Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Merci Le Mirror, for finding my British great-grandad
Macron’s joy over long-lost relatives
FRENCH President Emmanuel Macron has thanked the Daily Mirror for unravelling the mystery of his English great-grandfather.
Despite being elected one of the world’s most powerful leaders last year, he had no idea of the identity of his cross-channel ancestor.
So I tracked down the full story of Bristol-born George Robertson.
And at a London reception on Thursday night I gave the 40-yearold President de la Republique a dossier containing full details of the war hero’s life both in Britain and France.
Mr Macron told me: “This is so wonderful. Thank you very much for doing all of this work.
“I never knew about this so I am delighted to be able to see these documents about this man’s life.”
With PM Theresa May by his side at the Victoria and Albert Museum in West London, Mr Macron looked fascinated as I showed him George’s 1888 birth certificate.
I also provided the French marriage licence which shows George stayed in France after fighting on the Somme in the First World War. In 1919 in the northern city of Abbeville, close to where the President grew up in Amiens, the ex-butcher wed Suzanne Leblond.
Our exclusive investigation revealed that George and Suzanne had three daughters. The middle one, Jacqueline, born in 1922, went on to marry Andre Macron. And their son, Jean-michel, was the dynamic young President’s father.
It appears, however, that George was not widely discussed in the Macron family because he ran out on his wife while the children were still young.
After working in Paris he divorced Suzanne, returned to England and settled in the East End of London. He became a shopkeeper and married a war widow called Elizabeth with whom he spent the rest of his life.
George told his new family little of his earlier life so the secret link between the President and the young Bristol butcher never emerged. But now Mr Macron has proof he is part English, it might at least encourage him to be a tad more generous towards the land of his ancestor.
Because at a news conference before the reception, the one-eighth-english President dashed Mrs May’s hopes that the UK’S financial services industry will be able to compete on the same terms after Brexit.
She looked extremely uncomfortable as the “entente chaleureuse” (warm agreement) of their meeting at Sandhurst, Berks, suddenly turned a lot cooler.
But at least the two did heal another long-standing family rift – this one going back to 1066 and the Battle of Hastings – by agreeing to bring the Bayeux Tapestry to Britain for the first time.