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3 unusual facts about Joseph Vuillemin


Joseph Vuillemin

Commenting to General Edward Spears on 30 May 1940, the British Air Attaché in Paris, Air Commodore Douglas Colyer, criticised certain senior French officers saying that, while they had been very brave pilots in the last war, they were not sufficiently educated to command important formations now.

Between November 1933 and January 1934, he led the so-called ‘La Croisière noire aérienne’ – an ambitious training and trailblazing mission from France via Morocco and the Sahara to French West Africa and French Equatorial Africa using French Potez 25 biplanes.

Loire-Nieuport LN.401

The chief of staff of the air force, general Joseph Vuillemin, declared that the aircraft was too slow, and requested the development of a fast dive bomber for the air force, which became the Loire-Nieuport LN.42.



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