Part 169

"It was while affairs were in this critical condition that the Mountain undertook the sole conduct of the government in France. They had hitherto resisted all attempts of the Girondists to establish a new constitution in place of that of 1791. They now undertook the work themselves, and in four days drew up a constitution, as simple as it was democratic, which was issued on the 24th of June. Every citizen of the age of 21 could vote directly in the election of deputies, who were chosen for a year at a time and were to sit in a single assembly. The assembly had the sole power of making laws, but a period was fixed during which the constituents could protest against its enactments. The executive power was entrusted to 24 men, who were chosen by the assembly from candidates nominated by electors chosen by the original voters. Twelve out of the 24 were to be renewed every six months. But this constitution was intended merely to satisfy the departments, and was never put into practice. The condition of France required a greater concentration of power, and this was supplied by the Committee of Public Safety. {1293} Ever since the 6th of April the original members of the Committee had been re-elected, but on the 10th of July its composition was changed. Danton ceased to be a member, and Barère was joined by Robespierre, St. Just, Couthon, Billaud-Varennes, Collot d'Herbois, and, in a short time, Carnot. These men became the absolute rulers of France. The Committee had no difficulty in carrying their measures in the Convention, from which the opposition party had disappeared. All the state obligations were rendered uniform and inscribed in 'the great book of the national debt.' The treasury was filled by a compulsory loan from the rich. Every income between 1,000 and 10,000 francs had to pay ten per cent., and every excess over 10,000 francs had to be contributed in its entirety for one year. To recruit the army a levee en masse was decreed. 'The young men shall go to war; the married men shall forge arms and transport supplies; the wives shall make tents and clothes and serve in the hospitals; the children shall tear old linen into lint; the aged shall resort to the public places to excite the courage of the warriors and hatred against kings.' Nor were measures neglected against domestic enemies. On the 6th of September a revolutionary army, consisting of 6,000 men and 1,200 artillery men, was placed at the disposal of the Committee to carry out its orders throughout France. On the 17th the famous 'law of the suspects' was carried. Under the term 'suspect' were included all those who by words, acts or writings had shown themselves in favour of monarchy or of federalism, the relatives of the emigrants, etc., and they were to be imprisoned until the peace. As the people were in danger of famine, a maximum price, already established for corn, was decreed for all necessaries; if a merchant gave up his trade he became a suspect, and the hoarding of provisions was punished by death. On the 10th of October the Convention definitely transferred its powers to the Committee, by subjecting all officials to its authority and by postponing the trial of the new constitution until the peace."

_R. Lodge, History of Modern Europe, chapter 23, section 11._

The Committee of Public Safety--the "Revolutionary Government," as Danton had named it, on the 2d of August, when he demanded the fearful powers that were given to it--"disposed of all the national forces; it appointed and dismissed the ministers, generals, Representatives on Mission, the judges and juries of the Revolutionary Tribunal. The latter instrument became its strong arm; it was, in fact, a court martial worked by civil magistrates. By its agents it directed the departments and armies, the political situation without and within, striking down at the same time the rebels within and the enemies without: for, together with the constitution were, of course, suspended the municipal laws and the political machinery of the communes; and thus cities and villages hitherto indifferent or opposed to the Revolution were republicanized. By the Tribunal it disposed of the persons of individuals; by requisition and the law of maximum (with which we are going to be better acquainted) it disposed of their fortunes. It can, indeed, be said that the whole of France was placed in a state of siege; but that was the price of its salvation. ... But Danton has committed, a great mistake,--one that he and especially France, will come to rue. He has declined to become a member of the Revolutionary Government, which has been established on his motion. 'It is my firm resolve not to be a member of such a government,' he had said. In other words, he has declined re-election as a member of the Committee de Salut Public, now it has been erected into a dictatorship. He unfortunately lacked all ambition. ... When afterwards, on September 8, one Gaston tells the Convention, 'Danton has a mighty revolutionary head. No one understands so well as he to execute what he himself proposes. I therefore move that he be added to the Revolutionary Government, in spite of his protest,' and it is so unanimously ordered, he again peremptorily declines. 'No, I will not be a member; but as a spy on it I intend to work.' A most fateful resignation! for while he still for a short time continues to exercise his old influence on the government, both from the outside, in his own person, and inside the Committee, in the person of Hérault de Sechelles, selected in his place, he very soon loses ground more and more,--so much so even that Hérault, his friend, is 'put in quarantine,' as was said in the Committee. And very natural. A statesman cannot have power when he shirks responsibility, and without power he soon loses all influence with the multitude. Those who now succeed him in power are Robespierre, Barère, Billaud-Varennes, and Carnot,--the two last very good working members, good men of the second rank, but after Danton not a single man is left fit to be leader."

