TIME LINE 1960 to 1962

Marxists Internet Archive: History Archive: Algeria

Principal Dates and Time Line of
Algeria 1961-1962
From Timelines of History

1961 January 1 General Fernand Gambiez replaces General Crépin as Commander in Chief of the Army in Algeria.
January 8 French voters overwhelmingly approve General de Gaulle’s Algerian policy in a referendum. The measure is defeated in Algeria were 40% of the electorate obeys the FLN’s order to abstain.
January 8 - 15 Five hundred six rebels are put out of action during the week.
January 15 - 22 Seven hundred three rebels are put out of action during the week.
January 25 General Challe resigns as commander of NATO forces in eastern France and goes into retirement.
January 25 Pierre Popie, liberal lawyer and transporter of funds to the FLN, is killed by counter- terrorists.
February 8 A state of seige is declared in Algiers.
February 8 Twenty five people are killed and 84 wounded inFLN attacks in the Orania.
February 10 The Secret Army Organization (OAS) is founded in by Pierre Lagaillarde; Tassou Georgopoulos, former journalist of l'Echo d'Oran, owner of the Café Riche on the Place Villebois Mareuil and a staff sergeant in the Territorial Armies; garage owner George Gonzalès and Robert Tabarot, former boxer and nephew of the founder of Oran Républicain. Raoul Salan, the most decorated general in France will take charge of it soon after.
February 19 A rebel force is trapped by the French Army near Beni Smir in the Aïn Sefra region while attempting to flee into Morocco. Ninety six rebels are killed and 49 escape.
February 20 French negotiators led by Georges Pompidou meet with an FLN delegation led by Ahmed Boumendjel at Luzerne.
February 28 The first OAS pamphlet is distributed in Algeria and OAS posters appear on the walls of Algiers.
March 1 The FLN incites riots in Oran. Europeans are forced out of the city’s Moslem quarters.
March 3 Verdict is rendered in the Barricades Trial. All of the defendants present in the courtroom are acquitted but placed in administrative internment. Joseph Ortiz is sentenced in absentia to death. The other fugitives are sentenced in absentia to prison terms of 2 to 10 years. The leniency shown by the military tribunal leads to its replacement by the Court of State Security.
March 5 Meetings between French and FLN negotiators resume in Luzerne, Switzerland.
March 8 Twenty five Moslem deputies are expelled from the Gaullist Union pour La Nouvelle Repubique for dismissing the FLN’s claim to exclusively represent the Algerian people in the negotiations. March 30
The French secret services create the Algerian Democratic Action Front (FAAD) which is touted as an outgrowth of the MNA and likely to participate in negotiations on an equal footing with the FLN.
March 31 The Mayor of Evian is killed when an OAS bomb explodes outside his home.
March 31 The Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic agrees to participate in talks at Evian.
April 5 The Algerian Democratic Action Front (FAAD) recruits henchmen among the North Africans in the Paris region to eliminate the leadership of the FLN in the capital and bomb the cafés frequented by known FLN sympathizers.
April 7 The Evian Conference opens. France attempts to bring the MNA and Algerian deputies into the talks but accepts the FLN demands that it be recognized as the exclusive representative of the Algerian people and only valid interlocutor when the FLN threatens to break off negotiations.
April 10 France implements a unilateral ceasefire. Military operations are suspended and replaced with patrols under orders to avoid confrontation.
April 20 The first natural gas from the Hassi R’Mel field in the Sahara reaches the Mediterranean coast by pipeline.
April 21 - 22 Two thousand armed insurgents gather in the Forest of Orléans outside Paris and another 400 in the Forest of Rambouillet where they prepare to join armored units and hussards for a march on the capital. They soon disband for lack of orders.
April 22 Generals Maurice Challe, Edmond Jouhaud, Marie André Zeller and Raoul Salan launch a putsch in Algiers.
0300 – The 1st REP, acting on orders from Commander Elie Denoix, seizes strategic locations in Algiers in a bloodless coup.
1915 – General Challe declares over the radio, “I am in Algiers with Generals Zeller and Jouhaud and in communication with General Salan to uphold our oath, the oath of the Army, to keep Algeria so that our dead will not have died for nothing. A Government of abandonment ...is today on the verge of definitively delivering Algeria to the external organization of the rebellion. ... Would you want Mers El-Kébir and Algiers to be Soviet bases tomarrow?...The Army will not fail in its mission and the orders that I would give you will never have any other goal.”
