A history of England

by Charles Oman

English naval supremacy.—Lord Howe's victory.

The moment that the war began, the naval supremacy of England enabled her to seize most of the outlying French colonies. At the same time our fleets moved down to blockade the great naval arsenals of Brest, Toulon, and Rochefort, where the French navy was cooped up. So thoroughly were the hostile fleets held in restraint, that there was only one important sea-fight in the first three years of the war. In the summer of 1794 the Brest squadron came out to convoy a merchant fleet, and was caught and completely beaten by Lord Howe on "the glorious First of June."

Vigorous government of the Convention.—The Reign of Terror.

The years 1793-1794 were the hardest part of the war for the French. The coalition against them now comprised England, Austria, Prussia, Spain, Holland, and Sardinia. Assailed on every frontier by foreign enemies, they had also to face a formidable royalist rising in La Vendée and Brittany. Yet the Convention made head against all its foes. The Jacobin faction, headed by the ruthless Robespierre, put a fearful energy into its generals, by the summary method of sending every officer who failed to the guillotine. The sanguinary despotism which they exercised was a thing of which the most tyrannical monarch would never have dreamed. They had impeached and slain the Girondists, or moderate Republicans, in the summer of 1793. Six months later, Robespierre, determined to be supreme, had seized and executed his colleague and rival Danton, and all his faction. The "Reign of Terror" made Paris a perfect shambles: 1400 prisoners were guillotined in six weeks, and Robespierre called for yet more blood.

Military success of the French.

But these horrors within were accompanied by vigour without. Quickened by the axe hanging over their necks, the generals did their best, and finally succeeded in beating back the allies, whose motley armies failed to co-operate with each other, and had no one commander who could direct the whole course of the war to a single end.

English reverses in Flanders and at Toulon.

England's part in these early years of the war was neither important nor glorious. The Duke of York, the second son of George III., was sent with 20,000 men to aid the Austrians in Flanders. But he was a very incapable commander, got beaten by the French at Hondeschoote near Dunkirk, and was forced back into Holland, and at last chased as far as Hanover (1793-94). Another failure was seen at Toulon in the same year. The royalist inhabitants of that town called in the English to their aid, and surrendered its arsenal and fleet. But the place was indifferently defended by General O'Hara, and fell back into the hands of the Republicans after a short siege, mainly owing to the ability displayed by a young artillery officer named Napoleon Bonaparte. The only compensating advantage was that, before evacuating the place, the English were able to burn the French fleet and arsenal.

Fall of Robespierre.—The Directory.

Pitt had said that when all Europe united against a nation of wild beasts and madmen, two campaigns would settle the business. But at the end of 1794 things seemed further from a settlement than ever. For the coalition against France, after faring ill in the field, both in Flanders and on the Rhine, began to show signs of breaking up. That this was possible came from the fact that the "Reign of Terror" and the domination of the implacable Robespierre were at last ended. The time had come when he and his associates, having guillotined all available Royalists and Moderates, were reduced to preying upon their own party, in their insane desire to find imaginary conspirators against the Republic. Robespierre fell at the hands of the rank and file of the Jacobins, who found the rule of the dictator intolerable, when it began to imperil their own necks. Having long shared in his misdoings, they sent him to the guillotine, when he began to terrify them (July, 1794). Tallien, Barrère, Barras, and the other leaders in Robespierre's overthrow were, if less ferocious than their master, full of vices of which he could never be accused, profligate, venal, and corrupt. But, however bad they were, they yet reversed Robespierre's policy. The executions and massacres ceased, and the reign of the guillotine came to an end. The Convention dissolved itself in 1795, and gave place to the government of the "Directory," a committee of five ministers, of whom Barras was chief.