_L. Gronlund, Ça Ira! or Danton in the French Revolution, chapter 4._

ALSO IN _C. A. Fyffe, History of Modern Europe, volume 1, chapter 2._

_H. M. Stephens, History of the French Revolution. volume 2, chapter 9._

_H. C. Lockwood, Constitutional History of France, chapter 1, and appendix 2._

FRANCE: A. D. 1793 (July). The assassination of Marat.

"Amongst those who had placed faith in the Girondists and their ideals was a young woman of Normandy, Charlotte Corday. ... When the mob of Paris rose and drove with insult from the Convention those who in her eyes were the heroic defenders of the universal principles of truth and justice, she bitterly resented the wrong that had been done, not only to the men themselves, but to that France of which she regarded them as the true representatives. Owing to Marat's persistent cry for a dictatorship and for shedding of blood, it was he who, in the departments, was accounted especially responsible both for the expulsion of the Girondists and for the tyranny which now began to weigh as heavily upon the whole country as it had long weighed upon the capital. Incapable as all then were of comprehending the causes which had brought about the fall of the Girondists, Charlotte Corday imagined that by putting an end to this man's life, she could also put an end to the system of government which he advocated. Informing her friends that she wished to visit England, she left Caen and travelled in the diligence to Paris. On her arrival she purchased a knife, and afterwards obtained entrance into Marat's house on the pretext that she brought news which she desired to communicate to him. She knew that he would be eager to obtain intelligence of the movements of the Girondist deputies still in Normandy. Marat was ill at the time, and in a bath when Charlotte Corday was admitted. {1294} She gave him the names of the deputies who were at Caen. 'In a few days,' he said, as he wrote them hastily down, 'I will have them all guillotined in Paris.' As she heard these words she plunged the knife into his body and killed him on the spot. The cry uttered by the murdered man was heard, and Charlotte, who did not attempt to escape, was captured and conveyed to prison amid the murmurs of an angry crowd. It had been from the first her intention to sacrifice her life for the cause of her country, and, glorying in her deed, she met death with stoical indifference. 'I killed one man,' she said, when brought before the revolutionary court, 'in order to save the lives of 100,000 others.' ... His [Marat's] murder brought about contrary results to those which the woman who ignorantly and rashly had flung away her life hoped by the sacrifice to effect. ... He was regarded as a martyr by no small portion of the working population of Paris. ... His murder excited indignation beyond the comparatively narrow circle of those who took an active part in political life, while at the same time it added a new impulse to the growing cry for blood."

_B. M. Gardiner, The French Revolution, chapter 7._

ALSO IN _C. Mac Farlane, The French Revolution, volume 3, chapter 13._

_J. Michelet, Women of the French Revolution, chapter 18-19._

_Mrs. R. K. Van Alstine, Charlotte Corday._

_A. Dobson, Four French Women, chapter 1._

FRANCE: A. D. 1793 (July-December). The civil war. Sieges of Lyons and Toulon. Submission of Caen, Marseilles and Bordeaux. Crushing of the Vendeans.

