List of Légion d'honneur recipients by name (M)

The French government gives out the Legion of Honour awards, to both French and foreign nationals, based on a recipient's exemplary services rendered to France, or to the causes supported by France. This award is divided into five distinct categories (in ascending order), i.e. three ranks: Knight, Officer, Commander, and two titles: Grand Officer and Grand Cross. Knight is the most common and is awarded for either at least 20 years of public service or acts of military or civil bravery. The rest of the categories have a quota for the number of years of service in the category below before they can be awarded. The Officer rank requires a minimum of eight years as a Knight, and the Commander, the highest civilian category for a non-French citizen, requires a minimum of five years as an Officer. The Grand Officer and the Grand Cross are awarded only to French citizens, and each requires three years' service in their respective immediately lower rank. The awards are traditionally published and promoted on 14 July.

The following is a non-exhaustive list of recipients of the Legion of Honour awards, since the first ceremony in May 1803. 2,550 individuals can be awarded the insignia every year. The total number of awards is close to 1 million (estimated at 900,000 in 2021, including over 3,000 Grand Cross recipients), with some 92,000 recipients alive today. Only until 2008 was gender parity achieved amongst the yearly list of recipients, with the total number of women recipients since the award's establishment being only 59 at the end of the second French empire and only 26,000 in 2021.

Recipient Dates
(birth – death)		 General work & reason for the recognition Award category (date)
Douglas MacArthur
Donald Matheson 1926-2021 D-Day Landing on the 6th June 1944 - Able seaman aboard H.M.S Black Prince. Flag Semaphore - Flag communications between ships. Telegraphist. Knight (2021)
Ian MacGregor 1912 – 1998 Scottish-American metallurgist and industrialist
Frederick William MacMonnies
Franciszek Macharski
Nevil Macready
Mauricio Macri President of Argentina
Stanisław Maczek Polish general
Auguste Antoine Maestracci Recognised for his military and civil service. TBA (1913)
Norman Mailer
Jean-Christophe Maillot
Jacques Maisonrouge
Claude François de Malet
Laure Manaudou
Steve Mandanda World Cup winning footballer
Benoît Mandelbrot
Édouard Manet 1832 – 1883 French painter TBA (1881)
Lata Mangeshkar India
Charles Mangin
Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim 1867 – 1951
Alexander Mantashev 1842 – 1911 Oil magnate, financier and philanthropist. Made a donation to build Armenian Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Paris
Frederick Mappin
Sir Frederick Mappin, 1st Baronet
Jean-Baptiste Antoine Marcellin Marbot French general
Antoine Adolphe Marcelin Marbot French general
Marcel Marceau
Peyton C. March
André Marchal
Stanley Marcus
Maria of Yugoslavia Consort of King Alexander I of Yugoslavia
Anna Marly
Lara Marlowe American journalist
Auguste Marmont
Jacques Maroger
Paule Marrot 1902 – 1987 Parisian textile designer
Wynton Marsalis
Albert Marshall
David Marshall 1908–1995 Chief Minister of Singapore (1955–1956), Singaporean ambassador to France (1978–1993) Knight (1978)
George Marshall
Richard Marshall
Frédéric Martens 1806 – 1885 French photographer Knight (10/29/1855)
Gregory S. Martin
Henri Martre
Charles Marx
Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk
Mashhour Ahmed Mashhour President of Suez Canal Authority in Egypt 1965 – 1983
Henri Gratte Maskens Captain in the Service of Napoleon 1, 1787 – 1871
André Masséna
William Massey Prime Minister of New Zealand 1912 – 1925
Isabelle Massieu 1844 – 1932 French traveler, photographer and writer
Jan Matejko
Mateja Matevski
Mireille Mathieu
Olivier Elzéar Mathieu
Ginette Mathiot
Mimie Mathy French actress and comedian Knight (4 May 2015)
Blaise Matuidi World Cup winning footballer
Amélie Mauresmo French tennis champion
François Mauriac
Daniel Maximin
Peter Mayle
Paddy Mayne
Robert Blair Mayne
Kylian Mbappé World Cup winning footballer
Paul McCartney
John P. McConnell|
Cyrus McCormick
James "Earthquake McGoon" McGovern Jr. American World War II and First Indochina War pilot
Leonard William McKiel
Beverly McLachlin
Lesley J. McNair
Joseph T. McNarney
Merrill A. McPeak
Joe Medicine Crow Last war chief of the Crow tribe
Zubin Mehta
Étienne Méhul
Georges Méliès
Antoine Brutus Menier
Benjamin Mendy World Cup winning footballer
Henri Menier
Emile-Justin Menier
Honoré Mercier
Lennart Meri President of Estonia Grand Cross (July 28, 2001)
Angela Merkel
Philippe-Antoine Merlin de Douai
Yves Mersch
Luc-Olivier Merson
Olivier Messiaen Composer, organist, and pianist.
Paul Métivier
Corinne Mentzelopoulos
André Meyer
Gerald C. Meyers
Joseph François Michaud
Aníbal Milhais Portuguese World War I hero
Darius Milhaud
Édouard Jean Baptiste Milhaud Removed from the Légion after the second restoration of Louis XVIII
Madeleine Milhaud
Niko Miljanić
George Millar
Syd Millar
Franklin Miller
Seymour Miller WW2 Tank commander D-Day Invasion
Charles Joseph Minard
Alfred Peter Mischo
Živojin Mišić
Francis Mitchell (Royal Navy officer)
Nancy Mitford
Mizan Zainal Abidin Sultan of Terengganu and current Yang Di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia
Narendra Modi Prime Minister of India Grand Cross (14 July 2023)
Robert Mondavi
Mongkut King of Thailand
Henri Monod 1843 - 1911 Head of the Directorate of Public Welfare, Paris. Knight (12 July 1880)
Jacques Monod Molecular biologist. First cousin twice removed of Henri Monod, who was also a recipient.
Luc Montagnier
Prosper Montagné
Jean-Pierre de Montalivet
Philippe de Montebello
Agénor Azéma de Montgravier
Raymond Monvoisin
Charles Moore
James Moore (cyclist)
Charles Antoine Morand
Justin Bonaventure Morard de Galles
Charles Paul Narcisse Moreau
Émilienne Moreau-Evrard
Daniel Morelon
Roland Moreno
Michèle Morgan
Eugène Moret, Officier
Thomas Alfred Morgan
Akio Morita
Vincent de Moro-Giafferi
Ennio Morricone
Leslie Morshead
James Mortimer
Serge Moscovici 1925 – 2014 Social psychologist
Otakar Motejl 1932 – 2010 2000
Lamia Moubayed Bissat TBA (13 July 2015)
Paul Mounet
Ethel Moustacchi 1933 - 2016 Rersearcher in molecular biology and radiobiology, and research director at the French National Centre for Scientific Research Knight (1999), Officer (2013)
Mamadou Moustapha Sall Secretary General of Cams
Gerard Muirhead-Gould
Brian Mulroney Axel Munthe, Physician and writer.
Alexander Murdoch World War II veteran 2019
Audie Murphy 1925 – 1971 U.S. Army soldier, actor, songwriter
John Murray (soldier)
Leonard W. Murray
Alfred de Musset 1810 – 1857 French dramatist, poet, novelist
Riccardo Muti

