Devil’s Island Prison - Infamous Island of Misery

today's episode is sponsored by Squarespace the all-in-one platform for building your brand and growing your business more about them in a bit the name Devil's Island conjures up images of almost unspeakable brutality yet the Island prison was but a small part of the prison colony of French Guiana France originally claimed the area in the 17th century and foundingly impossible to colonize its 1763 alone 12 000 settlers arrived in the region by the end of that year only two thousand were alive the rest having succumbed to the harsh climate and the tropical diseases they encountered the survivors took refuge on three small islands off the coast of the Mainland called by the French the Salvation islands of these three were habitable ilrel ILS and Joseph and El de Diablo or the devil's Islands as early as 1795 the French directory which controlled the government of revolutionary France exiled undesirables to French Guiana though I were not imprisoned their crimes consisted only of being a perceived danger to the New Order in France and many of the Exiles were priests they suffered the same risk of disease and death with the high rate of the latter preventing the colony for flourishing in the mid-19th century Napoleon III desirous of ridding France of criminals both Petty and fellowness as oh well as political enemies and other undesirables established French Guiana as a penal colony for men prisoners were expected to build their own prison a railroad into the jungle and to harvest lumber on the mainland the island surrounded by shark-invested Waters oh were to house those who refused to work or were considered to be too dangerous to mingle with the prison population in 1852 the first transport convicts to the Colony began those arriving there did not see Dante's famous dictum to abandon all hope though they may as well have the laws were written so that few of the arriving prisoners had any hope of ever seeing France again should they happen to survive the terms of their sentences and very few did over the course of the ensuing Century approximately 70 000 prisoners arrived at the colony about 5 000 of them survived their sentences and less than two thousand were allowed to leave the prison Colony once their terms were completed foreign III was so enamored with his schemed free Mainland France from the criminal element that he ensured even relatively Petty crimes could result in deportation seeing a loaf of bread could lead to incarceration alongside a murderer especially if the thief was a repeat offender although France had the guillotine for capital crimes judges were encouraged to sentence prisoners to deportation rather than execution by beheading prisoner labor was to replace the abolished slave labor to avoid the appearance of slavery a stipend for each prisoner was paid though it was usually confiscated by guards prisoners were also allowed to receive money from families and friends French law decreed that prisoners deported to serve sentences of eight years or longer could never return to France in effect forcing The Prisoner to remain in the Colony after his sentence was served prisoners sentenced to less than eight years came under the rule of dublage the sentence of less than eight years for example three meant three additional years in the colony under deblage four years meant four and so on prisoners serving the deblage sentence had certain privileges including the ability to earn money outside the prison system though they were still counted as part of the prison colony's population whether the new arrivals were hardened criminals or relatively minor miscreants made no difference to their guards heart treatment began while the prisoners were still in France awaiting transport beatings with fists rifle butts and whips were all inflicted by the guards with little Interruption from their officers until the prisoners were loaded aboard ships for deportation they were held under guard by the French army usually French Colonial troops from Senegal in France the prisoners ower collected from the courts and jails and held in a military prison near the port of Lara shell on the Bay of Biscay hello fellow internet Enthusiast Do you want to build a beautiful website that stands out and grows your business online well look no further than Squarespace the all-in-one platform that has everything you need whether you're a blogger an entrepreneur or an artist Squarespace has customizable templates and design tools that allow you to create a professional looking website without needing to know how to code and let's not forget about the e-commerce functionality that enables you to set up and manage online stores with ease you could even collect donations for your favorite cause you also will have access to in-depth website analytics tools that give you powerful insights into who's visiting your site and how they're interacting with your content plus Squarespace has powerful blogging tools to let you share your stories photos videos and updates you categorize share and schedule your post to make sure that your content is working for you plus you could do email campaigns customize every email you send with your Brands and colors and logos it's very easy to do and you've got analytics to make sure that you know what's happening with each of those emails who's opening it who's reading it Etc so what are you waiting for head to squarespace.com for a free trial and when you're ready to launch go to squarespace.com Geographics to save 10 of your first purchase of a website or a domain and use the code Geographic to check out and now back to today's video [Music] prisoners were