Devil's Island (Kourou) Devil's Island (Kourou) Devil's Island (French: Île du Diable) is the third-largest island of the Salvation's Islands, an island group in the Atlantic Ocean. It is located approximately 14 km (9 mi) off the coast of French Guiana in South America just north of the town of Kourou. It has an area of 14 ha (34.6 acres). The island was a part of a controversial French penal colony located in French Guiana for 101 years, from 1852 to 1953. Although it was the smallest part of the penal colony, it is notorious for being used for internal exile of French
Mettray Penal Colony was noted as being officially opened on 22 January 1840. The layout of the Colony was characterised by a sense of order and community. From the entrance to the Colony a large central square, dominated symbolically by a chapel on one side, lies at the end of a long tree-lined avenue. The entrance to the square has the director's house on one side and the preparatory school, where the instructors were trained, on the other. Ten identical, three-storey pavilions are arranged on the two sides of the square. These were referred to as "houses" and were the places where the