France ? Pierre Messmer, a member of the French Resistance who was the country’s prime minister from 1972 to 1974, has died at age 91, former President Jacques Chirac said Wednesday.

Messmer died Wednesday afternoon at Val-de-Grace hospital in Paris, according to the French daily Le Figaro.

Messmer entered the French Resistance in 1940, fleeing Nazi-occupied France for England on a cargo ship. He then participated in major campaigns in North Africa and elsewhere and stormed the beaches of Normandy in June 1944.

After the war, he entered politics and was appointed prime minister in July 1972 by then-President Georges Pompidou. Following Pompidou’s death in April 1974, Messmer was widely viewed as a potential presidential candidate, but he was outmaneuvered by his rivals for the position and never held another major political office.