Orphans on the earth : Girondin fugitives from the Terror, 1793-1794 9780739140680, 073914068X

Table of contents :
The Rolands and their circle (1791-93) --
Escape from Paris (Summer 1793) --
On the run (Summer 1793) --
Buzot's perspective (1791-94) --
Barbaroux's account (1791-93) --
Louvet's journey (November 1793-April 1794) --
The last days (June-July 1794).

Citation preview

Orphans on the Earth

Orphans on the Earth Girondin Fugitives from the Terror, 1793–1794

Bette W. Oliver

LEXINGTON BOOKS A division of ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC. Lanham • Boulder • New York • Toronto • Plymouth, UK

Published by Lexington Books A division of Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 http://www.lexingtonbooks.com Estover Road, Plymouth PL6 7PY, United Kingdom Copyright © 2009 by Lexington Books All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Oliver, Bette Wyn, 1933– Orphans on the earth : Girondin fugitives from the Terror, 1793–1794 / Bette W. Oliver. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-7391-2731-5 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-7391-4068-0 (electronic) 1. Girondists. 2. Girondists—Biography. 3. Revolutionaries—France—Biography. 4. France—History—Reign of Terror, 1793–1794. 5. France—Politics and government— 1789–1799. I. Title. DC179.O45 2009 944.04'40922—dc22 2009014891

⬁™ The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992. Printed in the United States of America



Contents

Acknowledgments

ix

Introduction

1

Chapter 1

The Rolands and Their Circle (1791–1793)

9

Chapter 2

Escape from Paris (Summer 1793)

25

Chapter 3

On the Run (July–October 1793)

37

Chapter 4

Buzot’s Perspective (1791–1794)

51

Chapter 5

Barbaroux’s Account (1791–1793)

65

Chapter 6

Louvet’s Journey (November 1793–April 1794)

81

Chapter 7

The Last Days (June–July 1794)

91

Conclusion

105

Bibliography

113

Index

119

About the Author

129

v

Fugitives’ Journey to St. Emilion

Louvet’s Journey from St. Emilion



Acknowledgments

Throughout the period of research for this book, I have benefited greatly from discussions with my colleagues in French history. The annual meetings of the Consortium on the Revolutionary Era 1750–1850, the Western Society for French History, and the Society for French Historical Studies have provided me, as an independent scholar, with valuable opportunities to exchange ideas and consider suggestions. I would especially like to thank Paul Hanson for his helpful suggestions on the manuscript for this book. I would also like to thank Robert Brown, Timothy Tackett, Michael Howell, Thomas Sosnowski, Ronen Steinberg, and Gil Mihaely for their interest in my work on the Girondins. Thanks are also due to my good friend, the late Bob Dawson, of University of Texas-Austin’s Department of French and Italian. In Paris, the helpful staff of the Department of Manuscripts in the Bibliothèque Nationale-Richelieu provided a most agreeable working space, for which I am grateful. Thanks to my friends Terry Sherrell of Morgan Printing in Austin for her assistance and expertise in handling the electronic aspects of this book; to Hermina Anghelescu of Wayne State University for compiling the index; to Maria Gonzalez, now also at Wayne State University, for expediting book orders from the University of Texas Library; and to Rebecca Duncan of Morgan Printing for her graphic work. Their contributions have made the writing of this book a pleasure.

ix



Introduction

Ascending to the platform where the guillotine waited to receive her, and gazing at the large model of Liberty designed by David nearby, Madame Roland spoke those immortal words that are as true today as they were in November of 1793: “O Liberty, what crimes are committed in thy name.”1

Just as it was not foreordained that the Terror of 1793–1794 should follow the early idealistic years of the French Revolution, neither could it have been imagined that some of those elected deputies who had helped to establish the new republic would become fugitives from their own government. Yet, in May–June 1793, twenty-nine deputies of the moderate Girondin faction were expelled from the National Convention by the radical Jacobin leadership and placed under house arrest. Some of the proscribed deputies chose to remain in Paris and were subsequently executed in October of 1793. Others escaped, fleeing first to Caen in Normandy, where they hoped to ignite a federalist revolt against the Jacobin government in Paris. When their efforts failed, a small group of the former deputies fled to nearby Brittany, and then sailed down the western coast of France to the Bordeaux area and found refuge near St. Emilion. Four of these fugitives, who hid for several months in the home and attached stone quarry of one of the Girondin deputy Guadet’s relatives, managed to write their memoirs before their presence in the area was discovered by Robespierre’s agents. The memoirs of François Buzot, Jérôme Pétion, Charles Barbaroux, and Jean-Baptiste Louvet, and some

1

2

 Introduction

of their correspondence, including that with Madame Roland, much of which is housed in the Bibliothèque Nationale-Richelieu, provide the basis for this book. C. A. Dauban’s unedited memoirs of Buzot, Pétion, and Barbaroux, which appeared in 1866, Louvet’s 1821 edition of his original memoir, and John Rivers’s 1910 account of the life of Louvet also contributed to documenting the last year in the fugitives’ lives.2 The names of these Girondin deputies—Buzot, Pétion, Barbaroux, and Louvet—and Jean and Manon Roland, were as well known to their contemporaries as those of Robespierre, Danton, and Marat. Sometimes the Girondins were even referred to as “Rolandins,” “Buzotins,” “Louvetins,” or “Brissotins” (another proscribed Girondin deputy). They had all worked together in 1789–1791 to form a new and, they believed, better form of government for France. Pétion had served as the popular mayor of Paris and Roland had twice been named interior minister. Buzot and Barbaroux were noted for their rhetorical eloquence, while Louvet was acclaimed as the author of a popular romance, Faublas. Yet today, except among historians of France, only the name of Madame Roland is widely recognized, usually for her last words. Although some other modern historians have examined the political activities of the Girondins and the Jacobins in the national assemblies from 1789 to 1794, none of them have focused on the Girondin fugitives’ final year in hiding, during which time they wrote their memoirs and attempted to justify their actions.3 My book will endeavor to shed some light on this lesser-known period of their lives and to acknowledge their contributions to the creation of the first French republic. Memoirs, used judiciously as primary sources and supported by other established secondary sources, offer a useful perspective on recorded history by illuminating details that may have been overlooked or purposefully deleted from the collective memory. When reading a personal memoir it is, of course, important to keep in mind that the writer naturally wishes to present himself or herself in the best possible light, especially if trying to justify a particular action or set of circumstances. That said, events that occurred over two hundred years ago can be given new life through the voices of those who were there, thus providing a more comprehensive understanding of the period. There is no substitute for reading the actual handwritten accounts of historical figures, replete with underlined or scratched-out words and phrases, corrections, and margin notes. The historian asks “what really happened?” knowing that much depends on who is remembering and how they choose to record such memories.

Introduction  3

Unedited memoirs provide firsthand observations by those who actually participated in events, whereas secondary accounts may be edited for either literary or political reasons. For example, an 1828 edition of Buzot’s memoirs was edited by M. Guadet, a nephew of one of the Girondin fugitives. He not only rearranged some sections, perhaps to present them in a more orderly or literary fashion, but he also deleted the final section, which offers some of Buzot’s most trenchant observations on the condition of France as a result of the revolution.4 In the process of editing, the dramatic eloquence of Buzot’s writing is lost. An even later edition in 1866 provided a truer rendering of the original manuscript, as the editor, C. A. Dauban, was at pains to state in his introduction. However, Dauban’s edition also differs in some respects from the manuscript version, because he merged various parts of the last section of the memoir, titled Notes sur la Troisième Cahier, with the notes to the main text.5 Each of the memoirs examined in this book offers a distinct treatment of the revolutionary period, providing not only personal perceptions of momentous historical events, but also arguments to justify the Girondin position on such matters as the ultimate fate of Louis XVI, the decision to go to war with other European powers, the balance of power or lack of it between Paris and the provinces (departments), and the role of the rule of law in a republic. While Buzot writes eloquently of the necessity of justice and the tyranny of the Jacobin leadership, Pétion provides a detailed account of his escape from Paris and the problems encountered in Caen. Louvet, a professional writer before the revolution, presents a dramatic narrative, from the early days of the revolution to his escape from Paris, followed by his journey from St. Emilion to Paris to find his wife, then to Switzerland, and finally back again to Paris after Robespierre’s downfall. Barbaroux documents his relations with the municipal officials in Marseille, who had sent him to Paris as their representative, and the intricacies involved in maintaining an almost daily correspondence to explain his actions on their behalf in Paris. Altogether, these memoirs help to answer some of the whys and wherefores of the revolution’s spiral from almost utopian idealism to utter despair as the republicans split into two irreconcilable factions. It is important to recognize that the Girondins were not a political party in the modern sense, although they were often portrayed as such by nineteenth- and early twentieth-century writers. The Girondins, so named because some of their deputies came from the department of the Gironde, whose major city is Bordeaux, numbered approximately two hundred, according to the English historian, M. J. Sydenham. Of this number, about

4

 Introduction

sixty formed a core group, while fifteen or twenty of them were very close associates, socially as well as politically. Even so, they usually acted as individuals in the assemblies, unlike the radical Jacobins or Montagnards, who displayed more unity and cohesion, which contributed to the strength of their positions. This topic will be explored in some detail in chapter 1. The myth of a Girondin party was perpetuated by French historians and writers in the years following the French Revolution, often for political purposes. The French government evolved from the first French Republic to the First Empire (1804–1814) under Napoleon I, to a monarchy during the Bourbon Restoration (1815–1830) and the reign of Louis-Philippe (1830–1848), then briefly to the Second Republic in 1848 before becoming the Second Empire of Napoleon III (1852–1870), and finally the Third Republic (1870– 1940). Radical historians have accused the Girondins of serving the royalist cause, while those who favored a monarchical system tended to find the Girondins almost as radical as the Jacobins. An early 1801 history by Toulongeon, a monarchist, considered the Girondins constitutional monarchists, who became republicans only after the monarchy had been abolished in August 1792. He also emphasized that, in contrast to their opponents, they had attempted to establish a republic by legitimate means. During the Bourbon Restoration, Mignet and Thiers also saw the Girondins as constitutional monarchists. Thiers found the Girondins to be “superficial republicans,” moderates and liberals whose weak organization had compromised the security of France. With the final fall of the Bourbons in 1830, the attitude toward the Girondins became less forgiving. Writing in the 1840s, Lamartine in his Histoire des Girondins contributed greatly to the legend of the Girondins as liberals, moderates, and idealists, but Sydenham writes that these views were actually those of earlier historians. Lamartine, however, did perceive them as a party, as republicans, and as representatives of the bourgeoisie, but apparently not interested in creating the kind of republic desired by the French citizens. Sydenham writes that Lamartine had finally concluded that the Girondins were, in fact, “an obstacle to the progress of the revolution and of France.” Writing in the same period, Michelet treated the Girondins less harshly, but he found them not sufficiently revolutionary in their attitudes, especially in their encouragement of local resistance to the center of power in Paris. He allowed that they might have been sincerely patriotic and republican, but pointed out that they lacked energy and unity of purpose. The socialist Louis Blanc considered the Girondins a party of sincere republicans, but he found

Introduction  5

them too individualistic and ambitious. He faulted them as proponents of liberty without equality, and champions of property rights and free trade. During and after the Second Empire, the Girondins were portrayed as revolutionaries, and thus enemies of the state, by writers including Cassagnac, Biré, and Taine. In this period only two favorable treatments were published—one by Quinet, a political exile who regarded the Girondins as a party, and the other, a new edition of Guadet’s 1828 memoirs. Guadet had written sympathetically about his uncle’s friends, but he noted that they had acted as individuals rather than as a party. After 1880 during the Third Republic, historians began to look seriously at the original sources for their examinations of the revolution, resulting in a more scholarly approach. This had occurred because, after 1870, the preservation and organization of revolutionary archival sources gained in importance, and by the late 1880s and 1890s collections of revolutionary documents had begun to be published. Under the government of the Third Republic, it was no longer necessary to downplay the revolutionary heritage of the nation. Sorel viewed the Girondins unfavorably, as a group that wanted war, caused discord, and were only bound together by political expediency. Aulard, in the early twentieth century, criticized them for promoting federalism and for incompetence, but he also praised their democratic leaders. The socialist Jaurès blamed them for causing strife and disunity within the government, which in turn had led to the failure of the revolution. The economic interests of the Girondins were stressed by Mathiez and Lefebvre. To Mathiez, an economic historian, the Girondins were an unstable group united by class interests and economic ideas. They represented the “property-owning commercial classes” characterized by “political incompetence and a wholly negative social policy.” Lefebvre wrote about the character differences between the Girondins and the Jacobins, noting that the Girondins did not feel close to “the people” and chose to favor local interests more than national unity. As a result he found that the Girondins became “the unwitting defenders of reaction.” Gaxotte, in 1928, tried to portray the Girondins as democratic, bourgeois republicans, cultured but incompetent and provincial.6 Truth be told, the Girondin deputies featured in this book could be described as bourgeois. Three of them (Buzot, Pétion, and Barbaroux) had worked as lawyers before the revolution, while Louvet was a writer and later a publisher. According to historian Timothy Tackett, at least two-thirds of the deputies from the Third Estate (that is, neither clergy nor nobility) had previously received training in the law.7 Most of the republican deputies,

6

 Introduction

both Girondin and Jacobin, were members of the provincial, professional bourgeoisie and shared similar educational and intellectual backgrounds. However, the Girondins were less enthralled with “the people,” especially those in Paris, than the Jacobins, who used them to their own advantage. The Girondins feared that too much egalitarianism might lead to mediocrity and even, perhaps, to violence. Individualistic and mostly provincial, they distrusted the centralized control of the government in Paris and deplored the neglect of interests in other parts of France. Idealistic to a degree almost unimaginable today, both the Girondins and the Jacobins strongly believed in the republican cause (or else cleverly disguised their true feelings) and ardently desired to create a better and more just world for themselves and for future generations. That they instead became overwhelmed by factional divisiveness that led to the Terror must be attributed not only to differing political opinions but to personal animosities as well. The memoirs and correspondence of the former Girondin deputies and the Rolands offer substantial evidence of such animosities as they developed between 1791 and 1793, finally resulting in the Girondins’ expulsion from the National Convention in May–June 1793. The personal relationships of some of those deputies will be explored further in chapter 1, “The Rolands and Their Circle (1791–1793).” Chapter 2, “Escape from Paris (Summer 1793),” focuses on the choice of some of the expelled deputies to escape from their enemies in Paris, their arrival in Caen, and their efforts to promote a federalist uprising in the departments. This period is vividly described in Pétion’s memoir. The fugitives’ flight to Brittany and their subsequent journey by boat to the Bordeaux area is covered in chapter 3, “On the Run (July–October 1793).” Chapter 4, “Buzot’s Perspective (1791–1794),” examines Buzot’s memoir, in which he presents his version of revolutionary events and justifications for the Girondins’ positions on various matters. Chapter 5, “Barbaroux’s Account (1791–1793),” concerns his interactions with constituents in Marseille and the events leading up to the Griondins’ expulsion from the National Convention. It is based on his correspondence with the municipality of Marseille and on his memoir. Forced by circumstances to leave their hiding place in St. Emilion after several months, the fugitives separated and Louvet set off for Paris to find his wife. Based on Louvet’s memoir, this period is documented in chapter 6, “Louvet’s Journey (November 1793–April 1794).” The final days of Buzot, Pétion, and Barbaroux are described in chapter 7, “The Last Days (June–July 1794),” which also includes an account of Louvet’s subsequent return to Paris from Switzerland after Robespierre’s execution in July 1794. The conclusion examines the legacies of the Girondin fugitives and their Jacobin enemies

Introduction  7

and considers the French Revolution, especially the period of the Terror, as a decisive turning point in measured historical time. The title of this book, Orphans on the Earth: Girondin Fugitives from the Terror, 1793–1794, is taken from the memoir of Buzot. Hiding from the Jacobin agents, fearing discovery, and depressed by news of the executions of his fellow Girondins and that of Manon Roland in Paris in the autumn of 1793, Buzot wrote: “Alas, already we are no more. All that remains for us is sadness. That which made our lives precious has preceded us to the tomb. . . . [We are] orphans on the earth, abandoned by all, strangers to all.”8

Notes 1. Papiers Roland II: Madame Roland. N. A. F. 9533, 296. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. See also Gita May, Madame Roland and the Age of Revolution (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970), 288. 2. C. A. Dauban, editor, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion et Mémoires de Buzot & de Barbaroux, accompagnés des Notes Inédites de Buzot et de nombreux documents inédits sur Barbaroux, Buzot, Brissot, etc. (Paris: Henri Plon, 1866); J.- B. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, Tome I (Paris: La Librairie Historique, 1821); John Rivers, Louvet: Revolutionist & Romance Writer (London: Hurst and Blackett, Ltd., 1910). 3. See M. J. Sydenham, The Girondins (London: University of London, The Athlone Press, 1961); Alison Patrick, The Men of the First French Republic: Political Alignments in the National Convention of 1792 (Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973); Leigh Whaley, The Radicals: Politics and Republicanism in the French Revolution (London: Sutton Publishing, Ltd., 2000); and Paul R. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire: The Federalist Revolt in the French Revolution (University Park, Penn.: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003). 4. M. Guadet, Mémoires sur la Révolution Française, par Buzot, Député à la Convention Nationale, précédés d’un précis de sa vie et de recherches historiques sur les Girondins (Paris: Pichon et Didier, editeurs, 1828). 5. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits. 6. For a detailed discussion of the early French historians mentioned, see M. J. Sydenham, The Girondins, 1–18, 236–37. See also Restoring Order: The Ecole des Chartes and the Organization of Archives and Libraries in France, 1820–1870, by Lara J. Moore (Duluth, Minn.: Litwin Books, LLC, 2008) for a discussion of revolutionary archival sources and their use in writing history. 7. Timothy Tackett, Becoming a Revolutionary: The Deputies of the French National Assembly and the Emergence of a Revolutionary Culture (1789–1790) (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1996), 36. 8. F.-N.-L. Buzot, Mémoires de François-Nicolas-Louis Buzot. N. A. F. 1730, 66. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits.

C H A P T E R

O N E



The Rolands and Their Circle (1791–1793)

It is possible to trace the trajectory of the rise and fall of the Girondin fugitives through their close relationships with the Rolands from the earliest days of the revolution. The Rolands were an oddly matched couple. The rather austere and industrious Jean Marie Roland de la Platière was twenty years older than his highly intellectual and attractive wife, Marie Jeanne (Manon) Phlipon. He had served the Bourbon monarchy as an administrator in the provinces from 1764 until revolutionary activities brought him back to Paris in 1791. Concerned with manufacturing and commerce, he had contributed articles to the Encyclopédie Méthodique and was named to the Académie des Sciences in Paris in 1776. In addition to conducting government business in England, Holland, Flanders, Switzerland, Germany, Spain, and Italy, Roland had written six volumes about his journeys to Italy.1 In short, Roland was a man who had served the interests of France well, and he would continue to do so after the revolution in 1789. Manon Phlipon, born in 1754, had been a precocious child who became a voracious reader, and like so many of her generation, a disciple of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. As an adult she sought to balance the traditional eighteenth-century roles of wife and mother with the need to express herself in written form. Yet she had determined early in life not to become a woman of letters, a savante who flaunted her superior intellect, but rather to confine her thoughts to private notebooks. Referring to women authors in a 1783 letter to her friend Bosc, she wrote that “no matter what their facility may be in some respects, they should never show their learning or talents in public.” 2 Had she and her

9

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 Chapter One

husband not become so deeply involved in the revolution of 1789, it is quite possible that Manon Roland’s thoughts might have remained private. Both of the Rolands considered themselves among those progressives who espoused a constitutional form of government based on the English model and they allied themselves with the republican cause. As soon as the Rolands returned to Paris from his last post in Lyon in 1791, they began hosting meetings several times a week in their apartment on rue Guénégaud near the Luxembourg Gardens. While the men discussed political matters, Manon would remain in the background, usually writing at her desk but listening carefully to the conversation. She had helped her husband edit his written reports for years and would continue to do so, even after he had been appointed as the Minister of the Interior in 1792. If, as the historian Owen Connelly has written, Roland was the “work horse” of what came to be known as the Girondins, it was Manon who proved to be a more gifted and persuasive leader.3 With her intelligence, charm, and revolutionary zeal, she made their home a congenial meeting place for the Girondins and their sympathizers during the months when the Constituent Assembly was in session. The Rolands’ circle of friends in 1791 included Jacques Pierre Brissot, a liberal lawyer and writer; François Lanthenas, a longtime friend and an amateur in anatomy; Louis Bosc, a naturalist; Jean-Henri Bancal des Issarts, a lawyer and naturalist; and most importantly, François Buzot, Jérôme Pétion, and on occasion, Maximilien Robespierre, all provincial lawyers. The latter three, who served as members of the Constituent Assembly from 1 October 1791 to September 1792, were famously called “the incorruptibles” by Manon, a label that would refer ultimately only to Robespierre, and then in an ironic sense.4 While in retrospect it may seem unlikely that Madame Roland would admire Robespierre, in 1791 she still regarded him as an honest republican. A brief examination of the early lives of the four Girondins discussed in this book offers further insights into their later decisive connections with the Rolands and with Brissot. Both Buzot and Pétion were sons of attorneys in Evreux and Chartres respectively. Both received good classical educations and chose to become lawyers. Pétion, the earliest “radical” of the group and later the mayor of Paris, had written radical propaganda since the early 1780s and in 1789 he served as a subdelegate to the intendant, or king’s representative, of Chartres. In 1787 Buzot, who would become known for his rhetorical eloquence, was a notable, or leading citizen in Evreux, where he was active in civic affairs. Barbaroux, the youngest of the group and a persuasive orator, came from a wealthy family engaged in commerce in Marseille where he had also received a good classical education and become a barrister. In

The Rolands and Their Circle (1791–1793)

 11

1788 he went to Paris, studied at the School of Mines, and wrote articles about scientific matters. Louvet’s Parisian family was not wealthy; in fact, his father has variously been described as a printer, a paper merchant, and a haberdasher. Nor did he receive a formal education, but he read voraciously, worked in a bookshop, and aspired to become a man of letters. He wrote what was considered a rather shocking novel, Les Amours du Chevalier Faublas, which brought him to the public’s attention in 1787. Louvet would continue his literary efforts throughout the revolutionary period.5 Brissot, a man with many connections and interests, had long been active in liberal causes. In 1788, along with the Abbé Grégoire, he founded a club, Les Amis des Noirs, to promote the emancipation of negroes. Françôis Lanthenas, the Rolands’ good friend, was invited to join the club. In 1788, Brissot also took a journey to the United States in an effort to promote French interests, including trade and settlement; he had even considered emigrating there with his family. However, after the revolution erupted in the summer of 1789, Brissot chose to return to France and participate in the creation of the first French republic. Once at home, he joined old friends like Pétion in promoting the republican cause. Brissot and Pétion, both from Chartres, had been friends since childhood, and it was probably Pétion who introduced Brissot to Buzot, a man who would play an increasingly important role in Manon Roland’s life. It was Brissot again who introduced Louvet, at that time a radical pamphleteer, to the Rolands later in 1792. Louvet, in turn, would introduce Barbaroux to the Rolands. Louvet had worked previously with Brissot, Lanthenas, and Bosc on the correspondence committee of the Jacobin Society. For his part, Bosc was employed by the postal service and corresponded regularly with Manon Roland. He had sent some of her wellwritten letters on to Lanthenas, who then passed them on to Brissot, who in turn was so impressed that he published extracts from her letters in his newspaper, the Patriote Français.6 It is not surprising then that with such interwoven connections the Girondins were often referred to as the Brissotins, and even occasionally as the Rolandins. While those who had served in the Constituent Assembly (Buzot, Pétion, and Robespierre) were ineligible to sit in the Legislative Assembly (1 October 1791–20 September 1792), they were eligible to be elected to the National Convention later in 1792, where they would be joined by Louvet and Barbaroux. The Rolands’ salon had several incarnations: from early 1791 until September 1791, when they returned briefly to Lyon; after Roland’s first appointment as interior minister in March 1792 until his dismissal in June; and again from August 1792 until his resignation in January 1793. Knowledge of these meetings of close associates, all of whom later opposed Robespierre’s

