Albert Londres
Encyclopedia
Albert Londres was a French
journalist
and writer
. One of the inventors of investigative journalism
, he criticized abuses of colonialism
such as forced labour. Albert Londres gave his name to a journalism prize for Francophone journalists.
in 1884. After finishing secondary school, he went to Lyon
in 1901 to work as a bookkeeper, then moved to Paris in 1903. He wrote occasional articles for newspapers from his native region, and published his first poetry in 1904. The same year, he started as correspondent in Paris for the Lyon newspaper Le Salut Public. Also in 1904, his daughter Florise was born, but his partner, Marcelle (Marie) Laforest, died one year later. In 1906 he became parliament
ary correspondent for Le Matin. His job was to listen to gossip in corridors of the French parliament
and report it in anonymous columns. When war
broke out in 1914, Londres, unfit for military service due to ill health and a weak constitution, became military correspondent for the newspaper at the Ministry of War
. Subsequently made war correspondent, he was sent to Reims
during its bombing, alongside the photographer Moreau
. Londres' first big article told of the fire in the cathedral
on 19 September 1914; the report was published two days later.
Londres wanted to go to the Orient
; the editors of Matin refused. So he left to become a foreign affairs reporter for Le Petit Journal
. In 1915 he went to south-east Europe
to report on combat in Serbia
, Greece
, Turkey
and Albania
. On his return, he covered the end of the war in France. In 1919 he was sacked by Le Petit Journal under the orders of the French Prime Minister Clemenceau
. Continuing his vocation, Londres reported that "the Italians are very unhappy with the peace conditions concocted by Clemenceau, Lloyd George
and Wilson
." He then worked for the illustrated daily Excelsior which had sought him. In 1920, Londres succeeded in entering the USSR, described the nascent Bolshevik
regime, profiled Lenin and Trotsky and told of the suffering of the Russian people. "Albert Londres was stunned. Sickened by what he had discovered. This was no bourgeois propaganda but rather brainwashing driven home by the Russian papers".
In 1922 he went to Asia. He reported Japan
and the "madness of China
". He also covered Nehru, Gandhi and Tagore
in India
. From 1922 his articles began to be published as books by Albin Michel through Henri Béraud
, literary editor of Le Petit Parisien
. Londres started investigative stories for Le Petit Parisien. In 1923, he went to the penal colony
of Cayenne
in Guyana
. Describing the horrors, his reports produced reactions in public opinion and the Establishment.
And the article continued: "I was taken to these places. I was taken aback by the novelty of the fact. I had never before seen fifty men in a cage. [...] They were getting ready for night. The place was swarming with them. They were free from five in the evening until five in the morning - inside their cage."
Londres also denounced "doubling". "When a man is sentenced to five to seven years forced labour, once the sentence is completed, he must stay in Guyana for the same number of years. If the sentence is more than seven years, he must stay there for the rest of his life. How many jurors know that? The penal colony starts with freedom. During their sentence they are fed (badly), they are housed (badly), they are clothed (badly). A brilliant minimum when one considers what happens afterwards. Their five to seven years complete, they are shown the door, and that's it."
In 1924 he investigated forced labour in North Africa
, where military prisons welcomed convicts of courts-martial
He became interested in the Tour de France
, which he saw as pitiless and intolerable physical exertion in this "Tour of Suffering", and criticised the rules. (Les Forçats de la route (The convicts of the road) and Tour de France, tour de souffrance (Tour de France, Tour of Suffering))
His next topic was the lunatic asylum. He exposed abuse of antipsychotic
s, sanitary and nutritional incompetence, and reminded readers that "Our duty is not to rid ourselves of the mad, but to rid the mad of their madness." (Chez les fous (With the Mad))
In 1928, still with the Petit Parisien, he travelled to Senegal
and French Congo
, and discovered that railway construction and exploitation of the forests was causing deaths among African workers. "They are the negroes of the negroes. The masters no longer have the right to sell them. Instead they simply exchange them. Above all they make them have sons. The slave is no longer bought, he is born." He concluded with a diatribe against colonisation
, which he held responsible for these crimes. (Terre d'ébène (Land of Ebony) )
In 1929, while anti-Semitism
was rife in Europe, he went to Palestine
. He met the Jewish
community and came face to face with an outcast people. He declared himself in favour of the creation of a Jewish state, but doubted peace between the Jews and the Arab
s. "The demographic imbalance presages difficult days ahead: 700,000 Arabs versus 150,000 Jews" (Le Juif errant est arrivé (The Wandering Jew
has come home))
He next went to the Balkans
to investigate the terrorist actions of the Komitadjis, ethnic Macedonian
nationalists protesting about the alleged division of their land between Greece
, Bulgaria
and Serbia
. (Les Comitadjis)
This was to be his last completed report. He was killed in the fire on the Georges Philippar, the ocean liner taking him from China back to France. He seemed to have uncovered a scandal - "It was a matter of drugs, arms, of Bolshevik interference in Chinese affairs" reported Pierre Assouline
's biography of Londres. But his notes were destroyed in the fire. Questions surround the fire - accident or attack? The only people to whom he confided the contents of his report - the couple Lang-Villar - died in a plane crash.
