When we arrived at La Roquette, as there were no steps by which to descend from the cart, the national guardsmen, who had not insulted us, aided the laymen in getting out, but when it came to the turn of the priests they refused their assistance. They shut us up for more than an hour and a half in a narrow room which could scarcely hold us. It was nearly five hours since we left our cells at Mazas. Some aged priests—pardon these common details concerning the sufferings of all kinds we underwent—asked to be shown to a retired place. After making them wait a long time, they placed a repulsive bucket in the middle of the room. During our whole stay at La Roquette, a hundred soldiers, ten ecclesiastics, and some national guardsmen had no other—what the English and Germans call by a modest euphemism “a closet or privy”—than an article of the same kind, placed in the middle of an infectious apartment in the third story, and I was suffering from an inflammation of the bowels, brought on by want of exercise, of nourishment, and of sleep.
The time passed in this anteroom was not lost. We became acquainted and we encouraged one another. In the school of misfortune, people learn to be communicative, and to overlook differences of age and social rank. Those who did not anticipate any imminent danger were undeceived. We will add, to show how profoundly
hope is graven in the heart of man, that the strongest pessimists easily yielded to the influence of the optimists. Not one was wanting in firmness and patience.
At last the door of the anteroom opened, and a citoyen with red pantaloons, a red girdle, and red cravat called over the prisoners. It was Citoyen François, the Director of La Roquette. Those familiar with the history of Paris know that, at the end of the Empire, the post of the sapeurs-pompiers of La Villette was taken by assault by a handful of demagogues, who killed several sapeurs-pompiers. The leaders of the insurrection were no other than General Eudes, a member of the Commune, and Citizen François, the warden of La Roquette. The citizen-director of Mazas had still greater claims on the confidence of the Commune. It will be seen that the hostages were well guarded.
La Grande-Roquette, so called to distinguish it from La Petite-Roquette, which is opposite, and where young prisoners are confined, is the prison of those condemned to death and to the travaux forcés. It is divided into two distinct parts: the eastern and western buildings. Separated by a spacious interior court, they are united on the street by a third building, in the lower part of which is the jailer’s office; and, on the opposite side, by a sufficiently large chapel, which was, of course,
closed and stript of all the exterior emblems they could destroy.
Some of us were confined in the first story of the western building where the hostages were who came the night before. The second and third stories were occupied by those sentenced by the court of assize of the Seine.
The remainder, and I was of the number, were sent to the third story of the eastern building. The first story was occupied by about forty Parisian guardsmen, prisoners of the Commune; the second story by a somewhat larger number of sergents de ville, who were found at Montmartre in the affair of the eighteenth of March. In consequence of the defection of a part of the line, they fell into the power of the insurgents. There were also on the same story a dozen artillerymen, likewise prisoners. The third story, where I was conducted with seven ecclesiastics and three laymen, was already occupied by a hundred soldiers, some of whom, on their way through Paris at the time of the proclamation of the Commune, refused to serve it, and others had been taken prisoners in the engagements between the insurgents and the regular army. The following night, three vicars from Belleville and St. Ambroise were imprisoned with us.
The cells of La Roquette are extremely plain. They are about one mètre and a few centimètres wide and two and a half metrès long. No chair, no table: the only article of furniture is an iron bedstead. Neatness is the least thing to be remarked concerning them. It was very evident that several generations of criminals had occupied them without rendering them any more agreeable. This was not all. The first night I found myself among two kinds of insects whose names are unmentionable.
When in the warm climes of the East, and in the villages of Southern Spain, I found myself aux prises with these nocturnal enemies, I had at least the consolation of lighting my taper, of complaining the next day to the hostess, and of changing my room or the inn. But at La Roquette none of these things was possible. Having no chair to sit on, I remained seated on my bed.