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 Chapter One

policies, ultimately would lead to charges of conspiracy leveled at Manon Roland.7 In addition to the meetings at her home, she had attended sessions of the Constituent Assembly and had expressed disappointment at its slow progress. By the time of the king’s flight to Varennes in June 1791 and his forced return to Paris, she feared that the monarchy might regain some power. However, it is doubtful whether Manon Roland or anyone else could have foreseen the chain of events that was set in motion by the king’s flight and the bitter factional rivalries that would follow. Early in July 1790, Louis XVI had sworn to uphold the constitution; the deputies and the French people wanted to believe that he would do so. It was apparent, however, that the king and his family were not at all pleased to be living in Paris under surveillance rather than at their palace in Versailles. Still, it came as a shock when Louis XVI and his family actually did flee from Paris to the border of the Austrian Netherlands (Belgium), and even more of a shock when evidence of a conspiracy long in the making came to light. For some reason, the king had left behind a handwritten note repudiating his approval of the changes brought about by the revolution. To the radical Jacobins, who were always on alert for secret plots, Louis’s flight offered proof of their suspicions. It is possible, although probably not likely, that a constitutional monarchy might have worked in France had the king not fled and left incriminating evidence behind. Although he was caught and brought back to Paris, and even reinstated, his word was never trusted again and his treachery served to reinforce existing fears of a grand conspiracy to overthrow the revolutionary government. As historian Timothy Tackett has written so persuasively, the king’s flight “helped set the nation on a new and perilous trajectory toward the future,” one in which the necessity of preserving the revolution would override all other rights and laws enacted by the government.8 In July 1791 the deputies debated the possibility of continuing to support a constitutional monarchy. Pétion assailed the king’s deceitfulness, asking: “How many times has Louis sworn his loyalty and love for the constitution?” suggesting that such words had been used to deceive the public about his true intentions. Buzot allowed that the public’s trust in the king had been destroyed and noted that without such trust, “you can never even hope to have civil peace.” 9 In his memoir, Buzot also addressed the possibility of the coexistence of a king and a republican form of government, writing that it had been a mistake to leave Louis on the throne. “The Constitution of 1791,” he wrote, “provided that the two parties would be continually at war, the state and the prince. Instead of establishing political harmony between them . . . the Constitution of 1791 provided a state of necessary discord which could finish only by the destruction of one or the other.”10

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As it turned out, the monarchy did indeed fall in August 1792, but only after an uneasy period of coexistence between the king and the new legislative assembly, which convened in October 1791. A ministerial crisis resulting from the king’s veto of several decrees had spurred Brissot to push for a new ministry, and in March 1792, Roland was appointed for the first time as the Minister of the Interior. Meanwhile, in addition to France’s internal problems, the international situation worsened as other European nations headed by monarchs feared that the revolutionary fervor might spread across their borders. In addition, they were urged by French émigrés living in their midst to take military action against the revolutionary government in France. The Girondin leadership, especially Roland, Brissot, and General Dumouriez, pressed for war against Austria, the queen’s native country, but the Jacobins opposed the idea, arguing that war would disrupt the work of the revolution. Perhaps thinking that a war against the enemies of the revolution would actually work in his favor, Louis declared war on Austria on 21 April 1792. This was the decisive action that convinced Robespierre to break with his former colleagues. Manon Roland would attribute Robespierre’s hostile attitude to his envy of Brissot and wrote that “Robespierre decided to become the leader of the party that opposed the declaration of war.”11 Such an interpretation does not reflect sufficient understanding of Robespierre’s deeply held beliefs about the necessity of preserving the unity of the revolution. To him, any action that diverted attention from that unity was suspect. For his part, Buzot recounted in his memoir a conversation with Robespierre, during which he asked Robespierre why he had turned against Roland and Brissot. “How,” he asked, “can you not recognize the good faith, the integrity, the patriotism of Roland? Dare you say that Roland sold out to foreigners?” To which Robespierre replied: “No, I don’t accuse Roland of selling out to foreigners, but I stopped seeing him the moment when he adopted Brissot’s opinion on the war.” Regarding Brissot, Robespierre explained that he did not believe Brissot was corrupt, “but his opinion of the war shows that he is not a patriot.”12 The division between the Girondins and Jacobins intensified after General Dumouriez’s invasion of the Austrian Netherlands ended in defeat. The citizens became alarmed after the Legislative Assembly ordered twenty thousand provincial national guardsmen, or fédérés, to Paris, but the king vetoed the order. This action in turn worried the Girondin-led assembly, which felt that it needed protection from the Parisian National Guard under the control of the radical sections of the city.13

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The king also chose to veto the Girondin decrees of 27 and 29 May and 8 June, 1792, which would have created a camp of federal troops to protect Paris and penalized non-juring priests by deportation. The king’s vetoes stirred the Interior Minister Roland to send a critical letter to Louis XVI. This letter, actually written by Manon, appealed to the king to understand the true meaning of the revolution and to uphold the constitution. “The present plight of France cannot long endure,” she wrote, urging the king to “pacify the nation by uniting with it.”14 By way of reply, the king fired Roland, and his cabinet was replaced briefly by constitutional monarchists. However, Roland’s (Manon’s) letter to the king had been published and Roland was praised for his courage in confronting Louis XVI. The Parisian sections rose up against the king, marching on 20 June to the Tuileries Palace, where Louis and his family were living under what amounted to house arrest. Having survived that threat, the royal family became increasingly fearful after the arrival in July of provincial guardsmen from Marseille—Barbaroux had been instrumental in persuading the mayor of Marseille to send as many as six hundred fédérés to Paris. The unrest in the capital had intensified due to food shortages, news of military defeats, and especially the reports that the Prussian army, allied with Austria and led by the Duke of Brunswick, was marching toward Paris. Alarmed by these developments, the Legislative Assembly engaged in intense debate and considered possible courses of action, including the removal of Louis XVI from office. The Duke of Brunswick made it clear, in a message of 1 August, that his Prussian forces intended to rescue the royal family. The Brunswick Manifesto, as it is known, also threatened to destroy the city of Paris “by fire and sword,” further intensifying the fears of the population.15 Such words only added fuel to the rumors of conspiracy and led the Paris sections to petition for dismissal of the king. Finally, on the night of 9–10 August, the new Commune, filled with representatives of the Paris sections, occupied the Hôtel de Ville (city hall), dismissed those officials who dared to oppose them, and killed the royalist commander of the Paris National Guard. The king and his family retreated to the comparative safety of the nearby Legislative Assembly, which was surrounded by radicals. However, the Commune was now firmly in charge and it demanded that the king be removed from office and imprisoned with his family. It also issued a decree calling for a new constitution and a new national assembly, elected by universal manhood suffrage without property qualifications.16 The fall of the monarchy and the rise of the radical sections marked a decisive turning point in the revolution, one that would not bode well for the Girondins.

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Pétion, who had been elected mayor of Paris in November 1791, was among those officials who had not opposed the takeover by the Commune. He had found himself in a difficult position not only as a representative of the city of Paris but also as a citizen who wanted to uphold the law. At this time Pétion, unlike some of the other Girondins, remained on good terms with Robespierre, but that would change by the end of August. Following the tumultuous events of 10 August, Roland was reappointed as Minister of the Interior. However, at this time Jacques Danton also became Minister of Justice. The juxtaposition of the serious, pedantic Roland with the radical and down-to-earth Danton led quickly to conflict between the two men and the factions that each represented. Manon Roland detested Danton and feared his influence with the people of Paris. She described feeling a physical revulsion in his presence and described him as “this halfHercules of gross form . . . whose amplitude announced his voracity.” She criticized his hypocrisy, his “immoderation with Bacchus,” his “laughter of debauchery,” and his violent discourse. Danton represented everything that the idealistic Manon condemned and she distrusted him instinctively. With regard to her husband’s ministry, she noted that it would be preferable “to have his enemy outside rather than inside,” because Danton “felt that he must dominate or lose to such a man, and he would begin by defying him.”17 In a letter dated 5 September 1792, Manon wrote to her friend Bancal that “we are under the knife of Robespierre and Marat, those who would agitate the people.”18 From her correspondence at this time, she makes it clear that the forces opposing her husband were gaining strength. Roland, meanwhile, continued to carry out his duties conscientiously, one of the most important of which was to assume responsibility for the protection of the national collections, which before the revolution had been owned by the monarchy. By 19 September the role of the national museum had been largely decreed, thus making the formerly royal collections available for public observation and instruction.19 On 21 September, Roland addressed the National Convention, as the new national assembly was called, and underlined the obligations of the government to act equitably and always within the law, warning that the good fortune of France depended on it.20 At this time the legislators also agreed to make funds available to Roland for propaganda useful to the revolutionary cause. At the urging of the Rolands, Louvet agreed to serve as the editor of a placard-journal, La Sentinelle, which appeared twice a week and was posted around Paris. Though ardently republican in tone, Louvet used wit and ridicule to attack the enemies of order and justice. Later, at the urging of Brissot, Guadet, and Condorcet, Louvet also took on the editorship of the Journal des Débats et les Décrets.21

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Meanwhile, Robespierre continued to work behind the scenes to undermine Roland and the Girondins, even going so far as to denounce them in a speech to the Convention on 4 September. The legislative elections in September had favored the Commune’s candidates: Robespierre, Danton (who had relinquished his post as Minister of Justice), and Marat had been elected. As a result, Manon Roland feared the dangers of popular insurrection and the dominance of Paris, her native city. She wrote to Bancal on 9 September, declaring that “Danton directs everything . . . Robespierre is his puppet, and Marat holds his torch and dagger.”22 As later events would prove, her assumptions at this time were not entirely correct. Manon also held Robespierre responsible for the September massacres, during which mobs invaded the Parisian prisons and killed over 1,100 prisoners, most of whom were neither priests nor aristocrats, supposed enemies of the revolution. The massacres had been precipitated by fears of enemies in hiding just waiting to strike, fears stirred up by Marat’s newspaper, L’Ami du Peuple. It was at this time also that the guillotine was set up in front of the Tuileries Palace. A letter dated 14 September 1792 from Emmanuel de Salm to Mallet du Pan in Lausanne described the September massacres in vivid terms. “The blood ran again the eighth in Paris . . . Le Duc de la Rochefoucault was massacred at Gisors . . . not by the people or the militia, but a group of 150 men who had been sent from Paris. . . . The prisoners from Orléans, 54 in number, have been massacred at Versailles when they descended from the wagon in which they had been transported, the Duc de Brissac among them, it is said, his ears and head cut off. . . . The murderers were neither the people or the guards from Versailles, but the drivers.” De Salm called on the national assembly, the ministers, the sections, the Commune of Paris, and all of the authorities to stop the carnage. He noted that Minister Roland, who had spoken and written with great courage, had been threatened, and that Brissot and Condorcet, who had protested against the inhumanity of the September massacres, had been denounced as aristocrats. “One does not know who reigns,” he wrote. “Society is destroyed to its foundations.”23 After the September massacres Barbaroux is reputed to have rebuked Robespierre by declaring: “Between virtue and vice there can be no compromise.” Louvet joined Brissot and Gorsas in attacking Danton, Marat, and especially Robespierre, whom he accused of intrigue and dominating the assembly with his “virtue,” in effect of becoming a dictator.24 Louvet published his accusations against Robespierre in an effort to call attention to the danger he posed to the new republic, and he was only slightly less critical of Marat, whom he labeled “the vainest of men,” and Danton, “the most heinous and bloody.” 25

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Louvet even criticized some of his Girondin associates for moving too slowly. While Manon Roland, Barbaroux, Guadet, and Salle agreed with him, the others seemed unable to act quickly or decisively as a group.26 Finally, on 29 October, Roland made a report to the National Convention in which he dared to indict the Commune for usurpation of power and acts of terrorism, even accusing Robespierre of trying to become a dictator.27 There was some speculation at the time that Manon Roland might have been responsible for this denunciation. The discovery of the king’s secret iron safe in November l792 revealed royal dealings with Mirabeau and foreign governments, providing further proof to the suspicious public about the existence of plots. Even worse for the Girondin cause, Interior Minister Roland was accused of having removed evidence from the safe that might have compromised the Girondins. In addition, since he and Manon were known Anglophiles, Roland was accused of pursuing secret negotiations with England. The trial of Louis XVI from 11 December 1792 to 15 January 1793 provoked further divisions within the National Convention. The Girondins favored a trial and possible exile, while the Jacobins called for the king’s execution. When it was decided that there would be a trial, not surprisingly the king was found guilty of conspiracy against the nation by a unanimous vote of the 693 deputies who were present. Although 745 deputies were members of the National Convention, some were absent that day or had attached some condition to their votes. The Girondins, counting on conservative support in the provinces (departments) and among the French peasantry, proposed a national plebiscite on the king’s sentence. Brissot, Barbaroux, and Pétion, among others, spoke in favor of the plebiscite, while Buzot argued persuasively for such an appeal to all of the French people, declaring: “Should I be the first victim of the assassins, it will not stop me from speaking the truth.”28 Despite their efforts, the proposal failed, after which it was decided by a vote of 387 to 334 that the king must die. In the end, one-third of the Girondins voted for the death penalty . . . “(though with delay or suspension of sentence).” Louis XVI was executed on 21 January 1793.29 On 16 October 1793, it would be the turn of Queen Marie Antoinette. As in other matters, the Girondin inner core, or Brissotins, had not been united in their opinions concerning the fate of the king. Although many of the 200 so-called Girondins did vote in favor of the execution, only three— Brissot, Louvet, and Valazé—voted consistently for moderation, while others, including Barbaroux, favored a harsher penalty.30 In a letter dated 22 December 1792 that Barbaroux wrote to the Marseille municipality, he excused his late reply by explaining that he had been primarily occupied in writing

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about “the horrible Bourbon family, that the Parisian imbeciles adulate and want to keep in their midst.” In another letter on 8 January 1793, he expressed relief that the National Convention had finally addressed the matter of the former king. He assured his readers, in case they had any doubts about his true feelings, that in his own writing “at least you shall find this hatred of kings, which has constantly animated me.”31 The call for a referendum on the king’s fate and their moderate votes served to further discredit the Girondins in the National Convention and hastened their downward slide. In December 1792, Manon Roland was ordered to appear before the Convention, where she was accused of being involved in a royalist conspiracy. The charge was later dropped, but she correctly foresaw trouble in the days ahead. As she wrote to her friend Lanthenas in December, “To be sure, the outcome of the revolution is not very clear, and what people call ‘parties’ will be judged by posterity; but I am convinced that it will grant my husband the recognition that is due him, and I have the foreboding that we will pay for this with our lives.”32 As Roland now faced the collapse of all his efforts on behalf of the republic, he was determined to make one last plea for justice before he left office. He had printed for distribution around Paris a large handbill addressed to the public in which he defended his actions as interior minister and claimed that “false and atrocious” rumors had been spread about him. Roland declared that he had furnished his records to the Convention, denied that he had anything to hide, asked to be judged fairly, and promised to refute false accusations. He signed the plea simply as “Roland.”33 He resigned as interior minister on 23 January 1793, after he had been denounced in the National Convention by Robespierre and accused of treasonous activities in the ministry office; he was replaced as interior minister by Dominique Garat.34 Roland had good reason to be depressed. Not only had he lost political power and his hope for a lawful republic, but he had also lost Manon’s love, though not her wifely respect or devotion. Manon’s confession the previous December of her love for Buzot had surprised and devastated Roland, who had no idea that his very proper wife had formed a romantic attachment. However, he had no doubts about her virtue remaining intact, knowing her high moral standards. Manon had even surprised herself, for she had dedicated her life to being a serious student and a devoted wife and mother; she had not counted on the power of an attraction to another man who shared her sensibilities. As a disciple of Rousseau, she felt that she must be honest about this development and so she told her husband about her feelings for Buzot. She had not been prepared for Roland’s reaction and later may have regretted adding to his disillusionment.35

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Meanwhile, as the Girondins’ influence weakened, the international situation worsened. Britain, Holland, and Spain recalled their ambassadors from France, after which the National Convention declared war on them in February and March. The Girondins reeled under increasing criticism after General Dumouriez lost again to the Austrians in March 1793 and finally deserted to the enemy’s side. In April the National Convention formed the Committee of Public Safety to serve as the executive, while accusations and denunciations continued to fly back and forth between the Girondin and Jacobin leaders. On 10 April, Robespierre accused “Brissot, Guadet, Vergniaud, Gensonné, and other hypocritical agents of the same coalition” of complicity in a treasonable conspiracy. Robespierre further labeled them as “links in a chain connecting all the hostile chancelleries of Europe” and sought to have them judged by the Revolutionary Tribunal. His call for action, made in the name of preserving national unity, failed that time, but the situation in the National Convention continued to deteriorate, and on 15 April a deputation from the Paris sections called for the removal of twenty-two Girondin deputies from the Convention. The Jacobin leaders, seeking increased popular support from the Commune, next moved toward easing the economic situation by instituting price controls. To calm the public, who were angry about food shortages and rising prices, the Committee of Public Safety enacted the Law of the Maximum. This law was intended to freeze grain prices, but it was not vigorously enforced. The Girondins chose to oppose the “maximum” and voted against it, further alienating the Parisians who had already turned against them.36 The Girondins knew that they still had support outside of Paris in the departments, where many citizens and their leaders approved of their actions in the National Convention. Girondin support was especially strong in Lyon, Caen, Bordeaux, and Marseille. Because of the existence of this provincial support, some Parisians feared that a federalist revolt led by Girondin supporters threatened not only their safety but national unity as well.37 AntiGirondin riots erupted in Paris on 30 May 1793 and by 2 June the National Convention had expelled the Girondins. Barbaroux’s letter of 6 June to his constituents in Marseille, written from what he referred to as his prison domiciliaire, presented a grim picture of the situation. He began by declaring: “All I have predicted in my former letters has happened. Force has dominated the National Convention. It has curtailed the popular representation of twenty-two of the most courageous deputies. . . . Magistrates of the people, the outrage that the factions have committed against the national representation is horrible.” Describing the scene in the National Convention on 2 June, Barbaroux decried the audacity of

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Commandant Hanriot and the troops who surrounded the Girondin deputies with bayonets, but he wrote that he was not intimidated by the danger. He noted that sixteen deputies from the sections of Marseille had left Paris, while four were under house arrest, and twelve others continued to courageously represent the people of Marseille. The deputies from the sections of Marseille referred to by Barbaroux had come to Paris to protest the policies of the Jacobin leadership in the Convention. They felt that the commercial interests of Marseille had been neglected and they also deplored the encouragement of “mob violence” to strengthen Jacobin influence in the Convention. Those who returned to Marseille reported on scenes of anarchy in Paris. Perhaps in an effort to reassure his readers, Barbaroux suggested that surely the French nation would not allow the situation to continue; he added that the citizens in Calvados, Finistère, the Gironde, the Jura, and the Vosges were already taking action. Barbaroux noted that Buzot had escaped to his home in Evreux and that he had received a letter from him, while Brissot (at that date), Louvet, Salle, Grangeneuve, LaSource, and Chambon were safe. Those still remaining in Paris, “under the knife of the assassins” included Guadet, Vergniaud, Gensonné, Pétion, Lanjuinais, Valazé, and some others. “I am here also,” he wrote, “but what does it matter? We think about liberty; it is the only thing that I can recommend. I entrust you to defend my memory and that of our brave friends. The crimes that we have been accused of are fabrications.” Barbaroux closed this letter by asking his readers to oppose “the real crimes of our accusers.”38 Pétion described in dramatic terms the day when the Girondins had been expelled from the National Convention. He wrote: “The dismal sound of the tocsin, the drums beating the alarm, the closed barriers, the orders to stop the mail . . . the bloodthirsty motions made in the tribune of the popular societies . . . everything announced a grand catastrophe. The clouds surrounded our heads and the storm was ready to break.” In the Convention “the victims fell under the iron of the assassins. The 31st of May was the fatal day.”39 Representatives of the radical Paris sections demanded the impeachment of twenty-four Girondins; by 2 June the National Convention was surrounded by armed men, determined to carry out the Commune’s wishes. Some of the accused had been forewarned and had fled from Paris before that fateful day, while others soon managed to deceive their guards and escaped to join their friends who were waiting for them in Caen, a drama to which we shall return in chapter 2.

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For all practical purposes, the Girondin cause was doomed. They had been considered radicals by the royalists and seen as royalists by the radicals, and their failure to act in a cohesive fashion had weakened their political position in the National Convention. Their connections to the disgraced General Dumouriez, who had defected to the Austrians, fueled conspiracy theories and rumors of deals with foreign governments.40 Robespierre and the radical Jacobins had won the day, but support still existed in the departments for the Girondin cause and the expelled deputies. Many departmental administrators reacted strongly against the expulsion of the Girondin deputies from the National Convention, and the cities of Caen, Lyon, Bordeaux, and Marseille protested in what has come to be called the “federalist revolt.” In effect, the central government in Paris was threatened for a short time by provincial leaders who sought to change the balance of power by gathering a volunteer force and marching on Paris.

Notes 1. Papiers Roland (1732–1793). N. A. F. 9532, 204–5. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 2. Correspondance, Lettres de Mme. Roland, ed. Cl. Perroud (Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1900–1902) I: 256–57. L.-A. Guilliame Bosc was the tutor of Madame Roland’s daughter, Eudora, and the editor of Mme. Roland’s memoirs; see Papiers Roland II: Madame Roland. N. A. F. 9533, 11. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 3. Owen Connelly, French Revolution/Napoleonic Era (New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1979), 113. 4. Gita May, Madame Roland and the Age of Revolution (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970), 182–83. 5. Leigh Whaley, Radicals: Politics and Republicanism in the French Revolution (London: Sutton Publishing Limited, 2000), 2, 3, 6, 9. 6. M. J. Sydenham, The Girondins (London: University of London, The Athlone Press, 1961), 62–68. 7. Sydenham, The Girondins, 86–89. 8. Timothy Tackett, When the King Took Flight (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2003), 223. 9. Tackett, When the King Took Flight, 138–9. See also Archives parlementaires de 1787 à 1860, recueil complet des débats législatifs et politiques des chambres françaises. Première série (1787–1799), ed. Jérôme Mavidal et al., 82 vols. (Paris: 1867–1913) 28: 245, 326, 362. 10. Mémoires de François-Nicolas-Louis Buzot. N. A. F. 1730, 75. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits.

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11. Mémoires de Madame Roland, ed. Cl. Perroud (Paris: Plon, 1905), II: 286. 12. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 71. 13. The original sixty electoral districts of Paris had been replaced by the National Assembly with forty-eight sections. 14. Mémoires de Madame Roland, I: 76; and C. A. Dauban, Étude sur Madame Roland et Son Temps suivie des lettres de Madame Roland à Buzot et d’autres documents inédits (Paris: Henri Plon, 1864), cxi, cxii. 15. David P. Jordan, The King’s Trial: Louis XVI vs. The French Revolution (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979, 2004), 41. 16. Connelly, French Revolution/Napoleonic Era, 120–21. 17. Papiers Roland II: Madame Roland. N. A. F. 9533, 39–46. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 18. Correspondance de Mme. Roland. N. A. F. 9534, 181–83. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 19. Edouard Pommier, Édition et Postface de Réflexions sur le Muséum National, 14 Janvier 1793 by Jean-Baptiste Pierre LeBrun (Paris: Réunion de Musées Nationaux, 1992), 68–70. 20. Papiers Roland. N. A. F. 9532. Printed report dated 21 September 1792 from Roland to the Corps Administratifs, 254–55. 21. John Rivers, Louvet: Revolutionist and Romance Writer (London: Hurst and Blackett, Limited, 1910), 17. 22. Correspondance, Lettres de Mme. Roland, II: 436. 23. Connelly, French Revolution/Napoleonic Era, 123–24; and Papiers Roland, N. A. F. 9534, 447–50. Extract from a letter dated 14 September 1792 from Emmanuel de Salm to Mallet du Pan in Lausanne. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 24. J. M. Roberts and John Hardman, eds., French Revolutionary Documents, Vol. 2: 1792–1795 (Oxford: Blackwells, 1973), 32. 25. Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet. N. A. F. 1730, 156. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 26. Mémoires de Louvet, N. A. F. 1730, 154. 27. P.-J.-B. Buchez and P. C. Roux, eds., Histoire parlementaire de la Révolution française depuis 1789 jusqu’à l’Empire (Paris: Paulin, 1833–1838), XIX: 410–12. 28. Jordan, The King’s Trial, 144–45, 172. 29. Connelly, French Revolution/Napoleonic Era, 129–30. 30. Sydenham, The Girondins, 143. See appendix C, pp. 228–30, for an analysis of the voting records of deputies associated with Brissot. 31. Correspondance de Barbaroux, Député à la Convention Nationale avec La Municipalité de Marseille, 1792–1793. N. A. F. 6140, 9, 11–12. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 32. Correspondance, Lettres de Mme. Roland, II: 457. 33. Papiers Roland, N. A. F. 9532, 334. 34. Sydenham, The Girondins, 148. 35. Mémoires de Madame Roland, I: 28.

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36. Connelly, French Revolution/Napoleonic Era, 131–33; and Sydenham, The Girondins, 162–66. 37. For an excellent treatment of the federalist revolt, see Paul R. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire: The Federalist Revolt in the French Revolution (University Park, Penn.: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003). 38. Correspondance de Barbaroux, N. A. F. 6140, 43–45. See also William Scott, Terror and Repression in Revolutionary Marseilles (London: The Macmillan Press, Ltd., 1973), 110–11. 39. Mémoires de Jérôme Pétion. N. A. F. 1730, 83. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 40. Sydenham, The Girondins, 179.

