This is the mythical place in Saint-Laurent where all convicts were unloaded on arrival from mainland France. After a medical examination, they were assigned to the various penitentiary centers in French Guiana. At the entrance to the camp, while waiting for the tour, you can enjoy a permanent photo exhibition retracing the history of the penal colony. Then, the guide, master of the keys, opens the doors to another world, and visitors are literally transported into this disturbing place. The most courageous will imagine themselves in the shoes of famous prisoners such as Papillon, Seznec or Dreyfus. It's a moving place, and the setting for Yves Boisset's L'Affaire Seznec (1993).

The beginnings. In 1644 - the year of Messire Charles Poncet's arrival in Cayenne - a few French survivors of a small colony established a year earlier were living on the banks of the Maroni. A first exploration of the river took place in 1820-1821, under the government of Baron de Laussat. This was followed by the mission of Lieutenant Carpentier in 1852. In his report of August 30, 1855, Carpentier wrote: "As for the Maroni, which borders the French and Dutch Guianas, it is far superior to the other Guiana rivers. The Amazon and Orinoco, alone, in this northern part of South America, outweigh it."

The lieutenant is enchanted by this region, and speaks highly of Sieur Kappler's establishment: "A fact that is happening at this establishment must attract the utmost attention of those interested in the colonization of these beautiful lands. About forty families from Friesland have settled in Kappler and have been cultivating and working the woods for over three years. When I left French Guiana a year ago, not a single sick person had yet been counted among them, yet they worked during the hottest hours of the day, without taking any precautions against the heat of the sun"

In 1852, Commissioner General Sarda-Garriga was asked to look for a more salubrious location for a penitentiary in French Guiana. His choice fell on the right bank of the Maroni, on the site of an ancient Galibi village where the Boni had settled. Between July 1852 and April 1853, work began on the penitentiary. But the departure of Sarda-Garriga put an end to the project. His successor showed no interest in the project, and it was not until Governor Baudin that the work was completed. Baudin arrived in French Guiana in November 1855 and took office as governor in February 1856. During these three months, he toured the Maroni, Mana, Sinnamary and Kourou rivers. He visited Kappler's establishment. His August 1856 report concluded: "I found some Europeans perfectly fed, housed cleanly and comfortably, in as good air as is possible between the tropics, and yet they were not free from fever."
The work of colonization began in earnest in 1858, just after the inauguration of the penitentiary. Saint-Laurent then became an agricultural penitentiary. The idea of colonizing and developing the economy of French Guiana in the manner of the English in Australia became a reality. The Saint-Laurent region became a model and several logging camps were opened, including those at Saint-Jean and Sparouine. Proud of this success, the French government decided to settle the deportees and, in 1859, the first convoy of condemned women arrived in Saint-Laurent. All were volunteers, chosen from among those most likely to return to a normal life. Soon, however, the health situation in French Guiana's prisons became catastrophic, and Napoleon III decided to suspend them. In 1867, he opted for New Caledonia. For twenty years, Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni would receive no more Europeans.
In 1859, a shortage of skilled workers led to the closure of four shipyards. Only Saint-Louis and Saint-Maurice remained open. In 1878, Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni became the headquarters of the penitentiary administration, before becoming a "special penitentiary commune" in 1880.

The establishment of the penal colony, birth of a commune. The Saint-Laurent penitentiary was founded in 1857. As early as 1852, M. Mélinon, one of the establishment's first commanding officers, dreamed of turning the region into a large-scale agricultural and forestry operation. The locality, then called Pointe-Bonaparte, was home to a few natives. In 1852, with the help of some forty former slaves from the Mana region, Mélinon began clearing the forest, and later obtained the services of a few dozen transported slaves to swell the ranks of his workers. On an inspection tour, the Governor of French Guiana, Admiral Laurent Baudin, decided that the future town would take the name of its patron, Saint-Laurent, as well as that of the river on which it was built, Maroni. The penitentiary, which had already been in operation for a year, was inaugurated a few years later, on February 21, 1858. In the same year, all the prison administration departments, offices, hotels for senior staff, houses for junior staff and guards, and a twelve-building hospital were installed.