Reports and investigations
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
and writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
. One of the inventors of investigative journalism
Investigative journalism
Investigative journalism is a form of journalism in which reporters deeply investigate a single topic of interest, often involving crime, political corruption, or corporate wrongdoing. An investigative journalist may spend months or years researching and preparing a report. Investigative journalism...
, he criticized abuses of colonialism
Colonialism
Colonialism is the establishment, maintenance, acquisition and expansion of colonies in one territory by people from another territory. It is a process whereby the metropole claims sovereignty over the colony and the social structure, government, and economics of the colony are changed by...
such as forced labour. Albert Londres gave his name to a journalism prize for Francophone journalists.
Biography
Londres was born in VichyVichy
Vichy is a commune in the department of Allier in Auvergne in central France. It belongs to the historic province of Bourbonnais.It is known as a spa and resort town and was the de facto capital of Vichy France during the World War II Nazi German occupation from 1940 to 1944.The town's inhabitants...
in 1884. After finishing secondary school, he went to Lyon
Lyon
Lyon , is a city in east-central France in the Rhône-Alpes region, situated between Paris and Marseille. Lyon is located at from Paris, from Marseille, from Geneva, from Turin, and from Barcelona. The residents of the city are called Lyonnais....
in 1901 to work as a bookkeeper, then moved to Paris in 1903. He wrote occasional articles for newspapers from his native region, and published his first poetry in 1904. The same year, he started as correspondent in Paris for the Lyon newspaper Le Salut Public. Also in 1904, his daughter Florise was born, but his partner, Marcelle (Marie) Laforest, died one year later. In 1906 he became parliament
Parliament
A parliament is a legislature, especially in those countries whose system of government is based on the Westminster system modeled after that of the United Kingdom. The name is derived from the French , the action of parler : a parlement is a discussion. The term came to mean a meeting at which...
ary correspondent for Le Matin. His job was to listen to gossip in corridors of the French parliament
Palais Bourbon
The Palais Bourbon, , a palace located on the left bank of the Seine, across from the Place de la Concorde, Paris , is the seat of the French National Assembly, the lower legislative chamber of the French government.-History:...
and report it in anonymous columns. When war
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
broke out in 1914, Londres, unfit for military service due to ill health and a weak constitution, became military correspondent for the newspaper at the Ministry of War
Ministry of War
A Ministry of War or Ministry for War is an administrative, supply and services agency of an army, as opposed to the entire military establishment. Both Mexico and Brazil both still maintain a War Department for the support of their armies...
. Subsequently made war correspondent, he was sent to Reims
Reims
Reims , a city in the Champagne-Ardenne region of France, lies east-northeast of Paris. Founded by the Gauls, it became a major city during the period of the Roman Empire....
during its bombing, alongside the photographer Moreau
Moreau
-People:*Basil Anthony Marie Moreau , French priest*Charles Paul Narcisse Moreau French soldier and mathematician .*Christophe Moreau , French cyclist*Daniel Moreau Barringer , American politician...
. Londres' first big article told of the fire in the cathedral
Reims Cathedral
Notre-Dame de Reims is the Roman Catholic cathedral of Reims, where the kings of France were once crowned. It replaces an older church, destroyed by a fire in 1211, which was built on the site of the basilica where Clovis was baptized by Saint Remi, bishop of Reims, in AD 496. That original...
on 19 September 1914; the report was published two days later.
Londres wanted to go to the Orient
Orient
The Orient means "the East." It is a traditional designation for anything that belongs to the Eastern world or the Far East, in relation to Europe. In English it is a metonym that means various parts of Asia.- Derivation :...
