A commemorative slab, marking the spot where Colonel Alfred Dreyfus, chief protagonist in the Dreyfus cause celebre, landed upon his arrival from incarceration in Devil’s Island on July 1, 1899, will be placed at Port Haliguen by the League for Human Rights, it was announced here yesterday.
Colonel Dreyfus landed at Port Haliguen enroute to retrial at Rennes, where his innocence of the charges of selling French military secrets to Germany, was established, after five years on Devil’s Island.
Colonel Dreyfus, now 71 years old, is living in retirement in France.
The production of a play based upon the Dreyfus case last year in Paris served to revive interest in the affair, especially because it brought about lively scenes on the part of the monarchists who attempted to discredit the Jews.
Colonel Dreyfus, then a captain of artillery in the French army, and a Jew of Alsatian birth, was arrested on October 15, 1894 and convicted on December 22nd at a secret court martial where he was sentenced to life imprisonment on Devil’s Isle.
The conviction of Dreyfus, his public degradation, and the withdrawal of his citizenship brought to his defense outstanding liberal leaders throughout the world, among them the late French statesman, Georges Clemenceau and Emile Zola.
As a result of their championing of his cause, the Court of Cassation of France, the supreme tribunal of appeal and revision, held a new trial on June 3, 1899, where the verdict was handed down that Dreyfus’s conviction was illegal and his reinstatement was ordered.
On September 9, 1899, Dreyfus was reinstated by the Army, on September 19, the President pardoned him. It was not, however, until July 7, 1906, that the Court of Cassation brought to a juridical end the Dreyfus case.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
