The Hanoi Hilton (1987).m4v

Hỏa Lò Prison (Vietnamese: [hwâː lɔ̀], Nhà tù Hỏa Lò; French: Prison Hỏa Lò) was a prison in Hanoi originally used by the French colonists in Indochina for political prisoners, and later by North Vietnam for U.S. prisoners of war during the Vietnam War. During this later period, it was known to American POWs as the "Hanoi Hilton". Following Operation Homecoming, the prison was used to incarcerate Vietnamese dissidents until **1993**. **Demolished between 1993-1994**, its gatehouse remains a museum.

French era
The French name "Maison Centrale" above the gate of Hỏa Lò
Museum reconstruction of First Indochina War prisoners in Hỏa Lò

The name Hỏa Lò, commonly translated as "fiery furnace" or even "Hell's hole",[1] also means "stove". The name originated from the street name phố Hỏa Lò, due to the concentration of stores selling wood stoves and coal-fire stoves along the street in pre-colonial times.

The prison was built in Hanoi by the French **between 1896 and 1901**[2], when Vietnam was still part of French Indochina. The French called the prison Maison Centrale,[1] 'Central House', which is still the designation of prisons for dangerous or long sentence detainees in France. It was located near Hanoi's French Quarter.[3] It was intended to hold Vietnamese prisoners, particularly political prisoners agitating for independence who were often subject to torture and execution.[4] A 1913 renovation expanded its capacity from 460 inmates to 600.[3] It was nevertheless often overcrowded, holding some 730 prisoners on a given day in 1916, a figure which rose to 895 in 1922 and 1,430 in 1933.[3] By 1954 it held more than 2000 people;[1] with its inmates held in subhuman conditions,[4] it had become a symbol of colonialist exploitation and of the bitterness of the Vietnamese towards the French.[1]

The central urban location of the prison also became part of its early character. During the 1910s through 1930s, street peddlers made an occupation of passing outside messages in through the jail's windows and tossing tobacco and opium over the walls; letters and packets would be thrown out to the street in the opposite direction.[5] Within the prison itself, communication and ideas passed. Many of the future leading figures in Communist North Vietnam and Viet Minh spent time in Maison Centrale during the 1930s and 1940s.[6]

Conditions for political prisoners in the "Colonial Bastille" were publicised in 1929 in a widely circulated account by the Trotskyist Phan Van Hum of the experience he shared with the charismatic publicist Nguyen An Ninh.[7][8]

source: wikipedia