Jean François Boudin in French military uniform

WHEN Bob Boudin was a small boy there were framed certificates on the wall of his grandmother’s home that led him to believe – not without reason – that his grandfather had been something of a hero.

One of the certificates, printed in glowing colour, was a good service commendation relating to his grandfather’s service in the French army.

The other celebrated the history of his grandfather’s regiment, the 70th Infantry.

Bob, who now works in the pre-press department of the JEP and was well-known as a DJ at the Tropicana back in the 60s and 70s, also has a precious picture of his soldier granddad in full French military uniform, complete with fancy epaulettes, and two of him at his place of work in Jersey, where he ran a shoe-repair business.

But Jean François Boudin’s real claim to heroism had little to do with the impressive certificates – or, indeed, the old photographs.

He served in the French army before the First World War but then moved to the Island, where he set up the shoe business at Oak Cottage, Millbrook – the property where Bob was later to live until the age of eight or nine.

When war broke out in 1914, Mr Boudin returned to the colours and saw service throughout the four-year conflict as an infantryman.

He served on the Western Front, seeing action in the carnage that was the Battle of the Somme.
But he did not escape unscathed.

He suffered the awful effects of mustard gas, the chemical weapon which blisters the skin and damages the lungs and, in the opinion of Bob Boudin’s grandmother, was never the same after he returned to Jersey.

She described the former soldier as a ‘fine man’, who managed to survive the war but was deeply affected by it.

So although the coloured certificates in their frames suitably impressed the young Bob, it was his grandfather’s loyal service to his native country during the Great War that was more deserving of recognition than his period in the peace-time army.

Sadly, the debilitating effects of the gas and, no d oubt, memories of the horrors of the trenches drove Jean François Boudin to drink heavily and he met an untimely end.
He was found dead in St Helier Harbour in 1932, but the inquest into his death was inconclusive.

Did he fall into the water or was he pushed? No one is likely to discover the truth. Later, Bob Boudin’s family connection with France assumed new significance.

In 1949 he left the Island with his family on a trip to Paris, where relatives kept a shop, but, as they disembarked at St Malo and showed their passports his father, Reg, was arrested.
Authorities

The French authorities, who promptly took him to Paris, wanted to know why he had not enlisted in the French forces when the Second World War broke out in 1939.

As a printer, working for the Chronique de Jersey, Reg had been in a reserve occupation at that time and would not have been eligible for conscription.

However, he was also able to point out that after the Germans arrived in 1940 it would have been more than a little difficult to make his excuses and tell them that he was just popping across the water to join up.

Happily, the authorities saw the sense of this, and he was set free to join the rest of his family and make the most of what was left of their Paris holiday.