The Decline and Fall of the First French Republic, Part 2

 In the misty fields of eastern Belgium, around 40,000 Frenchmen squared off against around 40,000 Austrians in and around the small village of Neerwinden. This confrontation on the 18^th of March in 1793 would be crucial to the future course of the First French Republic. It would be known as the Battle of Neerwinden.

General Charles Dumouriez would lead the French Revolutionary Army into battle. The lower estimates for Dumouriez’s forces were 40,000 foot infantry as well as 4,500 cavalry.¹ His opposite number was the Prince of Coburg – Frederick Josias, and is credited with 30,000 foot infantry with 9,000 cavalry by Phipps.²

The French advanced sweeping up the settlements of Racour and Oberwinden, and then Neerwinden. Dumouriez planned to strike the Prince Josias' left flank, believing that his right flank would be strongest in order to defend a potential cut off from coalition communications behind them. Austrian cavalry manoeuvres in the fields between the settlements were very effective, and fierce fighting ensued within the settlements. After being captured by each side a number of times, the Austrians seized Racour and Oberwinden, as well as Neerwinden, before driving the French further back with a cavalry charge. Dumouriez attempted another attack with his right flank, but this along with other French resistance withered away.³ In the morning, Dumouriez ordered a general French retreat from Neerwinden. ⁴

With the defeat at Neerwinden, Dumouriez was in a dire situation. He had been under criticism from the Jacobins, and four members of the National Convention had been dispatched to oversee his efforts. What Dumouriez did next was, frankly, rash. He had the four deputies from the Convention arrested, as well as the Minister of War – Pierre de Beurnoville and the general handed them over to the coalition forces.

He tried to persuade his men to march with him to Paris, and published a letter saying that if the National Convention did not recognise his absolute leadership, he would force them to.  The army refused, and he ran off and defected to the Austrians.

And that was the end of Dumouriez’s story, as far as we're concerned. He settled in England, and died in Henley-upon-Thames in 1823. But nonetheless he would leave his mark on history as his actions after the Battle of Neerwinden helped shape the future of the First French Republic. Dumouriez was linked with the Girondins, and the war had again turned against France, now on the back foot in the north, and the republic was under threat from its external enemies. But the republic was under threat internally too. The March 1793 Levy caused an uprising in the Vendee – parts of southern France. The central government described these rebels as royalist counter-revolutionaries, although the reality of the situation shows more characteristics of a rebellion of discontent than a rebellion to restore the Bourbons. The peasants in the Vendee were paying more in land tax than they had been paying before the revolution, and the wider economic situation was collapsing. By the end of the winter of 1792-93 grain prices had doubled, and the value of the assignat had halved. Large amounts of the currency (the assingnat) were still being pumped into the economy, against the demands of Saint-Just, which only worsened the economy

“The farmer does not want to save paper money and for this reason he is most reluctant to sell his grain.”⁵

The sale of Church land was also deeply unpopular among the population of the Vendee, as the land was generally bought by the bourgeoisie who raised the rents in these lands.⁶ The peasants who rebelled ‘looked to the nobles as their natural leaders.’⁷ The rebellion became so severe that 30,000 soldiers were drawn from the war front to put down the rebellion, but it would be deeply unsuccessful. The war in the Vendee would continue until 1796.

The coalition approach across the Rhine, the loss at Neerwinden, Dumouriez’s defection and the Vendee rebellion saw the young Republic under dire threat. The leadership sought to take decisive action.

President of the National Convention (Presidents were elected for two-week terms) Maxmin Isnard proposed the creation of a Committee of Public Safety – a nine-member executive group to the National Convention. Critically, the measure was endorsed by Danton, who would be instrumental in forming the first version of the CPS. The first CPS would even become known as ‘the Danton committee’.⁸ Danton was the most powerful member of the CPS, which included four other Montagnards, two Girondins and two members of the Plain. From its formation the CPS was tasked with supervising and speeding up the activity of ministers. The CPS’s powers were confirmed every month, however, by the National Convention. 

