Douard Drumont

Vocation

Notable

French anti-Semitic author, polemicist and journalist. He is the creator of the National League of anti-Semitic France . In 1886 Drumont withdrew from the staff of the "Liberté" (owned by Péreire, a Jew), claiming that the newspapers were unduly controlled by the Jews. He then issued his famous work in two volumes, "La France Juive" (Jewish France) a book which may be regarded as the beginning of the anti-Semitic movement in France. It has passed through more than one hundred editions, arousing wide-spread interest, and was soon translated into several languages. Because of it, Drumont fought several duels, notably with Charles Laurent and Arthur Meyer. Meantime the Panama affair, in which several Jewish financiers were prominently involved, gave to Drumont's agitation great popularity, and in September, 1892, he founded the "Libre Parole," a daily journal of rabid anti-Semitic tendencies. For his anti-Panama articles, Drumont was condemned to three months' imprisonment. In 1893 he was an unsuccessful candidate for the representation of Amiens; the following year he retired to Brussels. The Dreyfus affair helped him to regain popularity, and in 1898 he returned to France and was elected deputy for the first division of Algiers, but was defeated as a candidate for reelection in 1902. He died 3 February 1917, Paris. Link to Wikipedia biography