May 1968 events in France
On the morning of 29 May, de Gaulle postponed the meeting of the Council of Ministers that was due that day and secretly removed his personal papers from Élysée Palace. He told his son-in-law, Alain de Boissieu, "I do not want to give them a chance to attack the Élysée. It would be regrettable if blood were shed in my personal defense. I have decided to leave: nobody attacks an empty palace." De Gaulle refused Pompidou's request to dissolve the National Assembly, as he believed that their party, the Gaullists, would lose if there was an election. At 11:00 a.m., he told Pompidou, "I am the past; you are the future; I embrace you."  He left by helicopter but did not say where he was going. For more than six hours, nobody in France knew where he was.