Charles de Gaulle was a leader in the French Resistance.
Keenly aware of the need to seize the initiative and to get the process under firm judicial control, de Gaulle appointed Justice Minister Franois de Menthon to lead the Legal Purge (puration lgale) to punish traitors and to clear away the traces of the Vichy regime
 On 29 May, De Gaulle disappeared without notifying Prime Minister Pompidou or anyone else in the government, stunning the country

