EXTREMELY SENSITIVE CONTENT – 18+ ONLY
This post describes the last public execution by guillotine in France, 17 June 1939. Shared solely for historical education and remembrance of the victims of Eugen Weidmann.
The Last Public Guillotining in France – Eugen Weidmann, Versailles, 17 June 1939
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At 4:32 a.m. on Saturday 17 June 1939, outside Saint-Pierre prison in Versailles, 31-year-old German serial killer Eugen Weidmann became the last person in France ever to be guillotined in public.
Weidmann had arrived in France in 1937 and, with accomplices, committed a series of kidnappings and murders to finance a luxurious lifestyle. His six confirmed victims included a young American dancer, a chauffeur, a nurse, and a property dealer. Captured after a shoot-out with police in December 1937, he confessed quickly and was sentenced to death in March 1939.
Because of the sensational nature of his crimes, the French government decided the execution should be public “as a warning to others”.
The guillotine was erected overnight in the square in front of the prison. By dawn, an enormous crowd — estimated between 5,000 and 10,000 people — had gathered. Newsreel cameras and hundreds of private photographers were present.
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At 4:32 a.m. Weidmann was led out, pale but calm. Executioner Jules-Henri Desfourneaux and his assistants worked with practiced speed. The blade fell within seconds.
What the authorities had not foreseen was the behaviour of the crowd. People surged forward, some climbing lamp-posts, others taking flash photographs of the severed head. The scene descended into near-hysteria. Films and photographs of the execution circulated widely in the following days, causing national outrage.
On 24 June 1939 — just one week later — the French government issued a decree banning all future public executions. From then on, guillotinings would take place inside prison walls with only official witnesses present.
France continued using the guillotine privately until 1977 (Hamida Djandoubi, Marseille) and abolished capital punishment entirely in 1981.
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We remember the execution of Eugen Weidmann today not to sensationalise death, but to honour his innocent victims; to recognise that even justice can become spectacle and cruelty when performed in public; and to mark the moment France finally turned its back on the centuries-old tradition of executing people before cheering crowds.
Official & reputable sources
Archives Nationales de France – execution file Eugen Weidmann, 1939
Journal Officiel de la République Française – decree of 24 June 1939 banning public executions
Carlier, Claude – La guillotine en France (Éditions du Cerf, 1999)
Pathé-Gaumont newsreel archive – original footage of the execution (restricted access)
Tumblety, Joan – “The Last Public Execution in France” (French Historical Studies, 2002)