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Escape from Paris (Summer 1793)

Even before their proscription from the National Convention, some of the Girondin deputies had taken the precaution of passing their nights away from home and arming themselves when they went out in public. After they were expelled from the Convention, they were held under house arrest but not carefully guarded. Consequently, twenty-one of the twenty-nine expelled deputies managed to escape from Paris, although not all at the same time. Brissot and Buzot were among the first to escape, but Brissot was caught in Moulins on 10 June, arrested, and brought back to Paris. Gorsas arrived in Caen, in Normandy, by 9 June. Barbaroux left Paris on the night of 10–11 June and arrived in Evreux, Buzot’s hometown, by 13 June. Guadet, Lanjuinais, and Pétion managed to escape by 23 June, followed by Louvet on 24 June.1 Jacques Nicolas Vallée, a deputy from Buzot’s constituency, remained in Paris and served as a conduit between those Girondins who had left Paris and those who remained.2 Roland had left earlier in March and gone into hiding with friends in Rouen. However, Manon chose to remain in Paris, as did Vergniaud and Gensonné. On 1 June Manon was arrested and taken to the Abbaye prison, where she wrote: “I absolutely dedicated myself to my destiny, whatever it might be.”3 She would pass the next five months in prison writing her memoirs and corresponding with Buzot, a topic to be discussed in greater detail in chapter 3. In his memoirs Pétion provided a rather detailed account of his survival techniques between 31 May and 23 June, when he joined his friends in Caen. At his wife’s urging, Pétion slept at a friend’s house on rue Chausée D’Antin

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on the nights of 30 and 31 May. However, his friend reported that he was so frightened that he could not sleep, so Pétion left and sought shelter at another house on rue J. J. Rousseau. Here, “the husband was a good patriot and a captain in the National Guard,” who had been “persecuted by the Maratists.” Pétion described 1 June as “convulsive” and wrote of being stopped and surrounded by a group of angry Parisians, whereupon he managed to speak to them with composure. That night he ate dinner with several colleagues at chez — (the name effaced as a precaution, but in the printed edition of his memoirs the name is given as “Meillan”)—and they planned to meet the next morning. Twenty of these colleagues, “the principals being Brissot, Vergniaud, Gensonné, Guadet, and Buzot,” gathered on the morning of 2 June, a Sunday, and some of them chose not to attend the meeting of the National Convention scheduled for that day. Aware of the probable danger awaiting them, they separated. Pétion and Guadet headed toward an isolated “barrier” outside of the city, making many detours along the way. They were stopped by a wagon-driver, who asked to see their passports, after which they continued walking until they came to a field of rye grown high enough to conceal them from any passersby; it was then 2:30 in the afternoon. Fearing discovery, their pistols were ready as the two of them lay flat on their stomachs in complete silence, without food or drink, for seven hours. Since it was a Sunday, a number of people were making promenades close enough that they could overhear the conversations. As night fell, Pétion and Guadet heard again the sounds of the drums and feared the worst for their friends who had returned to the National Convention. They walked across some fields and finally reached a very high wall, which proved to be impossible to easily surmount. Meanwhile, they could hear intermittent cries of qui vive from nearby sentries. Finally, they decided to pass the three remaining hours of that night in the rye field and try another route later. Counting the hours, they began walking at 3:30 in the morning and crossed once more the isolated “barrier.” They were determined to head in the direction of the faubourg St. Marceau, chez — (name effaced, but in the printed edition, one of Pétion’s relatives, a grocer). Continuing on the boulevard that led to the porte St. Antoine, they were stopped by the guards who recognized them at the barrière du Temple. Pétion wrote that he heard one of the guards say distinctly: “It’s Pétion. It’s Guadet.” He added that the guards let them pass, but he suspected that they were being followed, and soon enough a group of eight to ten fusiliers stopped them. Pétion and Guadet were taken before the section’s revolutionary committee, which met in the former salle de la reine. Pétion declared that it was not possible “to see

Escape from Paris (Summer 1793)  27

a more hideous and disgusting spectacle” than this group of “poorly dressed, barefoot, dirty men, pistols at their belts,” with bottles, bread, pieces of meat, and bones strewn about the floor. Claiming that they knew nothing about any décret issued the day before, Pétion and Guadet listened as the président of the court told them about the events of 2 June in the National Convention. Pétion wrote that he “did not doubt that if Brissot, Guadet, Gensonné, Vergniaud, Louvet, Buzot, Gorsas, and [himself] had been found in the assembly, a massacre would have occurred.” The committee members, “this strange tribune,” decided that not enough members were present to judge the declarations of Pétion and Guadet and so allowed them to leave. Finally, they were taken in two different carriages, accompanied by guards, to their homes and deposited. Pétion reported that his wife was greatly relieved to see him and that he felt cheered by the presence of his friends. He advised them not to return to the National Convention; while some agreed, others did not. Pétion felt that there could be no meaningful debates in an assembly dominated by the Montagnards.4 Pétion wrote that he had been persuaded to join those Girondins in Caen, where they hoped to form a departmental army sufficient in strength to march against the government in Paris, or as he phrased it, “to proudly make the first strike of vengeance.” He also noted that he had published his opinions regarding “the weakness of the Parisians” in allowing brigands to take over their city. Accompanied by their guards, Pétion and those Girondin colleagues still in Paris continued to meet and discuss the situation in the National Convention. They considered that perhaps the people could choose new representatives to the Convention, since it was unlikely that the expelled deputies could regain their seats. Meanwhile, Brissot had been arrested at Moulins, returned to Paris, and denied a hearing. After that, Pétion wrote, their guards were doubled and their situation worsened; they were not supposed to go out or to communicate with others. “It is evident,” Pétion wrote, “that the scoundrels want to assassinate us. We must escape their daggers. I am convinced that our deaths will not save our country.” His friends in Caen urged him to hurry, “not to lose an instant.”5 Pétion’s plan was to dine at a colleague’s home, accompanied as always by his guard, whom he described as a Prussian, “a good man but very strict in his duty.” They went by carriage to Mazuyer’s, another deputy from the Eure-etLoire department, according to the published version of Pétion’s memoirs. While the small group dined, Pétion made sure that his guard was also given dinner and as much wine as he wanted. After seven or eight hours had passed, Pétion was able to leave the house dressed in a disguise and reach his designated hiding place in a nearby attic. His wife and his neighbor’s wife had

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managed to obtain a coat like that worn by the National Guard, boots, and a jacobite perruque—a wig. Settling into his hiding place, fortified with “some bottles of wine and some bread,” two pistols, and a saber, Pétion waited for the agreed upon signal that it was safe to descend. A gutter spout next to the attic window abutted a chamber inhabited by a neighbor’s domestic servant, and from that chamber he could descend into the house occupied by Mr. Raimond. Then he planned to go from Raimond’s garden to the garden of the Tuileries and thence toward the river and the fields. The plan was to be executed under cover of darkness. He waited for three days and three nights in this hiding place, with little to do but read to pass the long hours. Pétion admitted that his thoughts were becoming ever more somber, and he decided that if his escape plan failed, he would take his own life rather than “fall into the hands of the scoundrels who persecuted me.” Pétion wrote that Madame Goussard took good care of him during his “captivity,” acting as a go-between with — (name effaced)—who had already conducted one of his colleagues to Caen. According to published sources, Madame Goussard was a good friend of the wives of Pétion, Louvet, and Roland. Finally Pétion received word that his time to escape had been set for nine o’clock that night, but twenty-four more hours would pass before he could descend from the attic. “Those twenty-four hours seemed like a century,” Pétion wrote. Accompanied by Madame Goussard, he joined five or six others walking by the house and climbed into a carriage headed for St. Cloud. His benefactress left the carriage near the boulevard St. Honoré. Pétion noted that he had obtained a passport under a false name and did not encounter any difficulties. Arrangements had been made for him to pass the night at the home of Mr. — (name effaced)—and to leave at five o’clock the next morning. Although Pétion became impatient, he was able to obtain a new passport and to leave by 11:30, accompanied by a domestic servant as far as the first poste station. After arriving at St. Germain, the servant departed and Pétion continued in a carriage. He wrote that he feared being recognized, even with his disguise; after all, he had served as the mayor of Paris and had been much in the public eye.6 In his memoir, Pétion’s relief is almost palpable when he wrote that he had reached St. Germain and found “a superb route. The weather was good, the air was pure. . . . It had been so long since I had breathed freely that my body and my soul seemed to be reborn.” After changing horses in St. Germain, Pétion approached Mantes, the home of his maternal grandfather, whom he would not have time to visit. He reported “a delicious sentiment,” neverthe-

Escape from Paris (Summer 1793)  29

less, as he hurried toward Evreux. Passing the night at Boussey, he left at five o’clock the next morning for Pacy, where for the first time he was asked for his passport. He showed it with confidence and continued on his journey to Evreux. Still in disguise, Pétion wrote that he felt a great tranquility: “the storms had passed, I could see the bridge.” In Evreux, Pétion asked for the home of “Citoyen — (name effaced)—an ambitious and generous patriot,” where he was warmly received. He was told that Guadet and Louvet had left for Caen the day before, after which Pétion wrote that his eyes filled with tears of relief, for he had feared for their safety. Pétion and his host determined to join their friends in Caen the next day.7 Unlike Pétion, Buzot did not include a description in his memoirs of his escape from Paris. However, it is known that he left Paris sometime on 2 June and arrived that night at the Commune of Vieil-Evreux. He passed the night at the home of a former priest, the brother of the deputy Vallée, and then proceeded to Evreux. There he spoke to his constituents at a public assembly held in the cathedral and explained what had just transpired in the National Convention. Buzot’s department of the Eure would be among the first to organize volunteers to oppose the government in Paris.8 Barbaroux was not long in following Buzot, first to Evreux and then to Caen. Apparently, between February and May of 1793, some of Barbaroux’s correspondence with the municipality of Marseille had been seized, resulting in misinformation passing between Paris and Marseille. Barbaroux was subsequently denounced as a federalist and a counter-revolutionary by his department, charges he vigorously refuted.9 In a letter of 6 February 1793 he had expressed indignation over such false charges and wrote that he looked forward to terminating his career in the National Convention. Barbaroux wrote that he envisioned being “only an obscure citizen . . . living far from the intrigues and slanders of false patriots.”10 In a letter of 25 February, Barbaroux expressed shock that the Jacobin Society and some of the sections in Marseille had declared him a traitor to the country. He declared that the only thing that truly concerned him was “the opinion of my fellow citizens,” and he lamented that “they have made me drink the chalice of suffering down to the dregs.”11 Louvet, the last of the Girondin deputies to leave Paris, departed by carriage with his companion and soon-to-be-wife, Lodoiska, on 24 June, and met Guadet the next day in Evreux. After Guadet had convinced Louvet that it would be safer for Lodoiska to return to Paris, she did so with great regret, while Louvet and Guadet continued their journey. They rejoiced that, with the exception of Brissot, their small group had all managed to arrive safely in Caen.12

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The elected officials in Caen in the department of Calvados had been concerned with the increasing hostility within the National Convention for some months before the proscribed deputies arrived. In addition, two deputies from Calvados, Gabriel de Cussy and Claude-Jean-Baptiste Lomont, had sent reports to their constituents and urged them to write and express their opinions to the National Convention. Should the factions not be able to reach an agreement, the Girondin deputies were assured of a safe haven among friends in Caen. By 27 May 1793, the city, district, and department officials and delegates from the sectional assemblies had voted to approve a resolution creating a departmental armed force to go to Paris. A small delegation had been sent ahead to Paris, arriving on the decisive day of 2 June, when it proved impossible to read their resolution in the National Convention. After conferring with their Calvados deputies, as well as Pétion, Barbaroux, Valazé, and Lanjuinais, they returned to Caen by 8 June. Alarmed by what they had seen and heard in Paris, the delegation convened an assembly and agreed to a “unanimous declaration of insurrection and resistance to oppression until that time at which the National Convention should recover its liberty.” Next, the assembly asked support for their declaration from the department of the Manche, west of Calvados, and arrested the representatives-on-mission in Bayeux, holding them as hostages in Caen to guarantee the safety of the Girondin deputies. General Felix Wimpffen, commander of the Fourteenth Military Division based in Bayeux, was notified of the assembly’s actions and asked to meet with a “provisional committee of insurrection.” As early as 9 June, the assembly had heard from Antoine-Joseph Gorsas and Pierre-François Henry-Larivière, among the first Girondin fugitives to arrive in Caen. Their words had the desired effect and the assembly “voted to break off relations with the National Convention, ordering that no decrees issued after May 27 would be recognized and that henceforth the bulletin of the Convention would not be printed in Caen.” In addition, the assembly decided to form a departmental force and to name sixteen commissioners to visit sixteen nearby departments; the representatives from Calvados and the other departments would choose a location as the headquarters for the revolt against Paris.13 It is no wonder that the proscribed deputies arriving in Caen felt assured of their safety and looked forward to a renewed struggle against their enemies in Paris. Pétion’s unedited memoirs in the Bibliothèque Nationale are instructive regarding the situation in the departments. He acknowledged that not all of the citizens in the departments were united against the government in Paris and that such discord was exploited by the Montagnards in the National

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Convention. Noting that any public officials who made their opposition known were punished by the revolutionary tribunals, Pétion wrote: “Fear freezes the courage of weak men, that is to say three-quarters and a half of men.”14 However, he was encouraged by the “great vigor” in some of the departments, especially in the Eure and Calvados, as well as the Midi, Marseille, and Bordeaux. All over France, Pétion wrote, the citizens are ready to ask for the “reintegration of the members so indignantly persecuted” in the National Convention.15 In his somewhat unflattering account of the days spent in Caen, Pétion expressed an ambivalent attitude toward its citizens. A large house once inhabited by the former intendant (king’s representative) was made available to the Girondin deputies, and they were invited to meetings of the local Carabot society, where some of them were warmly received at first. Pétion guessed that these good bourgeois citizens might be “royalists in disguise,” who were only waiting for Louis XVI’s young son to return to the throne. Some aristocrats, he surmised, had thought that the proscrits must be royalists, since they opposed the Montagnards. However, when these good citizens discovered that the Girondin deputies detested the monarchy and sincerely desired a republic, they turned their backs on them. Pétion concluded that Caen evidently “inclined toward royalism.”16 The limited amount of evidence available on the Carabot club indicates that the club had a “more collaborative relationship with the departmental administration than did the Jacobin club.” Composed of artisans and small shopkeepers for the most part, the Carabot club was formed in February 1793 and chose the motto: “Execution of the law, or death.” According to historian Paul Hanson, the club apparently existed as “a client group of the departmental administration and probably of the Caen merchant elite.” It is possible that Pétion’s suspicion of their royalist inclinations was somewhat of an exaggeration.17 The Girondin deputies did, however, organize meetings in Caen, presided over by Pétion, while Barbaroux and Denis-Toussaint Lesage, a deputy from the Eure et Loire, served as secretaries. They attempted to influence local officials by speaking to various groups and were sometimes applauded by the spectators. When they were welcomed at the popular societies, Pétion wrote, a young girl would present them with a branche de laurier (laurel) tied with a tricolor ribbon. He observed a much larger number of women than men in attendance at these gatherings and noted that the women showed more energy and patriotism. He also remarked upon the absence of young men. After his experiences at the Carabot society, Pétion spoke in public less frequently.18

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Fortunately for the Girondin fugitives, the assembly at Caen made funds available to them and even agreed to pay each one his accustomed salary. Without such help, they would have been destitute. In addition, the assembly paid for the publication of various reports and pamphlets written by the Girondins, including the response to St. Just’s report to the National Convention on 8 July, in which he declared the Girondin leaders to be traitors, because they had instigated the rebellion in the departments of the Eure and Calvados. Those who had fled to Caen, St. Just said—Buzot, Barbaroux, Louvet, Gorsas, Pétion, and the others—plotted to create a civil war and destroy the unity of the republic by taking up arms against it. However, when St. Just allowed that all of the Girondin deputies who had been detained, including Brissot, might not be guilty of any crime, he displeased the more radical Jacobins who were not inclined to show mercy. Up until the time the deputies had fled to Caen, there existed numerous protests against the purge of 2 June in the National Convention; some members had even hoped for their reinstatement. Following their flight and subsequent efforts to create a departmental force, however, the government in Paris felt that they had little choice but to condemn them.19 The punishment meted out to Buzot in absentia would be particularly cruel. After all of the contents of his home had been transported to the city offices in Evreux, the house was demolished. This action had been decreed by the National Convention on 17 July and was carried out on 26 July. An inscription on the walls nearby read: “Buzot the scoundrel betrayed liberty. For this infamous crime, he shall be decapitated.” The following December Buzot and several other “traitors” would be burned in effigy in the city square. One can only imagine the impact of such actions on his wife, who then fled to Brittany, and other relatives.20 While the threat of a united federalist revolt did not materialize, in early July of 1793 the government in Paris had good reason to fear such a possibility, especially in Caen. That city was not only closer to Paris than Lyon, Marseille, or Bordeaux, but it was also situated in a rich agricultural region that provided necessary grains and dairy products to the capital. In addition, Caen was near the sea, making it a desirable location should sudden flight become necessary. A commercial city, as were Bordeaux, Marseille, and Lyon, Caen provided a welcome refuge to the Girondins. The departmental administrators “largely controlled the sources of information from Paris,” and “censored declarations from the Montagnard Convention and the Paris Jacobins.” These administrators were not opposed by any popular organized group, as was true in Marseille. As a haven for the Girondin fugitives, Caen was at-

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tracting others who were opposed to the radical government in Paris, and none more so than one Charlotte Corday. The eloquent oratory of both Buzot and Barbaroux found an eager audience in this young Norman woman. Corday became acquainted with some of the deputies, strongly supported their cause, and was present on 7 July to witness a public parade featuring a review of the volunteer battalions by General Wimpffen. This spectacle had been intended to attract more volunteers to march on Paris, but only seventeen others agreed to join. This was a disappointing response, because more men were desperately needed if the force were to make any useful advances. Corday was stunned by the lack of response and decided to take action herself, reasoning that if the men of Caen lacked courage, the same would not be said of her. Corday left Caen for Paris on 9 July, and by l3 July she was prepared to put her plan into action. Purchasing a knife at a shop in the Palais Royal, she asked directions to the apartment of Jean-Paul Marat, the radical Jacobin editor of L’Ami de Peuple, a journal which had long denounced the Girondins along with aristocrats, the royal family, and moderates. To gain access to Marat, who was seated in his bath due to a skin condition, Corday presented a note explaining that she had information about the Girondin fugitives and other federalist rebels. Holding the note in one hand, she approached Marat, pulled out her knife, and proceeded to stab him to death. This unlikely and dramatic scene was duly memorialized by Jacques-Louis David, whose famous painting of The Death of Marat provided instant martyrdom for “the friend of the people.” Corday, who did not try to escape, was arrested and tried for her treasonous crime, in the process becoming something of a martyr herself. Unfortunately for the Girondin fugitives whom she had wanted to help, she had carried with her to Paris a letter from Barbaroux to be used as an introduction to Claude De Perret, one of the deputies in the National Convention. This letter would serve as evidence of Corday’s connections with the fugitives in Caen as well as lead to the subsequent death of De Perret. Instead of helping the fugitives, Corday’s brave if impulsive action had only provided further evidence of a federalist threat to the republic, adding yet another layer of suspicion and conspiracy to the period now known as the Terror.21 Despite the lack of new volunteers for the departmental force, the military leaders in Calvados and the nearby Norman and Breton departments decided that their force of approximately two thousand men (volunteers, National Guardsmen, and regular soldiers) was ready to begin the march toward Paris. Thus, on 13 July, on the same day that Charlotte Corday executed her “successful” plan in Paris, the rebel forces encountered a volunteer force sent

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from Paris to “pacify” them. At the chateau of Brécourt near Vernon (now famous for the artist Claude Monet’s home/museum and gardens), the opposing forces met and fired a few shots at each other before retreating. With such an obvious lack of fighting spirit, it quickly became apparent that the federalist forces in Caen did not pose a threat to the government in Paris. Now, however, the Girondins, who had urged the impeachment of Marat in April before their expulsion from the National Convention, were held liable for his death as a result of Corday’s action. Already, by 15 July, substitute deputies had been designated to fill the seats of the departed Girondin fugitives—Buzot, Pétion, Barbaroux, Louvet, Gorsas, Guadet, and Brissot—in the National Convention. Marat’s death signified that their fugitive status would become permanent. By the end of July, the federalist revolt in Caen had dissipated, the Girondin fugitives had fled to Brittany, and the city of Caen had fallen under the control of the deputy Robert Lindet and his “army of pacification” from Paris.22 In his memoirs Pétion blamed the failure of the departmental force on its leadership, General Felix Wimpffen and General Joseph Puisaye, his “aidede-camp” and friend. Noting that only four to five thousand men could be enlisted in their cause, Pétion wrote that at least sixty thousand were needed to march on Paris. The troops needed to be inspired by the cause of liberty; otherwise, he feared that “small quarrels could undermine a great cause.” An experienced general with sufficient zeal would have been able to inspire his troops and attract greater numbers, according to Pétion, who believed that Wimpffen was not sincerely attached to the federalist cause. Pétion even suspected that Wimpffen was a royalist, since he spoke so admiringly about the English system of government. If the republican cause were lost, according to Pétion, Wimpffen favored a union of France with England; the English could introduce “good civil order” as well as “offer greater security to our commerce and favor its development.” Wimpffen also suggested that the Normans and Bretons must surely be more interested in an English prince than an Austrian one. As Pétion surmised, Wimpffen never really favored the federalist cause, and therefore, did not truly try to lead the departmental force to victory. As for the “battle” near Vernon led by Gereral Puisaye, Pétion found it badly mismanaged, full of confusion and disorder, because Puisaye had not waited for all of his troops to arrive from Evreux. Despite that, in Pétion’s view the enemy force, fewer in number, could have been defeated under the proper leadership. Reflecting on the Girondins’ situation, Pétion wrote that “often the smallest cause produces the greatest effect.”23 While the departmental force reunited the next day in Lisieux, Pétion proceeded on foot back toward Caen to meet his wife, who was accompanied

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by his son and the faithful Madame Goussard. Louvet and Girard walked with him and Pétion reported that each of them had only fifty francs in their pockets, “hardly enough to subsist.” Nearing Caen, they met a National Guardsman in a carriage who called out to them to stop. Madame Pétion was inside, while close behind in a second carriage were Madame Goussard and his son. After a brief but joyful greeting, they all returned to Caen. On the way the guard expressed his anger with the retreat at Vernon and warned of the dangerous situation in Caen. Madame Pétion feared that forces from Paris would soon arrive and thought that it would be safer for the proscribed deputies to go to Lisieux instead. They would go on foot, while Madame Pétion promised to meet them in Lisieux the following day. Accompanied by the deputies Giroust and La Haye, Pétion described their miserable journey by a back route to Lisieux. They walked for miles in heavy rain through fields, crossing streams, and only stopping briefly to rest, finally reaching Lisieux at one o’clock in the morning. There they met Barbaroux, who told them that all was not yet lost— despite the disorder—spirits were good among some of the troops, for example, those from Finistère and Mayenne. However, those from Île-etVilaine and Morbihan, also in Brittany, were divided and “generally discontented,” while barely two hundred troops from Calvados remained and perhaps one hundred and fifty from la Manche. As for Wimpffen, he had done nothing to raise the spirits of the troops. In fact, according to Barbaroux, “he has the appearance of a man who has lost his head.” Wimpffen would be dismissed from his position by the National Convention and later flee from the Lisieux area. Pétion remained convinced that if the general had assembled the troops and marched on Evreux rather than retreating, then the honor of the department could have been saved. He noted that such a loss raised the spirits of the Maratists and discouraged those good citizens who are weak and uncertain. A counterstrike against Paris could turn things around, he wrote; otherwise, all was lost. It was apparent that without a departmental force to protect them, the Girondin deputies could not remain in Caen.24

Notes 1. Leigh Whaley, Radicals: Politics and Republicanism in the French Revolution (United Kingdom: Sutton Publishing Limited, 2000), 160. 2. M. J. Sydenham, The Girondins (London: University of London, The Athlone Press, 1961), 71. 3. Cl. Perroud, ed., Mémoires de Madame Roland (Paris: Plon, 1905), I: 28.

