The Dark History of Mont Saint-Michel: From Religious Building to Infamous Prison

Mont Saint-Michel was not just a religious building. It was also a prison following the French Revolution. From 1815, between 600 and 750 inmates per year stayed in the dungeons and dungeons of La Merveille. A dark page in its history.

There have been prisoners at Mont Saint-Michel since the Middle Ages. Under the Ancien Régime, the king exiled to the Rock sons of good families who were a little too turbulent. But after the Revolution, the “Merveille” became a real prison, where priests, then political opponents, were locked up before the jails became the “central house” under Napoleon. History of the Mont-Saint-Michel prison or a diverted and little-known vocation of pilgrims.

You have to imagine that the entire abbey is transformed into a prison. Very few traces remain of it in the abbey church. But in the dungeons, we have a very particular trace which is real proof of the presence of prisoners at the Mont Saint-Michel abbey. It is a door engraved with graffiti and which keeps the list of the different sentences of this prisoner over the years of incarceration.

Delphine Davy, teacher assigned to the Mont-Saint-Michel educational service

In 1811, Napoleon decided to transform Mont-Saint-Michel into a central house because it was a fortified island, in a huge bay with shifting sand. But the building is not suitable for inmates, it is adapted to a Middle Ages abbey. Its spaces are remodeled. For example, we install floors in the nave of the church, we use pre-existing floors in the refectory. The living area increases to accommodate a maximum of prisoners.

The first prisoners were refractory priests who did not sign the civil constitution of the clergy. Then come the heavily convicted common law prisoners, mostly Bretons and then political opponents, republicans like Armand Barbès who was locked up by Louis Philippe for almost four years in the so-called “Barbès” dungeon.

We are not very sure that Barbès was incarcerated at this specific location. Republican prisoners are locked up in abbey lodgings, in rather comfortable cells, or put in boxes above the cloister. One day, Armand Barbès returns to his dressing room and finds his window covered up. He gets angry and creates a sort of riot in the prison. At that time, the prison administration decided to lock him up for a while in the disciplinary unit.

Delphine Davy, teacher assigned to the Mont-Saint-Michel educational service

There have been prisoners at Mont-Saint-Michel since the Middle Ages. The abbots of the Mount are lords who have the power of justice. We can therefore lock someone up before the lord delivers his justice. At the time, prison sentences in the criminal sense did not exist. It was the French revolution that invented it.

The Mount has probably had a prison since the 13th century. In the 15th century, Louis Called “the Bastille of the seas” or even “the black legend”, the abbey became a state prison during the Revolution. The republican Barbès but also Blanqui, the revolutionary socialist, will stay there for several years.

Jérémie Halais, archivist and author of “The prison of Mont-Saint-Michel”

The prison was mixed until 1822. On the other hand, there were always young prisoners (in small numbers). This poses a problem for the administration which must isolate them from the oldest prisoners for reasons of promiscuity.

The dungeon is a cramped, rudimentary space. Living conditions are extreme. They can almost be described as inhuman because physiological needs are not respected. It’s humid, it’s cold. Water is insufficient, the air is stale from overcrowding, prisoners lack sleep and cleanliness. They are washed on arrival only.

Near the dungeons, there is a huge wooden wheel to respond to the rock’s primary problem of transporting heavy loads, the equipment necessary for daily life in the prison and all the materials useful to the company. Because at the time the abbey was a business made up of weaving workshops, straw hat manufacturing, and slipper manufacturing. For all these workshops, we need fairly heavy materials.

The wheel is operated by the prisoners themselves. It drives a rope on the pulley, the rope itself being connected to a chain, itself attached to a trolley which slides along the ramp and allows all heavy loads to be raised, up to a ton each time. . It’s a bit like the freight elevator of the Middle Ages.

At the end of the 19th century, the prison closed. One of the reasons is that the bed of the Sélune, one of the rivers of the bay, changes position, is placed in front of the Mount and prevents the transport of goods. The premises were unsuitable for the requirements of a modern prison and the pressure of romantic writers and artists sealed the end to the prison in October 1863. The abbey was then returned to worship, that was 160 years ago!