Internment Camps in France - Before World War II

Before World War II

The first internment camps were opened during the First World War (1914–1918) to detain civilian prisoners (mainly German, Austrian and Ottoman). These prisoners were detained in Pontmain in the department of Mayenne, Fort-Barreaux in Isère, in the military camp of Graveson (Bouches-du-Rhône), in Frigolet near Tarascon (Bouches-du-Rhône), Noirlac (Abbey) (Cher), and Ajain(Creuse).

Other internment camps were used for Armenians in the 1920s-1930s (Mirabeau camp, Victor Hugo camp and Oddo Camp in Marseille); Gypsies after the 1912 Act on nomadism (for instance in the Royal Saltworks at Arc-et-Senans, but also in iron mines in the Manche and other disaffected industrial centers in Mayenne, in the Manche, in Loire-Atlantique, in the Sarthe, in the Maine-et-Loire, etc.).

But the most famous internment camps before World War II were used to receive the Republican refugees during the Spanish Civil War. These were interned mostly in the Roussillon Province, although internment camps were established in all of French territory, even in Brittany, in the north-west of France. These camps were located in:

• Agde in the Hérault department (near Montpellier)
• Argelès-sur-Mer, between Perpignan and the border
• Camp Gurs in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques, which received Spanish refugees following the defeat of the Spanish Republic. These were distinguished by the French state into Brigadists, gudaris (Basque nationalists) who had escaped from the siege of Santander, pilots, and farmers. The latter had trades that were in low demand, and the French government, in agreement with the Francoist government, incited them to return to Spain. The great majority did so and were turned over to the Francoist authorities in Irún. From there they were transferred to the Miranda de Ebro camp for purification according to the Law of Political Responsibilities.
• Camp Vernet near Pamiers, in the Ariège.
• Moisdon-la-Rivière and Juigné-des-Moutiers in Loire-Atlantique department (Brittany).
• The Camp de Rivesaltes, in the department of Pyrénées-Orientales. The Jewish detainees were sent to Drancy internment camp, near Paris, the Gypsies to Saliers and the Spaniards to camp Gurs.

To these camps must be added the camps for the German prisoners in 1939 (sometimes overlapping with those above), and those of the Colonial Empire, not well known in Europe.

Furthermore, the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, who had been named Consul in Paris for Immigration, organized the transportation to Chile of 2,200 Spanish refugees who had been detained in the camps on board the Winnipeg, which departed on 2 August 1939, and arrived in Valparaíso at the beginning of September 1939.