packed into a steamer wearing the only clothes they were allowed as well as wooden clogs for shoes few hammocks were available so the only comfort for sleeping was found on the deck if sufficient space to lie down could even be found in the mid-19th century The Voyage from Lara shell to French Guiana took about three weeks one of the more famous prisoners from The Colony Henri Sharia known to history as Papillion butterfly described his transport as consisting of 1 800 men about to vanish from ordinary life forever the prisoners for the most part had no idea what awaited them at their destination simply surviving long enough to reach it was their Chief occupation on the voyage Birds among the prisoners were frequent their guards usually looked to the other way rather than no problems between prisoners inmates found in possession of anything which hadn't been issued them endured beatings after which I were chained in the bilges for the remainder of their Journey the heat from the ship's steam engines added to their misery as did the incessant Roar of the Machinery the three-week or so Journey ended at a new prison erected to the standards of the French authorities at Saint Laurent on the Moroni River of the Mainland of French Guiana there the disembarked inmates were assigned classifications within the penal colony those who had spent most of their journey in shackles or possessed records of past misbehavior towards their guards found themselves classified as incos short for incorrigibles their immediate reward was being dispatched into the jungle to work camps to established to house laborers who were harvesting Timber and building a railroad the remaining inmates were classified as religa or Petty offenders or transportes serious vendors all three classifications yearned for the designation of liberas prisoners who had completed Court imposed sentences but due to the large and other laws were not yet free to leave the colony foreign one of the first things learned by the arriving inmates was the near impossibility of Escape alongside French Guiana were Dutch and British colonies the Dutch happily returned escaping inmates to the French authorities the British did not welcome prisoners either though they gave them some time to arrange passage from British Guyana before handing them back to the French Escape attempts as well as other indiscretions demanded punishment beatings withdrawal of what little food there was and other punishments were supplemented by solitary confinement on the island prisons of Il Sandro Josef and zilroyal escape from the mainland prisons was considered virtually impossible and required outside assistance in the view of the authorities the Maroney River as well as its tributaries was populated with caymana member of the alligator family as well as crocodiles piranhas and several species of dangerous snakes men oh a watch closely at the work camps where they had daily quotes of Labor to complete guards determined which of the men completed their daily quotas they also guarded against Escape attempts and though they happily accepted bribes from prisoners they did not always deliver what the bribe was intended to pay for for those who rebelled against the forced labor inadequate and often inedible food cruelty of the guards the centipedes and other biting pests leeches bats and the steamy air that was the punishment of the prisons within the prison if it was difficult escaping from the work camps on the mainland from the islands it was well now impossible the islands Rose from the sea from Rocky shorelines and the waters which surrounded them beat against them with a heavy surf in addition the waters were shark infested half-starved exhausted men drained of physical strength had little chance of surviving a swim from the islands yet men continued to escape despite standing orders for their guards to shoot to kill two years of solitary confinement was the punishment for the first attempt added on to their existing sentence for a second attempt five years were added on Ori Sharia received two-year stint in solitary for his first escape attempt served in the prison within a prison of ilsen Joseph there he was required to maintain a monastic silence speaking only when addressed by a guard or Warden a violation of the rule added another 30 days to confinement in a dank cell he shared with Cockrell roaches rats centipedes and other unwelcome guests the bearers were the classification of prisoners who had completed their prison sentence but were not at Liberty to return to France since they were no longer prisoners forced to work their stipend ended there were a few means of generating income one such means was accepting bribes from would-be escapers to assist them either and as a guide Through the Jungle or by obtaining a boat often liberas turned against the escapers robbing them and killing them in the jungle others worked with guards helping to attract down those men who fled into the jungle in return for a financial reward the bearer is working with the French Administration received a dead or alive warrant killing and robbing an escape e afterwards delivering the dead body to the authorities was a lucrative undertaking for some escapees that survived the Jungle the guards and the liberas often found themselves recaptured classified as incos and sent to Ill Royal where they occupied a former Barracks that became known as the Crimson Barracks during working hours prisoners there were forced to remain standing or pacing in their cells greetings in the roof above their cells allowed the guards to ensure they did just that if a guard a little nor another prisoner died as a result of an escape attempt