The reason for the CPS having a Montagnard majority is the declining influence of the Girondin section of the Jacobin club. After the campaign for war and the trial of the King, they had lost support and suspicion arose about them being traitors to the republic. Dumouriez’s treachery only seemed to confirm to the republicans that they were facing enemies from within, and this feeling was furthered when the extent of the Vendee Rebellion was realised in late March of 1793. As the CPS formed under Danton’s leadership, the Girondin-Montagnard clash would come to a head with the republic entering its first spring.

On the 5^th of April, the Jacobins sent out a letter to many of the societies across the country. The letter called for a dismissal of the deputies who had voted to pose the trial of the King to a popular vote, rather than the trial being decided by the National Convention. This had been demanded by the sans-culottes already, but now was seemingly the stance of the head of the Jacobin club. At the time, Jean-Paul Marat was the president of the Jacobins, and had signed the letter. Marat had reacted badly to the loss at Neerwinden, and he would have understood that this letter targeted the Girondins in particular. The letter was sent out some three weeks after Dumouriez’s betrayal, and it was especially alarming for those many deputies who had voted for a popular vote on the King’s life. 8 days later, a Girondin deputy decided to take action. The downward slide for his faction had gone on long enough, and with a speech in the Convention, Marguerite Guadet declared that Marat should be arrested for his signing of the letter which threatened the legitimacy of the Convention itself. The measure was passed by 226 votes to 93. ⁹

Marat was incredibly popular with the sans-culottes, and his supporters gathered near the Revolutionary Tribunal – a tribunal set up to try those suspected of counter-revolutionary activity. The tribunal itself would go on to be a key mechanism in the Terror, condemning suspects to death in many cases. Danton defended the setting up of the tribunal:

“Let us be terrible so that the people will not have to be.”¹⁰

In court Marat portrayed himself as a champion of the people, and that the revolution belonged to them, not the Girondins. He claimed he was ‘the apostle and martyr of liberty’. Marat was finally acquitted on the 24^th of April, to the jubilation of his followers. A move from the Girondins to take out one of the most influential Montagnards had failed, but they would turn their attacks to the Paris Commune, the birthplace of the Jacobins and the centre of Montagnard power. On the 17^th of May Guadet denounced the Paris Commune describing it as “authorities devoted to anarchy” and “political domination”. ¹¹ Guadet declared that the Commune had to be destroyed, and twelve deputies were tasked with its dismantlement – all Girondin – called the Commission of Twelve. The Commission called for Hebert to be arrested on the 24^th of May, and in response on the 25^th, the Commune demanded that arrested ‘patriots’, including Hebert, be released. Isnard, the man who first proposed the creation of the CPS retorted in extraordinary fashion:

“If any attack made on persons representative of the nation, then I declare to you in the name of the whole country that Paris would be destroyed; soon people would be searching along the banks of the Seine to find out whether Paris ever existed.”

The next day, on the 26^th, Robespierre called on the people to revolt. The sans-culottes rallied. The contesting factions were pushing each other to the brink, to see who blinks first. From the 31^st of May to the 2^nd of June, the Girondins and Montagnards would clash for the last time.

An insurrection began on the 31^st, and revolutionary delegates from the 33 sections of Paris reinstated the powers of the Commune at around 6:00 am. They told the commune that they were to speak to Francois Hanriot, a battlement commander, and make him the commander of the Paris National Guard. The city gates were closed and the Convention was called to assemble. Brissot and Danton, accompanied by Guadet, Isnard, and Saint-Just made their way to the Convention to observe the demands of the Paris Commune. The demands included the formation of a central revolutionary army, fixing the price of bread, and armouries created for the sans-culottes. Robespierre arrived, and made a speech denouncing and calling for the suppression of the Commission of Twelve. Vergniaud, a Girondin deputy, thought his speech had gone on long enough. He called out for Robespierre to get it over with, to which Robespierre responded:

“Yes, I will conclude, but it will be against you! Against you, who…wanted to send those responsible for it to the scaffold; against you, who have never ceased to incite to the destruction of Paris; against you, who wanted to save the tyrant; against you, who conspired with Dumouriez...”¹²

The Convention agreed to the suppression of the Commission of twelve by the end of the day, but the Commune was not yet satisfied.

