Madeleine Cemetery
Encyclopedia
Cimetière de la Madeleine is also the name of a cemetery in Amiens
Madeleine Cemetery in French known as Cimetière de la Madeleine is a former cemetery in Paris
, part of the land on which the Chapelle expiatoire
now stands.
bought a piece of land of approximately 45x19m destined to become the third cemetery of the parish. It was located on the intersection of Rue d’Anjou and the Grand Égout (now Boulevard Hausmann) in Paris. It became known as the Madeleine Cemetery.
The cemetery was closed on March 25, 1794, reputedly because it was full, but maybe for sanitary reasons, as it was located in an affluent part of Paris.
victims were thrown in specially dug trenches and covered in quicklime to speed up the decomposition process. There were no markers.
Among those reputed to have been "buried" here:
It is unclear how many corpses were "buried" but the estimates vary from hundreds up to three thousand.
" the cemetery was closed and became private land. The beheaded corpses (victims of the guillotine) were then taken to what was to become the Errancis Cemetery
(it remained open for three years but is now also gone).
The land was sold to a stonemason. On June 3, 1802, the land in which the bodies lay, was bought by Pierre-Louis Olivier Desclozeaux, a royalist magistrate, who had lived adjacent to the cemetery (now Square Louis XVI)http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=w7W&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=s&q=square+Louis+XVI+%C3%A0+Paris&oq=&gs_rfai=&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=Square+Louis+XVI,+75008+Paris,+France&gl=us&ei=uP-nS-b2E4XGlQeh9e2dDA&sa=X&oi=geocode_result&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CAcQ8gEwAA since 1789. Desclozeaux had taken note of the sites where the King and Queen were buried and reputedly surrounded them with a hedge
, two weeping willows
, and cypress
trees.
On 11 January 1815, Desclozeaux sold his house and the old cemetery to Louis XVIII. One of the first decisions of Louis XVIII
when he acceded to the throne of France at the time of the Bourbon Restoration
, was to move the remains of his brother and sister-in-law, King Louis XVI
and his Queen Marie Antoinette
, to the necropolis of the Kings of France, the Basilica of St Denis. They were exhumed on January 18 and 19, 1815, and moved to Saint-Denis Basilica on January 20. Marie Antoinette's remains were identified by a garter and a jaw, which an eyewitness identified as being the queen's, based on having seen her smile over thirty years before. Louis XVIII also searched for his sister Élisabeth in the Errancis Cemetery, but to no avail.
In 1844 the cemetery was cleared and the skeletal remains were transferred to the l'Ossuaire de l'Ouest (West Ossuary). When the ossuary was closed, the contents were transferred to the Paris catacombs.
Amiens
Amiens is a city and commune in northern France, north of Paris and south-west of Lille. It is the capital of the Somme department in Picardy...
Madeleine Cemetery in French known as Cimetière de la Madeleine is a former cemetery in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, part of the land on which the Chapelle expiatoire
Chapelle Expiatoire
The Chapelle expiatoire is a chapel located in the eighth arrondissement, of Paris, France. This chapel is dedicated to King Louis XVI and his Queen Marie Antoinette, although they are formally buried in the Basilica of St Denis....
now stands.
History and location
In 1720, the parish of Sainte-Madeleine de la Ville-l’ÉvêqueÉglise de la Madeleine
L'église de la Madeleine is a Roman Catholic church occupying a commanding position in the 8th arrondissement of Paris. It was designed in its present form as a temple to the glory of Napoleon's army...
bought a piece of land of approximately 45x19m destined to become the third cemetery of the parish. It was located on the intersection of Rue d’Anjou and the Grand Égout (now Boulevard Hausmann) in Paris. It became known as the Madeleine Cemetery.
The cemetery was closed on March 25, 1794, reputedly because it was full, but maybe for sanitary reasons, as it was located in an affluent part of Paris.
Use of the cemetery
Major interments were the 133 victims of the firework celebration of the marriage of the Dauphin (the future Louis XVI) to Marie-Antoinette of Habsbourg-Lorraine on May 30, 1770 and that of the Swiss Guards who were massacred in the Tuileries, August 10, 1792.During the French Revolution
The decapitated corpses of the guillotineGuillotine
The guillotine is a device used for carrying out :executions by decapitation. It consists of a tall upright frame from which an angled blade is suspended. This blade is raised with a rope and then allowed to drop, severing the head from the body...
victims were thrown in specially dug trenches and covered in quicklime to speed up the decomposition process. There were no markers.
Among those reputed to have been "buried" here:
- Louis XVI (January 21, 1793) he and Marie Antoinette were reputedly the only victims buried in a coffin
- Marie AntoinetteMarie AntoinetteMarie Antoinette ; 2 November 1755 – 16 October 1793) was an Archduchess of Austria and the Queen of France and of Navarre. She was the fifteenth and penultimate child of Holy Roman Empress Maria Theresa and Holy Roman Emperor Francis I....
(October 16, 1793) - Charlotte CordayCharlotte CordayMarie-Anne Charlotte de Corday d'Armont , known to history as Charlotte Corday, was a figure of the French Revolution. In 1793, she was executed under the guillotine for the assassination of Jacobin leader Jean-Paul Marat, who was in part responsible, through his role as a politician and...
(July 18, 1793). - 22 GirondistsGirondistThe Girondists were a political faction in France within the Legislative Assembly and the National Convention during the French Revolution...
