- Robert Benoist
Robert Marcel Charles Benoist, (March 20, 1895 – September 9, 1944) was a French
Grand Prix motor racing driver and war hero.Early life
Born near
Rambouillet , Île-de-France,France , Robert Benoist was the son of Baron Henri de Rothschild's gamekeeper. As a young man, Benoist served duringWorld War I in the French infantry, then as a fighter pilot in the new "Armée de l'Air" and ultimately as a flying instructor.Grand Prix Driver
Looking for excitement in the post-war world, Benoist joined the "de Marçay" car company as a test driver. He then moved on to
Salmson and was very successful in cyclecar races before being signed to drive forDelage in 1924. The next year, teamed withAlbert Divo , he won theFrench Grand Prix in the race that claimed the life of Italian racing starAntonio Ascari .In 1927, driving a Delage 15-S-8, he won the French, Spanish, Italian and
British Grand Prix races, earning the season championship title for the French manufacturer. He is the only driver ever to win these major Grand Prix races in the same year and his accomplishment earned him the Legion of Honor from the French government.When the Delage company dropped out of racing, Robert Benoist was without a job and was appointed manager of the Banville Garage in Paris. He did occasional races for the
Bugatti team, finishing second in the 1928San Sebastián Grand Prix inSpain . The following year he teamed up withAttilio Marinoni to win theSpa 24 Hours race inBelgium , driving an Alfa Romeo. At the end of the season he retired until 1934, when he made a comeback with theBugatti team. He was soon made head of the competition department and masterminded the company's Le Mans programme. In 1937 he partnered withJean-Pierre Wimille to win the24 hours of Le Mans [cite web
url= http://www.grandprix.com/ft/ftjs016.html
title= "Jean-Pierre Wimille"
publisher= Grandprix.com
accessdate=2007-03-17] endurance race. Following that victory, Benoist retired permanently, but continued to run Bugatti's racing department until called up into the French Air Force.World War II
In addition to
Jean-Pierre Wimille , Robert Benoist became good friends with another Grand Prix driver,William Grover-Williams . [cite web
url=http://www.forix.com/8w/rb-w-jpw.html
title="A different danger - three champions at war"
publisher="8W"
author=Richard Armstrong
accessdate=2007-03-18] WhenWorld War II broke out and France was occupied, these three race drivers all escaped toEngland where they joined theSpecial Operations Executive as secret agentscite web
url= http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/releases/2003/may22/soe.htm
title= "Special Operations Executive (SOE) files"
publisher= The National Archives UK
accessdate=2007-03-17] to return to France to assist theFrench Resistance . Parachuted into France, Benoist helped organize sabotage cells and withWilliam Grover-Williams moved weapons from air-drops in theRambouillet forest to his home at Auffargis for storage and distribution.In June of 1943, the "Prosper" network in
Paris collapsed as a result of an informant and its leaders,Francis Suttill andAndrée Borrel , were arrested by theGestapo . In August, Benoist's home was raided by the Gestapo and Grover-Williams was captured and executed at theSachsenhausen concentration camp .Capture and escape
Three days later, Robert Benoist was apprehended in Paris. While being driven to Gestapo headquarters, Benoist leaped from the moving vehicle and escaped,cite web
url= http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/releases/2003/may22/soe.htm
title= "Special Operations Executive (SOE) files"
publisher= The National Archives UK
accessdate=2007-03-17] eventually being smuggled back toEngland via the underground.New missions
Benoist would later return to France on a second mission, lasting from October 1943 to February 1944, after which he returned to
London for a short time before going back to France in March to work in theNantes area with fellow SOE agentDenise Bloch .Robert Benoist was arrested on June 18, 1944 and shipped to
Buchenwald concentration camp where he was executed three months later, on September 11.Testimony
Following
Germany 's surrender, on September 9, 1945 (the date of the first anniversary of his death) the "Coupe Robert Benoist" automobile race was held in Paris in his memory.Captain Robert Benoist is recorded on the
Brookwood Memorial inSurrey ,England and as one of the SOE agents who died for the liberation of France, he is listed on the "Roll of Honor" on theValençay SOE Memorial in the town ofValençay , in theIndre _fr. departement of France.In his honor, the village of Auffargis named a street after him and it is there in the churchyard cemetery on "Allée Robert Benoist" that fellow pioneer race driver,
Ferenc Szisz is buried.Bibliography
*"Au volant: Cours pratique de conduite automobile", Bernard-Précy, Robert Benoist, Paris, Ed. Tallandier 1933
* Foot, MRD: "SOE in France" (HMSO, London 1966)
* Ryan Robert: "Early One Morning" , Headline 2002 ISBN 074726872X
* Pernod Alain: "Grand Prix de France, un si�cle en histoires" , ed. ETAI, 2006, ISBN 2-7268-8657-4
* Saward, Joe: "The Grand Prix Saboteurs", Morienval Press, London, 2006, ISBN 978-0-9554868-0-7References
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