Revolutionary Europe, 1789-1815

by H. Morse Stephens

Battle of the 1st of June.

The only checks which the Great Committee received were at sea. Whether it was because it is more difficult to improvise a navy than an army, or because sufficient attention was not paid to the republican navy, it is impossible to decide, but it is quite certain that the sailors of the Republic did not rival the soldiers in success, though they did in valour. One reason for this was that all the best sailors preferred the lucrative work of preying upon the commerce of the world in frigates and privateers to serving in the regular fleets, where no prizes were to be made. The two principal French fleets were those stationed at Toulon and at Brest. An ineffectual effort had been made by Sir Sidney Smith to burn the Toulon fleet when the English and Spaniards evacuated that port. Nevertheless, a new fleet was soon prepared, but its action against the English and the Spaniards who blockaded the coast were ineffectual. The English on leaving Toulon had proceeded to Corsica. That island had been raised against the Convention by the native patriot, Paoli, who invited the English to come and take possession in the name of George III. In Corsica, owing to the weakness of the French Mediterranean fleet, the English remained unmolested for nearly a year. The Brest fleet, however, came to blows with the English Channel fleet, under the command of Lord Howe. The United States of America had agreed to pay part of the debt which they owed France for money lent during the War of American Independence in grain, and a convoy was sent to protect the grain-ships. Lord Howe was directed to cut off this convoy, and the French fleet left Brest to ensure its safe arrival. From one point of view, the action of the French fleet was crowned with success, for the convoy arrived safely, but the fleet itself was utterly defeated by Lord Howe on the 1st of June 1794. Since the object had been attained, the Committee of Public Safety claimed credit for the action in which the fleet had been engaged, and the reports which Barère read daily from the tribune of the Convention were invariably of battles won and of feats of valour.

Fall of Robespierre, 9th Thermidor (27th July) 1794.

The brilliant successes which followed the establishment of the power of the Great Committee of Public Safety justified its despotism in the eyes of France, but as soon as those successes had freed France from the invaders, it was generally felt that the weight of the Reign of Terror was intolerable, and that it had become unnecessary. It was at this period of most brilliant military triumphs that the Terror grew to its greatest height in Paris. On 22d Prairial (10th of June 1794) a law was passed to accelerate the procedure of the Revolutionary Tribunal, and the number of deaths upon the guillotine increased to an average of 196 a week. Robespierre, who, as has been said, was more of a statesman than his colleagues upon the Committee of Public Safety, who were simply administrators, understood the tenor of feeling in France. He believed that the time was coming when the Reign of Terror should cease, and a new Reign of Virtue, carrying into effect the maxims of Rousseau, could be established. The working members of the Committee allowed Robespierre to theorise to his heart’s content; as long as he did not interfere with them, he might advocate what principles he pleased. The first evidence of Robespierre’s new tendency appeared in his establishment of the Worship of the Supreme Being. He was a profoundly religious and virtuous man, and the chief cause of his hatred of Hébert and Danton was his belief that they were immoral atheists. On 18th Floréal (7th May 1794) Robespierre made his most famous speech in the Convention, by which he induced the Convention to officially acknowledge the existence of a Supreme Being and the immortality of the soul. The speech was followed on 20th Prairial by a great festival in honour of the Supreme Being, at which Robespierre presided. This was the day when his power seemed greatest, but many of his colleagues laughed at his assumption of virtue and at his posing as a high priest. He perceived clearly that he could not establish his chimerical Reign of Virtue without destroying the scoffers who refused to believe in him and his doctrines. He absented himself for six weeks from the meetings of the Committee, and prepared a speech by which he hoped to induce the Convention to proscribe his opponents.