April 23 President de Gaulle delivers a televised address to the Army and the conscripts ordering them to disobey the orders of the putschists and to sabotage their arms.
April 24 Jean Claude Perez, future head of the OAS, is released along with the other French Algerian detainees from Téfechoune where he was interned for his activities during the Barricades of January 24, 1960.
April 25 French technicians conduct an unplanned test of a nuclear device at Reggane. Gerboise Vert, a Plutonium fission device, is hastily detonated to prevent it is possible capture by General Challe's mutineers. The yield, <1 kiloton, of this shot may have been intentionally compromised.
April 26 The Putsch fails and the insurgents retreat with the 1st Régiment Étranger Parachutiste to Zéralda 30 kilometers from Algiers.
April 26 General Challe surrenders to the authorities. Salan, Zeller and Jouhaud go underground.
April 27 General Petit, the Premier’s military cabinet chief, is dismissed and sentenced to 5 years in prison, in the wake of the putsch.
April 28 The 1st REP is disbanded, the legionnaires leave Zéralda Sidi Bel Abbes singing Edith Piaf’s song “Non je ne regrette rien” (No, I regret nothing).
April 28 Over 400 people, military and civilians, are arrested in France and Algeria.
April 29 A strict curfew is imposed on Algiers. Searches and identity checks commence at 8 p.m. The partisans of French Algeria employ a new psychological tactic: whenever they spot a military patrol during curfew, they tap “Al-gé-rie-fran-çaise” on a glass bottle until the patrol passes from view.
April 30 The 14th and 18th Régiment Coloniale Parachutiste and the Parachute Commando Group are disbanded.
May 4 The police and the Army in Algeria are reorganized.
May 4 The Algiers Bar Association is dissolved.
May 6 General Zeller surrenders to the military authorities in Algiers.
May 10 The French Government and the FLN announce that negotiations will open on May 20th in Evian.
May 13 Publication of three Algiers newspapers is suspended.
May 19 The OAS sets off 19 bombs in Algiers.
May 20 Negotiations between France and the FLN open in Evian.
May 20 France decides to undertake a unilateral truce.
May 20 6,000 FLN internees are released.
May 22 To counterbalance the FLN slogan, “The suitcase or the coffin”, the OAS adopts the propaganda slogan, “Neither suitcase nor coffin, one country.”
May 29 The trial of Generals Challe and Zeller begins.
May 31 Algiers commissioner Avoury, a specialist in the anti-OAS fight, is killed by an OAS commando.
June 1 The number of rebels put out of action during the preceding month is placed at 1,200.
June 2 Two hundred captains boo a colonel who hailed the failure of the Algiers Putsch off stage at Camp Valdahon in Doubs, France.
June 7 General Charles Ailleret replaces General Gambiez as Inter-Army High Commander.
June 9 Four people are killed and 54 wounded in FLN attacks throughout Algiers.
June 13 The Evian talks break down over the intransigence of the FLN in regards to sovereignty over the Sahara and departure of Europeans from Algeria.
June 15 Colonel Godard establishes the organizational structure of the OAS.
June 20 The Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic calls to a resumption of negotiations.
June 20 General Nicot is sentenced to 12 years in prison for participating in the putsch.
June 21 General Gouraud is sentence to 7 years in prison for participating in the putsch.
June 28 President de Gaulle, speaking in Verdun, declares, “The Algerian War is finished. There remains the terrorism.” June 28
Colonel Lecomte is sentenced to 8 years in prison for participating in the putsch.
July 1 Moslems in Algiers go on strike.
July 5 Pro-FLN Moslems demonstrate in protest of French refusals to recognize the Sahara as a part of Algeria. Clashes with the forces of public order leave 81 demonstrators dead and 266 wounded.
July 11 Sentencing is concluded for participants in the Algiers Putsch:
Generals Salan, Jouhaud and Gardy and Colonels Argoud, Broizat, Gardes, Godard, Lacheroy and Commandant Vailly are sentenced in absentia to death.
Captain Sergent is sentenced in absentia to 20 years in prison.
Generals Challe, Zeller and Bigot – 15 years
General Nicot – 12 years
Generals Faure and Vaudrey and Commandant Hélie Denoix de Saint-Marc – 10 years
Colonels Masselot and Lecomte – 8 years
General Gouraud, Colonels de La Chapelle and Bernard Sabouret Garat de Nedde – 7 years
July 14 OAS attacks resume.