The 2^nd of June would see the end of the power struggle between the Girondins and Montagnards. The National Guard was still mobilised, and the day before Marat made a return to the Hotel de Ville and called for an assembly. The Commune was to deliver a petition calling for the arrest of the 22 at 18:00, but the Convention dispersed. The tocsin sounded again and the petition was to be given to the CPS to be deliberated over, and a response was to be given within three days.¹³

Despite this, the next day, a Sunday, Hanriot and his National Guard surrounded the Convention, with a force of 80,000 Frenchmen in arms.¹⁴ The session ensuing was bitter. Lanjuinais, a Girondin deputy, and exclaimed in fury at what was, in his opinion, treachery by the Paris Commune. His speech was met with shouting from across the Convention, that he wants a civil war, or a counter-revolution, and that he was insulting the people. His voice rose. Lanjuinais told the Convention that Paris was being oppressed by the Commune, and violence erupted. Various Montagnards raced over to him to rip him down from the tribune, where deputies spoke in the Convention. He held on to the tribune as he was being attacked and continued his speech:

“I demand the dissolution of all the revolutionist authorities in Paris. I demand that all they have done in the last three days be declared null.”¹⁵

The Commune’s petitioners rushed in, and called for Lanjuinais’ arrest, as well as the twenty-two Girondins for counter-revolutionary rhetoric and activity. It was ruled that the petition was to be decided upon by the CPS. ¹⁶

The petitioners stormed out of the Convention, straight to the National Guard. Orders were given to Hanriot that no deputy would be allowed to enter or exit the Convention. While the Girondins were being urged to give up their powers (Isnard, the president of the Convention for two weeks prior did so quickly), Lacroix, a Montagnard deputy came racing into the chamber calling out that he had been ‘insulted’ at the door, and that no-one was allowed to leave. Even Danton said that such a violation of the Convention should be avenged, but the Girondins remained under dire threat. Barrere of the Plain roused the deputies of the Convention to ‘cause the bayonets that surround you to be lowered’, meaning to confront the National Guard.¹⁷ Led by the president, Herault, the Convention marched to the exit. And there, at the door, they were greeted by none other than the commander of the National Guard – Hanriot. He looked to the head of the crowd – Herault, who told the commander, not fully grasping the gravity of the situation, that the Convention intended to promote the people’s happiness, asking ‘what do the people require?’¹⁸

Hanriot, holding his cannon, spoke to the deputies around Herault.

“Tell your stupid president that he and his assembly are fucked, and that if within one hour he doesn’t deliver to me the Twenty-two, I’m going to blast it to the ground.”¹⁹

Time had run out for the Girondins. The Assembly were prevented from leaving at every exit from the Convention, and they proceeded to vote for the arrest of twenty-nine Girondin deputies. Among these included Brissot, Guadet, Vergniaud, and Lanjuinais.

Many more Girondins would be proscribed, and the original Twenty-two were tried in the Revolutionary Tribunal beginning on the 24^th of October. Lanjuinais managed to escape before this but the Twenty-two were condemned to be executed on the 31^st. It took 36 minutes to execute them.²⁰ On the way to their execution they all sang La Marseillaise, and continued as they were executed.²¹ Vergniaud was the last.²² Marie Phillipon was imprisoned and later executed on the 8^th of November. Jean Roland, her husband, upon learning of her fate in Paris, sat down beside a tree, and wrote out a short note:

“From the moment when I learned that they had murdered my wife, I would no longer remain in a world stained with enemies.”