; the editors of Matin refused. So he left to become a foreign affairs reporter for Le Petit Journal
Le Petit Journal
Le Petit Journal was a daily Parisian newspaper published from 1863 to 1944. It was founded by Moïse Polydore Millaud. In its columns were published several serial novels of Émile Gaboriau and of Ponson du Terrail.- Publishing :...
. In 1915 he went to south-east Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
to report on combat in Serbia
Serbia
Serbia , officially the Republic of Serbia , is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe, covering the southern part of the Carpathian basin and the central part of the Balkans...
, Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
, Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
and Albania
Albania
Albania , officially known as the Republic of Albania , is a country in Southeastern Europe, in the Balkans region. It is bordered by Montenegro to the northwest, Kosovo to the northeast, the Republic of Macedonia to the east and Greece to the south and southeast. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea...
. On his return, he covered the end of the war in France. In 1919 he was sacked by Le Petit Journal under the orders of the French Prime Minister Clemenceau
Georges Clemenceau
Georges Benjamin Clemenceau was a French statesman, physician and journalist. He served as the Prime Minister of France from 1906 to 1909, and again from 1917 to 1920. For nearly the final year of World War I he led France, and was one of the major voices behind the Treaty of Versailles at the...
. Continuing his vocation, Londres reported that "the Italians are very unhappy with the peace conditions concocted by Clemenceau, Lloyd George
David Lloyd George
David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor OM, PC was a British Liberal politician and statesman...
and Wilson
Woodrow Wilson
Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913...
." He then worked for the illustrated daily Excelsior which had sought him. In 1920, Londres succeeded in entering the USSR, described the nascent Bolshevik
Bolshevik
The Bolsheviks, originally also Bolshevists , derived from bol'shinstvo, "majority") were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party which split apart from the Menshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903....
regime, profiled Lenin and Trotsky and told of the suffering of the Russian people. "Albert Londres was stunned. Sickened by what he had discovered. This was no bourgeois propaganda but rather brainwashing driven home by the Russian papers".
In 1922 he went to Asia. He reported Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
and the "madness of China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
". He also covered Nehru, Gandhi and Tagore
Rabindranath Tagore
Rabindranath Tagore , sobriquet Gurudev, was a Bengali polymath who reshaped his region's literature and music. Author of Gitanjali and its "profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse", he became the first non-European Nobel laureate by earning the 1913 Prize in Literature...
in India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. From 1922 his articles began to be published as books by Albin Michel through Henri Béraud
Henri Béraud
Henri Béraud was a French novelist and journalist.- Life :Henri Béraud was the son of a baker. In 1903 he began his work in journalism....
, literary editor of Le Petit Parisien
Le Petit Parisien
Le Petit Parisien was a prominent French newspaper during the French Third Republic. It was published between 1876 and 1944, and its circulation was over 2 million after the First World War.-Publishing:...
. Londres started investigative stories for Le Petit Parisien. In 1923, he went to the penal colony
Penal colony
A penal colony is a settlement used to exile prisoners and separate them from the general populace by placing them in a remote location, often an island or distant colonial territory...
of Cayenne
Cayenne
Cayenne is the capital of French Guiana, an overseas region and department of France located in South America. The city stands on a former island at the mouth of the Cayenne River on the Atlantic coast. The city's motto is "Ferit Aurum Industria" which means "Work brings wealth"...
in Guyana
Guyana
Guyana , officially the Co-operative Republic of Guyana, previously the colony of British Guiana, is a sovereign state on the northern coast of South America that is culturally part of the Anglophone Caribbean. Guyana was a former colony of the Dutch and of the British...
. Describing the horrors, his reports produced reactions in public opinion and the Establishment.
(Au bagne, 1923)
It must be said that we in France have erred. When someone - sometimes with our knowledge - is sent into forced labour, we say "He has gone to Cayenne". The penal colony is no longer at Cayenne, but at Saint-Laurent-du-MaroniSaint-Laurent-du-MaroniSaint-Laurent-du-Maroni is a commune of French Guiana, an overseas region and department of France located in South America. Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni is one of the two sub-prefectures of French Guiana and the seat of the Arrondissement of Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni...
first of all and later at the Îles du SalutÎles du SalutThe Îles du Salut are a group of small islands of volcanic origin about 11 km off the coast of French Guiana in the Atlantic Ocean...
