Pierre Lefaucheux

Vocation

Notable

Leading French industrialist and recipient of the Order of Liberation, awarded to heroes of France's Liberation during World War II. He volunteered for military service in September 1917, his record of military achievement in the First World War being crowned with his receipt of the croix de guerre. Returning to civilian life he enrolled at the école centrale des arts et manufactures, obtaining his diploma in 1922. Lefacheux began his working life with a brief spell at the North France Railway Company, before joining in 1925 the Compagnie générale de construction de fours (General Boiler Manufacturing Company) where he would build his career until 1939, and where he became a director. In parallel, he began in 1929 a doctoral thesis which he would submit in 1935 on the subject of “The peseta and the Spanish economy”. War would again transform Lefaucheux's life. Called up in 1939, he was appointed Director for the Le Mansammunition factory in January 1940. His distinguished Resistance career was truncated when he was captured and imprisoned at Buchenwald After the nationalisation of the Renault automobile business Lefaucheux took charge of the company in 1945. Lefaucheux had no great passion for cars, and even after being appointed to the top job at Renault he continued, for some time, to travel to work using his preferred form of locomotion, a pedal cycle. Lefacheaux set a pattern whereby Renault, despite now being a nationalised industry, ferociously rejected management by politicians: in this he was naturally able to draw on the network of influential former resistance leaders and fighters, many now in positions of power within the Fourth Republic French state. This was important at a time when France was ruled by a strongly dirigiste government, capable of implenting the Pons Plan which reflected government determination to structure the French auto-industry according to priorities identified by politicians and civil servants. Lefaucheux's stewardship saw Renault becoming France's leading automobile manufacturer, with Lefaucheux directing the development of the commercially successful Renault 4CV — and up until the time of his death, its successor, theRenault Dauphine. On Friday, 11 February 1955, Lefaucheux was scheduled to give a presentation to Catholic students in Strasbourg. Despite inclement icy weather, Lefaucheux, an avid motorist, decided at the last minute to travel by car — placing his suitcase not in the trunk, but on the rear seat of his Renault Frégate. Approaching Saint-Dizier from the West, on the Route Nationale 4 (N4), he encountered a detour, which at the last moment he tried to follow. The road surface was covered with black ice, the car spun, rolled over and landed on its side in a field. Though the Frégate's passenger cell was largely intact, Lafaucheux's unsecured suitcase on the rear seat had struck him in the neck, killing him instantly. In his pocket, he carried a train ticket for the trip. Link to Wikipedia biography