Jean proceeded to sink a knife into his chest.

The Girondins were totally removed from the Convention, leaving the government dominated by the Montagnards, and the CPS led by Danton.

Jean-Paul Marat retired. He had been suffering badly from a worsening skin condition, akin to severe eczema. To remedy this, he often bathed in oatmeal, and would do his work on a table above his tub. Despite this he would still carry out official business, sending letters to the Convention, and corresponding with Robespierre and Danton, although they began to distance themselves from the now retired Marat. On the 13^th of July, a young woman with brown hair and dark eyes by the name of Charlotte Corday came to Marat’s home with vital information regarding escaped Girondins following the proscriptions in June. Marat’s wife advised against speaking to Corday, but he did so anyway. They spoke for around fifteen minutes, as Corday listed the names of deputies and explained what was happening in Normandy – where the Girondins had escaped to. Corday claimed that Marat said to her “Their heads will fall within a fortnight.”

Then, the twenty-four year old Corday stood up, brandished a knife from her corset, and drove it into Marat’s heart.²³

The blood loss was massive. Marat cried out “Help me, my dear friend!” to his wife, and slumped to his death.

Corday was promptly executed four days later, saying that she had killed one man ‘to save 100,000’. Marat died in the vain belief of Corday’s that it would bring the Reign of Terror to an end. Rather, it was with the fall of the Girondins that the Terror began to accelerate. The insurrection of the 31^st of May to the 2^nd of June saw a clear dominance by one faction for the first time.

Marat’s death would be immortalised by David, in his painting aptly titled – The Assassination of Marat. It shows him dead in his bathtub, in a position similar to a traditional position in which Jesus is portrayed. Marat was not the Jesus of the French Revolution, but his death became one of Montagnard tragedy. His paper The People’s Friend was published for the last time on the 14^th of July, and he would become glorified by the Montagnards. Nonetheless his assassination was both a signpost of what the rule of the National Convention had been so far, and what it was to become.

Up until the fall of the Girondins the French Revolution had been a struggle of one ideal against another – at first Royalism vs. Constitutional Monarchism, then Constitutional Monarchism vs. Republicanism. When the struggle of Girondinism and Montagnardism ended - there was no opposition to take the place of the Girondins.

This unrestricted rule combined with the political extremism of the Montagnards would see the Terror become its most terrible, as the CPS came into its position of dominance. Though with the Girondins gone, the Republic was still under dire threat. On the morning of the 2^nd of June it was announced in the Convention that in Lyon, Vendee Rebels had seized the local assembly, and some 800 republicans died. The Vendee Rebellion threatened the very existence of the republic as did the approaching coalition in the east. Danton, Robespierre and Saint-Just were tasked with leading the Montagnards, and thus the republic, into the most critical phase of the revolution.

1 Ramsey Phipps, The Armies of the First French Republic and the Rise of the Marshalls under Napoleon I, 2011, p. 155

2 Ibid

3 Rickard, J (12 January 2009), Battle of Neerwinden, 18 March 1793 , http://www.historyofwar.org/articles/battles_neerwinden_1793.html

4 Theodore Dodge, Napoleon: A History of the Art of War: From the Beginning of the French Revolution, P. 103

5 Access to History: France in Revolution P. 95

6 Ibid

7 Ibid

8 Hillary Mantel, 2009, He Roared, London Review of Books. 3 (15): 3–6

9 Albert Sobul, The French Revolution: 1787-1799, 1974, P. 307

10 Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution, Simon Schama, P. 706

11 Albert Soubul, The French Revolution: 1787-1799, P. 309

12 Albert Mathiez, The French Revolution, 1929, P. 324

13 The French Revolution, a Political History, 1789-1804, in 4 vols. Vol. III, François-Alphonse, 1910

14 Access to History: France in Revolution

15 Francois Mignet, History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814, 1824, P. 297

16 Ibid

17 Ibid P. 298

18 Ibid

19 David Bell, When Terror Was Young, https://jshare.johnshopkins.edu/myweb/davidbell/andress.pdf

20 Simon Schama, Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution, 1989, P. 803-805

21 William Doyle, The Oxford History of the French Revolution, 1989, P. 289

22 http://www.executedtoday.com/2008/10/31/1793-girondins-girondists-pierre-vergniaud/

