Albert Séverin Roche (1895–1939) was a distinguished French soldier, known for his numerous successful missions and the capturing of enemy soldiers throughout the First World War.
Ferdinand Foch, the Supreme Allied Commander during the war, said that Roche was "the first soldier of France".
In 1913, Albert was rejected by an assessment board of the French Army, because it considered him too puny to serve. This apparently delighted his father who stated, “We need arms to run the farm." In August 1914 Albert, however, wanted to fight and in opposition to his father took his bag and ran away.
Albert was assigned on 3 July 1915 to the 27th Battalion of Chasseurs Alpins, this battalion was nicknamed the "blue devils" by the Germans.
On one occasion, he was captured
with his wounded lieutenant. Isolated in a bunker during an interrogation, he
managed to overwhelm and kill his interrogator and to steal his pistol. He
returned to the French lines with 42 new prisoners while wearing his wounded
lieutenant on his back.
By the end of the war, Albert had been wounded nine times and had personally captured 1,180 prisoners. At the end of the conflict, at 23, he was still a second-class soldier. On November 27, 1918, on the balcony of the City Hall of Strasbourg, Albert was presented to General Ferdinand Foch in front of a huge crowd with these words: "Alsatians, I present to you your liberator Albert Roche. He is the first soldier of France!" Shortly before, Foch had surprisingly discovered Albert's service record and exclaimed, "He has done all this, and he has no rank."
In April 1939, Albert was involved in an accident with a car as he was departing from a bus that took him to work. The car once belonged to the former President of the Republic, Emile Loubet. He was transferred to the Sainte-Marthe hospital in Avignon, where he died on 14 April.
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