Camelots du Roi

The King's Camelots, officially the National Federation of the King's Camelots (french: Fédération nationale des Camelots du Roi) was a far-right youth organization of the French militant royalist and integralist movement Action Française active from 1908 to 1936. It is best known for taking part in many right-wing demonstrations in France in the 1920s and 1930s.

History

Genesis

In 1908, the Action française sought to equip itself with a youth militant organization. Commander Louis Cuignet prospected in the ranks of the army in search of a leader of men. It was finally Maxime Real del Sarte, a student at the Beaux-Arts, who was chosen, after the coup "by the Court of Cassation". In the continuity of the Dreyfus affair, the young Real del Sarte decides to attack the judges by interrupting a hearing interrupted by the public prosecutor Alexis Ballot-Beaupré:

Created on 16 November 1908, the formula "Camelots du Roi" was used for the first time in the daily ''L'Action française'' to designate the newspaper sellers of the '' Gazette de France'', '' L'Accord social'' and ''L'Action française''. Their name originates from their first vocation, that of ensuring propaganda by selling mainly the issues of the ''French Action'' newspaper in the streets of Paris, hence their name of Camelots, newsagents. The name of the group means "street-hawkers of the king" and does not refer to the legendary locale of Camelot. They were recruited on the one hand from the royalist group of the XVIIe district of Paris organized by Henry des Lyons to sell newspapers at the door of the churches, and on the other hand from among the royalist workers and employees of ''L'Accord social'' of Firmin Bacconnier.

Few in number at the start, the first police reports mention about fifty members in January 1909. At the end of 1909, the police counted around 400.

On 21 November 1908, the Camelots du Roi disrupted a reading-tribute dedicated to Émile Zola at the Odéon.

During the winter of 1908 to 1909, the Camelots du Roi damaged or even destroyed statues erected in Paris or in the provinces representing Dreyfusards or Republicans.

The Camelots were the instrument of a policy of tumult on the part of Action Française. They were much more an armed force than a force of political proposal. The idea was to stir up trouble to remind public opinion of the royalist cause and thus bring in new recruits. The members of Les Camelots had great admiration for Charles Maurras as a writer and as a politician. He was their indisputable master, even if some gradually marginalized their position within Action Française, without however questioning their affiliation with this movement. The first president of the King's Camelots was named Maxime Real del Sarte, while Henry des Lyons was the national secretary. Marius Plateau, Lucien Lacour, Armand du Tertre, Lucien Martin, Léon Géraud, Jean Dorange are appointed delegates. The man who decided on the relationship of the Camelots with the central organization of Action Française, as well as the discipline, was Maurice Pujo.

The Thalamas affair

In 1904, the history professor Amédée Thalamas enjoyed a small reputation for having relativized the political role of Joan of Arc during the Hundred Years War and questioned her virtue as well as the supernatural character of the virgin of Orleans. He had received a reprimand from the Minister of Public Instruction. In November 1908, the Council of Professors of the Faculty of Letters, chaired by Dean Alfred Croiset, authorized Thalamas, who did not have the title of Doctor of Letters, to provide a free course once a week throughout the winter on history pedagogy. This course was divided into twelve small courses. Trained by Maxime Real del Sarte, the Camelots du Roi decide to interrupt the lesson given by the professor every Wednesday, even if it meant resorting to violence.

During the first lesson, on 2 December 1908, students and Camelots invaded the Michelet amphitheater and caused a hellish uproar. Maxime Real del Sarte grabbed Thalamas and slapped him. He flees. The young people leave the room, spread out on the boulevard Saint-Michel, break through the police roadblocks, cross the Seine, and arrive at the statue of Joan of Arc, where they lay a wreath of flowers.

On 9 December, the royalists demonstrated more vigorously at the Sorbonne.

On 23 December, wanting to rehabilitate Joan of Arc, Maurice Pujo undertakes to devote a free course to her in the middle of the Sorbonne, in the Guizot amphitheater. He traces in front of his listeners a historical picture, comparing the state of France in the XVth century with that of his time. He is wrapping up when a peace officer, followed by a Captain of the Guard and a line of soldiers, asks him to come out. The listeners dispersed without incident.

The first trial against a Camelot du Roi took place on 24 December: Serge Real del Sarte, a student at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, was accused of "violence against an agent". The same day, a group of 500 demonstrators, led by his brother Maxime and the Camelots, headed for the Senate and invaded the courtyard of the palace to cries of "Down with the republic !" to make themselves known, the Camelots du Roi do not hesitate to be voluntarily arrested to appear in public trial and to get people talking about them in the press.

On 31 December, Maxime Real del Sarte was sentenced to fifteen days in prison for "insulting agents".

On 16 February 1909, the professor was spanked in the middle of class, which became a "true feat of arms for the Camelots du Roi".