23 Well, not quite his heart, very close to it though, and it did cause severe blood loss very quickly

The Decline and Fall of the First French Republic, Part 1

The year is 1793, and the King of France, Louis XVI has just been executed. Marie Antoinette, the King’s wife would soon follow, both of whom condemned to death on charges of treason. Treason against France – accused of conspiring against France in what would become known as the War of the First Coalition, when France declared war on Austria after rising tensions following its movement towards republicanism. But now, France has become a republic – the first of its kind in Europe.

The sovereign of France was suddenly and dramatically gone, and a scramble for power ensued. Many of us in western society are lucky enough to see the peaceful transferral of power as, essentially, a given. Arguably we take this for granted, but you don't have to look too far to see what can happen when the order of succession has been muddied. France had the dilemma of having no clear successor to King Louis. 

The National Convention was the representative legislature of France when the King was killed, and after the office of the King was widely seen as the next highest authority in the land. This was particularly so after the predecessor to the Convention – the Constituent Assembly - brought about of the Constitution of 1791. In this constitution feudalism was abolished and limitations were applied to the King’s power and a system of constitutional monarchy was established. In 1793, there was no clear leader amongst the deputies who made up the legislature. The chamber was divided up until the most recent elections between royalists who sat to the right of the speaker, republicans who sat to the left, and independents who sat in between.¹

But in the most recent election, the royalists were wiped out of the legislature, and the Convention became stacked with some moderate republicans or constitutionalists and more radical republicans. The republican influence was clearly seen in the vote on the king’s life, where not a single person voted against the execution order, although over 100 abstained. This vote was taken after a debate where a leading republican deputy stated that the vote on the King’s life would be taken publicly, so that traitors in the Assembly are known.

Jean-Paul Marat was a journalist in the early stages of the French Revolution, in his own self-published newspaper – L’Ami du Peuple (The People’s Friend), although before this, he enjoyed a very colourful life. Around 1770, Marat took the decision to move to Newcastle at 26 years old, where, according to his own accounts, he lived on black coffee for months, and produced his first political work – Chains of Slavery.² He would go on to be a scientist, conducting studies on light, fire, and electricity. He dipped into the medical field, publishing an essay on gonorrhoea and gaining an MD from St. Andrews. By the time Louis was executed, Marat had become a staunch radical republican, whose journalism had taken on fiery criticism of right wing republicans, and he had become part of the Jacobin Club.³

The Jacobin Club began as a broad republican movement within France, and picked up steam following the Flight to Varennes, where the King was caught trying to flee, and marched back to Paris under the National Guard. Despite this, the Jacobins saw splinter groups within it – the more moderate Girondins and the radical Montagnards (The Mountain). The former dominated the party at the time of the execution of the King, but also sought to resist the momentum the revolution had on French society, believing that Europe simply would not accept radical republicanism, as seen with the declaration of Pillnitz, and later, the Brunswick Manifesto. They would come into conflict with the left-wing branch of the party – the Montagnards over these conflicting views. Marat aligned himself with the Montagnards, and criticised the Girondins in The People’s Friend.

