St John’s Church in Alresford is home to the final resting place of five Napoleonic prisoners of war. The French gravestones commemorate Lieutenant Pierre Garnier, marine Joseph Hypolite, Officer C Lavau, Lieutenant Jean de Thiulle, and Marie Louise V Fournier, the wife of a captain in Napoleon’s army, who passed away in Arlesford between 1810 and 1812.
The Fourniers were captured in the West Indies, and despite Marie Louise following her husband into captivity, the captain’s remains were not laid to rest in the same location.
Located opposite the west door of the church, the graves are a poignant reminder of the lives of these individuals who found themselves in captivity in a foreign land. During the Napoleonic Wars, Alresford (along with 10 other towns in Hampshire), became designated parole towns, where higher-ranking French prisoners were billeted and expected to abide by certain regulations, including dusk to dawn curfews and travel limitations. Despite their circumstances, they were treated with respect. As a gesture of gratitude to the local population for their kindness, in 1811 the French prisoners gifted the church a clock for its tower.
The presence of French prisoners in Alresford was not isolated to the Napoleonic Wars; throughout the 18th century Britain was in conflict with France. Even almost 50 years before the Napoleonic Wars, there were 300 French prisoners of war living in Alresford. Over 200,000 prisoners of war were brought to Britain between 1793 and 1815, yet the graves in Arlesford are a rare example of a burial site for these French prisoners of war in England.