. I ask, by the way, that these isles be debaptised, for they are not the Isles of Salvation, but the Isles of Punishment. The law allows us to behead murderers, not to employ them. Cayenne is nevertheless the capital of the penal colony. (...) Finally, I arrived at the camp. The labour camp. Not a machine for producing well defined, regulated, uniform punishment. A factory churning out misery without rhyme or reason. One would search in vain for any mould to shape the prisoners. It crushes them, that's all, and the pieces go where they may.
And the article continued: "I was taken to these places. I was taken aback by the novelty of the fact. I had never before seen fifty men in a cage. [...] They were getting ready for night. The place was swarming with them. They were free from five in the evening until five in the morning - inside their cage."
Londres also denounced "doubling". "When a man is sentenced to five to seven years forced labour, once the sentence is completed, he must stay in Guyana for the same number of years. If the sentence is more than seven years, he must stay there for the rest of his life. How many jurors know that? The penal colony starts with freedom. During their sentence they are fed (badly), they are housed (badly), they are clothed (badly). A brilliant minimum when one considers what happens afterwards. Their five to seven years complete, they are shown the door, and that's it."
In 1924 he investigated forced labour in North Africa
North Africa
North Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, linked by the Sahara to Sub-Saharan Africa. Geopolitically, the United Nations definition of Northern Africa includes eight countries or territories; Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, South Sudan, Sudan, Tunisia, and...
, where military prisons welcomed convicts of courts-martial
Court-martial
A court-martial is a military court. A court-martial is empowered to determine the guilt of members of the armed forces subject to military law, and, if the defendant is found guilty, to decide upon punishment.Most militaries maintain a court-martial system to try cases in which a breach of...
He became interested in the Tour de France
Tour de France
The Tour de France is an annual bicycle race held in France and nearby countries. First staged in 1903, the race covers more than and lasts three weeks. As the best known and most prestigious of cycling's three "Grand Tours", the Tour de France attracts riders and teams from around the world. The...
, which he saw as pitiless and intolerable physical exertion in this "Tour of Suffering", and criticised the rules. (Les Forçats de la route (The convicts of the road) and Tour de France, tour de souffrance (Tour de France, Tour of Suffering))
His next topic was the lunatic asylum. He exposed abuse of antipsychotic
Antipsychotic
An antipsychotic is a tranquilizing psychiatric medication primarily used to manage psychosis , particularly in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. A first generation of antipsychotics, known as typical antipsychotics, was discovered in the 1950s...
s, sanitary and nutritional incompetence, and reminded readers that "Our duty is not to rid ourselves of the mad, but to rid the mad of their madness." (Chez les fous (With the Mad))
In 1928, still with the Petit Parisien, he travelled to Senegal
Senegal
Senegal , officially the Republic of Senegal , is a country in western Africa. It owes its name to the Sénégal River that borders it to the east and north...
and French Congo
French Congo
The French Congo was a French colony which at one time comprised the present-day area of the Republic of the Congo, Gabon, and the Central African Republic...
, and discovered that railway construction and exploitation of the forests was causing deaths among African workers. "They are the negroes of the negroes. The masters no longer have the right to sell them. Instead they simply exchange them. Above all they make them have sons. The slave is no longer bought, he is born." He concluded with a diatribe against colonisation
Colonisation
Colonization occurs whenever any one or more species populate an area. The term, which is derived from the Latin colere, "to inhabit, cultivate, frequent, practice, tend, guard, respect", originally related to humans. However, 19th century biogeographers dominated the term to describe the...
, which he held responsible for these crimes. (Terre d'ébène (Land of Ebony) )
In 1929, while anti-Semitism
Anti-Semitism
Antisemitism is suspicion of, hatred toward, or discrimination against Jews for reasons connected to their Jewish heritage. According to a 2005 U.S...
was rife in Europe, he went to Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
. He met the Jewish
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
community and came face to face with an outcast people. He declared himself in favour of the creation of a Jewish state, but doubted peace between the Jews and the Arab
Arab
Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...
s. "The demographic imbalance presages difficult days ahead: 700,000 Arabs versus 150,000 Jews" (Le Juif errant est arrivé (The Wandering Jew
Wandering Jew
The Wandering Jew is a figure from medieval Christian folklore whose legend began to spread in Europe in the 13th century. The original legend concerns a Jew who taunted Jesus on the way to the Crucifixion and was then cursed to walk the earth until the Second Coming...
