Alain Pignon from France died at the end of last month at the age of 100. As a parachutist, he landed in Wateren during the liberation of Drenthe in 1945, and then free Appelscha. After the death of Pignon, three more French paratroopers who were dropped in the Netherlands during Operation Amherst.
Pignon was born on December 12, 1924 in Tunis. In the war he took his parachutist qualification and on 30 May 1944 he joined the elite troops of the 3rd Special Air Service (SAS), a British unit of which French parachutists were part of. The 3rd SAS played an important role in the operation around the French town of Sennecey-le-Grand, in which troops managed to surprise a German convoy. Pignon was the last survivor of the operation.
Later in the war, the 3rd SAS was also used during Operation Amherst, the offensive that had to ensure the liberation of the Northern Netherlands. Around 700 parachutists landed across Drenthe to expel the German occupiers. In the night of 7 to 8 April, around 60 French parachutists, spread over five groups (so-called sticks), set foot on the Drents-Friese border.
Due to the bad weather, Collery’s stick, of which Pignon was a part, did not land on the planned droplocation. “But at the Kerks farm near Appelscha, the five sticks gathered to perform their operations,” says Geert Veen from the Historical Association Appelscha.
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