July 20 During a skirmish between the 22nd BCA and a rebel band near Bouira, Colonel Si Salah is found in shackles among the wounded. An official statement announces that he was killed as a combatant.
July 20 Negotiations with the FLN resume in Lugrin.
July 28 The Lugrin talks breakdown with the FLN holding firm on two points, sovereignty over the Sahara and guarantees to Algeria’s Europeans.
August 1 Algerian Affairs Minister Louis Joxe declares, “No matter what comes, we will all work so that the men and women of Algeria can build their future together.” But then emphasizes, “I am well constrained to ask what the declarations of intent in which our negotiators make the future of Algeria’s Europeans gleam with reference to association with France....are worth.”
August 2 Coup de Fréjac: The Premier warns the cabinet, “If the Government does not prepare for the evacuation and resettlement of the Pied Noirs in metropolitan France, it will bare a heavy responsibility.” The ministers refuse to listen. According to Boulin, “serious studies” show that the departure of 200,000 can be expected in three months following independence. In fact, more than a million leave by during the next year.
August 5 The one o’clock news program on Algiers television is interrupted by the first OAS pirate broadcast.
August 6 The 4th Congress of the FLN opens in Tripoli with 2 European sympathizers, Locusol (who will be killed by the OAS) and Chaulet, in attendance.
August 8 Si Mohamed, the last FLN protagonist of the Si Salah affair, is killed during the capture of the FLN radio station in a suburb of Blida by the 11th Shock Batallion.
August 16 The unilateral truce ends.
August 20 General Jouhaud takes charge of the OAS in the Oran region.
August 21 The first edition of an OAS pirate newspaper is published in Algiers. During the night an armed gang enters the printing plant of l’Écho d'Alger and replaces the paper’s frontpage with one composed by the OAS. Similar operations are repeated in Oran and Constantine.
August 27 Yusef Ben Khedda replaces Ferhat Abbas as leader of the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic.
August 28 Representatives of the OAS meet secretly with those of the Algerian Democratic Action Front in suburban Oran.
August 31 A private radio station reports that the French special services have been in contact with the Oran OAS.
August 31 Commissioner Ouamri, leader of the anti-OAS brigades, is killed by an OAS commando.
September 5 President de Gaulle accepts the FLN position that the Sahara is an integral part of Algeria.
September 7 Maurice Gingembre, liaison agent for the OAS, is arrest on an airplane flying between Paris and Algiers by Colonel Debrosse of the Gendarmerie Mobile, while in possession of numerous documents which lead to the arrest of several members of the OAS hierarchy.
September 8 President de Gaulle survives an assassination attempt. A remote controlled bomb explodes on the Pont sur Seine as the General passes while en route to his home in Colombey-les-deux-églises. The attackers, who used a personal vehicle with the true plates, are quickly rounded up but the organizer, Colonel Bastien Theiry, will not be arrested until after another attack at Petit Clamart.
September 9 Authorities acting on information provided by the documents seized from Gingembre, arrest Colonel de Blinière and generals Vanuxem and Crèvecoeur.
September 21 The trial of General Faure for his role in the Paris Putsch ends. Faure is sentenced to 10 years in prison.
September 21 A new OAS pirate broadcast on the television delivers instructions for actions to be taken on the 23rd, 25th and 28th of September.
September 22 At 10 p.m. , in accordance with instructions from the OAS, Europeans take to the balconies and bang out the message, “Al-gé-rie-fran-çaise” on pots and pans in a noisy show of support.
September 23 At 6 p.m., on instruction of the OAS, a half hour of silence decends on the European quarters of Algiers. Window curtains and shutters are closed. No one speaks. Cars are parked. Pedestrians stand immobile in the doorways. At 6:30, a bugle sounds to announce the end of the demonstration.
September 25 During the night, hundreds of OAS signs, banners and Tricolors are hung from public buildings, harbor cranes and lampposts throughout Algeria.
September 25 Commissioner Alex Goldenberg, specialist in the anti-OAS fight, is killed by an OAS commando.
September 28 At noon, on instructions from the OAS, all civilian vehicles stop where they are, causing a massive traffic jam that paralyzes Algiers for half an hour.
October 1 Colonel Ahmed Rafa, a French citizen of native origin is promoted to General. He is request to take command of the Force Locale (ATO) but declines declaring that he is French and will remain so until death.
October 2 The OAS begins an offensive against the European milieu (mafia). Nearly all the Algiers gangsters will be killed.
October 5 The curfew for Algerian Moslems is reestablished in Paris.