The campaign against Thalamas lasted three months, with numerous arrests for insults and violence against agents : in addition to those of Maurice Pujo and Maxime Real del Sarte, his brother Yves, Henry des Lyons, Marius Plateau, Georges Bernanos and dozens Anonymous Camelots du Roi were arrested, then released after spending a fortnight in prison.

The Thalamas affair then aroused passionate reactions; the thalamist and anti-thalamist camps confronted each other again during the year 1909. The Republican Federation of Students of France led by Edmond Bloch tried to obstruct the Camelots du Roi. This episode is part of a period of "mythification" of Joan of Arc in French nationalist circles; it was one of the first feats of Camelots du roi.

Recruited among the student population, they made Paris's Latin Quarter their fief. The Camelots were involved in many brawls and street-fights against left wing organizations or competing far right organizations. They were originally directed by Maxime Real del Sarte, president of the National Federation of the Camelots du Roy. This royalist youth organization included popular figures such as Catholic writer Georges Bernanos, Théodore de Fallois, Armand du Tertre, Marius Plateau, Henri des Lyons or Jean de Barrau, member of the directing committee of the National Federation, and particular secretary of the duke of Orléans (1869–1926), the son of the Orleanist count of Paris (1838–1894) and hence Orleanist heir to the throne of France.

Exchanges with anarchists

In the 1910s, the Camelots du Roi briefly befriended the extreme left, in particular the anarcho-syndicalists. Activists from both sides sympathize in prison and discover a common enemy: the Republic. For example, the Camelot du Roi Georges Bernanos was arrested on 14 January, 8 February and 10 March 1909. During his last arrest, he was sentenced to 10 days in prison and 25 franc penalty. He recounts his incarceration and his fraternization with revolutionary militants:

There were all the same some hitches between the Camelots du Roi and anarchists, as illustrated by the testimony of the Camelot du Roi Georges Moyrizot, which nuances this prison friendship:

This relationship is deepened in the Cercle Proudhon supported by Henri Lagrange but the urgency of the war quickly puts an end to this rapprochement.

1910 floods

During the 1910 Seine flood, the Camelots du Roi helped the victims in various ways: soup kitchens, distribution of coal and clothing, ferries to cross or bring the victims to safety, collection of donations. The Camelots du Roi imagine themselves "in the most working-class neighborhoods, in the reddest suburbs of the outskirts with a certain guts, sometimes expelled by a stubborn police commissioner, as in Javel, or by a mayor ..like in Issy-les-Moulineaux ». In the suburbs of Issy-les-Moulineaux, the Action Française soup kitchen provided a thousand meals a day and the Camelots du Roi provided regular assistance to 172 families for a total of 882 people. Maurice Pujo gives an account of these events in the ''Almanach de l'Action française'' of 1911.

From February 17 to April 20 in Vigneux, the Camelots du Roi build and furnish twenty-five barracks for workers, with the help of the marquise de Mac Mahon and the Association of Young Royalist Girls.

Previously, Action française had financed barracks to rehouse the victims of the earthquake of June 11, 1909 in the South of France.

The coup of Lucien Lacour

On the night of November 19 to 20, 1910, Camelots plastered the walls of Brest with a poster entitled Les Gloires de la République, which depicted a fat Jewish woman — wearing a Phrygian cap and Masonic garb, and attacked with virulence the Chairman of the Board Aristide Briand and Joseph Reinach nicknamed "Reinach Boule-de-Juif" (stings about his overweight, in reference to a short story by Maupassant titled '' Boule de Suif''). The next day, Lucien Lacour managed to slap Briand twice, shouting:

.

On 6 December 1910, Lucien Lacour was sentenced to three years in prison. He was finally released on 16 January 1912 after 422 days in prison. On 23 April 1912, the Camelots of King Henri Bourgoin and Norbert Pinochet freed Gabriel de Baleine, another imprisoned activist. They phone the director of the Central House of Clairvaux pretending to be the President of the Council. The stratagem will inspire telephonist Charlotte Montard a few years later.
File:Lucien Lacour, Camelot du Roi, inflige une gifle à Aristide Briand, président du conseil dans Le Petit Parisien du 4 décembre 1910.jpg, Lucien Lacour slaps Aristide Briand in ''Le Petit Parisien'', December 4, 1910.
File:Caricature de Lucien Lacour corrigeant Aristide Briand dans L'Assiette au beurre du 25 mars 1911.jpg, Caricature by Lucien Lacour correcting Aristide Briand in '' L'Assiette au beurre'', March 25, 1911
File:Lucien Lacour dans Le Matin du 7 décembre 1910.png, Lucien Lacour in ''Le Matin'' of December 7, 1910

Protests at Comédie-Française

In February 1911, Henry Bernstein presented his play ''Après moi'' at the Comédie-Française. As soon as the first performance was announced, the Camelots du Roi put up posters reproducing a letter in which Henry Bernstein boasted of having deserted. During the second performance on 21 February 1911, Maurice Pujo and several Camelots du Roi were arrested while heckling the play. Each performance gives rise to demonstrations of Action Française. On 3 March, the play is deprogrammed. On 4 March, Maurice Pujo was sentenced to one month in prison and a 25 franc penalty, César Berthollet to eight days and 16 franc, while the other Camelots du Roi received suspended prison sentences and a few francs penalty.

