#Alfred dreyfus wife and children trial#
#Alfred dreyfus wife and children free#

He enrolled in the Ecole Supérieure de Guerre and, having graduated with an honourable mention, became a trainee in the Army’s General Staff headquarters, where he was the only Jewish officer. He married Lucie Eugénie Hadamard in 1891, and they had two children. By 1889, he had been promoted to captain. He then spent two years in specialist training at the artillery school in Fontainebleau after which he was assigned to a regiment. He came from a wealthy family of Jewish descent, and was commissioned in 1880 after graduating from the elite Ecole Polytechnique military school in Paris. L’Affaire Dreyfus, as it was known, made the front pages worldwide, and France was especially condemned by the British press.Īlfred Dreyfus (1859-1935) was an artillery officer from Alsace.

#Alfred dreyfus wife and children free#

It effectively meant that the press were free to print articles based on racial and religious discrimination. The right-wing press continued to attack his reputation, and his Jewish ancestry – even after his death in 1935 – until anti-Semitism in France was made illegal after the Second World War.Īuthor and historian Georges Joumas, whose book Alfred Dreyfus, Citoyen came out last year, notes that the only legal defence against any kind of discrimination, racism or anti-Semitism at that time was to sue for defamation.

It began in 1894 when Army captain Alfred Dreyfus was arrested for spying, and officially continued until 1906 when he was finally exonerated.īut it continued for many years afterwards. In addition to the love letters, the Beit Hatfutsot exhibition will also include other items from the Dreyfus family's private collection, as well as newspaper segments and cartoons about the affair and a film directed by Georges Méliès.įrance's ambassador to Israel and Dreyfus' great granddaughter will attend the opening night on March 10.The Dreyfus Affair was a political scandal that shamed France for decades. 'The story of the family in general, and the story of his relationship with Lucie, provide a possible answer to the question of his survival and character, and so it was important to us to stress in the exhibition, for the first time, the personal aspect of the words 'the Dreyfus affair.'' Today we know that Lucie played an important role in maintaining Alfred's sanity, as he was chained to a bed most hours of the day. A person who in addition to the serious physical torture he went through, also suffered from terrible mental humiliation. 'Over the years, the question of Dreyfus' survival in the inconceivable conditions he was imprisoned in has been raised more than once. Possible answer to the question of Dreyfus' survival (photo courtesy of the Museum of Art and of Jewish History in Paris)

#Alfred dreyfus wife and children trial#

We both needed superhuman efforts to focus and stretch our nerves, in order to endure this huge trial courageously.'

I have prepared for this excitement, I wanted to be strong and not to break down in any way. In 1899, after Dreyfus returned from his imprisonment and was waiting in a military jail for his second trial, his wife wrote to him: 'My dear Alfred, for four years I have been struggling, praying and hoping for the arrival of this blessed day. Tears come to my eyes when I think of them.' He expressed his feeling for her by writing, 'I kiss you a thousand times as I love you, as I adore you, my dear Lucie. One of the first letters Alfred wrote Lucie, in 1894, reveals his optimism despite his difficult situation: 'I trust to God and to justice that truth will make itself known in due time. A young Alfred Dreyfus (Photo: Charles Dreyfus, from the Dreyfus family's private collection)