"The insurgents in Calvados [Normandy] were easily suppressed; at the very first skirmish at Vernon [July 13], the insurgent troops fled. Wimpfen endeavoured to rally them in vain. The moderate class, those who had taken up the defence of the Girondists, displayed little ardour or activity. When the constitution was accepted by the other departments, it saw the opportunity for admitting that it had been in error, when it thought it was taking arms against a mere factious minority. This retractation was made at Caen, which had been the headquarters of the revolt. The Mountain commissioners did not sully this first victory with executions. General Carteaux on the other hand, marched at the head of some troops against the sectionary army of the south; he defeated its force, pursued it to Marseilles, entered the town [August 23] after it, and Provence would have been brought into subjection like Calvados, if the royalists, who had taken refuge at Toulon, after their defeat, had not called in the English to their aid, and placed in their hands this key to France. Admiral Hood entered the town in the name of Louis XVII., whom he proclaimed king, disarmed the fleet, sent for 8,000 Spaniards by sea, occupied the surrounding forts, and forced Carteaux, who was advancing against Toulon, to fall back on Marseilles. Notwithstanding this check, the conventionalists succeeded in isolating the insurrection, and this was a great point. The Mountain commissioners had made their entry into the rebel capitals; Robert Lindet into Caen; Tallien into Bordeaux; Barras and Fréron into Marseilles. Only two towns remained to be taken Toulon and Lyons. A simultaneous attack from the south, west, and centre was no longer apprehended, and in the interior the enemy was only on the defensive. Lyons was besieged by Kellermann, general of the army of the Alps; three corps pressed the town on all sides. The veteran soldiers of the Alps, the revolutionary battalions and the newly levied troops, reinforced the besiegers every day. The people of Lyons defended themselves with all the courage of despair. At first, they relied on the assistance of the insurgents of the south; but these having been repulsed by Carteaux, the Lyonnese placed their last hope in the army of Piedmont, which attempted a diversion in their favour, but was beaten by Kellermann. Pressed still more energetically, they saw their first position carried. Famine began to be felt, and courage forsook them. The royalist leaders, convinced of the inutility of longer resistance, left the town, and the republican army entered the walls [October 9], where they awaited the orders of the convention. A few months after, Toulon itself [in the siege of which Napoleon Bonaparte commanded the artillery], defended by veteran troops and formidable fortifications, fell into the power of the republicans. The battalions of the army of Italy, reinforced by those which the taking of Lyons left disposable, pressed the place closely. After repeated attacks and prodigies of skill and valour, they made themselves masters of it, and the capture of Toulon finished what that of Lyons had begun [December 19]. Everywhere the convention was victorious. The Vendeans had failed in their attempt upon Nantes, after having lost many men, and their general-in-chief, Cathelineau. This attack put an end to the aggressive and previously promising movement of the Vendean insurrection. The royalists repassed the Loire, abandoned Saumur, and resumed their former cantonments. They were, however, still formidable; and the republicans, who pursued them, were again beaten in La Vendée. General Biron, who had succeeded General Berruyer, unsuccessfully continued the war with small bodies of troops; his moderation and defective system of attack caused him to be replaced by Canclaux and Rossignol, who were not more fortunate than he. There were two leaders, two armies, and two centres of operation; ... The committee of public safety soon remedied this, by appointing one sole general-in-chief, Lechelle, and by introducing war on a large scale into La Vendée. This new method, aided by the garrison of Mayence, consisting of 17,000 veterans, who, relieved from operations against the coalesced powers after the capitulation, were employed in the interior, entirely changed the face of the war. The royalists underwent four consecutive defeats, two at Châtillon, two at Cholet [the last being October 17]. Lescure, Bonchamps, and d'Elbée were mortally wounded: and the insurgents, completely beaten in Upper Vendée, and fearing that they should be exterminated if they took refuge in Lower Vendée, determined to leave their country to the number of 80,000 persons. This emigration through Brittany, which they hoped to arouse to insurrection, became fatal to them. Repulsed before Granville, utterly routed at Mons [Le Mans, December 12], they were destroyed at Savenay [December 23], and barely a few thousand men, the wreck of this vast emigration, returned to Vendée. These disasters, irreparable for the royalist cause, the taking of their land of Noir-moutiers from Charette, the dispersion of the troops of that leader, the death of Laroche jacquelin, rendered the republicans masters of the country. {1295} The committee of public safety, thinking, not without reason, that its enemies were beaten but not subjugated, adopted a terrible system of extermination to prevent them from rising again. General Thurreau surrounded Vendée with sixteen entrenched camps; twelve movable columns, called the infernal columns, overran the country in every direction, sword and fire in hand, scoured the woods, dispersed the assemblies, and diffused terror throughout this unhappy country."

_F. A. Mignet, History of the French Revolution, chapter 8._

ALSO IN _A. Thiers, History of the French Revolution (American edition), volume 2, pages 328-335, and 398-410._

_Marchioness de Larochejaquelain, Memoirs._

_A. des Echerolles, Early Life, volume 1, chapters 5-7._

FRANCE: A. D. 1793 (July-December). Progress of the war of the Coalition. Dissensions among the Allies. Unsuccessful siege of Dunkirk. French Victories of Hondschotten and Wattignies. Operations on the Rhine and elsewhere.

