François Charles-Roux (19 November 1879 – 26 June 1961) was a French

businessman A businessperson, businessman, or businesswoman is an individual who has founded, owns, or holds shares in (including as an angel investor) a private-sector company. A businessperson undertakes activities (commercial or industrial) for th ...

historian A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the stu ...

and

diplomat A diplomat (from grc, δίπλωμα; romanized ''diploma'') is a person appointed by a state or an intergovernmental institution such as the United Nations or the European Union to conduct diplomacy with one or more other states or internati ...

. He was born in

Marseille Marseille ( , , ; also spelled in English as Marseilles; oc, Marselha ) is the prefecture of the French department of Bouches-du-Rhône and capital of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. Situated in the camargue region of southern Franc ...

Biography

Charles-Roux, the son of Jules Charles-Roux, studied at the

École libre des sciences politiques , motto_lang = fr , mottoeng = Roots of the Future , type = Public research university''Grande école'' , established = , founder = Émile Boutmy , accreditation ...

. This led to a diplomatic career in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

St. Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

Constantinople la, Constantinopolis ota, قسطنطينيه , alternate_name = Byzantion (earlier Greek name), Nova Roma ("New Rome"), Miklagard/Miklagarth (Old Norse), Tsargrad ( Slavic), Qustantiniya (Arabic), Basileuousa ("Queen of Cities"), Megalopolis (" ...

Cairo Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metro ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

and

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...

before being appointed

Ambassador An ambassador is an official envoy, especially a high-ranking diplomat who represents a state and is usually accredited to another sovereign state or to an international organization as the resident representative of their own government or sov ...

of France to the

Holy See The Holy See ( lat, Sancta Sedes, ; it, Santa Sede ), also called the See of Rome, Petrine See or Apostolic See, is the jurisdiction of the Pope in his role as the bishop of Rome. It includes the apostolic episcopal see of the Diocese of Rome ...

in 1932. In May 1940, he succeeded Alexis Léger to the position of Secretary General of the

French Foreign Ministry The Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs () is the ministry of the Government of France that handles France's foreign relations. Since 1855, its headquarters have been located at 37 Quai d'Orsay, close to the National Assembly. The term Qu ...

but left office the following October. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, he was a strong supporter of keeping the

French colonial empire The French colonial empire () comprised the overseas colonies, protectorates and mandate territories that came under French rule from the 16th century onward. A distinction is generally made between the "First French Colonial Empire", that exist ...

including the ultra group Présence française which fought for the maintenance of the French protectorate in Morocco. He was chairman of the Central Committee of the

Ministry of Overseas France The Minister of the Overseas (french: Ministre des Outre-mer) is the official in charge of the Ministry of the Overseas in the Government of the French Republic, responsible for overseeing Overseas France. The office was titled Minister of ...

and President of the

Suez Canal Company Suez ( ar, السويس '; ) is a seaport city (population of about 750,000 ) in north-eastern Egypt, located on the north coast of the Gulf of Suez (a branch of the Red Sea), near the southern terminus of the Suez Canal, having the same boun ...

from 1948 to 1956. He also chaired the Catholic Relief. His work as a historian led to him being elected a member of the Academy of Moral and Political Science in 1934. François Charles-Roux married Sabine Gounelle in 1914. She was from a family of merchants in Marseille who owned the Villa Valmer. They had three children: the writer

Edmonde Charles-Roux Edmonde Charles-Roux (17 April 1920 – 20 January 2016) was a French writer. Early life Charles-Roux was born in 1920 at Neuilly-sur-Seine, the daughter of Francois Charles-Roux, the former French ambassador to Czechoslovakia, a member of t ...

, socialite Cyprienne Charles-Roux, and priest Jean-Marie Charles-Roux.

Selected works

* ''Huit Ans au Vatican, 1932-1940'' (1947), about his years at the Vatican

References

* 1879 births 1961 deaths Businesspeople from Marseille Diplomats from Marseille {{France-diplomat-stub