defeat of Napoleon I at Waterloo, to replace the eight foreign regiments serving in Napoleon’s army. After its dissolution in early 1831, the unit was replaced by the Foreign Legion.
Read moreHistory: Learn about the predecessor to the French Foreign Legion
40 years ago, in early February 1982, a common French military exercise was planned in Djibouti, a country in the Horn of Africa. A French Foreign Legion airborne platoon was to participate. The Legion paratroopers were ordered to carry out a routine training jump over a drop zone located nord-west of the capital. They boarded their aircraft and took off…
In the mid-1950s, violence against French military, administrative, and civilian targets spread across French North Africa, which included Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco. At the beginning of 1956, several Foreign Legion units were stationed in Morocco. One of those units was the 2nd Foreign Infantry Regiment (2e REI), commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Jacquot. The regiment was based in northern Morocco, in the Taza region. The area was already well known to the Legion.
In North Africa in late 1956, two little-known motorized groups of the Foreign Legion were disbanded, and their five companies helped to double the ranks of the two freshly established “motorized regiments”, first among Foreign Legion units. Learn more about these units that patrolled not only Algeria or Morocco, but also Northern Mauritania.
Read more65 years ago: Two little-known motorized groups of the Foreign Legion were disbanded
In late 2021, a new English-written book dedicated to the French Foreign Legion was released: Collecting French Foreign Legion Insignia, Volume 1, 1st Foreign Regiment. Another original work of Andrew J. Mitchell, an Irish amateur historian and a Foreign Legion insignia collector.
Read moreAndrew J. Mitchell: Collecting French Foreign Legion Insignia – 1st Foreign Regiment
Officially, the very first Foreign Legion airborne unit appeared during the First Indochina War in 1948. However, the history of the legionnaires paratroopers started much earlier: in North Africa during the Second World War.
Read moreSecond World War: A little-known story about the very first para-legionnaires
On this Saturday, October 16, in memory of Hubert Germain, a former officer of the 13e DBLE and the last “companion of the Liberation” (people awarded the Ordre de la Libération of the Free French during WWII) who has just passed away, the Foreign Legion celebrated the centenary of its motto Honneur et Fidélité.
See an exceptional documentary dedicated to the French Foreign Legion’s 2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment (2e REP), produced by the regiment itself in late 1992. Posted on the official channel of the Foreign Legion, the documentary covers the whole period of the 2e REP, since its creation until the early 1990s. It contains rare, interesting old images. Enjoy.
100 years ago, in late June 1871, three battalions of the Foreign Legion landed in Algeria, having returned from the very first deployment of the Legion in metropolitan France. The men spent eight months there and took part in a wretched campaign. However, these weren’t the only foreigners to participate in the then fighting on the French side. Also, the three battalions didn’t represent all units of the Legion that were to partake in the conflict.
Read more100 years ago: A sad campaign in France ended for the Foreign Legion
75 years ago, on 1 June 1946, a new Foreign Legion disciplinary unit was born in French Indochina. Stationed on an island at Cam Ranh Bay in what is now called Vietnam, the unit’s mission was to reform badly behaving legionnaires who were being deployed to the Far East to participate in the First Indochina War (1946-1954), and who couldn’t undergo the usual punishment within their mother units. Although there is only little information, the new article dedicated to this disciplinary unit provides all currently available info, as well as very rare images that were never published before.
45 years ago, in late May 1976, a helicopter transporting Foreign Legion elements crashed to the ground during a military exercise in the Horn of Africa. Six legionnaires died immediately; another two died from their injuries later. At the time, this was the deadliest day for the Legion since the end of the Algerian War in 1962. Although considerably forgotten these days, even in France, this sad event and its victims should be remembered.
Read moreForeign Legion: 45th anniversary of a deadly accident in the Horn of Africa