Death of Gérard Descours

September 26, 2017

We are saddened to announce the death, on September 8, 2017, of Gérard Descours, husband of Marie Gatard, a long-standing friend of Odette.

Gérard Descours passed the entrance examination to the ENA at the age of 20. He devoted his career to the great adventure of the French oil industry. He was successively a management attaché at the Bureau de recherches de pétrole, secretary general of SN Repal in Algiers, then managing director of the Farsi Petroleum Company in Tehran. He was also deputy secretary general of the Union générale des pétroles, then of Elf-Union, president of Socantar and finally secretary general of Elf-France and of the refining and distribution branch of the Elf-Aquitaine group. He then moved into the food industry, becoming chairman and managing director of Sanders SA and a member of the management board of the Entreprise minière et chimique. Retiring from the civil administrators’ corps in 1998, he was appointed to the supervisory board of the CDR. In the private sector, he was a partner in the financial services company SODITEEX and manager of Agro associés. He was also director of the monthly “Regards sans frontières”, published by the association Rayonnement français et réalités internationales. Gérard Descours’s career earned him the titles of Knight of the Order of Merit, Knight of the Legion of Honour and Knight of the Order of Agricultural Merit.

Marie Gatard met Odette immediately after the Liberation. Odette was then working in the department in charge of sanatoriums in France. The head of the department was Dr Gaston Baissette, who belonged to the circle of friends of Marie’s mother. Marie was then 13. When Marie’s mother, who was older than Odette, died in 1991, her ties with Odette grew closer. That is how Odette told Marie about the hidden children coming back to her and Moussa. Marie remembers hearing her say: “I held little children in my arms, and now I’m facing grandparents!”

Marie Gatard is a writer. Find her latest books here.