Unpublished eye witness manuscript by a Central Committee insider of the Paris Commune

Vanden Camp, Alphonse, journalist and anarchist (1833-1901). Souvenirs personnels pour servir à l’histoire de la Commune par Alph. Du Camp, ex membre du Comité central de la Garde nationale de Paris et du gouvernement insurrectionnel du 18 mars.

€ 15.000,00

First hand, hitherto unpublished narrative by an influential participant in the events of March-May 1871, written under the author's well attested pseudonym “Alphonse Du Camp”, here identifying himself as a former member of the Central Committee of the Paris National Guard and of the insurrectionary government of 18 March.

The account offers a granular, day by day view from within the revolutionary apparatus, structured in 25 headed chapters that follow the rise and unravelling of the Commune: the origins of the Central Committee, the 18 March seizure of power, the Committee’s occupation of the Hôtel de Ville, the 2 April sortie, an attempt to seize Thiers, relations between the Central Committee and the Commune, portraits of revolutionary actors, the episode “Basile à la rescousse!”, a “tragi comic incident”, the “horrible conspiracy” unmasked, the figure of Rossel, deliberations before the Committee of Public Safety, the role of women at the Préfecture, nights of street fighting (“Au feu!”), arrests and interventions, the “pétroleuses”, café and literary milieus around the Café Médicis, and the final dossier. Beyond the immediate narrative, the manuscript illuminates internal procedures of the Central Committee (decrees, attributions, and battalion/legion organisation); the author’s own positions within the XVIIe Légion and the municipal commission; and the atmosphere of suspicion, arrests, and survivals that marked the last weeks.

Written in a clear contemporary hand and expressly composed as a contribution “to serve the history of the Commune”, the text combines reportage, programme, and retrospective justification, offering researchers close detail on actors, places, and timings rarely preserved in comparable depth. A rare survival of Communard testimony from an anarchist leaning publicist who adopted multiple noms de plume. The present text, preserved as a working fair copy, appears unique and unpublished.