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4. Mémoires de Jérôme Pétion. N. A. F. 1730, 84–95. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits; and C. A. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion et Mémoires de Buzot & de Barbaroux, accompagnés de Notes Inédites de Buzot et de nombreux documents Inédits sur Barbaroux, Buzot, Brissot, etc. (Paris: Henri Plon, 1866), 108–20. 5. Mémoires de Pétion, N. A. F. 1730, 98; and Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, 126. 6. Mémoires de Pétion, N. A. F. 1730, 99–106; and Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, 128–38. Mazuyer was later executed. 7. Mémoires de Pétion, N. A. F. 1730, 108–10. 8. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, lxvii, Notes to the introduction; and Paul R. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire: The Federalist Revolt in the French Revolution (University Park, Penn.: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003), 69, n. 21. According to Hanson, Buzot arrived in Caen on 12 June, 1793. 9. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, xxiii–iv. 10. Correspondance de Barbaroux, Député à la Convention Nationale avec La Municipalité de Marseille, 1792–1793. N. A. F. 6140, 35. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 11. Correspondance de Barbaroux, N. A. F. 6140, 39–41. 12. John Rivers, Louvet: Revolutionist & Romance Writer (London: Hurst and Blackett, Ltd., 1910), 203–204. 13. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire, 66–69. 14. Mémoires de Pétion, N. A. F. 1730, 95. 15. Mémoires de Pétion, N. A. F. 1730, 95–96. 16. Mémoires de Pétion, N. A. F. 1730, 111–13. 17. Paul R. Hanson, Provincial Politics in the French Revolution: Caen and Limoges, 1789–1794 (Baton Rouge, La.: Louisiana State University Press), 51–53. 18. Mémoires de Pétion, N. A. F. 1730, 112–14. 19. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire, 70; and Whaley, Radicals, 162. 20. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, lxvii–lxix, 102. 21. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire, 25–26, 196–97. See also Paul R. Hanson, Provincial Politics in the French Revolution: Caen and Limoges, 1789–1794, 141, 242. 22. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire, 25–26. 23. Mémoires de Pétion, N. A. F. 1730, 115–25; and Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, 149–61. 24. Mémoires de Pétion, N. A. F. 1730, 126–36; and Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, 162–76.

C H A P T E R

T H R E E



On the Run (July–October 1793)

After officials in Caen had declared them outlaws, the fugitives left with a group of Breton volunteers, who offered them protection. Upon reaching the town of Vire, they retired for the night, but at midnight Louvet was startled by a servant who told him that a lady had arrived and wanted to speak with him. It was Lodoiska! Louvet had thought that she was still in Paris, but after hearing of the debacle in Vernon, she had decided to join him in Brittany. Even better, it so happened that Lodoiska finally had been granted a divorce from Mr. Cholet, whom she had been forced to marry at sixteen. After 1792 French civil law had legalized divorce and allowed for it on grounds of desertion or separation for a period of at least two years if a spouse had gone into exile or disappeared. Wives or husbands of émigrés sometimes used divorce to protect their property from government confiscation and many of them resumed their former married state after the revolution. Louvet and Lodoiska, almost the same age, had been childhood friends before they fell in love, and they had been waiting ever since to marry each other. In 1790 he had even written a work titled Emilie de Varmont ou le Divorce Nécessaire, in which he had advocated for the right to divorce and for priests to be allowed to marry. Now Louvet and Lodoiska were finally free to marry, albeit in an unlikely location and under less than ideal circumstances.1 Their friends and fellow fugitives—Buzot, Pétion, Salle, and Guadet—served as witnesses for the happy occasion. Although he rejoiced at his friend’s good fortune, Buzot must have been consumed with thoughts of his own beloved Manon Roland, still imprisoned in Paris.

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At least, Lodoiska had brought Buzot a letter from Manon, one of six which were smuggled out of prison with visitors. Manon also had received letters from Buzot (none of which have survived) from these same visitors, notably Madame Goussard, who was Lodoiska’s friend. In a five-page letter of 22 June 1793, we learn that Manon has received two letters from Buzot, for she responded to him by writing: “How often I read these dear letters over and over again! I press them to my heart, I cover them with kisses; I had lost all hope of hearing from you!” She warned that the mail might be intercepted if sent through official channels and confessed that she had suffered greatly until she heard of Buzot’s escape from Paris. Perhaps seeking to reassure Buzot of her calm state of mind, Manon declared that “I lead the life here that I led in my study at home,” adding that her room was about ten feet square. “Behind bars and bolted doors, I enjoy the freedom of my thoughts. . . . Don’t you see that by being alone, it is with you that I remain? It is through captivity that I sacrifice myself for my husband and keep myself for my friend.” She also asked Buzot not to pity her or to do anything rash for her sake.2 In addition to baring her heart to Buzot, Manon also composed her memoirs in prison. Titled Appel à l’impartiale postérité, this work would ensure that she and her friends were not forgotten. For the first time in her life, she had a sufficient amount of uninterrupted time to express herself fully, and she found that she could escape her prison surroundings by writing about earlier times. She felt that she had taken care of her duties as wife and mother; Roland was safe with friends in Rouen and her daughter Eudora was in the care of the family of the deputy Creuzé-Latouche. Buzot had managed to escape from Paris, and Manon’s mind was free to focus on her writing. Being a disciplined and conscientious individual, it is quite likely that Manon enjoyed the experience.3 The first half of the memoir concerns events of the revolution and the persecution of innocent victims, while the second part presents a surprisingly frank examination of her childhood and youth, and feminine virtue. The memoirs would guarantee her a place in posterity, but her letters to Buzot would provide a more balanced view of her as a mature woman. Manon felt hopeful when she was released from the Abbaye prison on 24 June 1793. However, as soon as she had reached her home, a deputation from the Committee of Public Safety arrested her again, charging her with alleged conspiracy against the revolution and complicity with her husband and other Girondins. She was taken to Sainte-Pélagie prison, where she resumed her routine of reading, writing, and occasionally visiting with friends who had remained in Paris. Unknown to Manon, her former cell at the Abbaye prison would be occupied first by Brissot and later by Charlotte Corday.4

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In another letter to Buzot, dated 3 July, Manon lamented the “cruel sacrifice” that had befallen them and France, but assured him that her heart was strong. She wrote that she read his letters, in which she heard his “courageous voice,” over and over to console herself. “I have been honored to be cherished by you,” she declared, to know the “sweetness of our affection” in spite of the contradictions of society and the horrors of oppressors. Manon urged Buzot to be calm in a letter of 6 July, in which she assured him that she had expected to be transferred to “this second prison,” Sainte-Pélagie. That was not true, of course, but she feared that Buzot and his friends might endanger themselves on her behalf and wanted to prevent that from happening. Manon explained that it was only a matter of waiting now for her public hearing before the Revolutionary Tribunal, perhaps pretending for Buzot’s sake to sound more optimistic than she actually felt. Apparently a letter of 7 July was written to cheer up Buzot and to strengthen his courage and resolve, while at the same time warning him to be careful. She applauded the progress of the revolution in the departments in a letter of 7 August, adding that she had read about what was happening in the assemblies. On a lighter note, she also described the delicious perfume of the flowers sent to her from the Jardin des Plantes from her friend Bosc. Although Manon despaired of ever seeing Buzot again, she wrote that she “shared his danger” and remained with him in all of his plans and hopes.5 The last letter that Buzot received from Manon, dated 31 August, was filled with subterfuges to disguise the identity of her correspondent. Addressed to the husband of her childhood friend Sophie Cannet, this letter nevertheless ends by affirming her deep feelings for Buzot: “Goodbye. Oh! How you are loved!”6 It was this last letter that he received after reaching Quimper in Brittany several days later. One may imagine his state of mind. According to Manon’s description of Buzot in her memoirs, he was given to melancholy, in addition to possessing “a lofty character, proud spirit, and fiery courage.” There could be little doubt of her intense feelings for him when she wrote that “he would forget the universe in the sweetness of private virtues with a heart worthy of his own.”7 Notwithstanding matters of the heart, the fugitives hastened to continue their journey from Vire to Fougères, while Lodoiska and a few other wives followed by carriage. Their ultimate destination in Brittany was Quimper on the southwest coast, where they planned to arrange passage to Bordeaux by boat. They traveled with the Finistère battalion from Fougères to Dol and then to Dinan. Since the authorities along the way made them unwelcome and caused problems for the Finistère volunteers, the fugitives chose to proceed alone to Quimper. However, the volunteers gave each one of them a

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uniform and a weapon, and the commandant even signed discharges stating that they had served with the Finistère battalion and were returning to their homes in Quimper. The journey on foot would take three days. The group of fugitives, which included Louvet, Pétion, Buzot, Barbaroux, Salle, Lesage, Bergoeing, Cussy, Giroux, Meillan, Girey-Dupré, and Riouffe (a journalist), was accompanied by six guides and Joseph, Buzot’s servant, who refused to leave his side. Due to ill health, Lesage and Giroux remained behind in Brittany. Guadet had become separated from his friends in Dinan, but managed to connect with them in Quimper. Valady would also join them later. Larivière was in hiding in Falaise, while Duchâstel and Kervélégan had already gone to Quimper to make preparations. Gorsas, who had been staying with friends in Rennes, had decided to return to Paris, which proved to be a fatal mistake.8 The false identities so thoughtfully provided by the commandant of the Finistère battalion helped the fugitives through some dangerous encounters, even as they heard reports of “the flight of the Girondins.” Several of their guides left them along the way; the rain continued to drench them; and they suffered from the cold as well as various foot problems, hunger, and lack of sleep. When finally they neared Quimper, one of their guides went into the town and returned with a Mr. Abgral, a district magistrate who was also a Girondin supporter. Worried about the safety of his wife, Louvet asked Abgral for news of her arrival. He was informed that Lodoiska had been arrested at St. Brieux, but had been released after satisfactorily answering the authorities’ questions and allowed to continue on her way to Quimper. Louvet would see her the next day, if only briefly.9 After resting and eating in the home of a priest, the fugitives decided that they would be safer if the group separated. Buzot stayed in “a worthy man’s” home in Quimper, while Pétion, Guadet, Valady, and Marchena stayed nearby. Kervégélan welcomed Salle, Bergoeing, Meillan, Cussy, and GireyDupré, and Mr. de la Hubaudière took in Louvet, Barbaroux, and Riouffe. Under these precarious circumstances Barbaroux became ill and reportedly was treated for smallpox, all the while somehow managing to remain hidden.10 It was also during this period that he wrote the first part of his memoirs, which remained there in Quimper “in safe hands,” according to Dauban, the editor of Barbaroux’s published memoir. Dauban’s 1866 edition included only the later sections of Barbaroux’s memoirs and his correspondence with the municipality of Marseille, and he declared in the introduction that these Mémoires de Barbaroux were exactly the same as those that appeared in an 1822 edition by Berville and Barrière, except that he had included some other documents “of great interest for the history of his private life.”11

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So far, the fugitives had been lucky in Brittany, a conservative area sympathetic to their cause, but by the end of August they realized that the central government’s agents knew of their presence in Quimper. Several of the fugitives left hastily for Bordeaux ahead of the others in their group, which proved to be unwise. After landing safely, Riouffe, Duchâstel, Girey-Dupré, and Marchena, who had joined the group in Quimper, were captured; Duchâstel and Girey-Dupré were later executed, while Riouffe and Marchena were imprisoned in Paris. Back in Quimper, Louvet moved to a house outside of town, where he composed his long dramatic poem, Hymne de Mort, in preparation for his imminent capture and death. Fortunately for Louvet, however, at this point he was invited to share the home of a National Guardsman and his family, who had already provided shelter for Lodoiska. After three weeks, on 20 September, Louvet and the remaining fugitives were notified that a suitable vessel was available to take them to Bordeaux. Louvet and Lodoiska parted once again; she would return to Paris and try to join him later in the Bordeaux area. Louvet met his friends—Buzot, Guadet, Pétion, and Barbaroux—five miles outside of Quimper. They needed to reach the coast before eleven o’clock that night, so that they could be transported to their ship, the Industrie, which was sailing as part of a convoy. After some difficulty locating the ship, they finally found it around dawn and climbed on board, where they were greeted by Valady, who had boarded at Brest. Meanwhile, the convoy had sailed on some hours ahead of them. Even at sea, however, the fugitives were in danger of being caught, because the captains of other French vessels had the right to board and search any suspicious vessel they encountered. On 22 September, as thirty ships from Brest were sighted, the fugitives lay on the floor of their cabin, guns ready should they need them. Thanks to the calm and persuasive Captain Grainger, the Industrie was not required to stop. That night they caught up with the convoy and continued sailing on, sighting land and the port of La Rochelle on the morning of 23 September. The crew wanted to stop there, but the captain persuaded them to continue sailing, apparently “assisted by a generous distribution of paper money by the Deputies.” The next day the convoy entered the Gironde estuary, into which the Garonne River empties. Casting anchor that night near the fort of Castillon, the captain and four sailors rowed the fugitives ashore near dawn. Filled with an overwhelming sense of relief that they had actually arrived safely, the fugitives went ashore at the low point of the Bec d’Ambès between the Dordogne and Garonne rivers. They rewarded the courageous Captain Grainger for his efforts, after which he returned to his ship, no doubt relieved to be free of them.12

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As for the fugitives, they felt somewhat safer in the Gironde than elsewhere in France, but they also knew that there were enemies looking for them even in this area. Guadet guided his friends to the house of his fatherin-law, Mr. Dupeyrat, a banker in the area. Finding the house locked, they went to a nearby inn where Guadet identified himself and asked a cooper named Blanc to open the house for them. This proved unwise, for now their presence had been confirmed and this information would be passed on to the representatives-on-mission in the area, who were given sweeping powers by the Committee of Public Safety to pacify rebellious areas by any means necessary. Claude-Alexandre Ysabeau and Marc-Antoine Baudot had been the first representatives sent to Bordeaux in August, followed in October by Guillaume Chandron-Rousseau and Jean-Lambert Tallien, along with nearly two thousand armed troops. They had made their intentions clear by threatening to execute anyone “who would make of Bordeaux a new Lyon,” a reference to that city’s resistance and the violence and destruction that had followed. In his memoirs, Louvet castigated those who would “make the streets of Bordeaux run with the blood of Frenchmen” and who “reduced to ashes this city of Lyon immortalized by its glorious resistance.” Buzot likewise regretted the destruction of Lyon, writing in his memoirs that it had once been “a city of antique opulence and superb monuments.” He also noted that Bordeaux and the Department of the Gironde had suffered for the cause of liberty, leaving many citizens without work or bread. “Misery is everywhere,” he wrote. The siege of Lyon had begun five days after the peaceful surrender of Caen on 3 August. Nine weeks of resistance in Lyon led to severe punishment, resulting in the execution of 1,900 of its citizens. The Girondin fugitives’ claims about the destruction of Lyon were exaggerated and probably based on the “ferocious decree” of 12 October 1793 issued by the Jacobin leadership of the National Convention. The decree contained the words: “the city of Lyon shall be destroyed” and proclaimed that henceforth the city shall be known as “Ville Affranchie” or “liberated city.” The central government clearly wished to punish the counter-revolutionary activities of the citizens of Lyon, who had been under siege for several months. Unable to hold out against the national forces, the volunteers finally capitulated in October and the city of Lyon was occupied. During the siege, a number of fine houses were reduced to rubble by bombardment, but the city was certainly not destroyed.13 The repression of the so-called federalist revolts, both in Bordeaux and in Marseille, would be much less harsh, although its citizens were not as easily pacified as those in Caen. Until May 1794, however, Bordeaux would remain

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under military rule imposed by the central government in Paris, and during that period 227 persons were charged with “the crime of federalism. . . . Between October 1793 and May 1794, only one hundred and four executions took place in Bordeaux,” which led the Committee of Public Safety to complain of leniency on the part of the representatives-on-mission. By the law of 14 Frimaire II (4 December 1793), local power in the departments was radically reduced and local elections were suspended by the National Convention, an indication that the sovereign people were no longer trusted to work toward national unity.14 As soon as the fugitives had gained entrance to Dupeyrat’s house, they locked the doors, closed the shutters, and tried to decide on a possible course of action. Guadet announced that he would go to St. Emilion, where some of his relatives lived and try to secure hiding places for his friends. Leaving the next day, he assured them that he would return in a day or two, but on 27 September he sent word that he had found hiding places for only two of the six fugitives. Meanwhile, a messenger had come to Dupeyrat’s house to report that the innkeeper had denounced the new arrivals to the authorities in Bordeaux. Fearing to remain where they were, the six fugitives left the house at night and headed toward the Garonne River where they found a boat to take them up the river to St. Emilion. After the boat was temporarily delayed by an ebb tide some miles below Libourne, they decided to proceed on foot. Reaching Libourne the following night, they crossed the Dordogne River in a ferryboat. Upon landing, they heard that the representative-on-mission Baudot and fifty troops were searching for them. The fugitives hid in a stone quarry and somehow managed to send word to Guadet, who soon arrived accompanied by Salle. Guadet’s news was disappointing: no one in the area dared to provide shelter for the proscribed deputies.15 They could hardly blame the local inhabitants who might have sympathized with their plight, but would have faced imprisonment or execution for harboring the fugitives. At that point, the situation seemed hopeless. All of the fugitives had been identified and were being pursued. Under the circumstances, they agreed that it might be better to separate. For the next two weeks the seven friends wandered about the countryside at night looking for shelter and during the daylight hours they hid. Louvet, Barbaroux, Valady, and an unidentified friend walked in the direction of Paris, since that was where Lodoiska waited. Pétion and Buzot simply bided their time, moving about the area hoping to find shelter, while Guadet and Salle walked south toward the Landes, one of those departments which had protested the proscription of the Girondins in the National Convention.

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Louvet and his three companions found help at the home of a sympathetic priest, who offered to shelter them for several days. Valady’s friend, however, decided to continue to walk on toward Paris and was subsequently caught in Périgueux and executed. Failing to find another refuge for the three remaining Girondins, the priest finally resorted to helping them hide in the hayloft of a neighboring farm. Only two of the farm’s inhabitants knew of their presence; they agreed to provide the necessary food and water, but often the fugitives seemed to be forgotten for long periods of time. In addition to their thirst and hunger, the hayloft was hot and stuffy, an altogether miserable hiding place. At one point Louvet and Barbaroux even considered ending it all with their pistols, but were stopped by Valady. Several days later they were alerted by the priest’s relatives and told that they must leave their hiding place. It seems that one of the farmhands had overheard the fugitives’ voices and told the farmer. He in turn complained to the priest, who was now under surveillance himself. The fugitives left their hayloft at once and passed the night in the forest, but in the morning the priest returned and invited them back to his house. Fortunately for all concerned, at this moment news arrived from St. Emilion from Guadet and Salle: the fugitives would be welcome to stay in the home of Thérèse Bouquey, Dupeyrat’s daughter, who owned a country house in St. Emilion and would open it to the fugitives. Louvet, Barbaroux, and Valady arrived the next night, while Buzot and Pétion, who had hidden in seven different places during the past two weeks, arrived several days later. By 12 October, the seven fugitives were together in Madame Bouquey’s house, relieved to find each other again and surprised that anyone would dare to welcome them.16 Like Charlotte Corday, Thérèse Bouquey exhibited the courage—or some might say the foolhardiness—to do what none of her compatriots dared. That she was able to succeed for several months, long enough at least for the fugitives to write their memoirs, is a tribute to her determination and cleverness. This thirty-one-year-old patriot was the wife of Robert Bouquey and the sisterin-law of Guadet, who had prevailed upon Roland when he served as Minister of the Interior to appoint Robert Bouquey to the post of Registrar of the National Domains. The Bouqueys thenceforth made their home in Fontainebleau, and it was from there that Thérèse Bouquey had journeyed to St. Emilion to open her country home to the fugitives. The location of Madame Bouquey’s home near the church was also fortuitous in that abandoned stone quarries, which had provided the building materials for both Bordeaux and St. Emilion, surrounded it. Indeed, the inhabitants of the house were able to descend directly into these old quarries by

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two routes. One route involved climbing down an old water pipe by using a ladder, but this was not practical because inhabitants in nearby houses would have been able to see them. The more difficult route, and the one necessarily used by the fugitives, involved climbing into a hundred-foot-deep well located in the garden, and descending by means of the footholds which had been cut on opposite sides. They could descend these slippery steps for twenty feet, at which point there was an opening into a large cavern and under that was concealed a deeper cave, entered by crawling through a hole. The fugitives literally lived underground during the daylight hours. Madame Bouquey made them as comfortable as possible by providing necessities, such as blankets, a table, chairs, a lantern, and cutlery. Never robust, Louvet apparently could not tolerate the cold and damp atmosphere underground, and so was hidden in the house. Even in better times, Manon Roland had described Louvet as “an unhealthy-looking little man, weakly, shortsighted and slovenly,” who was, however, “as courageous as a lion, simple as a child, a good citizen, and a vigorous writer.” This was high praise coming from one with such high standards herself, and in the coming days, Louvet would prove his courageous spirit more than once. At night the fugitives would ascend from their underground quarters and share the only substantial meal that Madame Bouquey could manage to provide. As it was, she had to procure rations for seven men while staying within her allotted limit; she was entitled to only one pound of bread a day. However, with the judicious use of garden vegetables, eggs (until all of the chickens had been eaten), and some milk, she accomplished her mission. Not only were these hunted men sheltered and fed, but they were cheered as well by her optimistic presence.17 Despite the constant danger of discovery, the weeks passed at Madame Bouquey’s house allowed the fugitives the uninterrupted time they needed to properly reflect on recent past events and to write accounts of these events as each saw fit. Yet even hidden many miles from Paris, the fugitives could not escape the Terror that gripped that city. In early November, Madame Bouquey told them about the trial and executions of their fellow Girondins in Paris. Twenty-one of those in custody, including their good friends Brissot, Gensonné, and Valazé, had appeared before the Revolutionary Tribunal on 24 October 1793, and on 30 October, all were declared guilty.18 It was assumed by the Tribunal that the Girondins, supposedly a “party,” had acted in unison against the policies of the government. “For the revolutionary, all opposition is necessarily counter-revolutionary, and preconcerted, and if all could be accused as conspirators, all could be convicted on a single capital charge.” 19 Even those who had chosen to remain in Paris, such as Vergniaud,

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were not excused from their associations with those who had fled Paris. It did not help their cause that the witnesses who were called to speak before the Tribunal, including members of the Commune of Paris, were hostile toward all of the Girondin prisoners. In addition, the accused were not allowed to defend their actions.20 The Girondin prisoners passed their last night of life in the Conciergerie, the prison where the condemned were sent before their executions. This infamous prison in the heart of Paris, now a national historic monument, housed more than 2,700 persons sentenced to death over a two-year period. The twenty-one Girondin prisoners, who waited there on the night of 29–30 October 1793, have been memorialized in the so-called “Girondins’ Chapel,” a small room which had served as a royal chapel in medieval times. MarieAntoinette, who spent her last days in this prison awaiting execution on 16 October 1793, has also been honored with a chapel, and her cell has been recreated; it is a favorite tourist attraction. Legend has it that the twenty-one condemned Girondin prisoners sang the Marseillaise as they were being transported through the heart of the city on their way to the guillotine. Whether or not they were singing, it must have been a sad spectacle to watch as these once-favored revolutionary leaders, most in their late thirties or early forties, went bravely to their deaths on 31 October 1793. To the fugitives hiding at Madame Bouquey’s house, the news of the executions was devastating and indicative of the prevailing mood in Paris. They had dared to hope that their fellow Girondins might receive a less harsh form of punishment, but now they realized that they could expect neither justice nor mercy from the radical government in Paris. They were determined, however, to seek such justice, if only posthumously. The news also proved devastating for Manon Roland, waiting in her cell. When she learned the outcome of the Girondins’ trial, she lost any hope for her own survival. She had earlier considered suicide, even writing to her old friend Bosc and asking for opium, but she chose martyrdom instead. Her last message to Buzot, which he never received, echoed the words of the dying heroine Julie in Rousseau’s La Nouvelle Héloïse: “And you whom I dare not name! You who will be better known one day when our common misfortunes will be pitied, you who respected the barriers of virtue in spite of an overwhelming passion, will you grieve to see me precede to an abode where we shall be free to love each other, where nothing will prevent us from being united? . . . There I shall await you. . . . Adieu. . . . No, from you alone I do not part; to leave this earth is to be near you.”21

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Manon also wrote a last letter to her young daughter Eudora, in which she asked to be remembered and advised living a dutiful and useful life, as she herself had tried to do. She wrote that she hoped Eudora would not have to face such difficulties as she had and advised that “a strict, well-occupied life is the best protection against all these perils and necessity, as well as wisdom, imposes upon you the law of working seriously.” She also asked Eudora to “be worthy of your parents; they leave you fine examples.” She closed her letter by reassuring Eudora that “the time will come when you will be able to judge the effort that I am making at this moment not to be moved to tears at the memory of you. I press you to my heart. Farewell, my Eudora.”22 As with all condemned prisoners, Manon Roland was transferred to the Conciergerie prison on 31 October—the day of execution for the condemned Girondins. At her previous interrogations, she had refused to implicate those who had visited her home, insisting that she had acted only as her husband’s secretary and not as part of any “secret bureau.” On 8 November she went before the Revolutionary Tribunal prepared to offer an eloquent defense, but she was not allowed to speak more than a few words. Her correspondence from prison with the Girondin fugitives in Caen had been discovered and a deputy who had served as a go-between, Lauze-Deperret, had been arrested and his papers seized; he had been executed with the other Girondins.23 This evidence, along with the knowledge of numerous meetings of the Girondin deputies at the Rolands’ home, would seal Manon’s fate. She was accused of conspiracy against the republic and sentenced to die within twenty-four hours. Never at a loss for words, Manon thanked the judges for “having allowed me to share the same fate as the great men you have assassinated.” She also wrote a note to Robespierre warning him to be careful, because “fortune is fleeting and so is the favor of the people,” words that he would come to appreciate before a year had passed.24 As a composed and dignified Manon Roland ascended the ladder to the platform on which the guillotine stood waiting to receive her, she raised her head to look at the large statue of Liberty nearby and uttered the words that would guarantee her fame: “O Liberty, what crimes are committed in thy name!”25 Manon’s husband, the former interior minister Jean Roland, hardly fared much better. He had taken refuge with friends in Rouen the previous March. When news of Manon’s execution reached him on 10 November, he walked a few miles away from the city and shot himself. It was on 15 November that Madame Bouquey summoned the courage to tell the fugitives about Manon Roland’s trial and execution. This was the

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news that Buzot had feared the most and there can be little doubt that he was overcome with grief. His letter to an old friend in Evreux, Jérôme LeTellier, expressed the sorrow that he could not hide. “She is no more, she is no more, my friend. The scoundrels have murdered her. Consider if there is anything left for me to regret on earth” (emphasis in original). Buzot wrote that he had suffered very much and that he expected to suffer even more, but “the end of my suffering will come soon.” He expressed the hope that after he had died “I shall yet live in your heart.” In the same letter Buzot enclosed a last letter to his wife and asked LeTellier to help her after his death, adding that he hoped all his worldly goods would not be gone. He asked LeTellier to burn this letter after his (Buzot’s) death and ended by writing: “I shall love you until my last breath.” He attached a note to the letter to protect LeTellier in case the letter fell into enemy hands. The note declared that he had never had any “political correspondence” with LeTellier and that they had been good friends since before the revolution. Buzot asked that whoever intercepted the letter “respect at least the last words of an unfortunate dead man and not trouble the peace of my tomb.”26 He then gave the letter to Madame Bouquey to be forwarded to Evreux at a suitable time. LeTellier was an apothecary in Evreux and had served as the mayor of that city in 1790, but he had not been involved in any of the “federalist plots” or other political events of June 1793. Nevertheless, he was arrested in November 1793 and imprisoned. Before being transported to a prison in Paris, however, LeTellier shot himself and died on 14 November.27 Buzot, of course, could not have known at that time of his friend’s unfortunate circumstances. The letter that he had written to LeTellier, as well as Buzot’s memoir, was found in Madame Bouquey’s house later in June 1794 by the representative from Paris, Marc-Antoine Jullien, who sent it on to the Committee of Public Safety.

