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Built
The French built a prison here between 1896 and 1901
The French built the prison between 1896 and 1901 and called it the Maison Centrale, or Central House. Its local name means stove, from a street where stores sold wood stoves and coal-fire stoves.
Crowded
It was expanded to hold 600 and housed 1,430 in 1933
A 1913 renovation expanded its capacity from 460 inmates to 600, but the prison was often overcrowded. It held some 730 prisoners on a given day in 1916, and 1,430 in 1933. Many future leaders of Communist North Vietnam spent time there.
1,430prisoners held in 1933
The Hilton
American prisoners of war nicknamed it the Hanoi Hilton
The first U.S. prisoner of war sent here was Everett Alvarez Jr., shot down on August 5, 1964. The prisoners nicknamed the prison the Hanoi Hilton, and inmates communicated with each other through a tap code.
The museum
Most of the prison was demolished, and the gatehouse is a museum
Demolition began in 1993 and most of the prison was gone by 1994. Only part exists today as a museum, whose displays mainly show the French colonial period, including the guillotine room with its original equipment.
The war
Prisoners of war were tortured here, and the accounts still differ
The prison was one site used by the North Vietnamese Army to house, torture and interrogate captured servicemen, with rope bindings, irons, beatings and prolonged solitary confinement. The Vietnamese government has said such claims are fabricated; U.S. Senate reports and former prisoners' testimony say otherwise.
Day 5, morning
Next is St. Joseph's Cathedral.
More stories from this trip idea
The words are a retelling of the Wikipedia article Hỏa Lò Prison, and are shared under CC BY-SA 4.0. They are checked against those articles, and a fact that is not in them is left out.