1961 Paris massacre
The 1961 Paris massacre was the mass killing of Algerians who were living in Paris by the French National Police. It occurred on 17 October 1961, during the Algerian War. Under orders from the head of the Parisian police, Maurice Papon, the National Police attacked a demonstration by 30,000 pro-National Liberation Front Algerians. After 37 years of denial and censorship of the press, in 1998 the government finally acknowledged 40 deaths, while some historians estimate that between 200 and 300 Algerians died. Death was due to heavy-handed beating by the police, as well as mass drownings, as police officers threw demonstrators into the river Seine.
The massacre was intentional, as substantiated by historian Jean-Luc Einaudi, who won a trial against Papon in 1999. Official documentation and eyewitness accounts within the Paris police department suggest that Papon directed the massacre himself. Police records show that he called for officers in one station to be "subversive" in quelling the demonstrations, and assured them protection from prosecution if they participated.
Forty years after the massacre, on 17 October 2001, Bertrand Delanoë, the Socialist Mayor of Paris, put up a plaque in remembrance of the massacre on Pont Saint-Michel. How many demonstrators were killed is still unclear. In the absence of official estimates, the plaque commemorating the massacre reads, "In memory of the many Algerians killed during the bloody repression of the peaceful demonstration of 17 October 1961". On 18 February 2007 calls were made for a Paris Métro station under construction in Gennevilliers to be named "17 Octobre 1961" in commemoration of the massacre.
Background
The massacre took place in the context of the Algerian War, which had become increasingly violent. After Charles de Gaulle's return to power during the May 1958 crisis and his sudden change of policy on Algerian independence, the OAS used all possible means to oppose the National Liberation Front, which took the war to the metropolis, where it was helped by activists such as the Jeanson network. The repression by French authorities, both in Algeria and in metropolitan France, was very harsh.The French National Police
According to historian Jean-Luc Einaudi, a specialist on the massacre, some of the causes of the violent repression of the 17 October 1961 demonstration can best be understood in terms of the composition of the French police force itself, which still included many former members of the force in place during the Vichy regime that collaborated with the Gestapo to detain Jews, as for example in the Vel' d'Hiv Roundup of 16–17 July 1942.The vast majority of police officers suspended after the Liberation of Paris in 1944 for extreme forms of collaborationism were later reintegrated into the police forces. In contrast, some of the policemen who had been part of the French Resistance had their career advancement blocked because of Cold War anti-communism, since the Resistance was partially communist and communist ministers had been expelled from the government in May 1947. Moreover, police officers who had been members of the Resistance might well have taken part in the various raids against Jews and other persecuted groups during the Vichy regime, as otherwise they would have been dismissed.
Papon's career as Head of Paris's police force in the 1960s and Minister of Finance under Valéry Giscard d'Estaing's presidency in the 1970s suggests that there was institutional racism in the French police until at least the 1960s. In fact, Papon was not charged and convicted until 1997–98 for his World War II crimes against humanity in being responsible for the deportation of 1,560 Jews, including children and the elderly, between 1942 and 1944.
Papon appointed head of Police Prefecture (March 1958)
Before his appointment as chief of the Paris police, Papon had been, since 1956, prefect of the Constantine department in Algeria, where he actively participated in the repression of and use of torture against the civilian population. On 13 March 1958, 7,000 policemen demonstrated in the courtyard of the police headquarters against delays in the "risque prime" accorded to them because of the war, although the FLN had not yet begun to target police officers. Encouraged by far-right deputy Jean-Marie Le Pen, 2,000 of them attempted to enter the Palais Bourbon, seat of the National Assembly, with shouts of "Sales Juifs! A la Seine! Mort aux fellaghas!" ! Death to the. With Minister of Interior Maurice Bourgès-Maunoury's recommendation, Papon was named prefect the next day. Two years earlier, in Constantine, Algeria, he had assumed the role of "Inspecteur général pour l'administration en mission extraordinaire". "Prohibited zones, detention centers, torture, executions without trial: this is the reality of the war he was supervising out there." According to Einaudi, in the following years he applied these methods in Paris and the Seine department.After the May 1958 crisis and the installation of the French Fifth Republic under 'Free France' leader Charles de Gaulle's leadership, Papon was kept on. He created the compagnies de district, police forces that specialized in repression, where new police recruits were trained. These companies were formed mainly from veterans of the First Indochina War and young Frenchmen coming back from Algeria.