Notes 1. John Rivers, Louvet: Revolutionist and Romance-Writer (London: Hurst and Blackett Limited, 1910), 221–22. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet. N. A. F. 1730, 144. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. See also Roderick Phillips, Putting Asunder: A History of Divorce in Western Society (Cambridge, Mass.: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 162–63, 173; and James F. Traer, Marriage and the Family in Eighteenth-Century France (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1980), 132–33.

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2. Correspondance 1793 (Letters from Madame Roland to Buzot). N. A. F. 1730, 2–5. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 3. Gita May, Madame Roland and the Age of Revolution (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970), 264. Madame Roland’s Appel à l’impartiale postérité, edited by Louis Bosc, was published by Louvet in 1795. 4. May, Madame Roland, 271–72. 5. Correspondance 1793, N. A. F. 1730, 6–15. 6. Papiers Roland II, N. A. F. 9533, 222. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 7. Marilyn Yalom, Blood Sisters: The French Revolution in Women’s Memory (New York: Basic Books, 1993), 82. The quotations are taken from the Portraits and Anecdotes section of The Memoirs of Madame Roland, edited by Paul de Roux (Paris: Mercure de France, 1986), 333, 99. 8. Rivers, Louvet, 223–26. See also Mémoires de Jérôme Pétion. N. A. F. 1730, 136. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 9. Rivers, Louvet, 238–41. 10. Rivers, Louvet, 243. 11. C. A. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion et Mémoires de Buzot & de Barbaroux, accompagnés de Notes Inédites de Buzot et de nombreux documents inédits sur Barbaroux, Buzot, Brissot, etc. (Paris: Henri Plon, 1866), 307, and introduction, iii. 12. Rivers, Louvet, 245–55. 13. W. D. Edmonds, Jacobinism and the Revolt of Lyon, 1789–1793 (N.Y.: Oxford University Press, 1990), 267–71, 280. 14. Rivers, Louvet, 257. Paul R. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire: The Federalist Revolt in the French Revolution (University Park, Penn.: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003), 226–27, 230–31, 193. See also Mémoires de Louvet, N. A. F. 1730, 148, and Mémoires de Buzot N. A. F. 1730, 61–62. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 15. Rivers, Louvet, 258–61. 16. Rivers, Louvet, 261–68. 17. Rivers, Louvet, 269–71, 330. 18. M. J. Sydenham, The Girondins (London: University of London, Athlone Press, 1961), 27–8, 218. The twenty-one men judged guilty were Antiboul, Boilleau, Boyer-Fonfrède, Brissot, Carra, Deperret, Duchâstel, Ducos, Duprat, Fauchet, Gardien, Gensonné, Lacaze, Lasource, Lesterp-Beauvais, Lehardi, Minvielle, Sillery, Valazé (who stabbed himself but was executed anyway), Vergniaud, and Viger. 19. Sydenham, The Girondins, 29–30. 20. Sydenham, The Girondins, 27–28. 21. May, Madame Roland, 277–79. 22. Olivier Blanc, Last Letters: Prisons and Prisoners of the French Revolution. Translated by Alan Sheridan (New York: Michael de Capua Books, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1987), 23.

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23. May, Madame Roland, 282. 24. Papiers Roland II. N. A. F. 9532, 371; and N. A. F. 9533, 296. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 25. Papiers Roland II. N. A. F. 9533, 296. 26. Mémoires de Buzot. N. A. F. 1730, 16. 27. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, 102–3.

C H A P T E R

F O U R



Buzot’s Perspective (1791–1794)

The memoirs of Buzot offer not only a contemporary perspective on the events from 1791 to 1794, but also an opportunity to share the deeply felt emotions of an eloquent writer. As we shall see, his memoirs focus more on the abstract and the ideal, such as the necessity of justice, the rule of law, and the balance of power between the central government and the departments, than on more mundane matters. Above all, he is concerned to leave what he considers an accurate record of recent events for those who survive the Terror and for future generations. As the editor of Buzot’s published memoirs explained in his introduction: “The pages left by Buzot are less his Mémoires than a Mémoire justificatif of his conduct and that of his friends.” The “tone” of the memoirs is “in perfect accord with Buzot’s severe, sensitive, and melancholic nature.” The editor judged Buzot an “honorable man” whose “authority is incontestable,” at least as it concerns his conduct and that of his friends.1 Reading Buzot’s handwritten memoirs in the Bibliothèque Nationale’s Department of Manuscripts, I would have to agree that his personality shines through the eloquent words. There can be no doubt that here was a man intent on leaving a testament behind before he met his end, which he sensed would not be long in coming. Buzot had already begun writing his memoirs in October 1793, but he added the introduction later in 1794. As he explained in the introduction, he had begun writing his memoirs “on the occasion of the murder of Gorsas . . . during some lucid moments” in an effort to alleviate his melancholy and to “address the epoch of the assassination of Brissot and of his illustrious,

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honorable companions in misfortune.” 2 The deputy Gorsas had died either on 7 or 9 October, 1793, after he had been captured and guillotined in Paris, while Brissot and twenty other Girondins had been executed on 31 October. Since Gorsas had been considered a fugitive outside of the law, he was not given a trial; thus Buzot referred to his death as “murder.” Buzot noted that “these memoirs,” along with some other papers, had been entrusted to loyal and courageous friends (the Bouqueys), “who shall not be corrupted by tyranny nor made to tremble.” Buzot also mentioned the “two friends” with him in St. Emilion, Pétion and Barbaroux, who were writing their own memoirs, “which good people will read with pleasure,” adding that these papers were also safe (with the Bouqueys). Apologizing to his future readers, Buzot declared that “the peace which is in my heart is not always in my head,” and added that his memory had been weakened by suffering, but that it was not important. He also wrote that there was not sufficient time to make his writing amusing but that it did not matter, because “it is to the good and simple souls that I address this writing . . . and to my friends finally, if they are still on this earth.” Buzot expressed the hope, somewhat similar to Manon Roland’s, that there might exist after this life a place where the friends of virtue are rewarded for their suffering.3 Explaining that he wanted to write fairly and not tire his readers with too many details, Buzot described what his readers might expect to find in his memoirs: “morality, integrity, some good actions mixed with involuntary errors—and those more often from weaknesses that one cherishes more than reproaches—profound respect for the dignity of man, and his rights and duties, a true, constant, unshakeable love of order, of justice, of liberty. Liberty! But of that liberty which is equal for all, wisely ordered, for the good of all and as distant from license as virtue is from crime. There is the picture that we [Buzot, Pétion, Barbaroux] offer to those who loved us.”4 Denouncing the greed and dishonesty of the Jacobin leadership, Buzot affirmed that “among us [the Girondins] I have not known a dishonest man,” citing the accounts of Roland as an example. “Whether we liked it or not, strict integrity was required to remain among us. . . . Without doubt we must sacrifice our lives for our country, but our honor and liberty as well?” Buzot deplored the destruction he had witnessed in the departments, citing the ruin of agriculture, commerce, public and private income, morale, and liberty as evidence of failures by the government in Paris. “France is already a terrible desert,” he wrote, but he also seemed to hold out eventual hope for the future: “The nations have suffered their destinies of which nothing can interrupt the course,” yet “in the political order as in the physical world, there are

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the laws of nature,” and eventually balance will be restored. “The monarchy will finish by destroying itself,” he prophesied correctly.5 It is important to understand that Buzot was exaggerating when he described France as “a terrible desert.” His hyperbole is intended to cast blame on the Jacobin leadership for all of the problems facing France, even though they had been in charge of the government for only a few months at that time. Writing as a victim, Buzot wanted his readers to share his sense of outrage at the treatment of the Girondin fugitives, despite the fact that they, like Gorsas, were living hors la loi (outside the law). Despairing of the French penchant for “inconstancy,” their passing from one extreme to another, Buzot dreamed of a legitimate tribune to judge him and his Girondin friends in a fair manner. He imagined such a trial as “a beautiful spectacle for all of Europe,” when the fugitives would be able to tell the truth about their persecutors and receive justice. Finally, Buzot wrote, humanity would be revenged. He also acknowledged that while such thoughts pleased him greatly, he entertained little hope that they would ever materialize. If France could not be a just country, Buzot wrote that he would desire nothing more than to live in “a poor corner of the earth in Switzerland or America . . . unknown in the most profound isolation of independence and peace.” Indeed, at one time he and Manon Roland had entertained the idea of fleeing to either Switzerland or America, but had decided, not surprisingly, that their duty was to remain in France. He added that, despite his cruel treatment, France was still dear to him and he would miss it should he leave never to return. However, he wrote, “a French monarch shall never be my master.”6 Closing his introduction, Buzot affirmed that he would devote the remainder of his life to leaving a truthful account of the principal events of the revolution and to uncovering the evidence of the atrocities committed against the proscribed deputies. “Providence . . . must be justified by their torment, or all moral principles have been annihilated on the earth.”7 The opening words of the main body of Buzot’s memoirs leave little doubt as to his state of mind. “They are no more! Talents, patriotism, virtue—crime has devoured all! And when they are dead, the slander attaches to their bloody cadavers; it employs the blackest treachery, the most cowardly lies to insult, dishonor, to defame their memory.” Who were these men, Buzot asked, “persecuted to the tomb? They are those in the Constituent Assembly or in the Legislative Assembly in Paris or in the departments who have defended with the most courage and perseverance the rights of the people who persecute them today.” Continuing in the same tone, Buzot answered that

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they are those in the National Convention surrounded by the populace of “this debased capital,” who struggled for eight months against “all the vices and excesses imaginable,” and braved the menaces and outrages to protect their properties and their persons and save liberty for their nation. He noted that they are the same men who, before the revolution, lived happy and free, “far from the torments of ambition or the agitation of intrigue.” They were those who personally had the least to gain from “a new order of things,” Buzot declared, adding that their cruel treatment was “a strange destiny for such generous men.”8 Comparing the despotism of kings and the aristocracy with the “daggers of the ferocious people,” he wondered if they could be the same people he remembered from the early and hopeful days of the revolution. Perhaps wistfully, Buzot recalled their better morals and kinder ways, their generosity, dignity, and respect for the rights of others. “It was then, and only then, that it was beautiful, that it was glorious, to have the esteem and the confidence of the French people,” he wrote, citing “this brilliant epoch of the revolution.” His words echo those of the poet Wordsworth, who wrote of the early revolutionary period that “to be young was very heaven.” Reflecting on the deplorable changes that had occurred since those early days, Buzot asked if it were even possible to refer to such “imbeciles” corrupted by the government as “people.”9 Turning next to a comparison between Robespierre’s faction and the Girondins, Buzot wrote that his friends would never have had the audacity to govern in the name of liberty using the means of despots. He cited the Montagnards’ use of slander, corruption, and terror to divide the citizens. “Their errors are irreparable,” he warned, acknowledging his sarcastic tone, “while ours can be corrected. In their system, it is necessary to imprison, pillage, kill immediately. . . . We would punish only the guilty, encourage the weak, honor the good, and in all things make the law equal.” Buzot explained that he and his friends felt the most persecuted by those “whom we had cherished the most,” citing the rapid changes, often within twenty-four hours, that had taken place within the majority of the departments. He noted the corruption and lack of unity among the citizens of each department and called attention to the spies sent from Paris to sow discord through bribery, especially in the commercial centers. Buzot criticized the “superiority” of Paris, and deplored the outrageous treatment of those provincial cities which had favored the proscribed Girondins, the “military despotism” employed against the deputies who had been chosen by the departments to represent them in the National Convention. “The contract between the representative and those he represents is reciprocal or it is nul,” Buzot declared. He noted that the departments

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had asked for a convocation of primary assemblies to elect new deputies to replace the proscribed ones, stating that such replacements could contribute to a stable government and good order. However, he added, those still serving in the National Convention slandered the intentions of the departments and accused them of “royalism” or “federalism.”10 Buzot defended the liberty of the press, the safeguard of all other liberties, and noted that it had all but disappeared by 1793, when only the “infamous Jacobin journals” could be found. These, such as Le Père Duchêsne, were filled with “the slander of good people” and audacious lies to pervert the morality of the people. He recalled that Gorsas’s press had been pillaged twice before 2 June 1793, when it had been suppressed. “It is by these first attacks on the liberty of the press that the greatest coups are prepared,” he wrote. After 2 June, he found the radical press even more “barbarous and disgustingly filthy, as in Le Père Duchêsne,” or “beastly and vile” as in Garat[’s], which circulated freely in France.11 Buzot (who must have had a copy with him) quoted from a letter of 8 June 1793, written by Manon Roland from the Abbaye prison to Garat, the interior minister, on this very subject. Her letter referred to the colporteur (newsmonger), who had announced the great anger of Le Pere Duchêsne about herself: “[T]his B. of Roland who was at L’Abbaye; this grand conspiracy discovered among the Rolandists, Buzotiers, Pétionistes, Girondins with the rebels of La Vendée, the agents of England; it is necessary to find old Roland to make him pay for his crimes.” Manon complained that the deluge of filthy repetitious epithets about her had provoked maltreatment. “Garat!” she exclaimed. “I am reporting this insult to you.” She further accused Garat of cowardice for allowing such slanders and, obviously relishing the opportunity to express herself, called for vengeance against him, concluding her letter thus: “In any case, receive this farewell that I send as a vulture to gnaw on your heart.” 12 Buzot blamed himself for “elevating” Garat (Interior) and Pache (War) to ministerial offices and regretted contributing to the success of these “odious choices.” However, Pache (who had become the mayor of Paris by spring 1793) had seemed like “an intelligent and hard-working administrator” and Garat had been “a man of letters” before the revolution. Buzot wrote that he realized too late the hypocritical nature of Pache and the weakness of Garat’s character.13 Citing the ensuing disorder as a recipe for “counter-revolution,” Buzot noted that despotic governments ruled through division, corruption, and terror. It began with the disorganization of the army and the corruption of “the public treasure,” assignats “poured out into the greedy hands of the soldiers.” That was followed by licentious publications filled with disgusting

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maxims and slanders against good people, and then barbarous executions. Buzot warned that the disorder and lack of good military leaders could only benefit the enemy.14 Buzot not only criticized the “outrageous superiority” of Paris, but he greatly regretted the damages suffered in the various departments. In Lyon, “the terrible instruments of force and tyranny deployed against this generous city” had almost destroyed “its antique opulence and the superb monuments that the hand of time, guided by the genius of the beaux-arts” had created. As noted earlier, Buzot had no firsthand knowledge of what had transpired in Lyon and he greatly exaggerated the damage inflicted upon the city. And Bordeaux, “so celebrated in the history of the revolution by its love of liberty . . . by its attachment to the law, to good order, to justice,” and the department of the Gironde had been subjugated by famine and corrupted by promises of wheat and assignats. Buzot blamed Tallien, who formed a so-called “military commission,” which, according to Buzot, was little more than a group of armed bandits. Here again, Buzot’s opinion was based on his natural prejudice against the Jacobin agents in the area. While Tallien and Isabeau did rely on “a highly personalized form of administration based on firm contacts with leading Montagnards in the Department [of the Gironde],” they were criticized by the Committee of Public Safety in Paris for their lack of decisive action in the area. They would be replaced by Marc-Antoine Jullien, who moved quickly to punish any suspected enemies of the revolution.15 Returning to the topic of “counter-revolution,” Buzot explained that its success required the silencing of courageous patriots and enlightened citizens through the use of terror and arrest. Especially dangerous to tyrants were men of inflexible character, Buzot wrote, obviously referring to himself and his Girondin friends. He concluded this section of his memoirs by declaring that if the Girondins had followed the recipe for “counter-revolution” and had committed all of the crimes of which they had been accused, then certainly, they would have been “counter-revolutionaries.” But, of course, they had not. Rather, it was the government in Paris that had acted in such a manner, destroying the revolution in the process. “The hand of time shall never efface the blood with which you are covered,” warned Buzot.16 Buzot admitted that his thoughts were dominated by the idea of avenging the injustices inflicted not only on himself and the Girondins, but on all of the innocent and suffering people of France as well. He desperately wanted to see the tyrants, especially those in Paris, punished by just laws and their treasonous acts revealed. Addressing his friends, Buzot wrote: “Pétion, Barbaroux, Guadet, Lepage, Louvet, and you Salles [sic], and all of you who survive the persecution and the tyranny of our persecutors, my duties are yours, your oaths are mine.”

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Dwelling on the loss of his liberty, the destruction of his friends, and the “awful thought” of his wife without any means of support, Buzot lamented “the misfortune to be born French!” Although he was in love with Manon Roland, Buzot regretted his wife’s circumstances, which had resulted from his actions against the central government. Nevertheless, he could suffer it all with resignation and with courage, he wrote, until the moment came for revenge. It was this hope that kept him going, that consoled him in his misery. Writing that only sadness remained for himself and the other fugitives, Buzot described them as “orphans on the earth, abandoned by all, strangers to all . . . all that which advances toward us is unfeeling and cold as the marble of a tomb.” He saw little awaiting them other than “a vast desert where our friends are flung without a Christian burial and without honor.”17 Buzot called upon the powers of the earth to listen to the voice of nature, “the legislator of God,” and to avenge the injustices perpetrated by the radical government. “What shall become of humanity, morals, virtue, if Robespierre, Barrère, and Danton die peacefully in their beds?” he asked. “Dear ghosts . . .” he continued, “friends of liberty—good Brissot, Gensonné, Vergniaud, Fonfréde, Ducos, Lacaze, Lasource, Viger, Fauchet, Valazé, Lehardi, Duprat, Mainvielle, Duperret, Duchâstel, Gorsas, Biroteau, Cussy, Sillery, Carra, Coustard, Lidon, Gardien, Lesterp-Beauvais, Chambon, Antiboul, Boilleau, and you, virtuous Roland! Honorable victims of the tyranny, you shall be revenged!” Buzot assured his departed friends that their “deaths were beautiful,” and that posterity would venerate their names as he and the other fugitives did; and he made sure that they would be remembered by listing them in his memoirs. As a student of history, Buzot well knew that it is the victors who write such histories, but he also realized that his memoir might one day serve as a counterbalance to the Jacobin writings about the period. Buzot then addressed “our dear colleagues” who still waited in the prisons of Paris. He wrote that “we speak often of your suffering, your friendship, your courage; it is the subject of our most frequent discussions. Yes, friends, the scaffold is [your reward] for your innocence and integrity.”18 At this point in his memoirs, Buzot wrote, “I have finished; my heart cannot suffer these sentiments which oppress me.” He found it cruel to suffer in silence and asked God what more remained for him. Hope had departed and he searched “in vain for the things that were dear to me, that made me love life, and most a heart that knows and responds and reanimates my life from its sweet flame,” probably an anguished reference to the loss of Manon Roland. “All is lost for me,” he wrote, adding that such words were terrible and plunged him into nothingness.19 Here it is apparent that Buzot’s natural melancholy had deepened into a state of depression.

