Even Children... ---- On the cover, seated child prisoners look into the
camera, wearing National Guard caps. A photograph no doubt taken in theVersailles camps. What will become of them? At least they weren't shot
on a street corner, on a barricade, these children of the Paris Commune.
The Association of Friends of the Paris Commune 1871 works tirelessly to
commemorate this period in our history and these key figures among the
people of Paris. It had already published an authoritative dictionary of
the women of the Commune. The principle is the same. ---- Annie Gayat,
Sylvie Pepino, and Claudine Rey offer us the fruit of several years of
work and research, a book of over 500 pages. 2,027 children are counted,
and we may find more. "18 years old, 16 years old, 7 years old... young
people, children whose names scroll before our eyes, born on..., lives
in... The lack of representation in history books of these sacrificed
young people shows to what extent this crime has been forgotten," notes
Claudine Rey, Honorary President of the association. She continues:
"These young people very often had a job, families. They were not petty
thugs as the Versailles people wanted to present them, but they followed
the Commune for a life they wanted better." Sylvie Pepino, head of the
Association's Heritage Commission, explains the working methodology for
finding the past of these young people in the archives. Annie Gayat,
whose husband is at the origin of the project, refers to Victor Hugo's
moving poem entitled On a Barricade, but also to the texts of Lissagaray
and Madame Hardouin. Some were sentenced to deportation to New
Caledonia, around 160 of them. Others were sent to reformatories like
the one on the sinister Belle-Île-en-Mer. The conditions of detention
were appalling, particularly on the pontoons of Brest and elsewhere, on
old, decommissioned vessels with appalling hygiene.
They are there throughout the pages from Antoine Abadie to Jean Zuber,
their lives in a few lines, with references from the archives, a
guarantee of seriousness. Let's take them at random.
"Louis Hamard: 18 years old, born May 9, 1853, in Alençon, living in
Paris at 14 rue des Couronnes (Belleville district), a wine merchant's
boy. Detained on the Hermione pontoon, Brest sector, he was released on
January 23 after a dismissal of charges was pronounced in the ports on
January 8, 1872." Eight months of imprisonment for this result.
Jean Ragon was 13, Henri Ranvier 14. And the list continues as the pages
turn.
Others will experience the journey to New Caledonia, between 153 and 115
days by boat on the Tagus or the Guerrière.
As Sylvie Braibant, co-president of the Friends of the Paris Commune
1871, points out, "There is no doubt that this new volume will
contribute to expanding, and even renewing, the historiography of the
Commune."
This book is only available from the Association by writing to them at
46, rue des Cinq Diamants, 75013 Paris. Email address: amis@commune1871.org
* Annie Gayat, Sylvie Pepino, Claudine Rey
Repression of the Paris Commune 1871
Short Dictionary of Imprisoned Children
Published by Les Amies et Amis de la Commune de Paris 1871, 2024
https://monde-libertaire.fr/?articlen=8377
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