ALFRED DREYFUS WIFE AND CHILDREN WINDOWS

'In promising you to live until my name is rehabilitated, I have made the greatest sacrifice that can be made by an honest man. Nothing can better give the impression of my wife and myself during the sad days I passed in the Sante Prison than our correspondence, of which I give a few extracts:. The latter, by the way, showed himself strictly just and fair during my whole stay. My wife was permitted to see me twice a week, in the private office of the Prison Director. At last, toward noon, I was taken to the Sante Prison and shut up in a convict's cell. My grief bowed me down.Īt the Central Prison, in my torn and stripped uniform, I was dragged from hall to hall, searched, photographed, and measured.

ALFRED DREYFUS WIFE AND CHILDREN WINDOWS

On coming to the end of the bridge, I saw through the tiny grating of my compartment in the van the windows of the home where such happy years of my life had been spent, where I was leaving all my happiness behind me. They tied my hands, and a prison van took me to the Depot (Central Prison of Paris), passing over the Alma Bridge. The round of the square made, the torture would be over, I believed.īut the agony of that long day was only beginning. I heard the howls of a deluded mob, I felt the thrill which I knew must be running through those people, since they believed that before them was a convicted traitor to France and I struggled to transmit to their hearts another thrill, - belief in my innocence. I was compelled to make the whole round of the square. Then, my whole being racked by a fearful paroxysm, but with body erect and head high, I shouted again and again to the soldiers and to the assembled crowd the cry of my soul. I saw all these material emblems of my honor fall at my feet. He tore off rapidly buttons, trousers stripes, the signs of my rank from cap and sleeves, and then broke my sword across his knee. Vive la France, vive l'armee!'Ī Sergeant of the Republican Guard came up to me. Soldiers, they are dishonoring an innocent man. 'Soldiers, they are degrading an innocent man. To sustain me I called up the memory of my wife and children.Īs soon as the sentence had been read out, I cried aloud, addressing myself to the troops:

I suffered agonizingly, but held myself erect with all my strength. General Darras, commanding the parade, gave the order to carry arms. If they had spoken to me about it before my departure from France, which did not take place until February, 1895, - that is, more than seven weeks after the degradation, - I should have tried to strangle this calumny in its infancy.Īfter this I was marched to the centre of the square, under a guard of four men and a corporal. It is by a travesty of these words that Lebrun-Renault, with singular lack of conscience, created or allowed to be created that legend of confession, of which I learned the existence only in January, 1899.

I protested against the vile accusation which had been brought against me I recalled that I had written again to the Minister to tell him of my innocence. The memory of the dreadful months which I had just passed came back to me, and in broken sentences I recalled to the captain the last visit which Commandant du Paty de Clam had made me in my prison.

During these long minutes I gathered up all the forces of my being. I underwent the horrible torture without weakness.īefore the ceremony, I waited for an hour in the hall of the garrison adjutant at the Ecole Militaire, guarded by the captain of gendarmes, Lebrun-Renault. THE DEGRADATION TOOK PLACE Saturday, the 5th of January. (Source: Five Years of My Life: The Diary of Captain Alfred Dreyfus)ĭreyfus marched out for his degradation on January 19, 1894

Alfred dreyfus wife and children