1916 in France

Events from the year 1916 in France.

Decades:

Incumbents

29 January â Paris is bombed by German zeppelins for the first time.
21 February â Battle of Verdun begins.
22 February â Battle of Bois des Caures ends.
27 April â Battle of Hulluch in World War I, 47th Brigade, 16th Irish Division decimated in one of the most heavily concentrated gas attacks of the war.
16 May â Britain and France conclude the secret Sykes-Picot Agreement to divide Arab areas of the Ottoman Empire following the conclusion of World War I into French and British spheres of influence.
1 July â First day on the Somme.
14 July â Battle of Bazentin Ridge, start of the second phase of the Battle of the Somme.
15 September â Battle of Flers-Courcelette begins and lasts for a week, third and last large-scale offensive by the British Army during the Battle of the Somme.
25 September â Battle of Morval.
26 September â Battle of Thiepval Ridge begins, German fortress of Thiepval is captured by the British.
28 September â Battle of Thiepval Ridge ends successfully, with the capture of the Schwaben Redoubt.
13 November â Battle of the Ancre launches, the final act of the Battle of the Somme.
18 November â Battle of the Somme ends.
18 December â Battle of Verdun ends.

11 January â Bernard Blier, actor (died 1989)
22 January â Henri Dutilleux, composer (died 2013)
14 February â Marcel Bigeard, military officer (died 2010)
16 February â Julien Darui, international soccer player (died 1987)
1 March â Lucienne Abraham, Trotskyist politician (died 1970)
20 March â Pierre Messmer, Gaullist politician and Prime Minister (died 2007)
4 April â Robert Charpentier, cyclist and Olympic gold medallist (died 1966)
9 April â LÃ©onie Duquet, nun (killed by a death squad in Argentina 1977)
5 May â AndrÃ©e Clair, writer (died 1982)
6 May â Jacques-Laurent Bost, journalist (died 1990)
25 May â AndrÃ© Devigny, soldier and French Resistance member (died 1999)
30 May â Jacques Georges, soccer administrator (died 2004)
3 June â Denise Vernac, actress (died 1984)
10 June â AndrÃ© Mandouze, academic and journalist (died 2006)
16 June â Francis Cammaerts, Special Operations Executive (SOE) agent (died 2006)

22 July â Marcel Cerdan, boxer (died 1949)
17 September â Francis Lefebure, physician (died 1988)
21 September â FranÃ§oise Giroud, journalist, screenwriter, writer and politician (died 2003)
18 October â Jean-Yves Couliou, painter (died 1995)
19 October â Jean Dausset, immunologist, shares the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1980 (died 2009)
26 October â FranÃ§ois Mitterrand, President of France from 1981 to 1995 (died 1996)

17 January â Marie Bracquemond, Impressionist painter (born 1840)
22 February â Ãmile Driant, nationalist writer, politician and army officer (born 1855; killed in action)
3 March - Jean Mounet-Sully, actor (born 1841)
4 March â Franz Marc, German painter and printmaker (born 1880)
12 May â Frank Cheadle, Australian rugby league footballer and World War I soldier (born 1885)
19 May â Georges Boillot, motor racing driver and World War I fighter pilot (born 1884)
25 May â Jane Dieulafoy, archaeologist and novelist (born 1851)
29 June â Georges Lacombe, sculptor and painter (born 1868)
6 July â Odilon Redon, painter and printmaker (born 1840)
8 July â Augustin Cochin, historian (born 1876)
28 August â Henri Harpignies, painter (born 1819)
26 September â Max Ritter von Mulzer, World War I German flying ace (born 1893)