Ernest Mercier

Ernest Mercier (1878 – 1955) was a French industrialist, director of the French Petroleum Company (CFP), the forerunner of the French petroleum conglomerate Total. His father, Jean Ernest Mercier, was an historian and the mayor of Constantine, Algeria, Algeria (then a French colony), where Ernest was born. Early life and the First World War Mercier's grandfather Stanislas Mercier, a Protestant republican from Doubs, left metropolitan France and established himself in Algeria, then a French colony. His father, Jean Ernest Mercier, had served as military-interpreter of Arabic to the colonial army and was a prolific author. Ernest Mercier Jr., was the third son of five children. After studying at the École Polytechnique, he chose a career in the French Navy. He was posted to the port in Toulon, where he was responsible for modernizing the site, notably the electrical network. He completed his education at the École Supérieure d’Electricité between 1905 and 1908, during which time he married Madeleine Tassin (1881-1924), the daughter of a republican Senator. He was later noticed by Albert Petsche, and left the public sector for private electrical enterprise. During the First World War, conscripted into the navy, he fought in the Balkans and the Dardanelles. According to Kuisel (1967, p. 5), he had a "fighting spirit". Injured while in command of Romanian troops on the Danube, he returned to Paris, where he served as the liaison of Louis Loucheur (Minister of Munitions for Georges Clemenceau) to Generals Ferdinand Foch and Philippe Pétain, as well as to the American troops. After the war, he remained as Colonel Mercier for the Anglo-American forces. When Louis Loucheur was named Minister for the Liberated Zones, Mercier accompanied him and dealt with the German factories that were dependent on the Military Control Board.