The moment will be "sober and simple, in the image of Dominique Bernard," warned Julien Bellengier, the village's mayor. At 6:30 pm on Monday, October 16, over a hundred people gathered in the courtyard of the elementary school in Berneville, northern France, some 10 kilometers west of Arras. It was in this small rural village of 500 residents that the French teacher killed on October 13 by Mohammed Mogouchkov (a radicalized 20-year-old) had lived with his wife and their three daughters for some 30 years.
"Dominique Bernard showed immense courage. Berneville will not forget him and mourns the loss of an immense hero who stood up to terrorism," declared the mayor in a speech lasting a few minutes, surrounded by his municipal team, next to flags at half-mast and a photo of the victim. This was followed by a minute's silence and a cappella "Marseillaise," the French national anthem, before a number of local residents laid flowers in front of Bernard's house, just opposite the school, which has been guarded by teams of gendarmes since the teacher's murder.
Bellengier admitted that the speech, though brief, was "difficult to write." "There's the national resonance of this affair, but also the local shock," echoed the town councilor as an aside. Bernard, a discreet man, was not known to everyone in the village. "We didn't necessarily know him, but it affects a local resident so it affects us all," added the elected official. "People sent me messages to ask if a tribute ceremony would be set up. The village is really going through it, and everyone has been emotionally affected."
The mayor admitted that he had only come across the slain French teacher "two or three times in 11 years." The teacher's family did not wish to attend the tribute. "I informed them of this ceremony out of respect, but for the time being, his wife and their daughters prefer to stay away from all this. There are a lot of things they don't know about, so we're trying to keep them as far away as possible," said the mayor.
"He was very involved in his teaching career, always writing," said Odile Payen, the deputy mayor. He said Bernard could be spotted on his doorstep, watching the carnival go by. "At first, we didn't see him at all, he was 'Mr. Discreet,'" recalled 96-year-old Madeleine Bray, a true living memory of the place. "He was very helpful." His wife, an English teacher at a local school, was better known in the neighborhood. Bray had prepared a letter to send her, as the widow had comforted her when the energetic nonagenarian lost her daughter a few years ago.
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