13 January 2025

By Göran R Buckhorn

French Olympic oarsman Roger Lebranchu, who was the oldest torch bearer at the 2024 Paris Games, died on 10 January 2025 at age 102.

Roger Lebranchu was born in 1922. During World War II, he joined the French Resistance but was arrested in June 1943 trying to escape to North Africa to join the Free French Army. He was deported to the Buchenwald Concentration Camp. Lebranchu managed to escape during the evacuation of the camp in April 1945, shortly before American troops liberated the camp.

Returning home, weak after two harsh years in the camp, he and two of his brothers joined the rowing club Société Nautique de la Basse Seine in Courbevoie, a suburb of Paris. With two French championships in the eight under his belt, in 1946 and 1947, Lebranchu was selected to represent France in the eights at the 1948 Olympic Games, with the rowing in Henley.

The French crew placed third (and last) in their quarterfinal heat. Though the crew had a second chance to advance in the repechage heat, the crew withdrew before the start.

Though Lebranchu never competed on the international scene again, he did row until he was 79 years old, according to French Rowing Federation.

He carried the Olympic flame at Mont-Saint-Michel, 31 May last year. At age 101, he is the oldest person to have had this privilege during the Paris Olympics.