Inside Paris’s Invalides: 350 years caring for war wounded and victims

PARIS’ Invalides is known worldwide for Napoleon’s tomb and the gilded dome that draws millions of visitors, but the institution’s core mission has long run alongside its tourist image. For more than 350 years, Invalides has functioned as a home and hospital for wounded soldiers and victims of war, providing long-term, medically supervised care for residents ranging from military veterans to Holocaust survivors and civilian victims of conflict and attacks, according to The Associated Press.

The National Institution of Invalides was built in the 17th century under King Louis XIV and today houses dozens of residents on the grounds of Les Invalides. Gen. Christophe de Saint Chamas, the Invalides governor, described the idea behind the institution as a state “act of gratitude” toward old soldiers, saying it was meant to provide care over the long term “until their death.”

Behind the Invalides’ grand façade, the institution’s facilities and resident life reflect that mission. AP reported that aging facilities are undergoing major state-funded renovation estimated at 100 million euros ($108 million), and that private donors have been invited to sponsor upgrading individual rooms.

This month, the Invalides granted rare access to AP reporters, who were taken into rooms on both sides of Les Invalides’ central mausoleum holding Napoleon’s sarcophagus. AP said the grounds also allow visitors to cross paths with residents in wheelchairs, though many may not realize the site’s continuing role as a hospital and home for people injured by war.

The institution also preserves testimony from the 20th century’s most recent genocides. Residents include Holocaust survivors Ginette Kolinka and Esther Senot, AP reported, and Senot, 98, has told her story publicly, including to students, as part of efforts to ensure lessons of the Holocaust are not forgotten.

Senot was 15 when she was arrested in Paris by French police and deported in September 1943 by cattle train. She told AP that on the transport, “out of 1,000 people, only two of us returned,” and that she survived 17 months in Nazi camps before returning to France weighing 32 kilograms (70 pounds), having lost 17 family members, including her parents and six siblings.

AP reported that Senot began sharing her story publicly after a visit to Auschwitz in 1985, when she challenged a guide’s account that she said ignored that most victims were Jewish. She described how people in her group asked whether she had been there and then asked her to explain what the number tattooed on her left arm meant, saying she ultimately chose Invalides as her home after her husband died and as she faced medical issues.

Invalides also serves as a home for wounded soldiers who live on site for years and take part in daily routines with other residents. AP described master corporal Mikaele Iva, who was injured in a parachute accident in Gabon in 2021 and now lives at the Invalides, where residents form bonds through shared activities such as attending football matches and concerts and spending time together in places like a coffee room.

Iva told AP that the institution has “truly become our second family,” adding that residents “share both joyful and difficult moments.” AP said Iva, who uses a wheelchair, practices fencing, archery and golf through Invalides’ sport club, represents the institution at national ceremonies, and said caregivers and residents support one another as part of a soldier’s life after injury.

Care teams described similar principles of purpose and individualized support. Mustapha Nachet, a nurse coordinator at the residents’ center since 2014, told AP that “We devote ourselves to them body and soul,” and he said that care reflects the nation’s way of giving back, while emphasizing that needs vary by age and circumstance—for example, comparing a 30-year-old wounded veteran’s needs with those of a 99-year-old civilian war victim.

The Invalides also operates as a specialized hospital for severe disabilities, with expertise in prosthetics and rehabilitation, AP reported, including research aimed at improving mobility for amputees and wheelchair users. AP said medical teams there have also treated victims from the 2015 attacks at the Bataclan concert hall, cafes and the national stadium.

The institution’s leadership tied those modern cases to patterns observed across multiple wars. Gen. Sylvain Ausset, director of the National Institution of Invalides, told AP that “Each conflict leaves its own mark, and none ever erases a previous one,” and he described how World War I brought severe facial injuries, World War II saw spinal cord injuries including paraplegia and quadriplegia, and that more recent conflicts in the Middle East, including Iraq and Afghanistan, involved multiple amputations. He added that today, psychological trauma is among the defining injuries, as Invalides continues its mission to care for wartime harm over the long term.