On 22 June 1911, Henry Bernstein feeling offended by an article by Léon Daudet, the two men faced off in a duel. On 26 July 1911, a second duel pitted Maurice Pujo against Henry Bernstein.

File:Maurice Pujo est conduit au poste le 20 février 1911.png, Maurice Pujo is taken to the polisce station on February 20, 1911
File:Duel entre Léon Daudet et Henry Bernstein dans Excelsior le 22 juin 1911.png, Duel between Léon Daudet and Henry Bernstein in Excelsior on June 22, 1911
File:Duel entre Maurice Pujo et Henry Bernstein dans Excelsior le 27 juillet 1911.jpg, Duel between Maurice Pujo and Henry Bernstein in Excelsior on July 27, 1911

The Three Year Law

In 1913, faced with the threat of an armed conflict with the German Empire, Action Française decided to support the extension of the duration of military service under the Three Year Law. The Camelots du Roi clashed with left-wing activists who were unfavorable to this measure and more inclined to improving relations with the German Empire and to the military training of reservists. The Camelots du Roi and the leaguers take part in numerous contradictory conferences as well as demonstrations in several cities: Bordeaux, Nice, Toul, Epinal, Toulouse, Limoges, Dijon, Orléans, Lille, Lyon, Rennes.

The law was finally adopted on 7 August 1913. Charles Maurras boasted that the President of the Council Louis Barthou had complimented Action française: "It would not have been possible without the Camelots du Roi". A probably apocryphal quote.

However, the merit of the promulgation of this law does not belong solely to the Camelots du Roi. The historian Rosemonde Sanson recalls that "the press campaigns carried out by groups of moderate republicans, the creation a little later of the Federation of the Lefts on the eve of the legislative elections of 1914 had, without a doubt, a greater repercussion".

During the Great War

In 1914, the Camelots du Roi sought to maintain their meetings although attendance was down due to the war and the call-up of many militants. In September 1915, the Action française decided to suspend the activity of the Camelots du Roi. In 1916, some sections nevertheless managed to maintain a rhythm and ensure meetings, such as in Bordeaux, Toulouse, Marseille, Nogent le Perreux, Rouen, Angers, Montpellier, Chambéry, Nantes, Riom and Saint Germain en Laye. The sections of Vannes, Nîmes, Lorient, Laval, Saint Denis, Nancy, Saint Nazaire, Tours manage to bring together members and activists from time to time.

At the end of the First World War, 10 of the 12 secretaries general and assistants of the Action française students between 1909 and 1914 were killed in action.

The assassination of Marius Plateau

On January 22, 1923, the general secretary of the Camelots du Roi, Marius Plateau, was assassinated by Germaine Berton, an anarchist militant to avenge Jean Jaurès, Miguel Almereyda and protest against the occupation of the Ruhr. Beheaded, the Camelots du Roi unleashed their fury by ransacking the offices and printing presses of three left-wing newspapers: ''L'Œuvre'', ''L'Ère Nouvelle '' and ''Bonsoir''. This time, public opinion does not support the Camelots and ''Le Populaire'' writes: "someone (Germaine Berton) dared to turn the methods of the Camelots against them".

On the evening of 31 May 1923, the Catholic Marc Sangnier, the radical Maurice Violette and the socialist Marius Moutet had to speak at a meeting in the hall of learned societies against "French fascism". But the Camelots du Roi attacked the three men by beating them and coating them with tar and printing ink. The victims narrowly escape treatment with castor oil. The next day, the Communists, the Socialists and, for the first time, the Radicals expressed their deep dissatisfaction. The Radicals, through the voice of their leader Édouard Herriot, are asking the government to reaffirm its republican character. Because of this aggression, the Camelots du Roi were nicknamed the "Apaches du Roy" in several press titles.

On 22 January 1930, the Association Marius Plateau was created in homage to the destiny deemed exemplary of Marius Plateau.

File:Caricature des Camelots du Roi dans L'Œuvre du 3 juin 1923.png, Caricature relating to the attack on Marc Sangnier, Maurice Violette and Marius Moutet in L'Œuvre of June 3, 1923.
File:Comparution de trois Camelots du Roi et de Charles Maurras en correctionnelle le 27 juin 1923.png, Appearance of three Camelots du Roi on June 27, 1923.
File:Caricature de Léon Daudet, Charles Maurras et Maurice Pujo dans L'Œuvre du 17 juin 1923.png, Caricature of Action française on its use of castor oil in L'Œuvre of June 17, 1923.