they're a captured prisoner faced the guillotine while many did die on the beheading machine many others did not since the income of the governors of the prison Colony always dependent on the number of prisoners under their care executing a prisoner removed a portion of that income and leaving them to rot for years of solitary confinement on our was usually deemed sufficient punishment when the guillotine was used it was the responsibility of the prisoners to designate some among them to serve as executioner absolving the guards from judicial murder foreign populated of the prisons that comprise French Guiana was ilda Diablo over the near Century that the prison complex was in operation only about 50 prisoners were housed there it was a housing complex for what the French government considered the most dangerous prisoners of all those considered enemies of France for their political views the only political prisoners were sent to the Devil's Island where they were held in isolation in the former leper colony Devil's Islands was the smallest of the three prisons and it was accessed from ilrel across a 60 meter wide Strait passing by boat was dangerous due to the swirling current and Rocky coasts eventually a cable car traversed the passage between the two islands conditions for the few inmates on Devil's Islands were relatively benign in comparison to the other prisons which made up the complex yet it eventually gave its name to the entire prison system most of the horrors of the prison system actually took place away from Devil's Island on the mainland it was there that prisoners were sometimes chained to trees in the jungle and abandoned to await their fate from nature in the form of wild animals insects starvation and dehydration it was in the other prisons where men were tortured in their cells by guard odds or their fellow prisoners tormented by rats and insects driven to near Insanity from starvation and brutal forced labor the prisoners on Devil's Island were not packed together in crowded cell blocks nor forced to live under canvas tents at jungle camps they were alienated in part to ensure their radical ideas concerning politics and government did not infect the prison population yet it was the case of one prisoner condemned to Devil's Island that first revealed the horrors of French guiana's the world that prisoner was a French military officer named Alfred Dreyfuss and his case became an international sensation in France the socio-political Scandal involving Alfred Dreyfuss is still simply known as La Affair the affair in 1984 French government and military leaders became concerned over military and diplomatic Secrets falling into the hands of the German Embassy through what would be known in subsequent years as leaks a French spy working in the German Embassy as a housekeeper uncovered a torn up note that revealed certain French military developments and mentioned that they would soon be transmitted to a French Ally or once her Masters in the French military intelligence service learned of the document which she obtained for them they initiated an investigation eventually the French authorities charged an army Captain Alfred Dreyfus with communicating French military secrets to the Germans Dreyfus was from The Alsatian region of France Jewish and had political views a repugnant of the government of the French third Republic as an Alsatian he spoke fluent German and as a practitioner of the Jewish faith his religion conflicted with Catholic frauds despite a market paucity of evidence against him he was convicted of collusion with a foreign power against the state the case always tried before a military tribunal closed to the public but simultaneously also in the court of public opinion in The French Press among the contributing factors to his conviction was rampant anti-Semitism prevalent in France including among the officer Corps as well as rising nationalism nearly all subsequent scholarship agrees that Dreyfus was entirely innocent of the crimes he was charged with nonetheless he was sentenced to deportation to the French prison colony in Guyana where he was placed in isolation on ilrel he arrived there in March 1895. after a month he was transferred to Devil's Island where he was the only inmate held there at the time and occupied a stone hovel about 1.2 square meters in the late summer of 1896 drivers was Shackled to a bunk in his heart freed only when his guards came to allow him to attend the cause of nature the shackling was ordered when French authorities learned of an alleged plot but supporters of drivers to arrange his Escape foreign was allowed to write letters to his wife they were censored by the prison wardens so were the letters he received this meant that Dreyfus was kept in the dark about new developments in the Spy case that revealed a different culprit French authorities suppressed the information convicted the real spy and continued to hold drivers on Devil's Island by 1899 support for drivers among various French political and social entities had reached such a level of intensity it became known as dry physicism with his supporters called dry facades that same year the conviction that led to dreyfus's imprisonment was overturned drivers was removed from Devil's Island and returned to France where he continued to be held in confinement though no longer legally guilty of any crime he was tried again convicted again and though sentenced to 10 years he was not to return to Devil's Island in a mass Act of clemency all persons involved in La Fair were pardoned including those who manufactured or suppressed evidence committed perjury committed treason or otherwise were charged with