Previously, on the same site, was a Maison de la santé (House of Health), built on the orders of Anne of Austria and transferred in 1651 to what is now the Sainte-Anne Hospital Center.

With executions having previously been performed at the entrance to Grande Roquette, it was decided to do something similar at La Santé.

The guillotine was erected at the corner of the Rue de la Santé and the Boulevard Arago, on the pavement.

[2] On 7 May 1932, Eugene Boyer, a 27-year-old criminal who had been denied a presidential pardon the previous day by President Paul Doumer, was to be executed by guillotine.

Doumer was assassinated the day the execution was scheduled: in France, the president could reverse his decision until the last moment and obviously Boyer could not benefit from this potential "ultimate mercy", so the execution was cancelled "in extremis" (twenty minutes before the time scheduled).

It was also at this site that the second-last public execution in France was performed, for burglar and double murderer Max Bloch on 2 June 1939.

On 15 March 1940, the Vocoret brothers, who killed three policemen in Issy-les-Moulineaux, were the first criminals to be guillotined inside the prison.

During the German Occupation of France, in addition to common law criminals, there were also executions of 18 Resistance fighters and communists.

The last two remaining guillotines in France are now stored in the basement of the National Centre for Guidance in Fresnes prison.

In 2000, the chief doctor of the prison, Véronique Vasseur, published a book in which she denounced the very poor imprisonment conditions.

In front of the exit of the prison there was a cafe called À la bonne Santé (In good health).