The dissidence of Faisceau

On 11 November 1925, Georges Valois, a former member of Action Française, founded the first French fascist party, baptized Faisceau. This short-lived group intentionally overshadows Action Française. Indeed, when he left Maurras, Georges Valois would have taken with him the file of subscribers to ''L'Action française''. When it was created, the Faisceau stoled 1800 adherents from the Action française between December 1925 and April 1926 in Paris alone. As a repeat offence, the Camelots du Roi sabotaged a meeting of the University Beam at the Salle d'Horticulture in Paris on 15 December 1925 by routing Georges Valois. Consequently, René Bardy, a former communist, was charged by Georges Valois "to set up a security service capable of facing both Maurras's troops and those of the Communist Party".

In April 1926, the Faisceau beat the Action française in the Paris region with 15 127 members against . The Camelots du Roi act as agents provocateurs in order to sabotage the rise of the Faisceau.

On 14 November 1926, the situation degenerated once again. Le Faisceau organizes a punitive expedition to the premises of the Action française, rue de Rome.

During the condemnation of the papacy

The Camelots du Roi also used stratagems. It happened that during a parade the Camelots at the head of the procession would go back to the tail of the procession to parade a second time, which they did, for example, on 28 November 1926, during the pilgrimage celebrating the dead of Action French in the Vaugirard cemetery. On 30 May 1927, during the Joan of Arc Parade, the Camelots disrupted rival Catholic groups by transmitting counter-orders through clandestine hookups to the telephone line.

Against interwar pacifism

In November 1930, the Camelots du Roi and Action Française students prevented the holding of a meeting of the Human Rights League devoted to "The Germany and us".

The year 1931 marked a new impetus in the activity of the Camelots du Roi. On November 27, 1931, the Camelots disturbed the International Disarmament Congress, organized by the School of Peace of Louise Weiss, at the Trocadéro in Paris and bringing together several thousand people from around forty different countries. The Camelots, allied with the Croix-de-Feu and the Jeunesses patriotes stormed the tribune and expelled the personalities who occupied it. You have to evacuate the room to successfully get the Camelots out.

Between 1932 and 1933, pacifists and royalists clashed on many occasions.

The siege of Rome street

In 1927, the Camelots du Roi actively participated in the protection of Léon Daudet and Joseph Delest when they were ordered to serve a prison sentence following the complaint of the taxi driver Bajot quoted in the Philippe Daudet Affair. From June 9, 1927, Léon Daudet took refuge in the premises of Action française, rue de Rome, to evade justice. The Camelots du Roi and the leaguers barricade the place like Fort Chabrol. After three days of siege which gave rise to major fights with the police, the prefect Jean Chiappe obtained the surrender of the two main madmen who were immediately imprisoned in the prison de la Santé. On June 25, 1927, the telephonist Charlotte Montard escaped Léon Daudet, Joseph Delest and the communist Pierre Semard thanks to a hoax telephone call to the Director of the prison. For this plan, Charlotte Montard delegates to a dozen Camelots du Roi, including André Real del Sarte and Pierre Lecœur, the responsibility of saturating the prison telephone lines.

The great dissidence of 1930

In 1930, the Camelots du Roi and the Ligue d'Action française waged a fratricidal war within the Action Française. Pierre Lecœur, secretary general of the Camelots du Roi, is accused of being a police informant by Bernard de Vesins, Henri Martin and Paul Guérin. Pierre Lecœur manages to confuse his detractors who resign. Several other resignations followed in Paris and in the provinces, and settling of accounts with “cane strokes on the premises of the newspaper” were reported by Jean de Fabrègues. This crisis weakened Action française in terms of staff but also financially.

The Stavisky Affair

In 1933, the economic crisis from America affected France and was accompanied by a political crisis, the Stavisky affair, with the rise of anti-parliamentarianism in France.

On December 25, 1933, on the orders of the sub-prefect Antelme, the director of the Municipal Credit of Bayonne Gustave Tissier was arrested for fraud and putting into circulation false bearer bonds for an amount of 25 million francs. We quickly discover that Tissier is only the executor of the founder of the Communal Credit, Serge Alexandre Stavisky, who organized this fraud under the complicit supervision of the Deputy Mayor of Bayonne, Joseph Garat (he was sentenced to two years in prison).

The investigation, led in particular by Albert Prince, head of the financial section of the Paris prosecutor's office, uncovers the many relationships maintained by the scammer in the police, press and justice circles: the deputy Gaston Bonnaure, the senator René Renoult

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