On 8th Thermidor (26th July 1794) he read this speech to the Convention, and attacked covertly, and without mentioning many names, not only certain of his colleagues in the Committee of Public Safety, but also the majority of the Committee of General Security and of the Financial Committee. These men, who had been governing France while Robespierre was theorising, would not tamely submit to be ejected from power and guillotined. On the evening of the same day Robespierre read his speech to the Jacobin Club, which was the headquarters of the puritans who believed in the possibility of a Reign of Virtue. But on 9th Thermidor the accused deputies determined to act. It was not only the working members of the Committees, but also the friends of Danton, the independent deputies of the Mountain, and the members of the Centre, who felt threatened, and their attitude was speedily declared. Saint-Just began to read a report accusing Billaud-Varenne and Collot-d’Herbois by name, but he was interrupted, and Robespierre himself, with Couthon, Saint-Just, and two other deputies were, after a stormy scene, ordered under arrest. But the puritan party were not only strong in the Jacobin Club; they dominated the Commune of Paris ever since the overthrow of the Hébertists. Hanriot, the commandant of the National Guard of Paris, rescued Robespierre and the other imprisoned deputies, and took them to the Hôtel-de-Ville, where a scheme of government was discussed. The Convention did not wait to be attacked. It declared Robespierre and all his adherents to be outlaws, and Barras, Fréron, and Léonard Bourdon collected columns of regular troops and national guards to attack the Hôtel-de-Ville. The Convention was completely successful. The people of Paris, like the people of all France, persisted in considering Robespierre as the author of the Reign of Terror, while not only his enemies but his colleagues threw upon him the responsibility for all the atrocities included under the name of the Terror. Though personally he had very little influence in the Committee, he was represented and regarded as its master. Consequently no hand was raised to protect Robespierre and the puritans; the Hôtel-de-Ville was easily occupied by Barras; Robespierre was wounded in the mouth by a gendarme, and on 10th Thermidor (28th July) he was guillotined, and was accompanied or followed to the scaffold by the small group of colleagues who had been impeached with him, and by the majority of the Commune of Paris.

The Rule of the Thermidorians. First Phase.

The death of Robespierre did not lead to a change of government, but it led to an alteration in the system by which the government was administered. The deputies who had been most instrumental in the revolution of Thermidor belonged to the Mountain, and expected to retain power in their hands; but they saw the necessity of preventing such a permanence of power as had existed during the previous year. It was, therefore, resolved that the Committees of Government—that is, the Committees of Public Safety and of General Security—should be renewed by a quarter every month, and that the retiring members should not be eligible for re-election until a month had passed. The survivors of the Great Committee still believed in the system of government by terror, but their new colleagues understood that now that France was victorious the country would no longer submit to such rigorous measures of repression. The victory of Fleurus had done away with the necessity of continually employing the guillotine. The system of terror was therefore tacitly abandoned; the supremacy of the Committees continued; the Law of the Suspects was unrepealed; the Revolutionary Tribunal continued to exist; representatives were still sent on mission with unlimited powers; but the succession of executions ceased, and the method of government, though arbitrary, was no longer sanguinary. The men who ruled France from Thermidor (July) 1794 to Ventôse (March) 1795 were deputies of the Mountain, men of the type of Carnot and Robert Lindet, the most sagacious of the members of the Great Committee of Public Safety. The most conspicuous of the new men of this period were Merlin of Douai and Treilhard, who took charge of the foreign policy. These statesmen, while Carnot superintended the carrying on of the war with his accustomed vigour and success, finally broke with the propagandist doctrines which had made the war of unparalleled magnitude and bitterness, and Merlin of Douai, on 14th Frimaire (4th December) 1794 read a report in the name of the Committee of Public Safety, declaring that the Republic did not wish to be at war with Europe for ever, and laying down the bases on which treaties of peace honourable to France could be made. While the Thermidorians were administering the government strongly and honourably, they were beset with cries of vengeance against the Terrorists of the previous year. They felt it necessary to yield to the general outcry, and on 21st Brumaire, Year III. (11th November 1794), Carrier, the most ferocious of the proconsuls of the Terror, was sent before the Revolutionary Tribunal. He was tried and eventually executed for his crimes. The agitation was stronger against the organisers of the Terror, Billaud-Varenne, and Collot-d’Herbois, with whom were associated in the popular hatred Barère, the reporter, and Vadier, who had been the most conspicuous member of the Committee of General Security. Both the doctrines and the men of the Terror had still plenty of supporters in Paris, who now dominated the Jacobin Club, which was therefore closed by the Thermidorians in December 1794. Almost at the same date the Law of the Maximum was repealed. In the same month the survivors of the seventy-three deputies who had protested against the proscription of the Girondins, and consequently been imprisoned, were recalled to their seats in the Convention.

Conquest of Holland. 1794–5.

The Batavian Republic.

Successes in other quarters.