October 9 At 1 p.m., the OAS takes over the television transmitter at Ouled Fayet near Algiers and broadcast the first of several pirate programs.
October 17 At the call of Maâmar Kaci, chief of FLN Wilaya I in France, 20 to 25,000 Moslem workers, immigrants from Algeria, demonstrate in Paris for an Algerian Algeria and the release of Ahmed Ben Bella. Clashes with the police leave a number of demonstrators dead or injured.
October 18 The FLN organizes further demonstrations in Paris to protest the police brutality of the previous day.
October 19 Five hundred of the 11,540 FLN sympathizers arrested during the Paris demonstrations are deported to Algeria.
October 20 The FLN launches 6 grenade attacks on the cafés of El Biar and at Maison Carrée near Algiers. One person is killed and 7 wounded when an FLN grenade explodes in the Café Château Neuf in El Biar at 8:10 p.m. Five minutes later a grenade explodes in the Café du Progrès wounding three people. Several more people are injured when a third grenade is thrown into the café a Saint Raphaël at 8:17 p.m.
October 21 The SDECE ceases support for the FAAD, with the militants threatened by the FLN, they have no other choice than to rally to the OAS.
October 25 François Mitterrand accuses the Government of seeking to negotiate a settlement to the Algerian crisis with parties other then the FLN during an address to the National Assembly.
October 31 Commissioner Louis Pelissier is killed by an OAS commando.
November 1 Twenty five people are killed and 100 injured in demonstrations organized by the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic and the Army of National Liberation to mark the 7th anniversary of the uprising.
November 1 Ahmed Ben Bella and his compatriots begin a hunger strike demanding they be treated as political prisoners.
November 7 The French nuclear testing program moves to the Oasis Military Test Center, an underground site, at In Ecker in the Hoggar region about 150 kilometers north of Tamanrassett. The first test conducted there is codenamed Agate.
November 7 The Mouvement Pour la Communauté (MPC) becomes the Mouvement Pour la Cooperation but its real goal is to fight against the OAS.
November 9 The National Assembly rejects the Valentin Amendment aka the Salan Amendment which calls for a reduction in term of service to 18 months for conscripts from metropolitan France and the mobilization of 8 military classes in Algeria.
November 10 René Joubert, commissioner of the anti-OAS brigades, is killed in a barroom by an OAS commando while celebrating his impending departure from Algeria.
November 12 Four policemen are killed during an attack by OAS commandos in the Rue Michelet, Algiers.
November 13 Members of the MPC bomb three downtown Algiers bars suspected of being gathering spots for the OAS.
November 13 A patrol of legionnaires is ambushed near Géryville. Five men are killed and seven are wounded.
November 14 Ahmed Ben Bella and his fellow prisoners are transferred to Garches.
November 15 The MPC bombs three more downtown Algiers bars during the afternoon.
November 20 Ahmed Ben Bella and his fellow prisoners end their hunger strike.
November 20 William Levy, Chairman of the Algiers section of the French Socialist Party (SFIO), is killed by an OAS commando.
November 22 The OAS sets off 18 explosive devices in Paris during the night.
November 27 FLN member Gueboub Boualen murders suspected OAS supporter Roger Falip.
December 4 Abdherramane Farés, future President of the Provisional Executive, is arrested on suspicion of collecting funds for the FLN.
December 4 A pro-French demonstration in Constantine draws 5,000 people.
December 5 The anti-OAS SAC and MPC brigades arrive in Algiers. At the same time, 200 police inspectors assigned to “Mission C” arrive by special plane and establish headquarters at the police academy in Hussein Dey near Algiers.
December 6 The cabinet issues a decree disbanding the OAS.
December 7 The OAS set off a small plastic bomb outside Saint Joseph’s church in Bab el Oued to protest the pastor’s pro-FLN position. December 8
Captain Abdelaziz Bouteflika, under a false Moroccan identity, visits the prisoners at the Château d'Aulnoy, to persuade Ben Bella to side with Boumediene against the GPRA’s willingness to negotiate.
December 9 French and FLN negotiators meet at Lons le Saunier in the Jura.
December 12 President de Gaulle issues an amnesty to 2,500 FLN members.
December 14 The OAS sinks an LST housing a French military radio relay transmitter in the port of Algiers. A sailor is killed in the explosion.
December 15 Alain Peyrefitte formulates a plan for the partition of Algeria at the request of President de Gaulle.
December 16 Colonel Ranson, head of military intelligence in Oran, is killed by the OAS.
