The 13 May uprising harnessed a total civilian shutdown across European Algiers.
Evidence
In preparation, European Algiers had imposed on itself a total shutdown. All through the morning pied noir farmers from the Mitidja, whipped in by Martel, poured into the city. Cars raced through the streets, sounding out on their horns the now familiar tattoo of AL-GÉR-IE FRANÇAISE. The university had been thoroughly organised by Lagaillarde, and a special “commando” detailed to stand by in readiness outside the railings of the “G—G”. Shortly after midday Lagaillarde appeared at the Otomatic (now recovered from its bombing of the previous year) and announced dramatically to the students there: “From now on I consider myself an insurgent.” By early afternoon the Rue Michelet and its tributaries were a solid mass of demonstrators and banners, an estimated 20,000 strong (Salan says 100,000). As passions rose, a first victim—ritualistically as in almost every civil upheaval since 1945—was the American Cultural Centre, sacked by an angry detachment of pieds noirs. — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 867
Categorization
- XREF: Connects to earlier chapters on the urban war and how pied noir mass mobilization developed alongside the army’s counterinsurgency. — connects to: War-weariness and compromise talk spread inside the F.L.N. after 13 May — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 962; The 1960 insurrection lacked the intercommunal fraternity of May 1958 — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 1096
Related
- The 1960 insurrection lacked the intercommunal fraternity of May 1958 (similarity 0.80)
Broader Connections
- War-weariness and compromise talk spread inside the F.L.N. after 13 May
#complicates(0.50) — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 962 - The 1960 insurrection lacked the intercommunal fraternity of May 1958
#complicates(0.45) — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 1096