See also

References

  1. ↑ Légion Code, article 16.
  2. ↑ Les étrangers qui se seront signalés par les services qu’ils ont rendus à la France ou aux causes qu’elle soutient, Légion Code, art. 128.
  3. 1 2 3 "France train attack: Chris Norman awarded Legion d'honneur". BBC News. 24 August 2015. Archived from the original on 27 July 2021. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  4. ↑ DM, Florey (29 March 2017). "Michelle Yeoh receives France's highest civilian honour". Cinema Online. Archived from the original on 19 July 2021. Retrieved 20 July 2021. Alt URL
  5. 1 2 3 4 "The Grand Chancellery is co-producing a film on women and the Legion of Honor". The Grand Chancellery of the Legion of Honour. Archived from the original on 24 July 2021. Retrieved 24 July 2021.
  6. ↑ "Legion of Honour". Australian Government – Department of Veteran's Affairs. 31 January 2021. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  7. ↑ Wattel, Michel; Wattel, Béatrice (2009). "Les Grand Croix de la Légion d'honneur. De 1805 à nos jours, titulaires français et étrangers". Archives & Culture.
  8. ↑ Benoist, Chloé (18 December 2020). "Explained: Sisi, Macron and the dubious history of France's Legion of Honour". Middle East Eye. Archived from the original on 26 July 2021. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  9. ↑ "The furrowed brow". time magazine. 4 April 1949. Archived from the original on 29 May 2011. Retrieved 29 May 2011.
  10. ↑ "Isabelle MASSIEU fut la première occidentale à se rendre, non seulement au Laos, en 1897, mais dans bon nombre de contrées lointaines de l'Inde, de l'Asie, de la Chine…". Lao Mag (in French). 12 May 2016. Archived from the original on 28 August 2018. Retrieved 26 December 2018.
  11. ↑ Yalioua, Zahia (11 May 2015). "Mimie Mathy décorée de la Légion d'honneur par Line Renaud" (in French). TF1. Retrieved 15 May 2024.
  12. ↑ "Photograph caption". Ward's Auto World. 17: 29. 1981. Retrieved 21 June 2013.
  13. ↑ "France confers Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour on PM Modi". Hindustan Times. 14 July 2023. Retrieved 14 July 2023.
  14. ↑ Caemmerer, H. Paul. "Charles Moore and the Plan of Washington." Records of the Columbia Historical Society. Vol. 46/47 (1944/1945): 237-258 254.
  15. ↑ Schofield, Jack (30 April 2012). "Roland Moreno obituary, Smart-card inventor who missed out on global recognition but was a hero in France". The Guardian. Retrieved 21 June 2013.
  16. ↑ "Nouvelles Vendredi, 23. JUIN, 2000". 23 June 2000. Retrieved 1 December 2023.
  17. ↑ "Décret du 31 décembre 1999 portant promotion et nomination - Légifrance". www.legifrance.gouv.fr (in French). Archived from the original on 15 March 2025. Retrieved 15 February 2026.
  18. ↑ Mortimer, Luke (3 May 2019). "Veteran awarded Legion of Honour decades after service in WWII". Daily telegraph. Archived from the original on 17 July 2021. Retrieved 17 July 2021.