Bedous, memorial to those who escaped from France via Spain

"These former escapees had come from far away. some were 80 years old, the youngest were approaching 70, huddled together as they had been in 1943 under a mountain hollow to hide before crossing the border, huddled together as they had been in Spanish prisons, huddled together as they had been in the landing craft at Arromanche or off Toulon, huddled together around their president Manuel Ricoy... And there, all together, they thought of the thousands of men who, in all the valleys of Soule, Barétous, Aspe, and Ossau, had escaped from France like them, had crossed the passes through Orgambidesca, Eroymendy, La Pierre-Saint-Martin, La Cuarde, the Col des Moines, or the Col du Pourtalet... But even if they had wanted to, many of these escapees could not make it to the rendezvous that Manuel Ricoy had arranged for them in Bedous. For 45 years, they have been sleeping in North Africa, Sicily, in front of Cassino, on a beach in the Estérel or against a fortification in Normandy. Some lie on the banks of the Rhine, in the Black Forest, in Bavaria, or in the Austrian Tyrol. But their memory lives on, and their sacrifice was revived the other day at the top of the Bedous hill, in front of the memorial that bears witness to the folly of men." 

François Bayé-Poey, La porte de la Liberté, passeurs et évadés de France (1942-1944) [The Gate of Freedom, Smugglers and Escapees from France (1942-1944)], Passages en Aspe bulletin no. 9 of the Association de Mémoire Collective du Béarn, Pau, 1994