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Turning next to more practical matters, Buzot addressed his wife as “you, poor unfortunate,” and wondered where she was and what would become of her “forsaken on the earth, because I sense we shall never see each other again.” He expressed the hope that, when the news of his death arrived, she would remain courageous and not waste any tears on his ashes. Buzot also thanked the good people who would help and console his wife: “May Heaven reward their tender friendship.” He hoped that they would continue to help her until such time as she might claim his confiscated goods. Buzot knew that his wife’s circumstances would be even more difficult after his death. When they had married, in 1784, her dowry had been comparatively meager, and he had borrowed money to establish their household. In the same paragraph, Buzot remembered “good Joseph, my faithful servant. I have not forgotten your care of me in my misfortune,” he wrote. “You wanted to share my exile, my suffering, my dangers and my death. Honorable young man, I thank you again.” He asked Joseph to continue serving his wife. Buzot also thanked “good Marie,” who had made his childhood happier. Addressing them and unnamed others as “my friends,” Buzot wrote that although he could no longer help them, he would love them always. “Receive my thanks and my last farewell. I cannot name you here, because your generosity would be a crime; but virtue is its own reward and the memory of the good that one does carries a sweet joy to the soul, of which tyranny cannot alter the charm. Farewell, all of you, farewell!”20 In a postscript to his memoirs, Buzot asked that the manuscript, along with some others in Brittany, be given to his wife to be printed. If his wife were no longer alive, then the dépositaire of the manuscripts should have them printed. A second postscript mentioned that “a good friend that I have in Evreux [Jérôme Letellier] has in his hands a precious manuscript [Voyage en Suisse by Manon Roland] that I begged him to give in two or three years to the young daughter of the person who was the author of it, if I am no longer here.”21 This request referred to Eudora, the Rolands’ daughter. The Voyage en Suisse was later given to Eudora or her father-in-law, M. Champagneux, and published in the edition of the Oeuvres de Madame Roland, 3 volumes, by Champagneux in 1800.22 Although this postscript marked the formal end of Buzot’s memoirs, he apparently decided to append another section titled Notes sur le Troisième Cahier. In the original manuscript in the Bibliothèque Nationale, the Notes follow immediately after the main body of the memoir, but in Dauban’s 1866 published version, the Notes are incorporated within the text.23 The Notes amount to twenty-four short sections or “articles of advice” and provide,

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among other things, revealing glimpses of the animosities that existed between the Girondins and Jacobins. After reminding his readers about the deplorable conditions that existed in France even before the proscription of the Girondins, Buzot defended his friend, Jérôme Pétion, as an “excellent patriot.” The people of Paris had abandoned and persecuted Pétion, who had once served as their elected mayor. They had dishonored this public servant, Buzot wrote, adding that if Pétion had been as ambitious as rumored, he could have remained popular with the people. That he chose instead to stand up for his principles had cost him dearly. Buzot next passionately defended Brissot, who by this time had been executed in Paris. Emphasizing Brissot’s “simplicity” and his lack of “dissimulation,” Buzot recalled that his friends used to laugh and say: “Of all the Brissotins possible, he [Brissot] was the least Brissotin. In the Constituent Assembly, he was accused, persecuted like a republican; in the Convention, he was accused as a royalist! At all times, he spoke, wrote, published, and suffered for liberty, and he died for it. His life was that of a true ‘philosophe’; he must also finish like Socrates.” Claiming the same for himself and the other fugitives, Buzot wrote: “He who wills the best for men must expect their hatred. It is a truth attested to by all of history.”24 In a further attempt to explain the enmity between himself and Robespierre, Buzot recounted a conversation that took place when both men served on the twenty-four-member Committee of Public Security, which preceded the Committee of Public Safety. After several useless debates, and in the presence of a hundred other deputies, Buzot reproached Robespierre for his conduct, his slanders against honorable men. “And I, for example, I said to him, can you in good conscience, can you here, publicly, in the presence of your friends, indict mine, accuse me of a lack of integrity, of ambition, of intrigues, slander my patriotism and the honesty of my intentions?” To which question, according to Buzot, Robespierre replied: “No, no, I esteem you, because I know you very well; but you have mistaken our reckoning, and our views, that is all.” Not satisfied, Buzot continued: “How can you fail to recognize the good faith, the integrity the patriotism of Roland? Do you dare to say here that Roland sold out to foreigners? You can’t have forgotten the services that he rendered you, if he was your most intimate friend during the Constituent Assembly?” “No, I don’t accuse Roland of selling out to foreigners,” Robespierre countered, “but I stopped seeing him from the moment when he adopted Brissot’s opinion on the war.” Buzot interrupted: “And Brissot, Brissot, you know his

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honorable poverty, you accuse him of having sold his pen and his talents to the enemies of France!” “I don’t believe that he is corrupt,” answered Robespierre, “but his opinion on the war demonstrates to me that he is not a patriot.” Buzot wrote that he was going to respond in anger, but since their conversation had caused the group of deputies around them to fall silent and listen with interest, he decided otherwise. He reported that Robespierre then departed, headed “to the Jacobins [club] to recommence his odious accusations.”25 Buzot made no secret of his feelings about Robespierre, going so far as to write: “For this man with the face of a cat, I have an invincible aversion.” He added that the greatest difference between Pétion and himself in earlier times was that Pétion “had a particular deference for Robespierre.”26 These comments are perhaps surprising, because it must be remembered that Buzot, Pétion, and Robespierre had all been regular attendees at the Rolands’ salon in 1791. Meeting there several times a week, they had agreed more than disagreed in those days, when Manon Roland had referred to the three deputies to the Constituent Assembly as “the incorruptibles.”27 That, of course, was before France had become involved in wars with other European powers, wars favored by the Girondins but denounced by Robespierre and the Jacobins. Buzot left no doubt about his adamant distrust of Paris, writing that “it is an incontestable truth that the city of Paris, inexhaustible source of all the misfortunes of France, has caused the ruin of this great and sublime revolution.” He regretted that the National Assembly had moved its meeting place from Versailles to Paris, where the capital city’s influence had led to violence. The revolution belonged to all of France, Buzot wrote, but by concentrating the government in Paris, it had become corrupted, “irritable and restless like the inhabitants.” As a result, the provinces had been reduced to a state of servitude, a situation that Buzot deplored. “What is Paris, in comparison with all of France?” he asked, adding, “It is because I love my country, her good fortune and liberty, that I have detested a city where all the most vile passions” have had a disastrous influence on good social order.28 Among the evil influences Buzot attributed to Paris were “the provocations printed in Marat’s journal, L’Ami du Peuple. He proposed a law against such “provocateurs to murder,” noting that such a law would cause “the inhabitants of the Mountain, the Jacobins, and the Parisian sections to flee.” Buzot wrote that atrocious lies had been spread about him, but he could not defend himself against such slanders, because those accused of crimes against the state could not publish their defenses. He objected strenuously to the lack of liberty to speak, write, or publish freely, and added sarcastically that Danton had once declared: “Liberty of the press or death.”29

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In a bitter, sarcastic tone, Buzot wrote about the so-called “sovereignty” of the people, stating that such sovereignty was enforced in the sectional assemblies of Paris, “composed of imbeciles or scoundrels, who would monopolize audaciously the will of all Parisians, and some factions reduced to the smallest number of partisan or ignorant men.” The sovereignty of the people, Buzot warned, will be lost “in the pestilential abyss of the Jacobins.”30 “Half of all Frenchmen detest the current government, but fear fills all of their hearts,” he wrote. “One cannot believe how much these revolutionary ideas have changed the ways of the country. The natural bonds . . . between parents and their children . . . morality . . . the religion of their parents” have been obliterated. Buzot found the new revolutionary religion, which extolled eternal nature and reason, to be lacking in substance and consolation, “a horrible profanation of the most precious sentiments of the human heart.”31 After the Legislative Assembly had been replaced by the National Convention, Buzot had become even more disillusioned with what passed for the rule of law under the revolutionary government. However, he wrote that, “forced to choose between two extremes equally opposed to my particular opinions,” he still preferred the party which at least considered the rights of the people to the one that “absolutely annihilates” them. “It is necessary to choose between the good or the bad genie of France: a king struggling for his family against the liberty of the people or a people debating on the debris of an imaginary liberty against the royal family.” Buzot wrote that it was only natural that Louis XVI would not willingly give up his power and accept new institutions. He wished that the “scoundrels who have inhumanely killed the unfortunate monarch” had been in his place, because their crimes had been more audacious than the king’s. Declaring that it had been a mistake to leave Louis XVI on the throne, Buzot explained that “the constitution of 1791 had offered only that the two parties, the state and the prince, would be continually at war. Instead of establishing peace between them, which made for reciprocal security and good fortune for all, the constitution of 1791 provided a state of necessary discord, which could finish only by the destruction of one or the other.”32 This had been the unfortunate result of the constitution, once so enthusiastically endorsed. Defending the Girondins against charges of federalism, Buzot wondered if it were a crime to cherish the kind of government under which “Americans lived happy and free.” However, he also acknowledged that France and America were very different kinds of countries. According to Buzot, the lack of safeguards in the constitution of 1791 and the “lack of moderation” in the French people would not allow for the creation of a republic like that in

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America.33 Buzot and his friends imagined America as a refuge, almost a paradise, and had even considered going there to escape the Jacobin Terror. In a letter of 2 August 1792 to Bernardin St. Pierre, Brissot, who had visited America in 1788, expressed his enthusiasm: “two hemispheres with this legend: French-American Society—the best of two worlds.” Brissot was referring to an organization founded in 1787, the Socíeté Gallo-Américaine, to promote the growth of Franco-American trade and the free exchange of information and ideas. An earlier letter from Brissot to Lanthenas had referred to America as “our refuge.”34 While it is doubtful that either Buzot or Brissot literally envisioned establishing federalism in France, evidence does exist upon which such suspicions were based. Their enemies cited Roland’s plan in the summer of 1792 to move the government to safety in southern France. Barbaroux’s unauthorized summons to the fédérés from Marseille, as well as the Girondin proposal for a national referendum on the sentencing of the king, were also considered suspect. Therefore, the provincial unrest in the spring of 1793, which resulted in rebellions in Caen, Marseille, Lyon, and Bordeaux, equated charges of federalism with treason and counter-revolution. Since it was known that Buzot regarded federalism as a legitimate form of government, and he had made no secret of his distrust of the central government in Paris, his enemies felt justified in accusing him of the crime of federalism.35 Turning once more to “the people” of France, Buzot claimed that no one respected or cherished humanity more than he did, but he deplored the cruelty and barbarity committed in their name, the killing of Frenchmen by their own countrymen. He asked whether those who suffer are not also “the people,” and answered his question by noting the restrictions imposed by such a generic expression: “The people in France, they are the sans-culottes; that word says it all.” Citing Robespierre and the Jacobins, along with “some imbeciles and cowards,” he asked how he could respect these people. He refused to honor the tyrants who were oppressing and ravaging France in the name of “the people,” but he did acknowledge that there existed a great number of respectable people, who desired a new order of things and detested the current state of affairs.36 “The meaning of the word ‘good’ is determined by that which follows,” Buzot wrote, and noted the moral decline that had occurred from the time of the Constituent Assembly to that of the National Convention. If the French had known the true state of the city of Paris before the elections, he opined, the Convention would never have held its meetings there.37

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Toward the end of the Notes sur le Troisième Cahier, Buzot mentioned that he and his friends had been in Brittany near Quimper, when they received word that some petitions on their behalf sent to the government had been refused and that the Revolutionary Tribunal, and the scaffold, awaited them in Paris. Assured that their cause was lost, Buzot predicted that the day would come when another king would be proclaimed in Paris, and perhaps even the restoration of the nobility, parliaments, and intendants. “All is prepared for that,” he warned, and added sarcastically that a king might be a preferable substitute for the Committee of Public Safety.38 The last article in the Notes makes it quite clear that Buzot thought his death was inevitable. Citing those who had already been captured and then executed in Paris, he affirmed that it was preferable to face “an honorable and uncertain danger rather than an inevitable and shameful one.” Perhaps he was recalling the words written by Manon Roland in one of her letters to him, in which she had warned him to be careful and “not to allow the mercenaries’ hands to touch you, to die as a free man as you have lived.”39 The final words in Buzot’s memoir reflect the hopelessness that he must have been feeling. “We can do nothing,” he wrote, “because all attempts for us are impossible. We could end up at Paris!”40

Notes 1. C. A. Dauban, editor, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion et Mémoires de Buzot & de Barbaroux accompagnés de Notes Inédites de Buzot et de nombreux documents inédits sur Barbaroux, Buzot, Brissot, etc. (Paris: Henri Plon, 1866), introduction: v, vi. 2. Mémoires de François-Nicolas-Louis Buzot. N. A. F. 1730, 19. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. Note: N. A. F. 1730 contains the memoirs of Buzot and some letters from Madame Roland to Buzot (pp.1–79); the memoirs of Pétion (pp. 80–114); and the memoirs of Louvet (pp. 137–62). 3. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 19. 4. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 20. 5. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 21–22. 6. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 22–24. 7. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 24. 8. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 26. 9. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 26–27. 10. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 28–29. 11. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 30–32. 12. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 56–58.

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13. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, 78–79. See also Paul R. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire: The Federalist Revolt in the French Revolution (University Park, Penn.: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003), 34, 66. 14. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 60. 15. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 61–62. See also Alan Forrest, Society and Politics in Revolutionary Bordeaux (London: Oxford University Press, 1975), 236–7. 16. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 62–63. 17. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 65–66. 18. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 67. 19. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 68. 20. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 68. See also Timothy Tackett, Becoming a Revolutionary: The Deputies of the French National Assembly and the Emergence of a Revolutionary Culture (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1996), 41, 314. The amount of his wife’s dowry in 1784 had been 14,000 livres, worth only 11,060 livres in 1787. 21. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 68–69; and Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, 103. 22. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, 103. 23. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, “Notes sur le troisième cahier,” 70–79. 24. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 70–71, article 2. 25. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 71, article 3. 26. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 74, article 13. 27. Cl. Perroud, editor, Mémoires de Madame Roland. (Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1900–1902), I: 256–57. 28. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 71–72, article 4. 29. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 72–73, article 5. 30. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 73, article 6. 31. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 73–74, articles 8, 10, 12. 32. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 74–75, article 13. 33. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 76, article 17. 34. Papiers Roland. N. A. F. 9534, 352, 45. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 35. M. J. Sydenham, The Girondins. (London: University of London, Athlone Press, 1961), 194–96. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire, Chapter 4. 36. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 76–77, article 18. 37. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 78, articles 20, 21. 38. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 78–79, articles 22, 23. 39. Perroud, Mémoires de Madame Roland, II: 269–70; and Correspondance 1793, Madame Roland à Buzot.” N. A. F. 1730, 12–15 (letter of 7 August 1793). Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 40. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 79, article 24.

C H A P T E R

F I V E



Barbaroux’s Account (1791–1793)

The sections of Barbaroux’s memoir that survived, in addition to his correspondence, not only differ in content from those of Buzot, but in tone and writing style as well. Born in 1767, Barbaroux was younger than Buzot (1760), Louvet (1758), and Pétion (1756), and hailed from the southern part of France, while the other three fugitives came from the north. Judging from his written records, Barbaroux exerted a great deal of energy trying to ensure that Marseille and the Midi were not shortchanged by the central government in Paris. He was also concerned about what he perceived as the less than forthright dealings among the various officials in the Bouches-duRhône department. His level of frustration is evident in the descriptions of his efforts to establish clear communication with those outside of Paris. Barbaroux’s tone is much less melancholy than Buzot’s, and his writing style is not as eloquent or abstract. Like Pétion, Barbaroux seemed more concerned with the practical details of events and situations, primarily those that affected his constituency. To phrase it another way, Buzot’s view encompassed the whole, while Barbaroux’s focused on the particulars. These differences may be attributed to age and experience as well as to personality. Buzot, as previously noted, has been described as proud, severe, sensitive, melancholic, and honest, while Barbaroux was characterized by some as young, ardent, and impetuous, but by others as shrewd and just. From reading his memoirs, it is apparent that Barbaroux was greatly concerned with the course of the revolution in all of France and that, like his Girondin friends, he deplored the excesses of the central government in Paris.1 Different they may

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have been, but Buzot in his memoir invoked three names “with particular affection”: Brissot, Pétion, and Barbaroux. Noting that Brissot was now dead, Buzot had written that the two others, Pétion and Barbaroux, were his “companions,” his friends in the fugitive life.2 Barbaroux considered himself an ardent republican. By 1790, at the age of twenty-three, he had become a founder of the Jacobin Club in Marseille, serving as its secretary and as the editor of the club’s newspaper.3 Dispatched to Paris in early 1792 to represent the interests of Marseille in the Legislative Assembly, he became the first deputy from the department of the Bouchesdu-Rhône to be elected to the National Convention.4 Although he worked diligently to protect the interests of his constituents in Marseille, his early criticism of Robespierre and his call for a referendum on Louis XVI’s ultimate fate caused him to fall into disfavor among the more radical members of his delegation. The collection of letters from Barbaroux to the municipality of Marseille in 1792–1793 provides evidence of his efforts to serve both his nation and constituents (in Marseille). According to a letter from a “Mr. Liran,” attached to the collection in the Bibliothèque Nationale and dated 2 May 1868, Barbaroux’s letters had been discovered in the archives of the city hall in Marseille. The letters, which for some reason had belonged in 1792 to a general in the army, were addressed to various members of the municipality of Marseille. Another collection of Barbaroux’s letters, published by C. A. Dauban in 1866, includes some but not all of the B.N. letters as well as a number of letters written early in 1792.5 In a letter to the municipality of Marseille dated 8 January 1793, Barbaroux noted the receipt of the excellent appeals from the Consul General of the Commune and those from the sections in Marseille, and he assured them that he found their appeals more convincing than those submitted from the department of the Bouches-du-Rhône.6 This letter and others are indicative of the enmity that existed between the Jacobin Club and the sections in Marseille. While the Jacobin Club favored Robespierre and the Montagnard faction, the moderates in the sectional assemblies opposed them. Moïse Bayle, one of the members in the Bouches-du-Rhône delegation, was an “ardent Jacobin,” who had openly favored the execution of the king, while Barbaroux had called for a referendum. The Jacobin Club in Marseille, regarding a referendum as little more than a delaying tactic, expelled both Barbaroux and François Rebecqui, his fellow delegate from the Bouches-du-Rhône delegation. This divisive issue led the Marseille Jacobin Club to adopt a motto in January 1793: “Death to the tyrant; no federalism.”

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This is one of the first times that the word “federalism” was used as “a pejorative epithet,” but surely not the last time.7 In a letter to the municipality of Marseille dated 23 January 1793, the day on which Roland resigned from his position as interior minister, Barbaroux wrote to defend himself against false accusations from his opponents. He suggested that such ease in casting blame on those who have served their country well foretold “the overthrow of the Republic.” He also assured them that he had enclosed a certificate verifying the deposit of their appeals with the Committee on Petitions.8 Two letters written by Barbaroux on 30 January 1793 address the provision of adequate supplies for the French forces and war with England. He wrote that he had spoken in the National Convention that very morning about the necessity of provisions for all of the troops. He deplored “the scandalous brigandage involved in supplying the troops” and blamed the Minister of War for buying supplies in Paris, where they cost three times as much as elsewhere. He added that his remarks, without doubt, would provide his enemies with more reasons to proclaim him “the enemy of Paris.” Changing his tone, Barbaroux then explained that he would speak soon in the Convention about the importance of fortifying Corsica, where enemies could intercept French commerce.9 In the second letter of 30 January, Barbaroux reported that the Minister of Foreign Affairs had spoken that morning about the order to return to France, given to the French ambassador to London “Citoyen Chauvelin,” who had subsequently done so. The ambassador had offered little hope for peace; therefore, Barbaroux advised that “we must prepare for war, especially the port of Marseille, which must display enough zeal to assure victory.” If Spain and Holland united with England, he wrote, then Pache, the Minister of War, must provide enough ships to overtake the four hundred English vessels already in the Mediterranean. Barbaroux accused Pache, who would be replaced in February by General Beurnonville, of leaving the Midi undefended, and he declared that more troops were needed to fight against the forces of the king of Sardinia and Spain. In the same letter, Barbaroux also addressed the matter of the battalion of fédérés from Marseille still remaining in Paris and their “mistreatment” by the minister Pache. He complained that the extreme left and the other delegates from the Bouches-du-Rhône—Granet, Moïse Bayle, Pierre Baille, and Gasparin—had not helped him defend the right of the battalion to remain in Paris; only the deputies Buzot, Grangeneuve, and Chambon had supported him. Barbaroux vowed, however, that he would demand financial reimbursement for Marseille from the military committee.10

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Barbaroux issued warnings about the Orléans faction in a letter written on 31 January 1793. He felt that some of the army generals, namely Biron, Kellerman, Servan, Laclan, and Latouche, might be unduly influenced by the Orléans faction.11 This letter was written several months before the National Convention took action against the Orléans family. Philippe d’Orléans, who used the name Philippe Egalité during the Revolution, was the cousin and the opponent of Louis XVI, and he had a following among some republicans. However, on 8 April 1793, Philippe and the Orléans family were ordered by the National Convention to be imprisoned in Fort St. Jean in Marseille. Neither the Jacobin leaders in Marseille nor the moderates were pleased to have a royal prisoner in their city; some even feared that Philippe, with the aid of radical Jacobins, could instigate a coup, return to Paris, and head the radical government.12 Barbaroux announced in a letter of 2 February 1793 that France had declared war on England and Holland, and he reported that general Dumouriez had already left to take charge of the troops. Although Barbaroux prophesied “a new career open to the glory of this general,” such was not to be— Dumouriez’s forces were defeated in March and he subsequently deserted to the Austrians. In the same letter, Barbaroux reported that the Minister of Justice had issued orders to buy all of the foreign wheat available in Marseille, as well as in Dunkirk and Bayonne, and he took credit for having introduced this motion in the National Convention. Barbaroux also pointed out the importance of providing adequate supplies to the French army in the Mediterranean area, since commerce would be interrupted in the north by the English squadrons.13 The tangled complexities of commercial matters in Marseille dominate the letters of 6 and 25 February 1793. Barbaroux’s impatience with the constant bickering and accusations is evident. “Be persuaded that this business, which shall terminate, I hope, my career in the National Convention, will be treated by me with all the attention, zeal, and all means of which I am capable.” He added that his life was “truly sad” and that “the anxiety and work have undermined my health. . . . My resignation is therefore necessary.” This rather uncharacteristic attitude on his part is followed by a tirade against the Commune of Paris, which had demanded an advance of four million for provisions to deter a threatened insurrection scheduled for 1 March. He cited the unfairness of such a demand, especially when the departments’ requests had been refused.14 The letter of 25 February recounted Barbaroux’s efforts during the past fifteen days to obtain the necessary funds, amounting to 2,200,000 livres, to buy foreign wheat. He criticized again the Commune of Paris, where the sit-

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uation had worsened due to food shortages and higher prices; the populace was becoming angrier by the day. Even “the award of seven million to Paris” had not calmed the unrest, he reported, and the sections were meeting even as he wrote, at eleven o’clock that night. Barbaroux feared the worst, correctly as it turned out. He noted that a warrant for his arrest had been issued only the day before. However, despite the dangers he faced in Paris, Barbaroux avowed that his only concerns were the opinions of his fellow citizens. He expressed shock that after all of his hard work for the department and for the republic, the Jacobins in Marseille had declared him a traitor.15 That was the hardest thing for him to accept, not only at that time but later as well, as he made clear in his memoir. Barbaroux’s unedited memoir was published in 1822 by Badouin Frères in Paris, after his son Charles Ogé Barbaroux (1792–1867) had given it to the publisher. The 1822 version also contained “enlightening historical notes” by Berville and Barrière; it is this version, with the addition of Barbaroux’s correspondence and assorted other documents, that comprises C. A. Dauban’s 1866 publication. However, as Dauban noted, the first part of the memoir and the first chapter of the second part were not included, because the missing sections had been deposited with someone in Brittany and had not been found.16 It was on 5 September 1792 that Barbaroux had been nominated by the electoral assembly meeting in Avignon as a representative, or deputy, to the National Convention. Out of a possible 776 votes, he received 775. After receiving this enthusiastic endorsement, Barbaroux dramatically, and indeed phophetically, affirmed his intentions to the assembly: “I accept. My soul is that of a free man. . . . I shall deliver France from this scourge [of tyranny], or I shall die. Before I leave [for the National Convention], I shall sign my death sentence, I shall designate all the objects of my affections, I shall indicate all my goods, I shall place a dagger on the desk. It will be destined to pierce my heart if I am disloyal for one moment to the cause of the people.”17 Others elected by the Avignon assembly included François Rebecqui; Gasparin d’Orange; Moïse Bayle; Pierre Baille; Lauze-Deperret; Mouraille, the mayor of Marseille; Duprat le jeune, the mayor of Avignon; Rovère ainé; Granet; Durand; and Carra of Paris. Barbaroux would write later in his memoirs that not all of them had turned out to be wise choices. Because he was old as well as deaf, Mouraille could not accept his nomination. Duprat had been a brave soldier in the civil wars of the region and had served as an impartial magistrate in his public functions, but Barbaroux wrote that “his kind would always be persecuted by the counter-revolutionaries.” He then noted that both he and Rebecqui had subsequently become proscrits. Granet he

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described as being a sort of wolf in sheep’s clothing, “a man of blood disguised as a philosophe,” who did the Mountain’s bidding, but refused to serve on committees so as to escape blame for his actions. Barbaroux described Moïse Bayle as “an inept man,” for whom all opinions were equal—he played to both sides to curry favor. To sum up Pierre Baille, Barbaroux declared that one quote would make his point. When Baille had been proconsul at Toulon, he had written: “All goes well here; bread shortage.” Gasparin had been an infantry officer before he became a deputy to the Legislative Assembly and the National Convention. Gasparin later demanded and obtained from Pache, the war minister, a position as adjutant general. Barbaroux attributed his success to Montagnard support and noted that Gasparin currently filled the role of “chef de brigade.”18 Barbaroux defended Deperret as “an ardent republican, an honest man, a good father, a good friend. He had all the qualities worthy of public esteem.” Rovère’s interest seemed to focus more on personal matters than on liberty, according to Barbaroux, while Carra was a man who wanted the right thing, but did not dare to do it.19 Jean-Louis Carra’s journal, Annales Patriotiques, which he had co-founded with Louis-Sébastien Mércier, could have served the cause of liberty better, Barbaroux declared, if Carra had been stronger. However, the pages of his journal appeared sufficiently fervent toward the revolutionary cause after the tumultuous events of 10 August 1792: emblazoned across all of the pages of Annales Patriotiques, Carra had demanded “pikes, pikes, and more pikes!” In addition, Roland, when he had served as Minister of the Interior, had appointed Carra, a library employee, and Sébastien Roch Nicolas Chamfort, a playwright, journalist, speech writer, and aphorist, as the first co-directors of the Bibliothèque Nationale in August 1792. Carra, a Girondin and Chamfort, a Girondin sympathizer, served as directors during the transformation of the formerly royal library into a national public institution.20 Carra would be among those Girondins who were executed in Paris in October 1793. Barbaroux’s workload had been heavy even before his election to the National Convention. He wrote that the work “never ceased to multiply” because Marseille was in “contestation” with all of the ministers. The municipality, which had ardently supported the revolution, considered itself ill-served by the central government in Paris. He cited problems with arms, food supplies, commerce, establishments in Africa and the Levant, fishing, manufacturing, money, in effect, “for all the objects of our industry and our needs.” His letters cited earlier clearly indicate that Barbaroux found himself in a difficult situation, attacked on all sides by disgruntled officials. He also commented on the “vivacity” of the inhabitants of Marseille, ready “at every

