civil service contributed to a drain of the rural population into the cities, and created an entrenched bureaucracy and trade union network that would prove to be a burden on state stability following independence. The French government continued to rule through a Governor-General until the elections of 1957 when a High Commissioner of the République was established. The total population in 1950 for the whole AEF was 4,143,922, with only around 15,000 non-Africans present. 1940s and Reforms World War II As with the arrival of the Portuguese events in Europe again had a deep impact on the affairs of Congo-Brazzaville, and Africa in general. Marshal Philippe Pétain surrendered to Germany on 22 June 1940, and this gave birth to the so-called Vichy France republic. Pétain had earlier refused to continue the war against Germany from African territory alongside Great Britain. With the help of a handful of local French administrators and officers, the British, and the Belgian government in exile Charles de Gaulle's Free French won over large parts of the French Empire. Politicians such as René Pleven, who later became prime minister, and officers as General Philippe Leclerc de Hauteclocque, Lieutenant René Amiot, Captain Raymond Delange, Colonel Edgar De Larminat and Adolphe Sicé helped him to gain control of the AEF territory. In three days troops loyal to De Gaulle took control of Chad (26 August 1940), Cameroon (27 August) and of Middle Congo (the 28th of August). Brazzaville hereby became the capital of the so-called Free French in Africa, ruled in theory by a Conseil de défense de l'Empire set up by De Gaulle on 27 October 1940. The FEA centred on Middle Congo went overnight from a backwater to a linchpin of Free French forces in Africa. Point Noire in particular became a vital transit area and base for bringing supplies, soldiers and labor from the interior to the coast and back again. The intense use of the railway led to the rise of a new urban labor class and improved the infrastructure of the colony. Felix Eboué In this revolt the then-governor of Chad Félix Eboué played a key role. Because of this and his earlier support for De Gaulle he became Governor-General of the Afrique Equatoriale Française (AEF) in 1940, the first non-white to achieve this position in French colonial history. Born in 1884 in French Guiana this descendant of African slaves was a key