He made his beliefs clear – that the death of Louis would have a generally positive effect on France and her people. And so he declared on that fateful night in the Convention, a public vote, so that traitors may be known. But when Marat said this, it was less of an attempt to convince people in the Convention to vote in favour of execution – he could be generally assured of that. In the context of the approaching power struggle, it was more of a threat. Here not only does Marat make it clear that he is one of the leading republican figures to his political rivals, he threatens those he saw as wolves in sheep’s clothing. It was a republican group within the Convention whom he believed to be counter-revolutionary – the Girondins.⁴

The Girondins were the moderate arm of the Jacobins, although they were becoming increasingly challenged by the rebellious, radical Montagnards. Marat was not the only figure with his crosshairs over the Girondins though; the entire Montagnard faction saw opportunity in the death of the King, and many were afraid of what would happen to the republic if it fell into Girondin hands. But the Montagnards were not about to move their political plans forwards without resistance. The Girondin leader Jacques-Pierre Brissot was one of the most formidable politicians in the French legislature.

Brissot himself had been aligning himself with the Girondins and became a leading figure as the revolution progressed. Although he began life as a law clerk, his works became increasingly critical of the monarchy. He was even imprisoned for his Theorie des lois criminelles in the Bastille, which advocated for penal reform. He founded an anti-slavery group, and became popular for his speeches in the Jacobin club. Brissot curried support in the Legislative Assembly after the Declaration of Pillnitz to take a war footing against Austria, and they eventually did declare war in April of 1792, which we will touch on later. In this the Girondins earned the reputation of being the ‘war party’.⁵ It should be stressed, though, that there were no parties in the Legislative Assembly. In fact the idea of political parties was frowned upon – seen as ‘pursuing the selfish interests of members rather than the common good of the nation’. They were seen as putting party above country. Rather, these two rival groups were loosely associated deputies, but largely remained loyal to their causes.⁶

The Girondins and Montagnards were, at their core, similar in their devotion to the republic, being anti-clerical, and wanting a more ‘enlightened and humane France’. But the Montagnards pushed for a powerful central government and tight control over economics. By contrast, Brissot spearheaded the Girondin support of a federal France, with a more liberal economic policy. Their power struggle would be all but decided in two main junctures – the decision for war, and the trial of the King.⁷

Brissot was instrumental in the Girondin position during the trial of the King. Despite voting for the King’s execution in the end, Brissot and the Girondins were still branded as royalist counter-revolutionaries by the Montagnards. He suggested various alternatives to executing Louis, hoping that his life would be spared. But this would cost Brissot and his faction dearly in the ongoing power struggle. The Montagnards secured the King’s death – and began to find their voice in the Convention.

One of the biggest coups the Montagnards achieved prior to the death of the King was the appointment of Georges Jacques Danton as Minister of Justice. Danton had a bourgeois background, but in 1792 was a champion of the sans-culottes (without-breeches, simply, the common people), as one of the most powerful orators in the Assembly. Danton was an imposing figure, and David Lawday tells us about his role in the early stages of the republic:

“His fate was to take charge of the revolution at a critical moment, when it stumbled and risked collapsing, so that France faced a return to the failed old order from which passionate reformers and an angry populace had torn it free.”⁸

Although originally operating in support of the Girondinist government, he eventually sat side by side with Marat in the legislature, yet he was more measured in his speech than Marat tended to be. Despite this, he was still a brilliant orator. After the Assembly voted to kill the king, Danton emphatically declared:

“The kings of Europe would dare challenge us? We throw them the head of a king!”

Danton came to see the Girondins as not able to fully recognise the threat that counter-revolutionaries posed to the republic. Next to Marat, Danton also sat with Maximilien Robespierre, another of the most important Montagnards in the Assembly. Robespierre had been part of the Montagnards since 1792. Another law student, like Danton and Brissot, but Robespierre actually became a judge. Yet he resigned a few years later, after the guilt he felt became too great for sentencing one man to death. After this incident he became an advocate for the poor – taking up the cases of poorer clients so they can have strong legal representation without ruining themselves financially.⁹

Robespierre was an admirer of the ancient Roman Republic, and fell in love with the great upholders of the republic in its death throes like Cicero and Cato the Younger. Robespierre made his position clear during the trial of King Louis:

