Parisian laundress, Victorine Gorget (1843 – 1901) actively participated in the Paris Commune, during which she was considered a leader.
The great Victorine
Daughter of Eléonore Cochon and Edmet Gorget, Victorine Gorget was born on April 20, 1843 in Paris. The journalist Henri Rochefort will indicate later, in his Adventures of my life , that "the great Victorine", whom he met in deportation, was of Creole origin. We know very little about her existence, except that she lives in Paris and works there as a laundress and washerwoman. Victorine was 27 years old when the Franco-Prussian War broke out in 1870, and suffered the full brunt of the siege of the capital by the Prussian armies during a particularly harsh winter, and the ensuing famine.
The sufferings of the siege, the French defeat and the armistice signed in January 1871 deepened the tensions born of the harsh working conditions of the workers of the time. Many Parisians in particular, like Victorine, refused defeat and wanted to continue the war. And when the government of Adolphe Thiers seeks to disarm the National Guard by requisitioning cannons paid for by the people of Paris, the revolt breaks out and the government takes refuge in Versailles. The insurrection, known as the Paris Commune, will last two months during which a policy of self-management will be implemented, and many clashes will take place between Paris and Versailles.
The Paris Commune
Many women took part in the experiment and in the insurrection, in the many political and social discussion clubs that were springing up in the city, such as on the barricades or in the management of daily life. Victorine Gorget, she frequents the Club of the social revolution, installed like many others within a church, that of Saint-Michel-des Batignolles in the 17th arrondissement. She is considered a leader. She does not hesitate to speak out, in particular to defend the place of women within the insurrection and the fights with Versailles. She would have claimed:“the ladies must take up arms to guard the ramparts, while the men make sorties against the troops of Versailles” .
In line with this commitment to the place of women within the Commune, Victorine also participates in the movement The Union of women for the defense of Paris and the care of the wounded. This feminist group, founded by activists Nathalie Lemel and Élisabeth Dmitrieff, brings together more than a thousand members dedicated to caring for victims of combat. Beyond this participation in the insurrection, the Women's Union also aims to defend the interests of working women and their economic emancipation.
The Paris Commune ended in Bloody Week from May 21 to 28, 1871, during which the revolt was crushed, thousands of people were killed and many others arrested. Denounced by neighbours, Victorine was tried in March 1872 and sentenced to deportation for "incitement to civil war and provocations, by speeches, cries or threats uttered in public places, to commit crimes and gather insurgents".
"I'm not here for stringing pearls"
Victorine Gorget embarked in August 1873 on a sailing frigate bound for New Caledonia, for a four-month crossing. Nathalie Lemel, Louise Michel and the polemicist and journalist Henri Rochefort embark on the same boat. In his Adventures of my life, the latter will devote a few lines to “the great Victorine”:
In the middle of these twenty-two unfortunates and dominating them with their whole head, a young and tall dark-haired girl, with short black hair, tawny eyes, brown skin, who was called "the great Victorine" . She was of Creole origin, although born in Paris. She paced her cage like a panther and had, it seems, fought like a man. She said to the two nuns who served the women's quarters and whom her appearance frightened:"Ah! I beg you to believe, my sisters, that I am not here to have strung pearls. I gave them, come on, shots of Chassepot, these scoundrels from Versailles!
Excellent creature, moreover, and could not be more attentive to his fellow prisoners. It seemed to me, after a few days, that one of the ensigns on board was looking at her with an eye that was not exactly indifferent.
Little is known of Victorine's life after her deportation. In Nouméa, she worked as a laundress and then as a baths manager. In 1875, she spent a few months in prison on the Ducos peninsula. Accused of living illegitimately with the soldier Jean-Baptiste Joseph Puissant, she married him in December of that same year.
In 1978, Victorine obtained a remission and the residency requirement was lifted the following year. However, she did not return to Paris:in 1891, she remarried in Papeete. And died in Nouméa in October 1901, at the age of 58.