breaking the law including Alfred Dreyfus the mass clemency allowed the depth of the conspiracy to remain effectively hidden for decades though it gradually emerged over time what also emerged were the conditions of the penal system including those in French Guiana while France dealt with and has dealt with ever since the legal extra-legal and socio-political Fallout of La Affair the rest of the Western World reacted with shock and horror at the conditions in the prison colony of French Guiana since stripers have been incarcerated on Devil's Island that name came to signify the entire penal colony among the prisoners both in French Guiana and other French colonies as well as in France the penal colony became known as lagilitin Sashay the dry guillotine in June 1913 American writer Explorer and social reformer Charles Wellington Furlong published Cayenne the dry guillotine in the popular Harper's magazine his was among the first detailed depictions of the conditions in the French penal colony to be penned by someone from outside the prison system Furlong overcame the objections of the authorities prison guards and even some of the prisoners themselves document the conditions found in French Guiana at the time of his visit to the binal Colony according to his account there were about seven thousand prisoners in custody and an unknown number of liberas living in Guiana Furlong described several instances of prisoner revolt and attacks on their guards called wardened in his article in one instance he described a warden murdered in The Jungle by an inmate using a machete in another he told of the revolt on ilsen Joseph in 1894 that resulted in the deaths of several guards and inmates rival gangs proud the prisons in furlong's article settling disputes among themselves and with other gangs using weapons fabricated from tools meant to work in the jungles and Fields Furlong also reported a death rate of about one man per day from disease most of the Dead prisoners were buried by dumping the body in the Moroni River or into the sea whichever was closer Predators then disposed of the remains in other work describing life in the prison colony of French Guiana appeared in 1928 in book form titled condemned Devil's Island written by American geographer and writer Blair Niles the book used material written by an inmate while incarcerated in French Guiana Niles fictionalized Escape attempts by the inmate Rene Bell Benoit from whom she purchased the rights while visiting the colony her book became the basis for a 1929 film of the same name starring popular actor Ronald Coleman and further strengthening condemnation from the public over conditions in The Colony orish area became famous upon publication of his autobiographical Memoir Papillon in 1969 a book that later spawned two films pabalon describes life on Devil's Island sharia's Escape return and eventual successful Escape though the work's accuracy has been questioned as noted Devil's Island o is used solely for political prisoners however Sharia was convicted and transported for murder most scholars believe he placed himself at the center of events that actually occurred to other prisoners by the time of the book's publication the French Guiana prison colony had become known universally as Devil's Island so-called and films documentaries articles and books and Sharia appropriated this name for his book French Scholars dispute sharia's account of his escape from Devil's Island as a recounted in Papillon he was never incarcerated on the island nor was there a Work Camp there as he asserted much of his time in French Guiana torim work as a nurse in the prison hospital at the hospital he frequently treated recaptured prisoners and others and heard the tales of their Adventures which he co-opted for himself he was later assigned as nurse at a work Camp from which she eventually escaped making his way to freedom and he wrote the book which made him wealthy and a folk hero in France in the 1930s public clamor and printed outrage over the prisoners living conditions led the French government to decide to close the prisons while maintaining the colony as a French possession the decision had not yet been implemented when the Second World War began and France's rapid collapse in 1940 led to American intervention in the colony concerns over Vichy France collaboration with Nazi Germany and its effect on American interests in the region forced the Americans to occupy Suriname that's Dutch Guyana along its border with the colony the Americans patrolled the border and escaped prisoners were turned over to the authorities in Suriname the final escapes from the prison Colony took place in 1953 when with the assistance of the Salvation Army the French government repatriated the remaining prisoners to France liberes were given the option of remaining in French Guiana if they so desired some did though understandably many did not the buildings of the prison system were allowed to deteriorate and the jungle reclaim the work camps in 1965 the French national scent of space studies cnes assumed control of the islands which once housed prisoners they founded the Rihanna Space Center and the rockets launch from Guiana were monitored by facilities on the islands tnes also restored some of the prison facilities throughout the region including The Stone Heart where Alfred Dreyfus spent his confinement on Devil's Island since then the islands become a popular tourist destination though IL de Diablo is no longer accessible to visitors

Channel: Geographics

Views: 239,530

Keywords: devils island, prison

Id: L3GqL0bzjy4

Length: 20min 1sec (1201 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 26 2023