“Louis must die so that the nation may live.”¹⁰

Robespierre would become one of the most controversial figures of the revolution. Much like the other prominent Montagnards, Robespierre had opposed war with Austria. Brissot had claimed that the war would help spread revolutionary ideals abroad, and rouse support for the revolution in France. Brissot even argued France had a great chance of victory because the oppressed masses of other European kingdoms would support the invading French armies. By contrast, France suffered in the early parts of the war, as Prussia and Austria brushed aside resistance as they invaded – seizing Longwy and Verdun in July of 1792. As the invading armies marched further and further into France, it became apparent that Brissot had seemingly made the wrong call. The republic was under dire threat when the Brunswick Manifesto was published, saying that Brunswick intended to restore Louis to his position prior to the revolution, as absolute monarch. This had the opposite effect though. It led to an almost immediate overthrow of the King, when Tuiliers Palace was stormed, and the King taken prisoner, before being deposed by the Convention in September. Almost on the same day as the deposition, the French Revolutionary Army met the Austrian army, and decisively defeated them at the Battle of Valmy, bringing the offensive to a halt. Brissot sighed in relief.

Alongside Brissot as leading Girondins in the Convention was Jean-Marie Roland, an economist who worked closely with Marie-Jeanne Phillipon, his wife. They worked in Lyon during the earlier stages of the revolution and pleaded with the central government for some relief, with the city’s debts and silk business suffering. He often wrote to Paris to negotiate concessions for the city he represented, and in this began regularly corresponding with a young and ambitious Brissot.

The Rolands took the decision to travel to Paris in February of 1791, and met deputies of the convention who would also make up the Girondins later on. The eventually settled on staying in Paris and Marie opened up a salon, which made the Roland name all the more famous in the French capital. Marie’s salon would become a common meeting place for Jacobins, after Jean joined the club. They would entertain various figures crucial to the revolution in Marie’s salon, who would go on to be their bitter political enemies, like Robespierre, or their closest allies, like Brissot. Around a year after arriving in Paris, Jean found himself appointed Minister of the Interior, when Brissot and the Girondins were at the height of their power, pushing the republic forwards.

Yet they suffered a setback in political power after the near-disastrous decision to declare war on Austria, despite the Austrians being likely to invade either way. The course of the war was enough of a setback for the Girondins, particularly following the Montagnards opposition to the war, and Roland, who had become the most prominent Girondin bar Brissot as the Minister of the Interior only helped them to losing the high ground in the convention further.

After Tuiliers Palace had been stormed, an armoire de fer (iron chest) had been found, which contained letters, documents, and general correspondence between King Louis and the leadership of Austria. This discovery damned the King almost certainly to death – and he was charged with high treason. Jean Roland was reinstated as Minister for the Interior after the storming of Tuiliers – he had been dismissed for reading a letter in the King’s presence (written by Marie) that was deemed disrespectful and inconsistent with the position of minister. It had criticised the King’s vetoes of decrees passed by the then Legislative Assembly. Nonetheless, after the storming of the palace and arrest of the King, Roland was in charge of the iron chest. He was to have it be investigated and eventually present the findings to the convention, as evidence for the King’s trial. But Jean, for whatever reason, did something that would cost him dearly. Whether it was a mistake or deliberately, you wonder whether he would have given it a second thought if he knew the consequences.

Roland didn’t seal the chest.

The chest containing crucial evidence proving the King’s treachery of the nation. Roland was quickly accused of tampering with the evidence, destroying some, or attempting to guide the charge of treason away from Louis.

The Montagnards saw this as just another Girondin plot to betray the revolution, but the Girondins believed the Montagnards’ desires to centralise a powerful government was simply a plot to seize power for themselves and betray the revolution. This clash became bitter and divisive in the Convention, where speeches were made from both sides condemning the other. Marat published anti-Girondin articles in The People’s Friend, and Robespierre spoke of Girondin treachery. In protest, Roland resigned as Minister of the Interior when the King was executed. After the debate over the war with Austria and Prussia, and the trial of the King, power had turned away from the Girondins. The Montagnards had the high ground.