December 19 Paris police break up an anti-OAS demonstration injuring hundreds among the crowd of nearly 20,000.
December 24 The OAS attacks the Algiers headquarters of the SAC and MPC anti-OAS brigades with bazookas and automatic weapons.
December 26 A repatriation law is enacted. 969,216 residents of Algeria become eligible for repatriation to metropolitan France.
December 28 Twenty one French soldiers are killed in an ambush.
1962 January 3 Philippe Castille, perpetrator of the bazooka attack on General Salan in 1957, who joined the OAS after escaping, is arrested once more in Paris.
January 3 Nineteen people are killed during the night in clashes between the OAS and FLN at Oran.
January 4 A lieutenant from the 43rd Infantry Regiment deserts to the OAS with his company’s arms.
January 4 An OAS terrorist cell attacks the Paris headquarters of the Communist Party.
January 7 An OAS cell enters the Satory Army base and seizes arms and ammunition.
January 8 Colonel Château Jaubert rejoins the OAS and takes command of the organization in Constantine.
January 9 Father Davezies trial on charges of aiding the FLN opens.
January 11 FLN and OAS terrorist stage 8 attacks in Algiers.
January 18 OAS terrorists launch 17 attacks in Paris.
January 19 Two leaders of the Algiers OAS are executed by their peers for contacting the French authorities to arrange negotiations on Alain Peyrefitte’s partition plan.
January 22 The French Foreign Office on the Quai d'Orsay, Paris is bombed by the OAS.
January 24 Algiers observes a five minute silence in memory of those who died on the barricades on January 24, 1960. At 6 o’clock in the afternoon on instructions from the OAS, the city’s European quarters fall silent.
January 25 Military posts in the Bled are closed and the troops withdraw to the coast.
January 27 Negotiations between the French and the FLN resume.
January 29 La Villa d'Andréa, command post of the counter-terrorist SAC in Algiers, is destroyed by an OAS bomb. The blast kills 21 people including 2 OAS prisoners being held in the cellar of the collapsed building.
February 1 A new SAC counter-terrorist squad arrives in Algiers and sets up headquarters in La Villa Raja.
February 2 Colonel Godard and Captain Pierre Sergent (OAS) are sentenced to 20 years in prison in absentia.
February 7 Algiers Gendarmes Mobiles, acting on intelligence reports, kill Captain Pivain of the OAS.
February 7 An FLN commando machine guns the entrance to the Lycée Bugeaud in Algiers killing one high school student and wound several others.
February 8 An anti-OAS demonstration organized by the Communist Party draws 10,000 protesters into the Place de la Bastille, Paris. Police charge the crowd killing 8 people including 3 women and a 16 year old boy who vainly sought refuge in the Charonne Metro station. 140 police are injured in the melee.
February 10 Si Azedine reorganizes the Algiers Autonomous Zone which had been broken up by General Massu.
February 11 A week of negotiation between French officials and the FLN begins in Rousses. The French negotiators argue unsuccessfully in favor of granting the benefits of Algerian citizenship to the Pied Noirs.
February 14 Police and OAS supporters clash in Algiers and Oran.
February 15 OAS commandos attack La Villa Raja headquarters of the SAC with bazookas and automatic weapons killing a number of the counter-terrorists and wound several more. Several of the wounded SAC men are killed by another OAS gang when their car arrives at Maillot hospital in Bab el Oued.
February 19 The OAS bombs the FLN camp at Oujda, Morocco using two T28 planes taken from a French base at Senia near Oran.
February 22 FLN attacks on European civilians in Algiers leave 23 people dead.
February 24 Delegate General Jean Morin instructs the prefects by telegram, “The French Republic will uphold the French nationality of all in Algeria who currently possess it and have not expressed the desire to renounce it.” February 25
The OAS kills 68 Moslem civilians in retaliation for the February 22nd FLN attacks that left 23 Europeans dead. A 4 p.m. curfew is imposed on Algiers.
February 27 OAS commandos attack the Maison Carré barracks of the Gendarmes Mobiles in suburban Algiers destroying the fuel and munitions depots.
February 27 The French Government information office issues a bulletin on the cease fire indicating that, “Nearly all the French will remain in Algeria after independence.”
March 1 Two OAS car bombs explode in the Moslem quarter of Oran killing 23 people and wounding 32.
March 2 OAS commandos enter the prisons at Algiers and Oran and kill several FLN prisoners.
