Editing Paul Touvier (section)

== Early life ==
Paul Claude Marie Touvier was born on 3 April 1915 in [[Saint-Vincent-sur-Jabron]], [[Alpes de Haute-Provence]], in southeastern France. His family was devoutly [[Roman Catholic]], lower-middle-class and extremely [[Conservatism|conservative]].<ref name="morgan">{{cite news|first=Ted|last=Morgan|url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DE3D9143BF932A35753C1A96F948260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all|title=L'Affaire Touvier: Opening Old Wounds|newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|location=New York City|date=October 1, 1989|access-date=February 12, 2011}}</ref><ref name="chrd">{{cite web|url=http://www.chrd.lyon.fr/chrd/sections/fr/pages_fantomes/biographies/paul_touvier/|title=Biography of Paul Touvier|website=www.chrd.lyon.fr|publisher=Centre d'Histoire de la Résistance et de la Déportation|location=Lyon, France|access-date=13 February 2011|language=fr|archive-date=21 July 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110721010151/http://www.chrd.lyon.fr/chrd/sections/fr/pages_fantomes/biographies/paul_touvier/|url-status=dead}}</ref> He was one of 11 children,<ref name="chrd" /> and the oldest of the five boys. He served as an [[altar boy]] when he was young, and attended a seminary for a year, intending to become a priest.<ref name="morgan" />

Touvier's mother, Eugenie, was an orphan who was raised by nuns. As an adult, she was very religious and went to [[Mass (liturgy)|Mass]] every day.<ref name="morgan" /> She died when Touvier was a teenager.<ref name="chrd" /> His father, François Touvier, was a tax collector in [[Chambéry]], after having retired after serving as a career soldier for 19 years. Touvier's father was very conservative, an admirer of the [[monarchist]] and [[anti-parliamentarist]] [[Charles Maurras]] and ''L'[[Action Française]]''.<ref name="morgan" />

Paul Touvier graduated from the Institute  [[Francis de Sales|Saint Francis de Sales]] in Chambéry at the age of 16. When he turned 21, his father got him a job as a clerk at the local railroad station, where he was working when World War II began.<ref name="chrd" /> Touvier was mobilized for the war effort in 1939. After the [[Vichy government]] was created, Touvier and his family were firm supporters of its leader [[Philippe Pétain]]. Father and son joined the Vichy veterans' group when it was founded in 1941.<ref name="morgan" />