No-one was more pleased than Louis Antoine de Saint-Just. Another key Montagnard figure, Saint-Just was a political firebrand – a radical revolutionary republican, with the tongue of a serpent. He became close friends with Robespierre after only arriving in Paris in 1786 at the age of 18. In his home town, Saint-Just had fallen in love with a young woman by the name of Therese Gelle. Tragically for Saint-Just – Therese married the son of a prominent local official while he was out of town, and tradition has it that he was heartbroken. Not two weeks later he set off for the capital, but was stopped by police after his mother reported him. In 1789 he ventured into poetry – writing Organt, poem in twenty cantos, a fantasy medieval epic, it was somewhat juvenile and politically extreme. Satirical, pornographic and attacking the clergy, nobility and monarchy, Saint-Just made his political position clear. It was banned.¹¹

His rise came after a shakeup in his home town’s leadership. It had long been led by the Gelle family (the same Gelle that Therese had come from) but this was challenged when the revolution began in 1789. In the elections of 1790, many of Saint-Just’s friends who had been challenging the Gelle were elected to prominent political positions in the town, and Saint-Just himself joined the National Guard.¹²

But one thing Saint-Just had above all else was flair. He had a skill for showmanship in the town council – he set a counter-revolutionary leaflet on fire and held his hand in the flame – declaring his love for France and the republic. Saint-Just finally reached the minimum age to be a deputy in the French legislature just in time for the election following the attack on Tuiliers Palace. The arrest of the King saw most of his political rivals resign and retire, and he was elected to the Convention in 1792.¹³

At the convention he was quiet at first. He didn’t make any speeches or make any declarations. He joined the Jacobins but was part of the Plain (deputies aligned with neither the Girondins nor the Montagnards). Saint-Just was patient, waiting for the right time to step forward and make his position clear. Finally, on the 13^th of November 1792, Saint-Just stood up in the Convention, and delivered his first speech:

“As for me, I see no middle ground: this man must reign or die! He oppressed a free nation; he declared himself its enemy; he abused the laws: he must die to assure the repose of the people, since it was in his mind to crush the people to assure his own.”¹⁴

His speech was met with applause throughout. Robespierre was impressed with the youngest member of the National Convention and spoke later with a similar message. In this Saint-Just almost instantly became one of the most prominent figures of the Jacobin Club, as his and Robespierre’s views became the official policy of the Jacobins. In his conclusion he delivered one of the most telling sentences of the revolution.

“No one can reign innocently.”¹⁵

Saint-Just was a politician who could utilise simple action to devastating effect, as would become evident over the next phase of the revolution, which would simply become known as The Terror. But after the king died, on the 21^st of January 1793, it remained unclear who would lead France into this new age. Brissot and the Girondins, or those simply known as The Mountain – the Montagnards? The stage was set for the two factions to clash, but the opening move would come from someone who wasn’t a politician. In fact, he wasn’t even in France.

A second part will be posted on Friday.

1 Access to History: France in Revolution

2 Les Chaines de l’Esclavage, 1793 (ed. Goetz et de Cock) p4167

3 de Cock, J. & Goetz, C., Œuvres de Jean-Paul Marat, 10 volumes, Éditions Pôle Nord, Brussels, 1995

4 Access to History: France in Revolution

5 Encyclopaedia Britannica

6 Access to History, France in Revolution

7 Ibid

8 David Lawday, Danton

9 Ruth Scurr, Fatal Purity: Robespierre and the French Revolution

10 Maximilien de Robespierre,  Oeuvres de Maximilien Robespierre, 1958

11 R.R. Palmer, Twelve Who Ruled, 1969

12 Norman Hampson, Saint-Just, 1991, P. 18

13 Ibid, P.26

14 Eugene Newton Curtis, Saint-Just, colleague of Robespierre, P. 38

15 Ruth Scurr, Fatal Purity: Robespierre and the French Revolution, P.221