has come home))
He next went to the Balkans
Balkans
The Balkans is a geopolitical and cultural region of southeastern Europe...
to investigate the terrorist actions of the Komitadjis, ethnic Macedonian
Macedonians (ethnic group)
The Macedonians also referred to as Macedonian Slavs: "... the term Slavomacedonian was introduced and was accepted by the community itself, which at the time had a much more widespread non-Greek Macedonian ethnic consciousness...
nationalists protesting about the alleged division of their land between Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
, Bulgaria
Bulgaria
Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...
and Serbia
Serbia
Serbia , officially the Republic of Serbia , is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe, covering the southern part of the Carpathian basin and the central part of the Balkans...
. (Les Comitadjis)
This was to be his last completed report. He was killed in the fire on the Georges Philippar, the ocean liner taking him from China back to France. He seemed to have uncovered a scandal - "It was a matter of drugs, arms, of Bolshevik interference in Chinese affairs" reported Pierre Assouline
Pierre Assouline
Pierre Assouline is a writer and journalist. He was born in Casablanca, Morocco. He has published several novels and biographies, and also contributes articles for the print media and broadcasts for radio....
's biography of Londres. But his notes were destroyed in the fire. Questions surround the fire - accident or attack? The only people to whom he confided the contents of his report - the couple Lang-Villar - died in a plane crash.
Works
Poetry- Suivant les heures, 1904
- L'Âme qui vibre, 1908
- Le poème effréné including Lointaine and La marche à l'étoile", 1911
Reports and investigations
- Au bagne (1923)
- Dante n'avait rien vu (1924)
- Chez les fous (1925)
- La Chine en folie (1925)
- Le Chemin de Buenos Aires (1927)
- Marseille, porte du sud (1927)
- Figures de nomades (1928)
- L'Homme qui s'évada (1928)
- Terre d'ébène (1929)
- Le Juif errant est arrivé (1930)
- Pêcheurs de perles (1931)
- Les Comitadjis ou le terrorisme dans les Balkans (1932)
- Histoires des grands chemins (1932)
- Mourir pour Shanghai (1984, texts on the Sino-Japanese WarSecond Sino-Japanese WarThe Second Sino-Japanese War was a military conflict fought primarily between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. From 1937 to 1941, China fought Japan with some economic help from Germany , the Soviet Union and the United States...
in 1932) - Si je t'oublie, Constantinople (1985, texts on the War in the Dardanelles in 1915-17)
- En Bulgarie (1989)
- D'Annunzio, conquérant de Fiume (1990)
- Dans la Russie des soviets (1996)
- Les forçats de la route / Tour de France, tour de souffrance (1996)
- Contre le bourrage de crâne (1997)
- Visions orientales (2002, texts on Japan and China written in 1922)
Albert Londres Prize
- Jean-Michel Caradec'hJean-Michel Caradec'hJean-Michel Caradec'h is a French journalist and writer. He is the author of several books in association with personalities of show business, sports, and civil life...
,1984. - Marie-Monique RobinMarie-Monique RobinMarie-Monique Robin is an award-winning French journalist. She received the Albert Londres Prize in 1995 for Voleurs d'yeux, an expose about organ theft...
, 1995. - Jean-Paul MariJean-Paul MariJean-Paul Mari is an award-winning French author and journalist. He was born in 1950 in Algiers, leaving his birthplace at the age of 11. He studied psychology and worked as a physiotherapist at a hospital in Toulouse. He has since done stints as a radio host, radio reporter and print journalist...
,1987. - Sorj ChalandonSorj ChalandonSorj Chalandon is a French writer and journalist. From 1973 until 2007 he worked as a journalist on Libération where, among other things, he covered events in Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, Somalia and Afghanistan. In 1988 he received the Albert Londres Prize for his articles on Northern Ireland and the...
,1988. - Jean RolinJean RolinJean Philippe Rolin is a French writer and journalist. He received the Albert Londres Prize for journalism in 1988, and his novel L'organisation received the Medicis award in 1996....
,1989. - Olivier WeberOlivier WeberOlivier Weber is an award-winning french writer, novelist and reporter at large. War correspondent for twenty-five years, specially in Afghanistan, Africa, Middle-East and Iraq. Assistant professor at the Institut d'études politiques de Paris, president of the Prize Joseph Kessel, he is today...
,1992.