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Charles Rechenmann was born on 24 August 1912, in Saint-Louis-lès-Bitche, Moselle, in what was then the imperial German province of Alsace-Lorraine, ceded from France in 1871 following the Franco-Prussian war. As such, Charles (the second born in a family of nine children), together with those two of his brothers and one of his sisters who were born prior to 1918, originally possessed German nationality, though the family considered itself French and that was the language spoken at home. His parents were Théophile Rechenmann and Marie Rechenmann (née Curin) and his father (born in 1883 with German nationality) was obliged to serve in the German Army in the First World War. As a result of that conflict, the Alsace-Lorraine region was returned to France in 1918 and the Rechenmanns took French nationality. The family, which eventually comprised five sons and four daughters, settled in Sarreguemines, close to the new France-Germany border and Charles attended the Lycée de Sarreguemines. After leaving school he went on to the Electro-technical Institute of Grenoble where he qualified as an electrical engineer and in 1935 he began working as such for the MECI (Matériel Electrique du Contrôle Industrial) company in Paris.

Rechenmann undertook his national service in the French Army in the artillery and he then went to officer training school in Poitiers for the Reserve artillery, being commissioned as a Sous-Lieutenant and serving with the 402nd Artillery Regiment in Metz......[Remainder of case study is complete - contact author for further details]. 

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