Walking in the autumn sunshine of Paris, it is hard to believe that these elegant buildings and clean white stone bridges were once the scene of so much slaughter. The Place de la Concorde may be orderly and neatly cobbled, but it was here that the king's head was held high for the roaring revolutionary crowds. The milling tourists of Montmartre walk on ground from which the Communards were routed. But such events hardly disturb; they happened long ago.
The distance afforded by time allows us to argue from barstools in defence of the ideology behind one slaughter or another. But things are a little different when talking about the recent past. States, in particular, find it hard to swallow culpability for sins within living memory - especially when those sins still have political currency.
Bloody Sunday
In Ireland, you might consider the Bloody Sunday atrocity. What marks it out from any terrorist slaughter - politically, not in human terms (where it hardly matters who pulled the trigger) - is that it was committed by State forces. However, the British state must be commended for finally establishing a credible tribunal to look into the 13 deaths of that day in 1972. Maybe the French could learn a thing or two from it as they look into a dark and buried event from their own recent history.
A small plaque, unveiled earlier this month by Bertrand Delanoδ, the socialist mayor of Paris, marks the end of an official silence. Any passer-by that notices it, and bothers to stop, will read that it is dedicated "to the memory of the many Algerians killed during the bloody repression of the pacifist demonstration of 17th October, 1961". It's a gesture of regret, but as a group of National Front members attested at its unveiling, for some in French society even this small public plaque is one gesture too many.
No one is sure how many were killed by police on the streets of Paris on that day in 1961. It was near the end of the Algerian war and media censorship was rife. Some say as many as 265 people were beaten to death by the Paris police. Even conservative estimates put the number killed at 50.
It started with a curfew being placed by Maurice Papon, chief of police and PrΘfet of Paris, on the Muslim population of the city. The Algerian nationalist organisation, FLN, responded by calling for a peaceful demonstration. That demonstration was broken up by police and approximately 11,500 Algerians were arrested. In a sinister development, buses were requisitioned and the arrested were taken to various soccer stadiums around Paris where they were detained.
Bodies dumped
The police, angered by the deaths of colleagues in Algeria, seem to have been acting under orders. In the main police office on the L'╬le de la CitΘ, a stone's throw from Notre Dame cathedral, many of the detained were beaten to death. From there their bodies were taken to the nearby Pont Saint-Michel, where they were dumped into the waters of the river Seine.
Because of a news blackout Parisians were largely unaware of the horror. They must have gradually become aware that something terrible had happened, however, as the Seine gave up body after body in the days and weeks that followed.
French collective amnesia of the atrocity is reflected in a poll recently carried out by the communist newspaper L'HumanitΘ Hebdo. It found that fewer than 50 per cent of French citizens had heard of the events of 1961 - not surprising, considering that recent history is been too contentious for most history curriculums.
Police unions
It is also not surprising that three of the main police unions in France, representing about one third of the national force, have come out against the commemorative plaque. According to the unions, it will only worse the deep divisions in French society, particularly at this time of war, when relations between Muslims and Christians are strained.
However, the appearance of a spate of books and a play dealing with the massacre are forthcoming suggest that France is examining its conscience. And France has a tradition of eventually facing up to its sins: think of the Dreyfus affair, for example. Maybe that tradition has something to do with the country's national narrative of gradual self-improvement, resulting in the establishment of republic after republic, each designed to be better than the last.
Still, France could learn something from the Northern Ireland experience by setting up a tribunal to investigate the events of 1961. But the French also have lessons to teach us: a public monument to the dead of our own recent history - and perhaps even the establishment of a second republic, determined to be better than the first?