Médaille militaire
military decoration of the French Republic
The Médaille militaire (French pronunciation: [medaj militɛʁ], "Military Medal") is a military decoration of the French Republic for other ranks for meritorious service and acts of bravery in action against an enemy force. It is the third highest award of the French Republic, after the Legion of Honour, a civil and military order, and the Order of Liberation, a Second World War-only order. The Médaille militaire is therefore the most senior entirely military active French decoration.
During World War I, 230,000 médailles were awarded, when 1,400,000 French Army soldiers were killed and 3,000,000 wounded. For comparison, the UK Military Medal was awarded on 115,000 occasions in World War I, when 673,375 British Army soldiers were killed and 1,643,469 wounded. There were 628 awards to 627 recipients of the Victoria Cross, the United Kingdom's highest military decoration.
The award was first established in 1852 by the first President of the French Republic, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte who may have taken his inspiration from a medal established and awarded by his father, Louis Bonaparte, King of Holland.
After the First World War, the Military Medal was also temporarily awarded for wounds received in combat.
Statute
Like many other French awards, the médaille can be awarded for different reasons. It can be awarded to foreign nationals serving with or alongside the French armed forces.
“Médaille militaire” enters the record as military decoration of the French Republic. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Médaille, militaire and military can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1465214. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1852.
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This entry incorporates text from “Médaille militaire” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.