"The civil war in which France for a moment appeared engulfed was soon confined to a few narrowing centres. What, in the meantime, had been the achievements of the mighty Coalition of banded Europe? Success, that might have been great, was attained on the Alpine and Pyrenean frontiers; and had the Piedmontese and Spaniards been well led they could have overrun Provence and Rousillon, and made the insurrection of the South fatal. But here, as elsewhere, the Allies did little; and, though defeated in almost every encounter, the republican levies held their ground against enemies who nowhere advanced. It was, however, in the North and the North-east that the real prize of victory was placed; and no doubt can exist that had unanimity in the councils of the Coalition prevailed, or had a great commander been in its camp, Paris might have been captured without difficulty, and the Revolution been summarily put down. But the Austrians, the Prussians, and the English, were divided in mind; they had no General capable of rising above the most ordinary routine of war; and the result was that the allied armies advanced tardily on an immense front, each leader thinking of his own plans only, and no one venturing to press forward boldly, or to pass the fortresses on the hostile frontiers, though obstacles like these could be of little use without the aid of powerful forces in the field. In this manner half the summer was lost in besieging Mayence, Valenciennes, and Condé; and when, after the fall of these places [July-August], an attempt was made to invade Picardy, dissensions between the Allies broke out, and the British contingent was detached to besiege Dunkirk, while the Austrians lingered in French Flanders, intent on enlarging by conquest Belgium, at that period an Austrian Province. Time was thus gained for the French armies, which, though they had made an honorable resistance, had been obliged to fall back at all points, and were in no condition to oppose their enemy; and the French army in the North, though driven nearly to the Somme, within a few marches of the capital, was allowed an opportunity to recruit its strength, and was not, as it might have been easily, destroyed. A part of the hastily raised levies was now incorporated in its ranks; and as these were largely composed of seasoned men from the old army of the Bourbon Monarchy, and from the volunteers of Valmy and Jemmapes, a respectable force was before long mustered. At the peremptory command of the Jacobin Government, this was at once directed against the invaders, who did not know what an invasion meant. The Duke of York, assailed with vigor and skill, was compelled to raise the siege of Dunkirk [by the French victory at Hondschotten, September 8]; and, to the astonishment of Europe, the divided forces of the halting and irresolute Coalition began to recede before the enemies, who saw victory yielded to them, and who, feeble soldiers as they often were, were nevertheless fired by ardent patriotism. As the autumn closed the trembling balance of fortune inclined decidedly on the side of the Republic. The French recruits, hurried to the frontier in masses, became gradually better soldiers, under the influence of increasing success. Carnot, a man of great but overrated powers, took the general direction of military affairs; and though his strategy was not sound, it was much better than the imbecility of his foes. At the same time, the Generals of the fallen Monarchy having disappeared, or, for the most part, failed, brilliant names began to emerge from the ranks, and to lead the suddenly raised armies; and though worthless selections were not seldom made, more than one private and sergeant gave proof of capacity of no common order. Terror certainly added strength to patriotism, for thousands were driven to the camp by force, and death was the usual penalty of a defeated chief; but it was not the less a great national movement, and high honor is justly due to a people which, in a situation that might have seemed hopeless, made such heroic: and noble efforts, even though it triumphed through the weakness of its foe. Owing to a happy inspiration of Carnot, a detachment was rapidly marched from the Rhine, where the Prussians remained in complete inaction; and with this reinforcement Jourdan gained a victory at Wattignies [October 16] over the Austrians, and opened the way into the Low Countries. At the close of the year the youthful Hoche, once a corporal, but a man of genius, who had given studious hours to the theory of war, divided Brunswick from the Austrian Würmser by a daring and able march through the Vosges; and the baffled Allies were driven out of Alsace, the borders of which they had just invaded. By these operations the great Northern frontier, the really vulnerable part of France, was almost freed from the invaders' presence; and, though less was achieved on the Southern frontier, the enemies of the Republic began to lose courage."

_W. O'C. Morris, The French Revolution, chapter 6._