HAUTEVILLE HOUSE
On 31 October 1855 the poet, playwright and novelist Victor Hugo arrived in windswept Guernsey, in desperate search of exile. Banished from his native France for aggravating Napoleon III with his outspoken republican views, he had wandered “from coast to coast on foreign soil” for four long years, sleeping in hotel rooms, train carriages and boat cabins.
Guernsey, a little island in the English Channel and a British dependency, was a safe haven, though Hugo’s arrival was unpromising: his unfinished manuscript of had almost been tossed overboard during a stormy crossing from neighbouring Jersey.
