The history of the Bastile, and of its principal captives

R. A. Davenport's The history of the Bastile, and of its principal captives is both a historical narrative and a political meditation on one of ancien régime France's most potent symbols of arbitrary power. The book surveys the Bastille's institutional history while recounting the fates of notable prisoners, blending antiquarian detail, moral commentary, and dramatic anecdote in a style characteristic of early nineteenth-century popular historiography.
Positioned in the long aftermath of the French Revolution, it treats the prison not merely as an architectural site but as an emblem of despotism, secrecy, and the abuses of state authority. Davenport was a prolific English compiler and historian whose works often sought to render continental and British history accessible to a wide reading public. His interest in the Bastille reflects the Romantic-era fascination with tyranny, imprisonment, and revolutionary memory, as well as Britain's strong engagement with French political history.
His method-synthetic, documentary, and interpretive-suggests an author attentive less to archival originality than to shaping historical material into an edifying narrative. This volume will reward readers interested in the cultural afterlife of the Bastille, the moralizing energies of nineteenth-century history writing, and the transformation of political trauma into historical legend. It is especially recommended for students of Revolutionary memory, carceral history, and popular historical prose.