March 2 A government circular specifies that on the day after the cease fire begins, two categories of people will be amnestied: Algerian Moslems who have participated in the FLN uprising and members of the French military who have committed infractions during the course of their missions.
March 5 The OAS sets off over 130 explosive devices in Algiers during the night.
March 7 The Evian Negotiations begin.
March 11 Measures to be taken for the reception and classification of French repatriates in Metropolitan France are officially published.
March 13 Michel Debré responding to General Ailleret’s question asking whether Algerian Moslems will lose their French citizenship automatically declares; "Yes, if they remain in Algeria but if they come to metropolitan France they will be able to reclaim French nationality and to benefit from the assistance to the repatriates."
March 15 Berber writer Mouloud Feraoun is killed along with 5 other people by the OAS at Beau-fraisier between Bab el Oued and El Biar.
March 16 A gang holds up the Bata shoe warehouse in Bab el Oued and carries off several hundred pairs for the OAS maquis.
March 18 The Evian Accords are signed by Belkacem Krim for the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic and Louis Joxe, Robert Buron and Jean de Broglie for France.
March 18 The FLN becomes a legal political party.
March 19 A ceasefire is declared in Algeria at noon.
March 19 Abderhamane Farés, FLN treasurer, is freed from prison.
March 19 Christian Fouchet is named French High Commissioner in Algeria.
March 20 Abderahman Farés is nominated to be President of the Provisional Executive in Algeria.
March 20 Ahmed Ben Bella and his fellow prisoners are released from detention at Aulnoy.
March 20 Algiers and Oran are paralyzed for 24 hours by an OAS general strike.
March 20 In Médéa, an officer of the ALN declares publicly: "OAS or no OAS, we do not want any more a French in Algeria."
March 21 The OAS issues an ultimatum to the Army prohibiting the later from armed entry into Bab el Oued as of March 23rd at midnight.
March 21 Clashes between Harkis and the FLN at Saint Denis du Sig leave 100 people dead.
March 22 The OAS fires 6 mortar shells on the Place du Gouvernement below the Algiers Casbah killing 24 and wounding 55 Moslem civilians.
March 22 An OAS squadron attacks an armored patrol of the Gendarmrie Mobile in the heart of Algiers. Eighteen policemen are killed and 25 others wounded.
March 22 An amnesty decree for FLN convicts is published.
March 23 An OAS gang robs the Bank of Algeria at Oran of 2,140,315,000 old francs.
March 23 In Bab el Oued several military patrols are disarmed by commandos of the OAS. A shootout between an Army patrol and rebels manning an OAS checkpoint on the Place Desaix leaves dead and wounded among the soldiers. At noon the Army imposes a total blockade on the quarter and calls in tanks and air support during the ensuing battle which leaves 17 dead and 97 wounded from the ranks of the forces of public order. Among the rebels and civilian populace, 18 are killed and 55 wounded. The inhabitants of Bab el Oued, who return to work are stopped and interned in the camps recently emptied of prisoners FLN.
March 24 During the night, nearly 20,000 police surround Bab el Oued. A permanent curfew is imposed on the quarter. All telecommunications are cutoff. The residents are confined to their home except for women who are allowed out for one hour between 9 and 10 a.m. The Army is ordered to fire without warning on violators.
March 24 At 8 a.m. with many of the building terraces of Bab el Oued occupied by soldiers, a shot is fired from a building on the Rue Mizon at police patrol in the street below. The gendarmes respond by showering the surrounding buildings will heavy machinegun fire for over half an hour.
March 25 Algerian deputies Abdesselam and Djebour receive a message from the provisional executive declaring them servants of colonialism and announcing their death sentence issued by the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic.
March 25 General Jouhaud, Naval Lieutenant Guillaume and Commander Camelin are arrested in Oran.
March 26 A massive demonstration of support for the besieged quarter of Bab el Oued is organized in Algiers. The procession enters the Rue d’Isly proceeded by the Tricolor and la Marseillaise where a regiment of Tirailleurs Algériens opens fire on the demonstrators killing 46 and wounding 200. March 27
A United Nations report estimates that 263,000 Algerian Moslems face political persecution if Algeria becomes independent.
March 28 An OAS maquis is established in the Ouarsenis.
March 29 The blockade of Bab el Oued is lifted. 7,500 apartments were search and ransacked. 15,000 residents have been stopped and interned for identity checks.
March 30 The OAS establishes a National Council of the Resistance (CNR) under the presidency of Georges Bidault.
March 31 Desertions from the French Army total 1,670 for the month of March.
