A Particularly Tragic Case of Possible Alzheimer's Disease, that of Marshal Pétain

Abstract

After World War I and more particularly in June 1940, the prestige of French Marshal Philippe Pétain, considered as the winning general the battle of Verdun, was very high. He became President of Council while the French army was unable to stop the German offensives. But five years later he was sentenced to death for high treason. By rereading his bibliography from a medical perspective, it is possible to find multiple suggestive events and to affirm a posteriori Pétain suffered from a neurodegenerative disorder, whose first signs appeared in the 1930s, suggestive of Alzheimer's disease, which had an impact on French politics. The modern medical knowledge of this disease casts a new light on the behavior of Petain during the last war.

Keywords: Alzheimer’s disease; Pétain; dementia; neurocognitive syndrome.