FORMER ROYAL PRISONS OF SAINT-AMOUR

Unique in the Jura. These old royal prisons house the audience (courthouse) with two bodyguards on the ground floor and two courtrooms on the first floor. In the back, we see the prisons themselves: the cour courtyard and apartment, the pistole, the chapel, the court of the prisoners, two detention rooms, three underground cachots with door-to-desk doors. These buildings, which were those of the Justice des Gabelles, were built in 1741. They were mainly used to try smugglers because the smuggling of salt, tobacco and fabrics was particularly active in Saint-Amour, a village located on the border of several provinces. After the annexation of Franche-Comté in 1678, the province maintained an advantageous tax system relative to its neighbours in Bresse and Burgundy. After the Revolution, the audience was occupied by the employees of the Grant, while the rest of the settlement became a prison of passage for the inmates of Lons-le-Saunier in Bourg-en-Bresse and vice versa. Several hundred live there every year. A very interesting visit.