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hour to engage in new fights,” workers’ claims regarding frequent insurrections, and various incompatibilities among different groups of citizens. Barbaroux complained that his work was “one hundred times interrupted” by the instability of the situation. Barbaroux’s description of his constituents is a fair one. The social divisions within the city were “deep-rooted” and intense, which influenced the course of the revolution locally and added to Barbaroux’s difficulties. As historian William Scott has written, “a particularly rapid progress towards extremism on the part of the revolutionary leaders was paralleled by a stubborn current of social conservatism among their richer fellow citizens.” The citizens of Marseille became even more polarized after the federalist revolt of 1793. Like the revolution itself, the Marseillais were involved in a civil war as well as a more extensive one outside its borders. Thus, Barbaroux’s position fluctuated greatly during his time in Paris and his frustration is clearly reflected in his memoir.21 He paused in his memoir to reflect on the contrast between his former busy, useful life and his current unhappy life as a fugitive. He described himself as being “without any other occupation than my sorrow, without hope of being useful to my fellows, and without any other thought than that of the death of the people, the sad results of the crimes of the agitators!” Then he addressed his absent friends, assuring them that he would never forget “our Sunday conversations: we dined frugally at my house; we climbed up to my office; you would read me your verses, I would consult you about my economic projects; the conversation touched on serious and light subjects, learned or frivolous.”22 The reader can almost hear Barbaroux sighing as he recalled those earlier, happier days. Barbaroux next addressed the work of the Constituent Assembly, which had begun, he wrote, as the “sublime spectacle of a reunion of wise men working for the good of all men.” He blamed the loss of this opportunity to found a republic without bloodshed on intrigue and fear, and on the weakness and deception of the king. The constitution guaranteed that the desires of the people and those of the king would be opposed and the efforts of both would be “on the point of collapse,” Barbaroux wrote. As for the Legislative Assembly, its weakness had been evident from its debut, although it had decreed that Louis XVI could not be given the title of “majesty,” only that of “King of the French.”23 Explaining how it was that he had been sent to Paris as a representative of the city of Marseille, Barbaroux cited a dispute that had arisen between Martin, a deputy from the Bouches-du-Rhône department, and Mourailles, who had succeeded him as the mayor of Marseille. The ensuing brouillerie, or

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serious disagreement, between the opposing sides had caused the business interests of Marseille to suffer. “Granet could do nothing; and among the other deputies of the department, Deperret, by his education, was a stranger to commercial questions, and Antonelle, by his taste and judgment, was incapable of defending those rights (of the city of Marseille).” Thus, it had been decided to send Barbaroux to Paris as a député extraordinaire to represent the interests of Marseille. On 4 February 1792, Barbaroux had departed for Paris, accompanied by Loys, a municipal officer. They were entrusted to explain the local situation, especially the counter-revolutionary movement in nearby Arles, to the Legislative Assembly.24 Barbaroux had a poor opinion of Loys, who apparently did not hold civic virtue in high regard. He had risen from being a police officer to a lawyer to a revolutionary, leaving Arles for Marseille in hopes of finding fame and fortune. In Paris, Loys did not impress the legislative body favorably either; not only did he read the denunciation of the city of Arles for counter-revolutionary activity, but also that of his own brother. Barbaroux reported that soon thereafter Loys left Paris and returned to the Midi. Loys would return to the capital in 1793, however, in time to serve on the revolutionary committee of 31 May, which arrested the Girondin deputies.25 As a result of Loys’s departure, Barbaroux remained as the only envoy from Marseille to represent the city’s interests before the Legislative Assembly. After criticizing the Legislative Assembly for neglecting the interests of the departments, Barbaroux turned to the cause of the “unhappy citizens of Avignon,” north of Arles, another problem area.26 Regardless of which group of citizens, the “satellites of Rome” or the “so-called patriots,” had committed the worst excesses in Avignon, Barbaroux maintained that such “butchery” must be punished and an armistice declared. Other deputies, including Lasource, Vergniaud, and Guadet had spoken on the matter before the Legislative Assembly, according to Barbaroux, who noted that an amnesty followed. The citizens of Avignon, however, appeared ungrateful and remained quiet when their defenders (the Girondins) were persecuted. “The civil war in this country has destroyed noble sentiments and any idea of morality,” he wrote, adding that the land of legend, philosophy, and lovers (Provence) had been defiled by blood and fire. “Poets, you have nothing to sing about on this land.”27 Meanwhile in Paris, Roland, Clavière, and Servan had been expelled from their ministerial posts in June 1792, after Roland’s (or Madame Roland’s) critical letter to the king. Roland would be reinstated after the fall of the monarchy in August, but as noted in earlier chapters, his tenure would be troubled by factional quarrels. Barbaroux cited Robespierre’s domination of

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the tribune in the assembly, where he held forth often on the court, the war, Brissot, and Louvet. Barbaroux defended Brissot, who favored an offensive war, noting that such action would profit from the nation’s energy, while a defensive war would not keep the Austrians away and would instead aid the French monarchy. In effect, according to Barbaroux, it was not a question of wanting war—it was necessary. He blamed the coalition composed of the court, the Jacobins, and the feuillants, or constitutional monarchists, for the instability which followed, allowing that ambition and avarice, and very little virtue, were involved in the ongoing war and in political matters. The same was true locally, for once Rebecqui had left the area, the “papists” and the counter-revolution continued to advance around Avignon. The Midi was seen as a point of resistance and Barbaroux wrote that “we secretly raised some barriers to tyranny in the Midi.”28 At this point in his memoir, Barbaroux recounted an important meeting with the Rolands during the critical summer of 1792, when the seat of government in Paris was thought to be threatened by advancing enemy troops. Foreseeing a possible invasion of northern France, Roland had invited Barbaroux to join him and Clavière in devising a plan, if necessary, to move the government to the southern part of France. Although later dismissed as “a trivial and hypothetical” plan by none other than Manon Roland, Barbaroux became so energized at the thought of it that he issued his famous summons to Marseille to send six hundred men who knew how to die to Paris.29 Barbaroux greatly admired Roland. He quoted his words as they had studied a map of France and had discussed possibilities for safeguarding the government: “Have we worked for three years to see this glorious revolution reversed in one day? If liberty dies in France, it is forever lost to the rest of the world.” If Paris and the departments in the north could not hold back the enemy, Roland suggested that they “carry the statue of liberty to the Midi and found a colony of independent men.” Barbaroux reported that he was moved to tears by such words and promised to ask Marseille to send a battalion and two cannons. Barbaroux compared Roland to the Roman statesman Cato, but acknowledged that Roland owed his courage and talents to his wife.30 Moving next in his memoir to 20 June 1792, Barbaroux reported that the Paris insurrection of that day led to Pétion’s departmental suspension as mayor, approved by the king, but noted that the Legislative Assembly had not let that decision stand, and by 14 July, Pétion had triumphed. He deserved to be cheered, Barbaroux wrote, for he had been able to thwart the plots of the court and had rectified the mistakes of the patriots. At this same time, Barbaroux noted that General Montesquiou had come to Paris under the pretext of asking for reinforcements for his army of the Alps. Calling the

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general a royalist and excessively ambitious, Barbaroux suspected that he had come for “more important schemes” involving the court. Perceiving the imminent downfall of Louis XVI, some feared that his young son might replace him, with Philippe d’Orléans serving as regent. Barbaroux considered Orléans a dissolute man, the “puppet” of the radicals, certainly worse than the weak and indecisive Louis XVI, and feared the influence of those around him.31 Regarding the condition of Paris before the decisive events of 10 August, Barbaroux described a scene of some confusion with everyone in Paris taking sides. The fédérés from Marseille had assembled at the homes of Gorsas and Carra; “Royou, Mallet du Pan, and a crowd of others worked for the court,” which had paid “immense sums” to influence public opinion. Fighting erupted at the Palais Royal, in the cafés and at theaters. Meanwhile, “half of the National Guard supported the court, while the other half were for the people.” Pétion, as mayor, had calculated the situation wisely, according to Barbaroux, “holding back or letting go depending on whether the court or the patriots were in force.” Pétion found himself always “placed in the middle of the excesses” of one group or another, but he tried to manage events fairly, before he was discredited by the radicals. “Such was the state of Paris,” Barbaroux wrote, “when the Marseillais arrived.”32 On 9 August, Rebecqui, Pierre Baille, and Barbaroux went to greet their “brothers” from Marseille with great joy, after which a small group dined together and discussed their plan of action. They had been assured by the Parisians that, on the following day, the fédérés would be joined by armed groups from the districts of Saint-Antoine and Saint-Marceau, who would march ahead of the Marseillais. Barbaroux reported that Santerre, the principal organizer in the Parisian sections, had promised a fête fraternelle composed of forty thousand men. The plan called for four hundred men to occupy the city hall, while others would occupy the Arsenal, the corn exchange, the Invalides, ministers’ offices, and all the bridges across the Seine. They would then march to the Tuileries palace in three columns, set up camp, and hope for a peaceful confrontation with the Swiss Guards, who protected the royal family. Barbaroux wrote that the demonstration was intended as “an insurrection for liberty . . . dignified, to serve as an example to all of the people.” If the agreed-upon plan had been followed, bloodshed would have been avoided, he wrote, and “the Republic could have been founded without convulsions.” Alas, Santerre did not keep his word, and managed to spoil their carefully devised plan. Instead of forty-thousand, only two hundred appeared to march with the group from Marseille; most of them were fédérés from other

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departments, according to Barbaroux, and they were accompanied by two dozen Parisians carrying pikes and kitchen knives.33 At this point in his memoir, before describing what transpired on 10 August, Barbaroux recalled his earlier meetings with Marat and Robespierre. He reminded his readers that as an amateur scientist in 1788, he had studied optics with Marat, who had once worked as a physician and considered himself a man of science. Marat had written to Barbaroux, complimenting him on an article about the rebellion in Arles, and inviting him for a visit. Barbaroux went to the home of his former teacher, located on the rue Saint-Honoré, next to the Café Richard. However, upon listening to Marat speak, Barbaroux thought that perhaps he “had lost his head.” He told Barbaroux that “the French were only paltry revolutionaries and that only he had the means to create liberty.” Barbaroux reported that he pretended to be interested and Marat continued in that vein for some time. In July, Barbaroux received some pages from Marat to be printed and distributed in Marseille. “The work appeared abominable to us,” he wrote, “a provocation to the Marseillais to attack the legislative corps.” Marat had declared that it was necessary to save the royal family, but to “exterminate an assembly [that was] evidently counter-revolutionary.” Barbaroux regretted that he had burned Marat’s letters, but noted that his “slanders and atrocities are written in blood in all of the departments of France.”34 Turning next to a meeting at Robespierre’s home, Barbaroux described the interior of “a pretty room where his [Robespierre’s] image was repeated in many forms. . . . ” Barbaroux, accompanied by Baille and Rebecqui, thought that they had come to discuss the lodging of the fédérés from Marseille. However, Robespierre apparently had other things on his mind and “boasted of having accelerated the revolution.” Barbaroux added that, after the National Convention had convened later in 1792, it dared not oppose Robespierre because he had usurped so much power.35 After this digression, Barbaroux focused on the events that had precipitated the fall of the monarchy on 10 August 1792. He wrote that the king had asked Pétion to come to the Tuileries palace on the night of 9 August, supposedly to inquire about conditions in Paris. However, Pétion had foreseen the danger of being taken hostage and he was detained for three hours. Meanwhile, the Paris sections had chosen three representatives from each section to form a new Commune, which then proceeded to take over the Hôtel de Ville, or city hall, on the night of 9–10 August. Many of the old officials were replaced, but Pétion, Manuel, and Danton were retained. Mandat, the commander of the National Guard, was arrested and later killed, after which

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Santerre took charge and gave orders to remove the guard from the Tuileries palace. The king had only nine hundred Swiss Guards and some volunteers from the Order of Chevaliers de St. Louis to protect the royal family and other inhabitants of the palace. By the early morning of 10 August, armed crowds had marched through Paris and surrounded the Tuileries. The Swiss Guards tried to retreat, but they were overwhelmed by the masses of people pushing forward into the palace; only three hundred managed to escape. The royal family, meanwhile, had escaped and sought refuge in the nearby quarters of the Legislative Assembly, which was also surrounded by the rebels. The new Commune issued orders to the assembly; the king was suspended from office; and the royal family was imprisoned in the Temple. The Commune also decreed that a convention would be called to write a new constitution and to replace the Legislative Assembly.36 According to Barbaroux, the fédérés from Marseille and the Bretons defended the Swiss and conducted themselves bravely amidst the tumult of “ten thousand men in the Place Louis XV,” even managing to save two young girls inside the palace. Many others were killed by the furious crowd “in the apartments, on the roofs, in the caves, the Swiss armed or disarmed, the chevaliers, the valets, all those who populated the chateau,” he wrote. The Legislative Assembly remained calm, despite “this grand commotion;” Guadet, Vergniaud, and Gensonné presided successively, with Vergniaud proposing the suspension of the king and calling for a convention. Barbaroux reported that Gensonné and Brissot had also managed to save a Swiss Guard who hid in an armoire. This same grateful man would later be ordered to guard Gensonné after the proscription of the Girondins; he even offered to die with Gensonné, who declined the generous offer.37 From the events of 9–10 August, Barbaroux moved to changes in the government, reporting that Roland, Clavière, and Servan were called again to serve as ministers, while Danton was installed as the Minister of Justice, a choice that Barbaroux deemed dangerous for France. Danton was at that time the most popular leader in Paris and, as noted earlier, a man whose personality contrasted markedly with that of the austere and pedantic Roland. Barbaroux also noted the appointment of Monge, “a good inspector of the navy, but an inept minister,” and LeBrun, “a refugee from Liège,” in foreign affairs.38 Between this time and 20 September 1792, when the Legislative Assembly dissolved itself, elections for the National Convention were in progress. Seven hundred forty-nine members were elected, including 189 from previous national assemblies.39 Barbaroux next recounted an animated conversation about how to judge the king. Over dinner in the Palais Royal, he was joined by Rebecqui, Pierre

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Baille, Bourdon, and “the young Seymaudi from Marseille.” Rebecqui thought that the king must be judged by the Convention, and the judgment reviewed by the primary assemblies, in effect, an appeal to the people. Barbaroux wrote that such an option was supported by those in the Convention who were “the most enlightened and the most sincerely attached to their country.” He noted that he had included this anecdote in his memoir and named witnesses because of published reports, especially in Marseille, that such a referendum by the people had been inspired by intriguers, perhaps by the English.40 Although the date of this conversation is given as 12 August 1792 in Dauban’s edited version of Barbaroux’s memoirs, that date must be incorrect because the king was not on trial until December of that year. His duties in Paris finished and not yet elected to the National Convention, Barbaroux left Paris on 17 August and returned to Marseille. Rebecqui and Bertin also left and returned to their duties as commissioners in Avignon, where according to Barbaroux, Rebecqui was greeted as a liberator. As for Barbaroux, he “rendered homage to the magistrates of the people” and embraced his mother. She, in her turn, gave him some important news: only ten days past his “dear friend, Annette” had given birth to a son. Barbaroux paused at this point in his memoir to note that almost a year had passed since he had received the good news of his son’s birth. He wondered if his son still lived or if his “persecutors” had searched him out and killed him. Hoping that his son might live and profit from his advice, Barbaroux wrote: “Do not avenge your father, avenge liberty . . . punish the tyrants. . . . Put up an altar to liberty in your home, be a good man, work the earth that will nourish you, study a little the sciences that will elevate you toward God, and share your bread with the children of my unfortunate, massacred friends. . . . My son, if you see this, receive the tender embrace of your father.”41 Barbaroux reported that upon his return, he was warmly welcomed by the best patriots of Marseille, who surrounded his home and sang Provencale songs written in his honor, along with La Marseillaise. Barbaroux wrote that Rebecqui also was treated to a musical welcome at his home. Nevertheless, despite the festivities, “a gang of scoundrels . . . dominated Marseille by terror. For them, there were neither laws nor magistrates,” he wrote. Barbaroux blamed the silence of the mayor, Mourraille, a suspicious old man, and some of the people who were always ready to attack those labeled as enemies. “They hang without obstacle the men who displease them and profit from the public consternation to fleece the rich. There is not enough courage among good men nor enough virtue in the administrative corps” to stop the brigands. In an effort to improve the situation, Barbaroux and some others

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advised setting up a popular tribunal in which the jury and the judges would be named by the sections, and the idea was adopted. While it lasted, the tribunal worked efficiently, Barbaroux wrote, but it was abolished by “the rulers of the Convention” as a result of some “vague suspicions.”42 Before his return to Paris as a deputy to the National Convention, Barbaroux attended to personal matters at home. He had his son baptized and named him “Charles Ogé,” after a man of color from Saint-Domingue, who had come to France to claim his rights under Louis XVI. Vincent Ogé, who was in Paris on business in 1789, when the revolution began, returned to Saint-Domingue and was involved in leading an uprising against the white planters. He was captured and arrested in 1790 and tortured before being executed in February 1791. Barbaroux wrote that he wanted his son to bear the name of a brave man of dignity, who knew how to defend it. Barbaroux also attended meetings of the electoral corps in Avignon, where he was unanimously named the president. As such, he was involved in various efforts to bring order to the region, especially in Tarascon and Arles. The counter-revolutionary activities in those areas continued, intensifying after the downfall of the monarchy on 10 August, and twelve hundred men were dispatched to Tarascon in an effort to establish order.43 Following the elections for the National Convention in September 1792, Barbaroux prepared to leave for Paris. He bid a fond farewell to all that he held dear: “to the people who had blessed me and who would soon outlaw me, to the magistrates, to my mother, to my son, to my Annette, to my good family and my friends of twenty years. I said adieu to the land of my birth, the beautiful sky of Provence . . . to my books, to my scientific instruments, to my minerals, objects dear to my spirit that had so agreeably occupied me. . . . Alas! Who knew that these goodbyes would become eternal!”44

Notes 1. C. A. Dauban, editor, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion et Mémoires de Buzot & de Barbaroux accompagnés de notes inédites de Buzot et de nombreux documents inédits sur Barbaroux, Buzot, Brissot, etc. (Paris: Henri Plon, 1866), xvii. 2. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits,” xvi; and Mémoires de Buzot. N. A. F. 1730, 19. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 3. Leigh Whaley, Radicals: Politics and Republicanism in the French Revolution (London: Sutton Publishing Ltd., 2000), 41. 4. Paul R. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire: The Federalist Revolt in the French Revolution (University Park, Penn.: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003), 82.

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5. Correspondance de Barbaroux, Député à la Convention Nationale avec La Municipalité de Marseille, 1792–1793. N. A. F. 6140. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits; and C. A. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 401–90. 6. Correspondance de Barbaroux, N. A. F. 6140, 11–12. 7. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire, 82. Hanson presents a detailed discussion of the different groups in Marseille and the results of their divisiveness. 8. Correspondance de Barbaroux, N. A. F. 6140, 17. 9. Correspondance de Barbaroux, N. A. F. 6140, 19–20. 10. Correspondance de Barbaroux, N. A. F. 6140, 21–25. 11. Correspondance de Barbaroux, N. A. F. 6140, 26–28. 12. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire, 84 13. Correspondance de Barbaroux, N. A. F. 6140, 29–30. 14. Correspondance de Barbaroux, N. A. F. 6140, 33–35. 15. Correspondance de Barbaroux, N. A. F. 6140, 39–41. 16. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 307, 320; and MM. Berville et Barriére, editors, Mémoires Inédits de Charles Barbaroux, Deputé à La Convention Nationale; avec des Eclaircissemens Historiques (Paris: Baudouin Frères, Libraires, 1822). 17. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 303–4. 18. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 381–82. 19. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 282–83. 20. Bette W. Oliver, From Royal to National: The Louvre Museum and the Bibliothèque Nationale (Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2007), 25–26. 21. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 316–17. See also William Scott, Terror and Repression in Revolutionary Marseilles (London: The Macmillan Press, Ltd., 1973), 19–21. 22. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 318. 23. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 319–20. 24. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 320–22. 25. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 322–23. 26. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 323–24. 27. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 327–28. 28. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 332–35. 29. M. J. Sydenham, The Girondins (London: University of London, The Athlone Press, 1961), 194. 30. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 236–39. 31. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 340–45. Dauban added in a footnote on p. 341 that, in his opinion, Barbaroux had judged Montesquiou unfairly. 32. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 346–47. 33. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 347–50. 34. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 354–58. 35. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 358–59. 36. Owen Connelly, French Revolution/Napoleonic Era (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1979), 120–22. 37. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 366–68.

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38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44.

Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 369. Connelly, French Revolution/Napoleonic Era, 126. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 370–71. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 373–74. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 374–76. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 377–80. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 385.

C H A P T E R

S I X



Louvet’s Journey (November 1793–April 1794)

While the fugitives realized that their situation at Madame Bouquey’s home offered them only temporary security, they had accustomed themselves to living underground, writing their memoirs, and assembling for dinner inside the house. At least there they could enjoy some semblance of normalcy and find out the latest news from Paris. That news had become steadily worse in early November, when Madame Bouquey had told them about the executions of their Girondin friends followed by that of Manon Roland. Then on 13 November, as the fugitives gathered for supper, they found Madame Bouquey in tears. They had never seen her so distraught, because she had always pretended to be cheerful in their presence. Finally she told them that her husband and some other relatives had insisted that she must no longer harbor the fugitives, that it was too dangerous for her to do so. After all, these Girondins were wanted for treason—they were outlaws. Anyone caught helping them would be likewise accused. The fugitives had no choice but to leave their temporary home. Madame Bouquey had risked her life to hide them and they expressed their profound gratitude to her for having the courage to do so. They left their memoirs in her keeping and asked her to hide them until it was safe to send them to the designated persons. Bidding farewell to Madame Bouquey, the fugitives split up. Buzot, Pétion, and Barbaroux remained together, even returning to Madame Bouquey’s for a brief period before they found another hiding place. Louvet, Guadet, and Salle accompanied Valady for a few miles on the road to Périgueux, northeast of Bordeaux, where Valady hoped to find refuge in a

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relative’s home. They left Valady at the crossroads and he continued on his journey alone. When he arrived at Périgueux later, however, his luck ran out. Afer being recognized by the authorities, Valady was arrested and subsequently executed. After taking leave of their friend Valady, Louvet, Guadet, and Salle hid in an abandoned quarry until darkness fell. Even though it was pouring rain, they walked for twelve miles to a place where Guadet felt assured of welcome. When they arrived, at four o’clock in the morning, soaked to the skin and shivering with cold, they were told that no help would be forthcoming. Guadet was furious at this rebuff, because in his pre-revolutionary life he had won a criminal case for this family and they had been most grateful. Now, however, a servant explained that the presence of a vigilance committee in the village nearby meant that the fugitives were not welcome. Louvet, who all along had intended to go to Paris and join Lodoiska, remained with his two dejected friends for a short while in the seclusion of a nearby forest. He shared some of his “paper money with Salle, who was even poorer than himself,” embraced his friends, bid them farewell, and set off walking in the direction of Paris. It would be a perilous journey undertaken by an unlikely hero, but Louvet would live to tell the tale, unlike his fellow fugitives.1 In his memoir Louvet provided a detailed account of his journey to Paris and the events that transpired after his arrival. As a professional writer, Louvet chose to rewrite the original 1793 version of his memoir in 1794, making it more of a straightforward narrative.2 While his brief memoir in the Bibliothèque Nationale covers the early days of the revolution up to May 1793, the 1794 version includes his journey from St. Emilion to Paris, from Paris to Switzerland, and finally his return to Paris after Robespierre’s execution in July 1794.3 Louvet wrote that his determination to see Lodoiska was so strong that he was willing to endure whatever dangers awaited him. Guadet and Salle had begged him not to go, but even the remote chance of joining Lodoiska appeared more agreeable to him than continuing to hide in the St. Emilion area. He reported that he left his friends—who had vague plans to escape to Holland and then to America—about four miles from Mont-Pont, the major town of the district. Louvet planned to go around the town during the night, when his passage would be less noticeable. The “rheumatism” in one of his legs made walking painful, so he had to stop and rest more often than he wished. However, he did possess a forged passport fabricated by a friend of a priest who had sheltered him and his friends. The passport affirmed that Louvet was a sans-culotte from Rennes, Larcher by name, but it lacked the offi-