(October 31, 1793), among them Jacques Pierre BrissotJacques Pierre BrissotJacques Pierre Brissot , who assumed the name of de Warville, was a leading member of the Girondist movement during the French Revolution. Some sources give his name as Jean Pierre Brissot.-Biography:...
and Pierre Victurnien VergniaudPierre Victurnien VergniaudPierre Victurnien Vergniaud was a lawyer and statesman, and a significant figure of the French Revolution. A deputy to the Assembly from Bordeaux, Vergniaud was a notably eloquent and impressive orator...
. - Olympe de GougesOlympe de GougesOlympe de Gouges , born Marie Gouze, was a French playwright and political activist whose feminist and abolitionist writings reached a large audience....
(November 3, 1793). - Louis Philippe II, Duke of OrléansLouis Philippe II, Duke of OrléansLouis Philippe Joseph d'Orléans commonly known as Philippe, was a member of a cadet branch of the House of Bourbon, the ruling dynasty of France. He actively supported the French Revolution and adopted the name Philippe Égalité, but was nonetheless guillotined during the Reign of Terror...
(November 6, 1793), also known as Phillipe Égalité. - Madame RolandMadame RolandMarie-Jeanne Roland, better known simply as Madame Roland and born Marie-Jeanne Phlipon , was, together with her husband Jean-Marie Roland de la Platière, a supporter of the French Revolution and influential member of the Girondist faction...
(November 8, 1793). - Madame du BarryMadame du BarryJeanne Bécu, comtesse du Barry was the last Maîtresse-en-titre of Louis XV of France and one of the victims of the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution.-Early life:...
(December 8, 1793). - Jacques HébertJacques HébertJacques René Hébert was a French journalist, and the founder and editor of the extreme radical newspaper Le Père Duchesne during the French Revolution...
, (March 24, 1794) and his supporters
It is unclear how many corpses were "buried" but the estimates vary from hundreds up to three thousand.
Closure
The day after the execution of the "HébertistsHébertists
The Hébertists were an ultra-revolutionary political faction associated with the populist journalist Jacques Hébert. They came to power during the Reign of Terror and played a significant role in the French Revolution....
" the cemetery was closed and became private land. The beheaded corpses (victims of the guillotine) were then taken to what was to become the Errancis Cemetery
Errancis Cemetery
Errancis Cemetery or Cimetière des Errancis is a former cemetery in Paris and was used to dispose of the corpses of guillotine victims.-History and location:...
(it remained open for three years but is now also gone).
The land was sold to a stonemason. On June 3, 1802, the land in which the bodies lay, was bought by Pierre-Louis Olivier Desclozeaux, a royalist magistrate, who had lived adjacent to the cemetery (now Square Louis XVI)http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=w7W&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=s&q=square+Louis+XVI+%C3%A0+Paris&oq=&gs_rfai=&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=Square+Louis+XVI,+75008+Paris,+France&gl=us&ei=uP-nS-b2E4XGlQeh9e2dDA&sa=X&oi=geocode_result&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CAcQ8gEwAA since 1789. Desclozeaux had taken note of the sites where the King and Queen were buried and reputedly surrounded them with a hedge
Hedge
Hedge may refer to:* Hedge or hedgerow, line of closely spaced shrubs planted to act as a barrier* Hedge , investment made to limit loss* Hedge , intentionally non-committal or ambiguous sentence fragments-See also:...
, two weeping willows
Willow
Willows, sallows, and osiers form the genus Salix, around 400 species of deciduous trees and shrubs, found primarily on moist soils in cold and temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere...
, and cypress
Cupressaceae
The Cupressaceae or cypress family is a conifer family with worldwide distribution. The family includes 27 to 30 genera , which include the junipers and redwoods, with about 130-140 species in total. They are monoecious, subdioecious or dioecious trees and shrubs from 1-116 m tall...
trees.
On 11 January 1815, Desclozeaux sold his house and the old cemetery to Louis XVIII. One of the first decisions of Louis XVIII
Louis XVIII of France
Louis XVIII , known as "the Unavoidable", was King of France and of Navarre from 1814 to 1824, omitting the Hundred Days in 1815...
when he acceded to the throne of France at the time of the Bourbon Restoration
Bourbon Restoration
The Bourbon Restoration is the name given to the period following the successive events of the French Revolution , the end of the First Republic , and then the forcible end of the First French Empire under Napoleon – when a coalition of European powers restored by arms the monarchy to the...
, was to move the remains of his brother and sister-in-law, King Louis XVI
Louis XVI of France
Louis XVI was a Bourbon monarch who ruled as King of France and Navarre until 1791, and then as King of the French from 1791 to 1792, before being executed in 1793....
and his Queen Marie Antoinette
Marie Antoinette
Marie Antoinette ; 2 November 1755 – 16 October 1793) was an Archduchess of Austria and the Queen of France and of Navarre. She was the fifteenth and penultimate child of Holy Roman Empress Maria Theresa and Holy Roman Emperor Francis I....
, to the necropolis of the Kings of France, the Basilica of St Denis. They were exhumed on January 18 and 19, 1815, and moved to Saint-Denis Basilica on January 20. Marie Antoinette's remains were identified by a garter and a jaw, which an eyewitness identified as being the queen's, based on having seen her smile over thirty years before. Louis XVIII also searched for his sister Élisabeth in the Errancis Cemetery, but to no avail.
In 1844 the cemetery was cleared and the skeletal remains were transferred to the l'Ossuaire de l'Ouest (West Ossuary). When the ossuary was closed, the contents were transferred to the Paris catacombs.