General History for Colleges and High Schools

by P. V. N. Myers

THE TERROR AT PARIS.—At the very same time that Robespierre was establishing the new worship, he was desolating France with massacres of incredible atrocity, and ruling by a terrorism unparalleled since the most frightful days of Rome. With all power gathered in his hands, he overawed all opposition and dissent by the wholesale slaughters of the guillotine. The prisons of Paris and of the departments were filled with suspected persons, until 200,000 prisoners were crowded within these republican Bastiles. At Paris the dungeons were emptied of their victims and room made for fresh ones, by the swift processes of the Revolutionary Tribunal, which in mockery of justice caused the prisoners to be brought before its bar in companies of ten or fifty. Rank or talent was an inexpiable crime. "Were you not a noble?" asks the president of the court of one of the accused. "Yes," was the reply. "Enough; another," was the judge's verdict. And so on through the long list each day brought before the tribunal.

The scenes about the guillotine were simply infernal. Benches were arranged around the scaffold and rented to spectators, like seats in a theatre. A special sewer had to be constructed to carry off the blood of the victims. In the space of a little over a month (from June 10th to July 17th) the number of persons guillotined at Paris was 1285, an average of 34 a day.

MASSACRES IN THE PROVINCES.—While such was the terrible state of things at the capital, matters were even worse in many of the other leading cities of France. The scenes at Nantes, Bordeaux, Marseilles, and Toulon suggested, in their varied elements of horror, the awful conceptions of the "Inferno" of Dante. At Nantes the victims were at first shot singly or guillotined; but these methods being found too slow, more expeditious modes of execution were devised. To these were playfully given the names of "Republican Baptisms," "Republican Marriages," and "Battues."

The "Republican Baptism" consisted in crowding a hundred or more persons into a vessel, which was then towed out into the Loire and scuttled. In the "Republican Marriages" a man and woman were bound together, and then thrown into the river. The "Battues" consisted in ranging the victims in long ranks, and mowing them down with discharges of cannon and musket.

By these various methods fifteen thousand victims were destroyed in the course of a single month. The entire number massacred at Nantes during the Reign of Terror is estimated at thirty thousand. What renders these murders the more horrible is the fact that a considerable number of the victims were women and children. Nantes was at this time crowded with the orphaned children of the Vendéan counter-revolutionists. Upon a single night three hundred of these innocents were taken from the city prisons and drowned in the Loire.

THE FALL OF ROBESPIERRE (July, 1794).—By such terrorism did Robespierre and his creatures rule France for a little more than three months. The awful suspense and dread drove many into insanity and to suicide. The strain was too great for human nature to bear. A reaction came. The successes of the armies of the republic, and the establishment of the authority of the Convention throughout the departments, caused the people to look upon the massacres that were daily taking place as unnecessary and cruel. They began to turn with horror and pity from the scenes of the guillotine.

The first blow at the power of the dictator was struck in the Convention. A member dared to denounce him, upon the floor of the assembly, as a tyrant. The spell was broken. He was arrested and sent to the guillotine, with a large number of his confederates. The people greeted the fall of the tyrant's head with demonstrations of unbounded joy. The delirium was over. "France had awakened from the ghastly dream of the Reign of Terror (July 28, 1794)."

THE REACTION.—The reaction which had swept away Robespierre and his associates continued after their ruin. The clubs of the Jacobins were closed, and that infamous society which had rallied and directed the hideous rabbles of the great cities was broken up. The deputies that had been driven from their seats in the Convention were invited to resume their places and the Christian worship was reestablished.

NAPOLEON DEFENDS THE CONVENTION (Oct. 5, 1795).—These and other measures of the Convention did not fail of arousing the bitter opposition of the scattered forces of the Terrorists, as they were called; and on the 5th of October, 1795, a mob of 40,000 men advanced to the attack of the Tuileries, where the Convention was sitting. As the mob came on they were met by a storm of grape shot, which sent them flying back in wild disorder. The man who trained the guns was a young artillery officer, a native of the island of Corsica,—Napoleon Bonaparte. The Revolution had at last brought forth a man of genius capable of controlling and directing its tremendous energies. 5. THE DIRECTORY (Oct. 27, 1795-Nov. 9, 1799).

THE REPUBLIC BECOMES AGGRESSIVE.—A few weeks after the defence of the Convention by Napoleon, that body declaring its labors ended, closed its sessions, and immediately afterwards the Councils and the Board of Directors provided for by the new constitution [Footnote: There were to be two legislative bodies,—the Council of Five Hundred and the Council of the Ancients, the latter embracing two hundred and fifty persons, of whom no one could be under fifty years of age. The executive power was vested in a board of five persons, which was called the Directory.] that had been framed by the Convention, assumed control of affairs.