Les Misérables · Chapter
III: The Ankle-Chain Must Have Undergone a Certain Preparatory Manipulation to Be Thus Broken with a Blow from a Hammer explained
The chapter opens with a historical reflection on the 1823 Spanish war, criticizing its political and moral implications for France.
What happens
The chapter opens with a historical reflection on the 1823 Spanish war, criticizing its political and moral implications for France. It then describes the arrival of the ship Orion at Toulon after heavy weather. Amidst a detailed depiction of a ship of the line, a convict on the Orion heroically saves a sailor who has fallen from a yard, but in the process, the convict himself falls into the sea and is presumed drowned. The chapter ends with a newspaper report identifying the drowned convict as Jean Valjean, number 9,430.
Themes in this chapter
Suffering and Sacrifice
Jean Valjean's act of saving a sailor at the cost of his own life exemplifies sacrifice and suffering.
Social Injustice and Poverty
The critique of wasteful military spending while the poor die of hunger highlights social injustice.
Characters to notice
- Jean Valjean
The convict who saves a sailor but falls into the sea and is presumed drowned; identified by number 9,430.
Key passages
“All this time the poor were dying of hunger.”
Meanwhile, the impoverished were starving.
Highlights the contrast between military extravagance and societal neglect.
“Yesterday, a convict belonging to the detachment on board of the Orion , on his return from rendering assistance to a sailor, fell into the sea and was drowned. The body has not yet been found; it is supposed that it is entangled among the piles of the Arsenal point: this man was committed under the number 9,430, and his name was Jean Valjean.”
The newspaper reported that a convict from the Orion, after helping a sailor, drowned and his body was missing; he was Jean Valjean, prisoner number 9,430.
Official account of Valjean's apparent death, setting up his potential escape.