April 1 Si Azedine, head of the FLN Algiers Autonomous Zone, delivers safe conduct passes to the French Army allowing its patrols to enter the Moslem quarters of the city.
April 2 The Europeans population begins a mass exodus from the Algeria. They must have an exit visa and wait several days for a boat or plane to leave the country at their own expense, the French government having not foreseen the need to finance resettlement. The Pied Noirs leave behind 600 cemeteries and 300,000 graves.
April 5 The 15,000 residents of Bab el Oued who were arrested during the blockade are released.
April 7 Lieutenant Roger Degueldre, head of the OAS Delta commandos is arrested in Algiers.
April 7 Louis Joxe addresses a note to the French High Commissioner Christian Fouchet, “We should not hesitate to gather and protect those (Harkis) who would be threatened and if necessary transport them to the metropolis.” April 8
The Evian Accords are approved by 90.7% of the voters in a referendum conducted in metropolitan France.
April 9 The OAS launches a grenade and mortar attack on the Summer Palace at Algiers around 11 p.m.
April 10 The ATO, a local force composed of armed Moslems, begins patrolling and making stops for identity checks. They will not enter the European strongholds of Bab el Oued in Algiers, Ekmule in Oran or Saint Eugene until June 25th.
April 11 After a brief period of success, the OAS guerrillas in the Ouarsenis region are wiped out by the FLN and the French Army which enjoys the advantage of air support. A captain, 7 officers and 46 men of the OAS are captured.
April 12 The FLN announces the first mass expulsion of Europeans. Nearly 6,000 are to be displaced.
April 13 Abderahmane Farès presides over the first meeting of the provisional executive council.
April 13 General Edmond Jouhaud is found guilty and sentenced to death.
April 14 The Government of Premier Michel Debré resigns.
April 14 Two French soldiers are killed and 3 wounded in a skirmish with FLN rebels near Géryville. Twenty six rebels are killed and 5 captured.
April 17 General Fourquet replaces General Ailleret as Commander in Chief of the Army in Algeria.
April 19 The Cabinet rejects a proposal for a general repatriation of the Harkis.
April 20 General Salan and Captain Jean Ferrandi (OAS) are arrested in Algiers.
April 26 Premier Georges Pompidou assures the National Assembly that, “All necessary provisions will be taken to prevent reprisals after Algeria gains independence.” April 29
The Government of Georges Pompidou takes office.
May 1 Beryl, the second underground nuclear test at the Oasis Military Test Center, ends with an accidental release of radioactive fallout to the atmosphere. The French will continue to test nuclear weapons at the site for another three years before moving the program to Muaroa Atoll in Polynesia.
May 2 A car bomb explodes in the port of Algiers killing 60 and wounding 135 Moslem dockworkers.
May 5 André Canal aka Le Monocle, head of the OAS in metropolitan France, is arrested.
May 6 An OAS commando opens the valves of a gasoline tanker parked on the heights above the Algiers Casbah. Quick intervention by European firemen saves the Moslem quarter from conflagration.
May 8 A National Assembly deputy reports that General Katz, military commander of Oran, has remarked, “Give me a battalion of the ALN and I will reduce the OAS to Oran.” May 11
Terrorist attacks in Algiers during the preceding week have claimed the lives of 230 Moslems and 11 Europeans.
May 12 Army officers are ordered not to take individual initiative in matters related to the repatriation of the Harkis.
May 13 The OAS distributes forged exit visas to Europeans allowing them to leave Algeria.
May 14 FLN commandos stage grenade and machine pistol attacks against several Algiers bars. Seventeen European civilians are killed and 35 wounded.
May 15 OAS commandos respond to the FLN attacks by killing 56 and wounding 37 Moslem civilians in Algiers. A 6 p.m. curfew is imposed on the city.
May 15 The trial of OAS leader General Raoul Salan begins in Paris.
May 16 Raoul Salan delivers his opening remarks to the tribunal declaring, “I need only render an account to those who suffered and died for having believed in a disavowed word and betrayed engagements.” May 16
Si Azedine, leader of the Algiers Autonomous Zone, holds a press conference to announce that the FLN will continue attacks on Europeans as long as the OAS continues to attack Moslems.
May 17 The 7th Régiment de Tirailleurs Algériens leaves Algeria and is stationed at Épinal, France.
May 18 François Mitterrand, testifying at the trial of Raoul Salan, blames Michel Debré for the 1957 bazooka attack on the General. Debré denies the allegation.
