The French Revolution 1789-1795

by Bertha Meriton Gardiner

These disasters reacted on the situation in the capital. The hold that the Girondists possessed on the Convention grew feebler every day. They had failed in all they had attempted. Their foreign policy had broken down, and the reproach fell heavily on the ministry of not having suffered Dumouriez to invade Holland when the proposition was first made. They had failed to save the King’s life, so that the whole constitutional party outside the Assembly was as fully estranged from them as from the Mountain. In spite of the fresh municipal elections in Paris, which they had decreed in hope of changing the character of the Commune (p. 128), it was the same criminal band that still exercised authority. To provide for the war expenditure resort was had to new issues of assignats. Prices incessantly rose, and discontent spread rapidly amongst the working population, taught by agitators to regard the right side of the Convention as the cause alike of the prevailing destitution and of military disaster. The deputies of the centre, in alarm for their own safety, and without confidence in the Girondists as leaders, followed a vacillating course, accordingly as they were actuated by their principles, their fears, or their regard for the necessities of the situation. When Miranda’s retreat was known an attempt was made to get up an insurrection directed against the Girondists. It failed, from want of union and support. But the bands at the service of the Jacobins and the Commune gathered round the Convention, filling the galleries and menacing deputies. The Mountain made use of the occasion to obtain the adoption of a law for the creation of an extraordinary criminal court, to judge without appeal conspirators against the state (March 9). The Girondists opposed the measure, but in vain; and thus were Robespierre and Marat provided with a ready weapon with which to strike at the heads of those who had so long menaced their own.

Treason of Dumouriez.

Affairs in Belgium assumed a yet more alarming aspect. Dumouriez, hastening back from Holland, rejoined Miranda near Louvain. He returned resolved to break with the Convention. He had no enthusiasm for democratic or republican ideals, and was excessively irritated because the Convention had not pursued the policy advocated by himself, of creating Belgium into a separate republic. He resolved to make a stand and to fight the Austrians, expecting after victory to be able to dictate his own terms to the Convention and to mediate between France and the allies. But a long contested battle, which raged fiercely round the village of Neerwinden, ended in the defeat and flight of the French (March 18). Dumouriez, with a remnant of his army, effected a retreat to the frontier, where he sought to make good his position by opening negotiations with Coburg. He offered to march to Paris and place the Dauphin on the throne if Coburg would undertake to give him moral and, in case of need, material support. As a pledge of good faith he was prepared to admit Austrian troops into Lille and Valenciennes, on condition that the towns were restored to France on the making of peace. It had long been suspected at Paris that Dumouriez was not to be trusted; but neither Girondists nor Montagnards had dared to propose his dismissal, because they had no general of talent to take his place. After the battle of Neerwinden he made no concealment of his hostile intentions; and on the arrival of four deputies sent by the Convention to summon him to Paris, gave them up to Coburg as hostages for the safety of the royal family. In the meantime every effort was made by the agents of the government to secure the fidelity of the army, and with success. The soldiers refused to betray France to Austria, and Dumouriez, to save himself from arrest, took refuge in Coburg’s quarters (April 3).

Party strife at Paris.

Dumouriez’ treachery increased the violence of the party struggle at Paris, where Girondists and Montagnards strove to cast on each other the odium of being the traitor’s accomplices. It was against Danton that the Girondists directed their most vehement attacks. They made charges in support of which they had no evidence to bring, and which have never been proved. According to them Danton had been bribed by Louis; he had misapplied public money; in Belgium he had plundered state property. They even accused him of plotting with Dumouriez the restoration of the throne, because he had praised that general’s talent in the Convention. Danton turned fiercely on his assailants, threatening irreconcilable war. Counter accusations and menaces were hurled from right to left, from left to right. Robespierre came forward to represent the entire public life of the Girondists as forming a long series of crimes directed against liberty and the republic, and concluded with a formal proposal to send Brissot, Vergniaud, Gensonné and Guadet, along with Marie Antoinette and the Duke of Orleans, as Dumouriez’ accomplices, before the new criminal court (April 9).

Committee of Public Safety.

Though the ascendancy which the Girondists once held was lost, their eloquence was still a power, and the first deputy who was sent before the court was a Montagnard, Marat, on the charge of inciting the people to insurrection (April 14). But this isolated party victory served only to irritate without weakening their adversaries. The court, composed of judges and jurymen, both elected in Paris, acquitted the accused, and his partisans restored him in triumph to his seat. The direction of the government, possessed by the Girondists at the opening of the convention, passed into other hands. The ministry had been broken up. Roland had resigned, complaining that he had not the support of the Convention. The Mountain and the Gironde struggled to obtain appointments for their own candidates, and the ministers, fearful of having their acts misinterpreted, refused to take a step on their own responsibility. Hence the wheels of government, when expedition and secrecy were most requisite, threatened to come to a standstill. Under the influence of the alarm excited by the treason of Dumouriez, the Convention established a Committee of Public Safety, composed of nine members, but subsequently enlarged to twelve, who were subject to re-election every month, and were empowered to deliberate in secret, to superintend the action of the ministry, and to take provisionally whatever measures were requisite for the national defence (April 6). The deputies entrusted with these large powers were Danton and eight others belonging to the Mountain and the Plain. From this time the ministers sank into the position of chief clerks of their respective departments, while the Committee of Public Safety stood at the head of the executive government.

Committee of General Security.

A second committee, which had been created earlier, acquired special importance about the same time. This was a Committee of General Security, which had under its superintendence the measures taken for the detection of political crime. Originally the Girondists possessed a majority in it, but shortly after the King’s death it had been reorganised, and was now composed of twelve Montagnards.

Deputies in mission.