Rennes and Rehabilitation (1899–1906)

Abstract

The cruiser Sfax arrived off the coast of France on 30 June 1899 bearing the most famous prisoner the world had known since Napoleon’s exile on Saint Helena. The case of the bordereau had become an Affair followed by millions from Moscow to Melbourne, from high aristocrats to poor peasants, yet the prisoner himself knew almost nothing about it. ‘I remained in 1894, with the bordereau the only document in the dossier’, Dreyfus later wrote, ‘I believed in the good faith of General Boisdeffre, I believed in a head of state, Félix Faure, who was wholly concerned with justice and truth.’ Boisdeffre had resigned in the aftermath of Henry’s suicide nearly a year before, while Faure had been dead four months. ‘I believed that people had recognized their error, I was expecting to find my family, and beyond them my comrades who would be awaiting me with open arms, with tears in their eyes.’

What sustained me… was the unshakeable faith that France would one day proclaim my innocence to the world. ¹