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Toussaint Rouge (French: [tusɛ̃ ʁuʒ], "Red All Saints' Day"), also known as Toussaint Sanglante ("Bloody All-Saints' Day") is a series of 70 attacks committed by militant members of the Algerian National Liberation Front (FLN) that took place on 1 November 1954—the Catholic festival of All Saints' Day—in French Algeria. It is usually taken as the starting date for the Algerian War which lasted until 1962 and led to Algerian independence from France.

Background

Attacks

Between midnight and 2 am on the morning of All Saints' Day, 70 individual attacks were made by FLN militants against police, military and civilian pied-noir targets around French Algeria. Ten people were killed in the coordinated attacks.

Reaction in Paris

After hearing of the attacks, François Mitterrand, then Minister of the Interior, dispatched two companies (600 men) of the Compagnies Républicaines de Sécurité (CRS) to Algeria. A total of three companies of paratroopers also arrived between 1 and 2 November.

On 12 November 1954, Pierre Mendes France, President of the French Council of Ministers declared that the attacks would not be tolerated in a speech to the National Assembly:

One does not compromise when it comes to defending the internal peace of the nation, the unity and integrity of the Republic. The Algerian departments are part of the French Republic. They have been French for a long time, and they are irrevocably French.... Between them and metropolitan France there can be no conceivable secession.

The Mendes France government increased the number of soldiers in Algeria from 56,000 to 83,000 men to deal with the situation in the Aures mountains — the "main bastion of the insurrection," though the sending of the conscripts to Algeria did not occur until one year later after the Journée des tomates (lit: "Day of Tomatoes") on 6 February 1956 under the Mollet government.

Public reaction

The political reaction notwithstanding, the Toussaint Rouge attacks did not receive much coverage in the French media. The French daily newspaper Le Monde ran a single short column on the front page, and L'Express gave it just two columns.

References

1. ^ "The Algerian Civil War, 1954–1962: Why Such a Bitter Conflict?". University of San Francisco. Archived from the original on 23 April 2006.
2. "La Toussaint rouge. 1 November 1954" (PDF). jeanyvesthorrignac.fr (in French). Retrieved 6 February 2023.
3. Stora, Benjamin, 1950- (2001). Algeria, 1830-2000 : a short history (Revised and updated ed.). Ithaca: Cornell University Press. pp. 35. ISBN 0801437156. OCLC 45304825.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
4. "A Savage War of Peace: Algeria 1954-1962. Rev. ed". The SHAFR Guide Online. Retrieved 16 October 2023.
5. Stora, Benjamin, 1950- (2001). Algeria, 1830-2000 : a short history (Revised and updated ed.). Ithaca: Cornell University Press. pp. 36. ISBN 0801437156. OCLC 45304825.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)

v t e Algerian War (1954–1962)
Background	Settler colonialism French conquest of Algeria Invasion of Algiers Atrocities Mokrani Revolt Deportations French Algeria Algerian popular resistance Algerian nationalism Attempted reforms 1920 petition Jonnart Law 1943 manifesto Divide and rule policies Crémieux Decree Kabyle myth French Union Indigénat Legal status [fr] Pied noir Sétif and Guelma massacre Other factors Cold War Decolonisation of Africa Brazzaville Conference (1944) First Indochina War (1946–54) Malagasy Uprising (1947–49) Massacre of 14 July 1953 in Paris
War	Chronology [fr] of key events Declaration of 1 November 1954 Toussaint Rouge Battle of Philippeville Soummam conference Battle of Algiers Hijacking of the FLN plane Operation Corsica Week of barricades [fr] Algiers putsch War crimes / human rights violations Torture Killing of Saadia Mebarek Charonne subway massacre Paris massacre Reactions Communauté française Constantine Plan FLN football team Manifesto of the 121 Proposed partition of Algeria [fr]
End of the war	1961 French referendum on Algerian self-determination Évian Accords referendum Algerian independence
Legacy and aftermath	May 1958 crisis French Fifth Republic Year of Africa Aftermath in Algeria 1962 Algerian crisis Effects in Algerian politics Films Monuments and commemorations 1 November 1954 Stadiums Algiers Batna El Oued Tizi Ouzou Martyrs' Memorial Memorial to the Liberation of Algeria
Groups	Pro-independence National Liberation Front National Liberation Army Algerian National Movement Algerian Communist Party Oujda Group Anti-independence France French Armed Forces Commandos de Chasse La Main Rouge Front Algérie Française Organisation armée secrète Other groups Defectors from the French army to the ALN Harkis Women
Category / Commons

• Massacres in the Algerian War
• Algerian war crimes
• Massacres in 1954
• November 1954 events in Africa
• 1954 murders in Algeria
• Terrorist incidents in Africa in 1954
• Terrorist incidents in Algeria in the 1950s
• 1954 in the Algerian War
• Military operations of the Algerian War
• 20th-century mass murder in Algeria
• Improvised explosive device bombings in Algeria
• Terrorism in the Algerian War