The Christ in the Cabaret: Putting a Blasphemous Bar Crawl on Trial in Third Republic France

In May 1874, four workers in the French city of Roubaix were imprisoned after a night drinking resulted in scandalous acts towards a life-size statue of Christ on the cross. This article takes a micro-historical approach by recreating the events of this night through previously-unexplored archival material and newspaper reports from across the globe. The case became a potent example for individuals to attack either the danger of urban drinking spaces, workers’ irreligion after the 1871 Paris Commune, or the abuses of the judicial system during the French ‘Moral Order’ clerical government of the early Third Republic.