It was here, on Place Blanche, that various witnesses reported the existence of a barricade manned by 120 women on 23 May 1871. The survivors went on to fight on the Place Pigalle barricade. They were all eventually shot.
The living conditions of working-class women at the time were deplorable, with wages half those of men (the equivalent of today's RSA), no water in the homes, almost compulsory prostitution to bring up children, and so on. Women welcomed the Commune with enthusiasm. They stood up to the soldiers on the Butte on 18 March. They took an active part in revolutionary clubs (3,000 women out of 4,000 attended the club des prolétaires, which met in the church of Saint-Ambroise in the 11th arrondissement). They set up the "Union des femmes pour la défense de Paris et les soins aux blessés", the first women's political organisation. And they were the last fighters on the last barricades.