Puyloubier, PK0 of Legionnaire Solidarity
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By Louis Perez y Cid

Some Foreign Legion Veterans Associations are based near a regiment, while others are located far from any unit, sometimes even abroad. Yet they all share the essential goal of fostering, maintaining, and passing on the solidarity that unites those who served under the white kepi.

The Puyloubier, Pays d’Aix, and Sainte-Baume Veterans Association has a unique characteristic: its headquarters are located at the Capitaine Danjou estate in Puyloubier, at the very heart of the Foreign Legion Veterans' Institution.

This location is not merely geographical. It carries significant meaning.

For the Puyloubier Institution is not like any other. It was founded in 1954, in the aftermath of the Indochina War, when the French Foreign Legion had just paid a heavy price: nearly 12,000 dead, in addition to thousands wounded and disabled.

These men needed a place. A place where they could receive care, support, regularize their administrative status, but also find work and prepare for a new chapter in their lives.

The French Army then acquired the estate known as "Le Général" in Puyloubier, at the foot of Mont Sainte-Victoire. Thus, the Institution for Disabled Veterans of the Foreign Legion was born.

Its unique character remains; it is run by the active-duty Legion for the benefit of those who served in its ranks. This continuity between active-duty legionnaires and those who have left the service is one of the most tangible expressions of Legionnaire solidarity.

The Institution's reputation quickly spread beyond the borders of the Legion. In 1991, in the aftermath of the Gulf War, General Norman Schwarzkopf, commander of the coalition forces, visited Puyloubier and signed the Institution's guestbook.

Deeply impressed by what he saw, he expressed his hope that a similar model could be developed for the benefit of the American Marines.

But the history of this solidarity goes back much further than Puyloubier.

As early as 1832, the Legion had acquired the Villa Abd-el-Tif in Algiers to house its convalescents. Other facilities were subsequently established in Algeria, Morocco, and mainland France. In 1908, Bastion 84 opened in Paris. In 1934, the Legionnaire's House in Auriol was inaugurated by General Rollet. Through these initiatives led by Legion veterans, a shared loyalty was already being expressed: caring for those who had served.

Puyloubier is thus part of this long history. But it also gives it a particular dimension. Over time, the Capitaine-Danjou estate has become a place where all generations of the Legion come together. Active legionnaires mingle with veterans. Those still in their prime meet those whose service has tested them. Visitors discover a history that is not confined to books, but continues to live on.
This is undoubtedly why Puyloubier has gradually acquired a special place in the hearts of legionnaires. Some officers and several commanders of the Foreign Legion have even defined it as "the tangible embodiment of Legionnaire solidarity."

The cemetery is one of its most powerful symbols.

Over the years, its Legion section has become a veritable pantheon of the Legion. Ashes from the so-called "eternal" graves of Sidi Bel Abbès were transferred there to mainland France. Among them are those of General Paul-Frédéric Rollet, a founding figure of the modern Legion; Prince Aage of Denmark, a Legion officer; and Legionnaire Zimmermann, the last Legionnaire killed in Algeria.
These graves, aligned along the cemetery wall, recall the old section of Sidi Bel Abbès. They were joined in 1990 by the remains of Chief Warrant Officer Struzina, representing the Legionnaires who died in Indochina.

Other prominent figures of the Legion who had expressed the wish to be buried there also joined them, including Lieutenant Colonel Jeanpierre and General Olié.

And then there is this grille from the ossuary of the heroes of Camerone in Mexico, as well as the marble plaques from the former Legion war memorial in Sidi Bel Abbès.
Camerone. Sidi Bel Abbès. Puyloubier.
Three places, three eras, but one shared memory.
Around them are the residents of the Institution, those who rest in the cemetery plot, and those who continue to keep this place alive, giving this memory a profoundly human dimension.
The Legion cemetery plot in Puyloubier is therefore not a place of nostalgia.

It is a place of remembrance, of transmission, and of gathering.

Here lie those who served, commanded, fought, suffered, and sometimes embodied the very spirit of the Legion.

It is this history, this continuity, and this human reality that guided the board of directors the Puyloubier Association unanimously designated the Capitaine-Danjou estate as PK0 (kilometer marker 0) of Legionnaire solidarity.

The choice of this name is not a claim. It does not seek to erase what existed before Puyloubier, nor to establish any hierarchy among Legionnaire solidarity initiatives.

It rests on a different truth: Puyloubier is today the place where this solidarity finds its fullest and most visible expression.

A marker now embodies this commitment: the "PK0 of solidarity."

But this marker is not an end in itself. It constitutes the starting point of a broader initiative, for the benefit of the Foreign Legion's Invalids Institution, the "Legio Patria Nostra" project. This project is structured around three pillars:
The Blue Squadron
The PK0 of Solidarity
The Pantheon

The Association is enthusiastically pursuing this initiative with a long-term perspective, in conjunction with the Institution's leadership and the regional branch of the FSALE (French Federation of Former Legionnaires).

Why PK0?

Because kilometer point zero is not necessarily the chronological beginning of a story. It is the point from which we measure, the point of reference, the one to which we return.

And Puyloubier has become that point of reference.

Since 1954, generations of legionnaires have passed through its gates. Wounded soldiers have been welcomed. Veterans have reunited with their comrades. Families have discovered the stories of their missing loved ones. Active-duty legionnaires, as well as AALE (Association of Former Legionnaires) from France and abroad, have come to pay their respects. And in its cemetery rest those who have left a part of themselves in the history of the Legion.

That is why, for our Association, PK0 is not a title we claim, but a reality that history has gradually built.
From Camerone to Sidi Bel Abbès, from Auriol to Puyloubier, Legionnaire solidarity has never ceased to evolve.

But in Puyloubier, it has found a place where the past, present, and future can converge.

A place where people come to remember, to serve again, to come together.

A place where the motto of the French Foreign Legion, "Legio Patria Nostra," also takes on another meaning: that of a brotherhood that does not end when service concludes.
Puyloubier is that place.
Puyloubier is our PK0 of Legionnaire solidarity.