May 18 Jean Jacques Susini meets with Abderahman Farés, President of the Provisional Executive in Algeria, to discuss an OAS – FLN ceasefire.
May 18 Bachaga Boualam leaves Algeria for France with his Harkis and their dependents.
May 20 One hundred twelve Pied Noir and pro-French Algerian police officers are transferred to metropolitan France at the request of the FLN.
May 22 The freedom to leave Algeria without an exit permit is granted to the women, children under the age of 19 years and men over the age of 65.
May 23 General Salan is found guilty by the High Court and sentenced to life in prison.
May 26 The first reception camp for Harkis in metropolitan France is opened at Larzac.
May 27 An ordinance dissolves the High Court. The move follows criticism of the Court’s lenient sentence in the Salan case. May 30
The Court of Military Justice is instituted.
May 31 OAS leader Jean Jacques Susini declares a truce.
June 3 Twenty seven farm workers including 8 Europeans are kidnapped by the FLN at Birtoutat, 20 kilometers from Algiers.
June 4 The Court of Cassation rejects the appeal of General Edmond Jouhaud and Sergeant Albert Dovecar who are sentenced to death for their participation in the OAS.
June 5 From his prison General Jouhaud, calls for an end to OAS operations.
June 7 Two OAS members; Sergeant Albert Dovecar and Claude Piegts, a Pied Noir civilian, are shot by a firing squad at the Fort of Trou d'Enfer.
June 11 General de Larminat, Gaullist President of the Court of Military Justice, who believes the soldiers cause is lost, commits suicide so as, “not to have to condemn brilliant soldiers.”
June 11 OAS attacks resume. The University of Algiers library is destroyed in a fire.
June 14 General Ginestet and Colonel Mabille are killed by the OAS in Oran.
June 15 An OAS truck bomb claims 40 civilian and military casualties and heavily damages the Algiers city hall.
June 17 Jean Jacques Susini of the OAS and Chouki Moustefai of the FLN reach an accord.
June 19 General Salan, imprisoned at Fresnes, approves the OAS - FLN accords.
June 19 The curfew is lifted in Algeria.
June 20 Eighteen hundred Moslem auxiliaries replace 1,500 European police.
June 20 Ahmed Ben Bella and Houari Boumediene reject the OAS – FLN accords. June 21
The forces of public order are prohibited from intervening in favor of persons threatened by the new regime in Algeria.
June 25 The OAS sets fire to the British Petroleum fuel depot in the port of Oran. The fire burns for three days.
June 26 Belkacem Krim, who favors allowing the European colons to remain in Algeria, clashes with Ahmed Ben Bella and Houari Boumedienne, who join Yuossef Ben Khedda in opposition.
June 27 Abderahmane Farès' provisional executive resigns.
June 27 The last OAS pirate broadcast appears on Oran televisions.
June 27 General Paul Gardy, who replaced Raoul Salan as leader of the OAS, leaves Algeria for Spain with his staff. OAS resistance ends in Algeria.
June 28 Lieutenant Roger Degueldre, leader of the OAS Delta commandos, is sentenced to death by the Court of Military Justice.
June 30 Ahmed Ben Bella breaks with the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic.
July 1 Algerians approve the Evian Accords in a referendum by a vote of 5,993,754 to 16,478.
July 1 Messali Hadj dissolves the MNA and announces the formation of the Party of the Algerian People (PPA) with the professed aim, “to perfect the independence of Algeria and to build the sovereign, democratic and social Algerian Republic.” He will not be permitted to return to Algeria.
July 3 France recognizes Algerian independence. National identity cards issued in Algeria are declared void. French Algerians of indigenous origin automatically become Algerian citizens. Those wishing to retain French citizenship must leave Algeria and request reintegration from a court in France.
July 4 The Provisional Government of the Republic of Algeria assumes power in Algiers under the presidency of Youssef Ben Khedda.
July 4 Moslem army units throughout Algeria desert en masse taking arms and equipment with them.
July 5 Algerian independence is proclaimed by the Provisional Government after a two day delay so that the declaration would coincide with the 132nd anniversary of the French conquest of Algiers.
July 5 The French National Assembly revokes the parliamentary immunity of Georges Bidault, the President of the CNR.
July 5 European civilians are massacred in Oran. Nearly a thousand people are killed, injured or disappear. French troops obey General Katz’s orders not to intervene.
July 5 The headline of France Soir proclaims, “AFTER 132 YEARS ALGERIA IS NO LONGER FRENCH”.