August 1958 raids
On 25 August 1958, the FLN launched an offensive in Paris. During this action, three policemen were killed on Boulevard de l'Hôpital in the 13th Arrondissement. Another policeman was killed in front of the cartoucherie de Vincennes. A police station came under machine gun fire. Papon retaliated with massive raids on Algerian people in Paris and its suburbs. More than 5,000 Algerians were detained in the former Beaujon hospital, in the Japy gymnasium and in the Vél'd'Hiv. The Japy gymnasium and the Vél'd'Hiv had been used as detention centers under the Vichy regime. A former member of the FTP resistance, reporter Madeleine Rifaud wrote in L'Humanité:In the past two days, a racist concentration camp has been opened in Paris. They have not even had the good sense to choose a site which would not remind French patriots who are currently celebrating the anniversary of the Liberation of Paris of what took place there.
Creation of the CIV and the FPA militia (1959–1960)
According to Einaudi, "Already at this time, policemen boasting about throwing Algerians in the Seine" river. Vincennes's "identification center" was then created under the authority of the prefecture of police in January 1959. Algerians detained during police raids in the Paris region could be brought there for identity verifications but could also be put under house arrest by the prefect. "These raids were frequently the occasion of violence," Einaudi wrote.The Auxiliary Police Force was created in 1959. This special constabulary force, under the authority of the Algerian Affairs Coordination Center of the Prefecture of Police and supervised by the military, was under Papon's control. Led by Captain Raymond Montaner and based at the Fort de Noisy, Romainville, it was composed entirely of Algerian Muslims recruited in Algeria or France. In autumn 1960, the FPA had 600 members. It first operated in the 13th Arrondissement, where it requisitioned café-hotels. Torture is rumoured to have been used, most notably at 9, rue Harvey and 208, rue du Château des Rentiers. Forced disappearances took place. The FPA then extended its action to the 18th Arrondissement, where three hotels were requisitioned in rue de la Goutte-d'Or. The FPA was also active in the suburbs, from the summer of 1961, in particular in Nanterre's bidonvilles. Some voices were opposed to these crimes denied by the police prefecture. Christian magazine wrote: "It is not possible to stay silent when, in our Paris, men are resurrecting the methods of the Gestapo".
1961
The FLN decided to resume bombings against the French police at the end of August 1961; from the end of August to the beginning of October 1961, 11 policemen were killed and 17 injured in Paris and its suburbs. "These bombings had the effect of spreading fear throughout the ranks of the Paris police, but also for increasing the desire for revenge and hate against the whole of the community. During the whole of September, the Algerian population was severely repressed. In practice, this massive repression was based on physical appearance", according to Einaudi. There were daily raids against Algerians—and frequently any Maghrebi people, and even Spanish or Italian immigrants, who were mistaken for Algerians. Algerians were arrested at work or in the streets and thrown into the Seine with their hands tied in order to drown them, among other methods, as shown for example in a report by the priest Joseph Kerlan from the Mission de France.According to Einaudi, "It was in this climate that, on 2 October, during the funerals of a policeman killed by the FLN, the police prefect proclaimed, in the prefecture's courtyard: 'For one hit taken we shall give back ten!' This call was an encouragement to kill Algerians and was immediately understood as such. On the same day, visiting Montrouge's police station, the prefect of police declared to the police officers present: 'You also must be subversive in the war that sets you against others. You will be covered, I give you my word on that'".
Events
On 5 October 1961, the Prefecture of Police announced in a press statement the introduction of a curfew from 8.30 p.m. to 5.30 a.m. in Paris and its suburbs for "Algerian Muslim workers", "French Muslims" and "French Muslims of Algeria". The French Federation of the FLN thus called upon the whole of the Algerian population in Paris, men, women and children, to demonstrate against the curfew, widely regarded as a racist administrative measure, on 17 October 1961. According to historian Jean-Luc Einaudi, Papon had 7,000 policemen, 1,400 CRS and gendarmes mobiles to block this demonstration, to which the Prefecture of Police had not given its agreement. The police forces thus blocked all access to the capital, metro stations, train stations, Paris' Portes, etc. Of a population of about 150,000 Algerians living in Paris, 30,000–40,000 of them managed to join the demonstration however. Police raids were carried out all over the city. 11,000 persons were arrested, and transported by RATP bus to the Parc des Expositions and other internment centers used under Vichy. Those detained included not only Algerians, but also Moroccan and Tunisian immigrants, who were then sent to the various police stations, to the courtyard of the police prefecture, the Palais des Sports of Porte de Versailles, and the Stade Pierre de Coubertin, etc.Despite these raids, 4,000 to 5,000 people succeeded in demonstrating peacefully on the Grands Boulevards from République to Opéra, without incident. Blocked at Opéra by police forces, the demonstrators backtracked. Reaching the Rex cinema, the police opened fire on the crowd and charged, leading to several deaths. On the Neuilly bridge, the police detachments and FPA members also shot at the crowd, killing some. Algerians were thrown into and drowned in the Seine at points across the city and its suburbs, most notably at the Pont Saint-Michel in the centre of Paris and near the Prefecture of Police, very close to Notre Dame de Paris.
