PATTON 241
of the 21st Com pany. Réveilhac ordered its commander, Capt. Equilbey, to pro-
duce a list of names that included six corporals and 18 enlisted men, randomly
chosen by lot from the two youn gest members in every squad. Six days after the
failed attack, the 24 men were court- martialed for cowardice by a military tribu-
nal, quickly convicted, and sentenced to death. Though 20 were subsequently
granted stays, 4 of the soldiers— Cpls. Théophile Maupas, Lefoulon Louis, Louis
Girard, and Lucien Lechat— were executed by firing squad on 17 March 1915. Two
of the four were married, three had children, and Maupas had been repeatedly cited
for bravery in battle. Like Mireau in the film, Réveilhac did not escape repercus-
sions. In 1916 he was relieved of command and later reassigned to rear echelon
duty. In 1921 public outrage ensued when Réveilhac’s callous actions at Souain were
revealed in the press. Nonetheless, Blanche Maupas and Eulalie Lechat, two of the
victims’ widows, would have to wait another 13 years to gain any satisfaction from
the French legal system. Fi nally, on 3 March 1934, a judge with the Cour spéciale
de justice (Special Court of Justice) ordered the French Army to exonerate the four
men and restore their ranks so their widows and dependents could receive pen-
sions. The story told by Cobb and Kubrick distills the history to achieve both greater
dramatic concentration and deeper sociopo liti cal resonance. In book and film only
three men are court- martialed, convicted, and executed. Their defense attorney,
the fictional Col. Dax, is also their regimental commander, which was not the case
in actuality— though the perfunctory nature of the court martial proceedings is
true to the historical real ity. A brave and caring officer and an articulate advocate
for legal justice, Dax expresses civilized moral ideals that were entirely absent at
the actual court- martial in 1915. Both book and movie also address questions of
social caste elitism and careerism in the military that are merely implicit in the
historical source material. Fi nally, book and movie elide the widows’ protracted
fight to have their martyred husbands’ names cleared—an in ter est ing historical
footnote but one that would dilute the admonitory power of both works.
Patton (1970)
Synopsis
Patton is an American biopic/war epic directed by Franklin J. Schaffner from a script
by Francis Ford Coppola and Edmund H. North. The film focuses on General
George S. Patton (played by George C. Scott) during his World War II ser vice as
commander of the U.S. Seventh and Third armies.
Background
General George Smith Patton Jr. (1885–1945), commander of the U.S. Seventh
Army in North Africa and Sicily and the U.S. Third Army in France and Germany
during World War II, was one of the most colorful and controversial figures in mod-
ern American military history. Known as “Old Blood and Guts,” Patton was a
strutting, profanity- spouting, war- loving egomaniac, but also an effective military
leader much feared by Amer i ca’s enemies— and sometimes feared and reviled by