Bir Hakeim ( ; sometimes written Bir Hacheim) is in the Libyan desert at and is the site of a former Ottoman Empire fort built around the site of an ancient Roman well, dating to the period when the oasis was part of Ottoman Tripolitania. It is about west of Sollum on the Libyan coast and south-east of Gazala. Bir Hakeim is best known for the battle of Bir Hakeim, which took place there during World War II. The battle occurred during the Battle of Gazala (26 May – 21 June 1942) when the 1st Free French Brigade of Général de brigade, future Maréchal de France Marie-Pierre Kœnig defended the site from against much larger German and Italian forces, commanded by Generaloberst Erwin Rommel. Capitaine Pierre Messmer was one of the French officers of the 13th half-brigade of the French Foreign Legion. Messmer had graduated from St Cyr Military School. He was commanding the 3rd battalion of the Legion. Plenty of his soldiers were from Spanish and German origin, and many of them Jews. The Kaddish was said most evenings at Bir-Hakeim. The other half-brigade of the 1st Free French Division included units that did not belong to the French Foreign Legion, like the Bataillon de Marche n°2 de l'Afrique équatoriale française (BM2), the Bataillon du Pacifique (French Polynesia, New Caledonia and New Hebrides), the 1st Bataillon of Infanterie de Marine, the 1st Regiment of Artillerie, the 1st Bataillon of Fusiliers Marins in association with the troop D of the 43st Battery of the 11th City of London Yeomanry Regiment, and the 22nd North-African French Armored Company. Pierre Messmer was the first French Foreign Legion soldier to be elected to the Académie Française. He would later become Prime Minister of the French Republic under President Georges Pompidou. During these 14 days, 3 700 French soldiers immobilized 40 000 Axis soldiers. Out of these 3 700, 800 died or went missing. This half-brigade had already fought the German Army at Narvik on 27 May 1940. Although the Afrika Corps captured Tobruk ten days later, the delay imposed on the Axis offensive by the defence of Bir Hakeim influenced the cancellation of Operation Herkules, the planned German invasion of the Suez Canal and Malta. The stand by the Free French gave the defeated and retreating British Eighth Army enough time recover from its heavy losses, and to reorganize. The British then stopped