During the night, a massacre took place in the courtyard of the police headquarters, killing tens of victims. In the Palais des Sports, then in the "Parc des Expositions of Porte de Versailles", detained Algerians, many by now already injured, systematic victims of a 'welcoming committee'. In these places, considerable violence took place and prisoners were tortured. Men would be dying there until the end of the week. Similar scenes took place in the Coubertin stadium... The raids, violence and drownings would continue over the following days. For several weeks, unidentified corpses were discovered along the river banks. The victims of the massacre can be estimated to at least 200 fatalities.
In 1961, the police prefecture spoke only of "2 persons shot dead". Following historian Jean-Luc Einaudi's testimony during the Papon trial in the late-1990s, left-wing police Minister Jean-Pierre Chevènement ordered the opening of parts of the archives. The resulting Mandelken Report, based on the investigation of these partial records, counted 32 dead. Einaudi then published an op-ed in Le Monde on 20 May 1998, contesting this official figure, criticizing both the methodology of the report and the consulted records. He called attention to the fact that many of the records had been destroyed. A report that Papon had prepared for Interior Minister Roger Frey, the prime minister, and the head of government, Charles de Gaulle, was not included in the consulted records. In addition, the Mandelken report ignored the massacre that had taken place in the courtyard of the Police prefecture, and Papon's name itself appeared nowhere in the report. Einaudi concluded his op-ed stating that: "on the night of 17 October 1961 there had been a massacre perpetrated by the police forces acting on the orders of Maurice Papon." Papon subsequently filed a lawsuit against him in February 1999, because of this sentence, alleging defamation of a public servant.
In the meanwhile, the state acknowledged in 1998 the massacre and spoke of 40 dead.
Responding to Papon's request, the court gave an ambiguous judgement. It stated that Einaudi had "defamed" Papon, but that Einaudi had acted on "good faith", and praised the "seriousness and quality" of Einaudi's research. Both Papon and Einaudi were thus vindicated by the court's judgement.
The French government commission in 1998 claimed only 48 people died. Historian Jean-Luc Einaudi asserted that as many as 200 Algerians had been killed. The historian Jean-Paul Brunet found satisfactory evidence for the murder of 31 Algerians, while suggesting that a number of up to 50 actual victims was credible.
This contradicts David Assouline, who in 1997 was granted limited access to consult part of the police documents by Minister of Culture Catherine Trautmann. He found a list of 70 persons killed, while the texts confirmed Einaudi's comments that the magistrates who had been called on by the victims' families to consider these incidents had systematically acquitted the policemen. According to Le Monde in 1997, which quoted the director of the Paris Archives, the register listed 90 persons by the second half of October.
In a 2001 article in Esprit, Paul Thibaud discussed the controversy between Jean-Luc Einaudi, who spoke of 200 killed on 17 October, and 325 killed by the police during the autumn of 1961, and Jean-Paul Brunet, who gave an estimate of only 50. Although criticizing Einaudi on some points, Thibaud also underlined that Brunet had consulted only police archives and took the registers of the IML medico-legal institute at face value. Based on other sources, Thibaud pointed out that administrative dissimulation about the dead had taken place, and that the IML could not be relied upon as sole source. Thibaud concluded that Einaudi's work made it possible to give an estimate of 300 Algerian victims of murder between 1 September and 31 December 1961.
The events surrounding the massacre and its death toll were largely unknown for decades. There was almost no media coverage at the time. These events remained unknown in part because they were overshadowed in the French media by the Charonne Metro Station massacre on 8 February 1962 whose victims were not only Algerians, but also French members of the French Communist Party.