FRANCE'S MODEM BASTILLE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 21, 25 January 1936, Page 8 (Supplement)

FRANCE'S MODEM BASTILLE.

The Real Devil's Island.

(By A Special Correspondent.)

PARIS. FRANCE still has its bastille where State prisoners, whose identity is rarely, if ever, revealed, are confined in secret, rigidly isolated from all contact with their fellow convicts and the outside world. This modern bastille is Devil's Island, known the world over as Captain Dreyfus' tragic place of exile, and still reserved exclusively for offenders against the State," that is to say, traitors and spies of French nationality. There are at the present time five eucli prisoners on Devil's Island. Nobody, except a few high Government officials, know their names, nor the reason why they have been condemned to serve thif unknown sentence in strict isolation from the common criminals imprisoned on the mainland of French Guiana, from which the lonely, rocky islet is separated by 35 miles of tropical sea. All efforts to establish their identity and the nature of their offences have been met with evasive politeness by the French authorities. They are men dead to the world, like the bastille prisoners whom even the cannon of their deliverers on July 14, 1789, failed to arouse out of their apathy. The Prisoners of Distinction. Like the bastille, abo Devil's Island is a prison for the elite, for Frenchmen of good social position, convicted of treason or espionage, whom the Government wishes to punish with exemplary severity while according them certain privileges not enjoyed by the common herd of convicts. It is, in a sense, a distinction to be sent there, as it was in the old times to be hurried off to the bastille on a lettre de cachet as a "King's prisoner" and to dwell there during his good pleasure at his expense. Thus, each of the five mysterious prisoners now held for "reasons of State" on Devil's Island has a little hcuse and garden of his own and a servant—a convict from the mainland—to wait upon him and cook his meals. While his fare cannot vie in excellence with the succulent meals served, according to recent researches 6f French historians, to the old bastille prisoners, • it is plentiful and varied by garden pro- ' duce. Within the limits of their gardens, which are enclosed by barbed-wire ( fences, the prisoners are free to move •' about as they like until sunset, when ' they are required to remain indoors. 1 There are two armed guards for each J prisoner, constituting a garrison of ten men commanded by a sergeant. Guards ' and prisoners are inspected periodically by superior prison officials from the mainland.

The Terror Of Loneliness. . Devil's Island is therefore by no means the hell on earth pictured, by imaginative writers stirred by Captain

EXCLUSIVE PRISON FOR THE ELITE.

Dreyfus' tragic story. As there is practically not the slightest chance of escape, surveillance of the prisoners is rather lax than otherwise. The island's greatest and only terror —and it is a very real one—lies in its loneliness. The prisoners are not permitted to communicate with each other and can talk with no one excepting their guards. Their sole consolation is reading, for they are allowed a certain number of books.

, Captain Dreyfus' house still exists, but it is no longer occupied. The island is so small and rocky—only two--1 thirds of a mile around—that the number of prisoners that can be confined on it is limited. Nevertheless, it has given its suggestive name to all the penal settlements in French Guiana, although the most important camp is at Cayenne, on the mainland, where from five to six thousand convicts, comprising many of the most dangerous criminals in France, are concentrated. One Of Three Islets. Devil's Island is only one of a group of three islets—called the lies du Salut —which were discovered by Columbus, who first sighted the coast of Guiana in 1495. The other two islands, which are larger, are named lie Royale and lie St. Joseph. The latter isle is more like what people imagine Devil's Island to be, for on it are confined particularly dangerous and unruly convicts, who have given too much trouble on the mainland. These "ba«i boys," who are about 300 in number, are naturally treated with exceptional severity. The lie Royale, which is very healthful, is used as a sanitarium for sick convicts. Drastic Reforms In Progress. The French Government lias in recent times repeatedly announced its intention of abolishing the penal settlements in Guiana altogether, in order to make a respectable and. prosperous colony out of its South American possessions. If these plans are carried out, Devil's Island, with its real and imaginary horrors, may soon he nothing but a memory, like the bastille which it in many respects resembles. In the meantime drastic reforms are being gradually put into effect by Governor Georges La my, recently appointed head of the colony. Governor Lamv is concentrating his efforts at present on a gradual suspension of the so-called doublage system, by which convicts who have been freed after serving their term of penal servitude are obliged to remain in the colony for a period equal to that of their original sentence. This system has tilled the colony with thousands of liberated convicts, who bear the stigma of crime, and are more or less left to their own resources and often reduced to hopeless misery. Officials admit that . it is impossible to estimate the exact number of these miserable-men, as many of them disappear into the jungle.