On March 16, 1880, a decree made Saint-Laurent an autonomous commune. With this decree, the President of the Republic, Jules Grévy, decided to organize the penitentiary commune of Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni. The decree was promulgated in Cayenne on May 7 by Governor Marie-Alfred-Armand Huart, and a director of the penitentiary administration was appointed to implement it. The Maroni penitentiary territory was renamed the "commune pénitentiaire du Maroni".

Punishments. The special maritime court in Saint-Laurent judges only convicts. It is presided over by a colonial infantry captain, whose assessors include the president of the Saint-Laurent civil court and a deputy head of the prison administration office. Another officer of the same rank is the Commissaire-Rapporteur, and a military supervisor acts as clerk. It is he who, when the time comes, reads the indictment to the accused. The meagre defense of those transported is provided by the wardens and by any free person willing to take on this role. The session room is the same as the courtroom of the disciplinary commission: on the day of the session, the door is open, as the hearings are public.

Caning: the number of strokes is set by decree in Paris. The whippers, who are also convicts, have no difficulty in making the torments even more terrible, depending on the mood of the guards. The convict Maynard writes of the whip Ambarrek: "When he struck the convicts bound to the fatal bench, he would rise on tiptoe so that the whip would fall from higher up, and suddenly curling up like a wild beast, he would lower the knotted whip and pull it horizontally. This Arab was the only corrector who tore off shreds of scarlet flesh with his seven-strap whip. His face twitched, his eyes sparkled. He showed all his teeth. He was dreadful The arrival of Jules Grévy as President of the Republic put an end to corporal punishment in the early 1880s. This was followed by the creation of a special maritime court and the institution of disciplinary camps.

The guillotine: when corporal punishment was abolished, the two machines were placed in a room in the Saint-Laurent disciplinary ward. Saint-Laurent's reputation as the capital of the penal colony was enhanced by the arrival of the two guillotines. Preparations for an execution began during the night. Executioners and assistant executioners erected the machine. They performed this task in silence, so as not to wake the occupants of the two rows of benches. At dawn, the group of "key-bearers" came to collect the condemned man. He was given a last meal, rum, a liter of wine and a pack of cigarettes. After this final snack, he was taken to the registry office, where he met the warden, the prosecutor, the doctor and the chaplain. He signed the register, and was then taken to the guillotine for execution. The guillotine used for death sentences was in permanent view of the other convicts. The executioner was a volunteer convict, who enjoyed a "privileged" position (bonuses, different meals).

Camp organization. The two prison administration buildings. On the right, the infirmary, and on the left, the accommodation for the warders and "key-holders", responsible for monitoring convicts and separated from other convicts for obvious security reasons. This building now houses a library.

Another complex includes the kitchen, the small chapel and the anthropometric room, where doctors were responsible for profiling convicts and assigning them tasks according to their skill level. A little further on, you can see the remains of a latrine, a basin, a well and a pump. A large mango tree stands proudly in the middle of the courtyard.

There were also double and single huts reserved for convicts sentenced to forced labor; the "Quartier des Relégués" (generally petty criminals convicted of theft), consisting of a collective building for up to 40 convicts and 19 individual cells; the "Quartier des Libérés", detained under the same conditions as the "relégués"; the "Tribunal Maritime Spécial", responsible for judging misdemeanors and felonies committed within the Camp's walls; the "Blockhaus", with a capacity of 40 convicts, but which sometimes housed twice that number in particularly harsh conditions: hindrance for the most recalcitrant, promiscuity, lack of air and light, and spartan sanitary conditions.

The rest of the buildings are divided up as follows: the Quartier Spécial, with 12 cells reserved for convicts sentenced to death (once the sentence had been passed, convicts waited up to 4 months for it to be carried out); the Premier Quartier, with some 20 cells for convicts bound for the Salvation Islands; the Deuxième, Troisième and Quatrième Quartier were reserved for "difficult" convicts, isolated from the others by gates. Finally, cell 47 is famous for having housed Henri Charrière, known as "Papillon".