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cial seals from the districts that he had to pass through on the route to Paris. Therefore, Louvet tried to avoid the larger towns and rested at night only in villages.4 Louvet’s acting skills were apparently convincing enough that he could pass for a good Jacobin. However, the increasing pain and swelling in his leg slowed his progress considerably, and he feared discovery by some suspicious innkeeper along the way. As a precaution, Louvet wrote that he slept in his pants and had “two good pistols in the pockets.” He also had with him “several pills of excellent opium” hidden in a glove, in case he was recognized and arrested.5 Before retiring for the night, Louvet ate and drank with the locals, making sure to act the part of an ardent Jacobin. He also tried to be entertaining and offered rounds of wine to his tablemates in an effort to ease their suspicions of him. Fortunately, Louvet also encountered some kind and generous people on his journey to Paris. One man driving a cart offered to take Louvet as far as Limoges, where he lived. After finding out that the driver disliked “the Maratists,” Louvet confided to him that he was a merchant from Bordeaux who had been the victim of a gang of Maratists. The sympathetic driver assured Louvet that he would be safe and that he would help him find another driver in Limoges. Louvet now had a chance to catch his breath and rest his sore leg. “What a happy change in my situation,” he wrote.6 True to his word, the driver found another conveyance whose conductor was willing to smuggle Louvet through the passport checkpoints from Limoges to Paris. The first driver even provided Louvet with bread, meat, and fruit, embracing him warmly when they parted. The new driver also proved to be “a good fellow,” but the seven passengers, all outspoken Jacobins, seemed at first to be a disagreeable lot. Nevertheless, by the next day Louvet had managed to charm them sufficiently that they agreed to hide him under their coats and baggage at the bottom of the heavy wagon whenever passports were to be checked. They thought he was a “deserter” and he did not disabuse them.7 The closer they came to Paris, the greater the number of checkpoints, and the more Louvet feared being recognized. At night they had to stop at inns to eat and sleep, and they encountered many people coming from Paris. At Châteauroux a Jacobin agent looked inside the wagon for escaped Girondins. “I did not budge; I did not breathe; but my heart beat loudly,” Louvet reported. He even found it amusing that, despite the agent’s surveillance, he had indeed allowed “a proud Girondin” to escape.8 According to Louvet’s memoir, it was at this time that the news of Madame Roland’s execution was confirmed. Other sources have indicated

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that the fugitives had been informed of her death before they left Madame Bouquey’s home; this may be explained by the fact that Buzot, Pétion, and Barbaroux returned to her home after Louvet had departed for Paris. At any rate, Louvet wrote that he also heard reports about the deaths of other friends and colleagues: Cussy, Manuel, Kersaint, and Lidon, as well as the suicide of Roland. Filled with despair, Louvet feared that, even if he managed to reach Paris, Lodoiska might not be there to greet him.9 Entering Orléans, Louvet recalled that it was the capital of the department that had elected him as its representative. Now he noticed that a scaffold stood in the marketplace, and those who were executed there were known as “Louvetins.” Because there were many packages for the driver to deliver and collect in Orléans, Louvet was forced to remain hidden in the wagon for four hours. Just as the travelers were finally leaving the city, however, they were stopped again. The guard ordered all of the passengers to descend, not to check their passports but to examine them. Apparently, he feared that some of the men were disguised in women’s clothing! Then the guard also decided to check inside the wagon. Louvet lay still beneath the heavy coats and piles of straw, while the guard poked around close by his outstretched body and even kicked some boxes around. Louvet’s luck held once again, but it had been a close call. Reportedly, the driver’s face had turned quite pale during the search of his wagon.10 Again, the next day in Étampes the wagon was searched. Louvet, describing himself as “a thin little man,” recounted the method of his concealment: “almost half-smothered under the passengers; two women sitting on my legs and thighs, a young girl crushing my chest, and my head weighed down with a soldier’s knapsack.”11 After the search, they were allowed to pass, but the town was filled with soldiers and citizens honoring a Jacobin deputy-onmission, who was returning to Paris. Louvet could not help but contrast this scene with earlier days, before the Girondins had been expelled and charged as traitors. He reported that he was happy to leave this place filled with “unfortunate people.”12 They stopped at Arpajon one night and at Longjumeau the next. The closer they drew to Paris, the more anxious Louvet became. Never a man of robust health, his nerves were on edge. He suffered from headaches and fatigue from the lack of sound sleep as well as the constant fear of discovery. One of the diners at the inn in Longjumeau even began to hum some of Louvet’s best-known verses: Is it fear or indifference? I wish I could guess.

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Louvet guessed that the man must have recognized him as the author of Faublas, but somehow he managed to pretend a nonchalance he was far from feeling. However, he reported that whatever appetite he had vanished in an instant.13 As they approached Paris, the driver made sure that everything was in good order, but surprisingly they were allowed to pass the checkpoint into the city “without a word.” At the rue d’Enfer, Louvet descended from the conveyance. He thanked his fellow passengers for their help and then addressed the driver: “Brave man, you have taken some chances, but between God and us, I judge that you have done a good thing.” Louvet assured the driver that he could never repay his kindness and then gave him all the paper money he had left, ten francs, plus his gold watch, “worth six times that.” After the two men parted, Louvet walked to a nearby inn to find a coach to take him to a friend’s house, where he thought that Lodoiska was staying.14 It was two o’clock in the afternoon, 6 December 1793, when Louvet set out to find Lodoiska. He was keenly aware that he was in extreme danger in this “ungrateful city” filled with enemies, but he had survived the long journey and he believed that a few friends might yet remain in Paris. He imagined that such friends, who had probably assumed that he was dead, “would cry with pleasure at seeing me again.” Yet he sensed that the situation might not be quite so welcoming. Louvet directed the coachman to the home of Citoyen Brémont, where Lodoiska was staying when he had last heard from her. Once there, he was told by the child who answered the door that Brémont had moved; the house was currently occupied by a deputy. Louvet left immediately and walked quickly across the courtyard and into the street. He inquired of a passing servant where he might find the home of Citoyen Brémont and learned that the address was nearby. Barely pausing to thank him, Louvet ran as fast as he was able toward the house. There, upon hearing a familiar voice through the open window, Louvet did not bother to knock. Instead, he dashed into the house and swept an astonished Lodoiska into his arms. It was a long-awaited reunion, he wrote, “a delirious joy . . . that erased all of my sighs and sobs.” Finally, Louvet felt that everything he had endured had been worth it and he thanked God for letting him experience such deliverance.15 He was greeted warmly enough by Madame Brémont, along with her nephews and one niece. After she had seen to his immediate needs, however, she and the children left the house and did not return. Louvet, exhausted from his journey, fell into a deep sleep, only to be awakened at ten o’clock that night by Lodoiska, who had some unwelcome news. Louvet’s old friend

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Brémont had returned and “he gives you half an hour to leave his house,” she reported. Although Louvet could understand the danger attached to sheltering a fugitive, he had thought that an old family friend would be willing to take the chance. Since that was not the case, Louvet agreed to leave, not in half an hour as requested, but the next morning. During the Terror, the “retreat” was beaten at ten o’clock every night. After that, anyone found on the streets must show an identity card giving his name, address, section, and physical description. It was obvious that, under the circumstances, Louvet could not leave that night. Brémont, however, did choose to leave the house rather than remain inside with the fugitive. Lodoiska assured Louvet that, no matter what happened, at least they would be together.16 Lodoiska was a clever, practical woman, and during the night she managed to figure out a plan of possible survival. Louvet was delighted. He was not ready to give up; in fact, he was filled with new energy and determination. Lodoiska had decided that, using her maiden name, she would rent an apartment in a remote part of the city. Louvet could stay with another old friend for a few days and then join her. Even if they had only a short time to live, she reasoned, at least they could share it. The plan appealed to Louvet’s romantic nature, as Lodoiska must have surely known that it would. At seven o’clock the next evening, “a brave young man,” the same one who had sheltered Louvet before his earlier escape to Caen, arrived to take the fugitive to his apartment, but only for three days. Meanwhile, Lodoiska had not been idle. Not only had she found a place to rent, but she had actually managed to construct a hiding place for Louvet inside one of the walls. It consisted of a secret chamber into which he could retreat quickly in case of imminent danger. Louvet reported that he passed many comfortable hours in this place, sitting on a bench, reading and writing by candlelight. Lodoiska had even thought to install a small valve to allow for the circulation of air. Had they not feared a nighttime search by government agents, the couple would have been quite content. During the daylight hours, Lodoiska might go out for supplies, while Louvet hid in his secret chamber. As a precaution at night, they slept with pistols under their pillows and kept the doors locked and barred at all times. “Nothing,” Louvet wrote, “troubled the sweetness of those too short days.”17 They managed to live in this manner for two months, during which time Louvet searched the papers for news about his former political associates and friends. He wrote that “day by day they were being unfortunately discovered, mercilessly assassinated.” He mentioned Lebrun, the former minister of foreign affairs; Bougon, an administrator from Calvados; Clavière, minister of taxes (finances); Rabaut (Saint-Etienne), Bois-Guyon, and Girey-Dupré,

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who were arrested in Bordeaux with the deputies Duchâstel and Cussy; Custine, the general’s son; Mazuyer, who had “lost his head for a witty remark”; and finally his friend Valady, “whom I had left in the Gironde, and who was apparently soon abandoned by his relative on whom he had counted.” He added that he valued those friends who had perished more than those he had counted on in Paris, who had feared to help him.18 As the Terror escalated, Louvet realized that he really could not afford to remain in Paris much longer. Perhaps Lodoiska had been recognized, and it was likely that soon their hiding place would be discovered and reported to the police. Fortunately, as was so often the case with Louvet, one friend (not identified by Louvet) remained who was willing to help him escape from Paris. Ten years before, Louvet had helped this man, and now he wanted to return the favor. His business was such that he traveled regularly between Paris and Switzerland, and he offered to arrange for Louvet’s escape. By 6 February 1794, Louvet and Lodoiska had prepared everything necessary for the plan to work: a proper disguise, a forged passport, and a means of travel. Louvet would leave the next day and, if all went as planned, Lodoiska would follow in six weeks. That afternoon, while Lodoiska was out making the final arrangements for his journey, Louvet wrote a long and loving letter to his wife, in which he also expressed his last wishes, in case of mishap. In closing, he wrote: “I leave behind me the most cherished half of myself, as you know. . . . I adore you, take care of yourself; I am leaving first, and I shall wait for you.” He left the letter in his secret chamber where she would find it after his departure.19 On 7 February at six o’clock in the morning, Louvet began yet another journey. Lodoiska accompanied him in the carriage as far as the end of rue Charenton, where he descended and walked toward the checkpoint. After making sure that his passport was accepted by the sentry, Lodoiska returned to their apartment. Louvet met his brave and helpful friend in Charenton and they walked together to Villeneuve-Saint-Georges. Their papers were quickly examined by an officer of the guard, who let “the two soldiers” pass on their way. Both of them were dressed in military attire and Louvet described his disguise in detail: “black woolen trousers with a short jacket to match, a tricolored waistcoat, and a Jacobin wig of straight black hair . . . finally a red liberty cap, an enormous saber, and a ferocious moustache,” grown while he was in hiding in Paris.20 Twenty miles away from Paris, Louvet and his companion joined other travelers in a stagecoach going to Dol. After their arrival the next day, all of the passengers had to show their papers to a member of the local committee of surveillance, who seemed especially interested in Louvet’s passport. He

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asked Louvet if he planned to rejoin the army. Louvet replied in the negative and explained that he was traveling on business. Finally, after a rather unpleasant exchange, the man took Louvet’s hand and said: “I wish you a safe journey, with all of my heart.” Louvet was surprised by such kind words and had no idea who the man was, but he suspected that he had been recognized and allowed to escape. Not for the first time, luck was with him.21 Louvet and his friend continued on foot, despite the cold and miserable weather. When they reached the Jura Mountains at five o’clock in the morning, Louvet continued on alone while his friend hurried back to Paris to tell Lodoiska that her husband was safe in Switzerland. Louvet reported that he was safe, but he was also isolated and lonely in his “retreat,” described as a cavern within easy reach of neutral territory. Living in his “impenetrable sanctuary,” Louvet passed entire days in the midst of “solitary forests, under the black fir trees,” where he thought incessantly of Lodoiska and his family, and he cried for his unfortunate country. Nevertheless, he wrote that “here, far from men and before God, in spite of revolutions and all of the tyrants, I am again myself, I am free.”22 And it was here, in Switzerland, waiting for Lodoiska to join him that Louvet began to rewrite the memoir he had begun at Madame Bouquey’s home. Surrounded by the natural beauty of Switzerland, Louvet thought of Rousseau and even compared his ordeal to that of Rousseau, “the friend of the people,” who was mistreated by them. Even more, he thought about his wife and worried himself to the point of illness when, after six weeks had passed, she did not appear. “Hope began to leave my heart,” he wrote, and he tormented himself by imagining all of the possible evils that might have befallen her. He even began to think of returning to Paris, bargaining with Robespierre for his wife’s return, and offering to give up his own life for hers. At this time Louvet knew that Lodoiska was pregnant, and he hoped that, at least, their child might survive. Judging from his memoir, Louvet’s exile was beginning to take a serious toll on his mental state.23 Louvet had met one other unfortunate Frenchman in his Swiss exile and they had become friends. On 21 May 1794, while they were out walking, Louvet admitted his fears about Lodoiska. He wrote that, almost at the same moment, his new friend had noticed a carriage in the distance and pointed it out to Louvet, who was too near-sighted to see it. The carriage moved toward them, stopping a short distance away. Louvet wrote that when he heard a voice cry “Stop!” he was overcome with emotion, for he knew it was Lodoiska. They were together for only three days before Lodoiska had to return to Paris to make further arrangements; what these were, Louvet did not say. She

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vowed to return again in several weeks and, happily, she did. Now relieved from his anxiety, Louvet wrote that he could truly enjoy the beauty surrounding him, the “romantic sites” filled with fresh breezes and singing birds. “Never has a couple been so happy,” he rhapsodized.24 Louvet addressed his readers at this point in his memoir to explain why certain events had not been fully described. For example, he cited Lodoiska’s journey from Finistère, in Brittany, to Paris, before the fugitives had fled to the Bordeaux area. He also mentioned her later journey from Paris to the Jura Mountains in Switzerland. According to Louvet, his wife had written about these events, but her written account remained in Paris with a trusted friend who also guarded their correspondence.25 One day, Louvet wrote, her memoir and their correspondence would be published. The missing sections, however, were not included in Louvet’s published memoir. It is possible that they could have been lost or destroyed. During the Terror, to have been discovered as a trusted friend of one of the Girondin fugitives’ wives might have proven fatal. In the late spring of 1794, Louvet could count himself a truly fortunate man. He had somehow survived the past year as a fugitive and even though he longed to return to France, Lodoiska was with him while they awaited the birth of their child with a mixture of hope and fear.

Notes 1. John Rivers, Louvet: Revolutionist and Romance Writer (London: Hurst and Blackett Ltd., Pasternoster House, E. C., 1910), 273–78. See also C. A. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion et Mémoires de Buzot et de Barbaroux. . . . (Paris: Henri Plon, 1866), 493. 2. Jean-Baptiste Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, Membre de la Convention, etc., de la Journée du 31 Mai, Suivis de Quelques Notices pour L’Histoire et Le Récit de Mes Périls depuis Cette Epoque Jusqu’à La Rentrée des Deputés Proscrits Dans L’Assemblée Nationale (Paris: A La Librairie Historique, 1821). 3. Jean-Baptiste Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Tome 1. N. A. F. 1730. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 4. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 78–84. 5. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 92–93. 6. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 108. 7. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 119–25. 8. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 131. 9. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 135–37. See also in ch. 3, n. 25 Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 16; and Gita May, Madame Roland and the Age of Revolution (N.Y.: Columbia University Press, 1970), 291.

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10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25.

Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 138–44. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 146–47. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 146–50. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 154–58. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 158–60. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 160–62. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 162–68. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 172–83. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 184–90. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 193–204. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 204–7. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 208–9. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 210–15. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 215–18. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 219–23. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Auteur de Faublas, 229–30.

C H A P T E R

S E V E N



The Last Days (June–July 1794)

Louvet’s friends, left behind in the St. Emilion area some months before, did not fare nearly so well. An unsigned “memoir” addressed to Louvet recounted the final days of Buzot, Pétion, Barbaroux, Salle, and Guadet. According to Dauban, the editor of the 1866 published memoirs of the fugitives, this “memoir” was probably written by the priest who had sheltered the fugitives for a short time. The unsigned memoir began at the point when Louvet bid farewell to Salle and Guadet and set off on his journey to Paris. Hoping that Louvet would reconsider and rejoin them, Salle and Guadet followed him as far as Mont-Pont; then they turned back and headed toward St. Emilion. They arrived at the home of Guadet’s father very late at night, but he rose quietly and let them in unobserved through a window. He was overjoyed to see them again, and the next day they managed to construct a hiding place inside of a closet. There the two fugitives could remain unseen and secure, even when the elder Guadet received his friends as usual.1 At this time, Buzot, Pétion, and Barbaroux were also hiding in St. Emilion. They had hoped to leave the area and, with the help of a guide, they had wandered toward the coast as far as Castillon. Just at that moment, however, the guide’s mother died very suddenly and he was unable to accompany the fugitives any farther. They feared to continue since they did not know a safe route to follow and, depite the danger, they decided to return to the only place they knew, Madame Bouquey’s home. There, they were greeted not by Madame Bouquey, but by a person who warned them that it was not safe to

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remain. The house and surrounding area had been searched by the authorities on 18 November, and such visites domiciliaires were being conducted all over the town. The fugitives retreated to the abandoned stone quarries nearby, where they managed to survive, again with the help of Madame Bouquey, until 21 January. At that time, she found them another place to lodge: in the garret of a house in St. Emilion owned by Baptiste Troquart, a trustworthy wigmaker. While the location was less than ideal, at least it was relatively safe. In addition, the ever generous Madame Bouquey brought them what food she could, along with books, and the news of the day.2 In the months that followed, the situation appeared more agreeable for Guadet and Salle, who were able to join the Guadet family for dinner every evening. Occasionally the Bouqueys would also dine at the Guadet home. Even more remarkably under the circumstances, Buzot, Pétion, and Barbaroux managed to join their friends several times for dinner and conversation. We can only imagine how they must have savored these rare moments of conviviality. Meanwhile, Madame Bouquey was engaged in the process of obtaining forged passports for the fugitives, who briefly considered trying to escape into Switzerland as Louvet had done. However, recent news from Paris caused them to reconsider such an option. Reportedly, Robespierre and Tallien, who had served as the representative-on-mission at Bordeaux, were engaged in a power struggle in the National Convention, a struggle which might possibly result in the overthrow of Robespierre’s dictatorial regime. The fugitives reasoned that, if Robespierre fell, they would have an opportunity to prove their innocence and to serve their country once again. Unfortunately, their decision to remain in St. Emilion turned out to be a fatal one.3 Two local inhabitants, “Coste jeune, a notary, and Nadal, an innkeeper, fierce men who enjoyed the fruits of their heinous crime,” reported to MarcAntoine Jullien that the Girondin fugitives were still hiding in St. Emilion. Jullien, the nineteen-year-old son of a deputy from Toulouse, was sent to Bordeaux to facilitate the capture of the enemies of the republic. Despite his youth, he already had proved himself in the western departments where he had served as an agent of the National Convention since September 1793. He enjoyed close connections with the Committee of Public Safety and was known as a fearless critic of those who were not sufficiently eager to punish wrongdoers. Jullien often bypassed his more moderate superiors, Ysabeau and Tallien, and sent his reports directly to Robespierre. During the two months he spent in the Bordeaux area, 198 people were arrested and executed, including most importantly, Guadet, Salle, and Barbaroux.4 Responding to the report about the Girondin fugitives, Jullien gathered several nearby regiments of cavalry and infantry at St. Emilion. On the night

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of 17 June 1794, he directed them to search and occupy all of the houses belonging to relatives and friends of the Guadet family. By four o’clock in the morning, the town was sealed off and no one was allowed to leave. The municipal officers were summoned by “Citoyen Oré,” who was in charge of carrying out this mission. They accompanied Oré to the home of Guadet’s father and were followed by six men who carefully searched the house, “pillaging whatever fell into their hands.” Oré, preoccupied with filling out the proper forms, apparently failed to notice or care about their actions. More than twenty times the men went into the closet under which Guadet and Salle were hiding. They searched the attic, the apartments, and the cave (cellar) as well, but found nothing. They were preparing to leave, when one of the men looked again at the space between the ground floor and the attic and noticed an irregularity. Several workers were then ordered to climb up to the roof and find the place indicated by the irregular measurement. As the men neared his hiding place, Guadet tried to shoot himself in the head, but his gun jammed and refused to fire. Both he and Salle were discovered and “seized by thirty scoundrels who bound them and weighed them down with iron.” Guadet’s seventy-year-old father, his sixty-five-year-old aunt, his thirty-year-old brother, and two domestic servants were treated in the same way. The officials also arrested Guadet’s father-in-law; Madame Bouquey, his sister-in-law; and her husband.5 Guadet wanted to speak to those townspeople who had gathered to watch the events taking place at his father’s house, but the officer in charge forbade him to speak even one word. Guadet demanded his right, as a representative of the people, to explain the situation to those who had assembled. He began to do so, but before he could finish, he and the other prisoners were taken away and locked into a room in a nearby tavern. At this point, the anonymous author of the memoir assured his readers that Citoyen Oré and his assistants were zealous in their work and did not hesitate to spread outrageous lies and false accusations about the prisoners. At two o’clock in the afternoon, Guadet and Salle, along with the others arrested at his father’s house, were packed into a cart, taken to Libourne, and imprisoned. The next day they were transported to Bordeaux, where they were visited by Jullien, who must have been very pleased to have finally captured these elusive Girondins. For some reason, Jullien asked Guadet what he thought about the assassination of Marat, to which Guadet replied: “It is a useless murder; the tyrant has been killed, not tyranny.”6 Jullien had no response to this statement and thereafter left his prisoners alone in their cell. Although Guadet and Salle knew what awaited them the next day, they reportedly ate their supper with good appetite, engaged in cheerful conversation

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with their guard, and slept until they were called before the military commission and indicted. The memoir writer noted that Lacombe, “the president of this tribunal of blood,” sent Guadet and Salle to the scaffold “for having more talent than their prosecutors.” They were executed on 20 June 1794, to be followed a few days later by Guadet’s relatives, including the courageous Madame Bouquey and her husband. Contemporary witnesses reported that Madame Bouquey resisted until her last breath. At her interrogation, she had cried indignantly: “Bloodthirsty monsters! If humanity, if blood ties are crimes, we all deserve death!” Before her execution she had appeared calm enough until the executioner tried to cut her hair. At that point she struggled mightily and had to be restrained with force.7 Still, she chose to go to the guillotine last, thus sparing her husband the sight of her execution.8 Buzot, Pétion, and Barbaroux had watched from their garret window as Guadet, Salle, and the Bouqueys were transported from St. Emilion. They reproached themselves bitterly for having brought such misfortune upon Madame Bouquey, and they feared that Troquart would soon meet the same fate. They decided that they could not wait any longer; they must leave that very night. At midnight, on 17 June 1794, the three friends slipped out of their last hiding place accompanied by Troquart, who supplied them with packets of bread, meat, and wine before embracing them and bidding them farewell. By daybreak they had reached the “plain of Castillon,” where they paused to rest and hide within a thick pine forest. Unknown to the fugitives, a small boy who had climbed a nearby tree saw the three men sitting on the ground, eating and drinking. He also watched as Barbaroux embraced Buzot and Pétion, removed a pistol from his pocket, and shot himself. Surprised and horrified, the child fell from the tree, while Buzot and Pétion, who believed that Barbaroux had killed himself, ran and hid in a dense wheat field some distance away. Meanwhile the child ran to tell his parents what he had witnessed, and they in turn informed a police court magistrate in Castillon, who hurried to the scene accompanied by a surgeon. Barbaroux, who was still barely alive, was carried to Castillon and identified by the papers found on his body. A courier was immediately dispatched to inform Jullien about the capture of this long sought Girondin fugitive. The following day Citoyen Oré arrived and arranged to transfer Barbaroux to Bordeaux by boat, since that would be the most comfortable mode of transport for the gravely wounded prisoner. The committee of surveillance and a large crowd of spectators waited to receive Barbaroux in Bordeaux. He was taken to a building, where Jullien proceeded to interrogate him, but Bar-

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baroux could not respond. In fact, the surgeons who dressed his wound reported that he was almost dead. Nevertheless, the military commission held “an extraordinary assembly” at nine o’clock that night, declared that the prisoner was indeed “the traitor Barbaroux,” and sentenced him to be guillotined. According to the decree which specified such punishment, Barbaroux was executed in Bordeaux on 25 June 1794, or 7 Messidor, an II, in the revolutionary calendar.9 The youngest of the Girondin fugitives was only twenty-seven years old. Citoyen Oré had remained behind in Castillon to try and find Buzot and Pétion. A local inhabitant had reported finding two dead men in a wheat field, and Oré suspected that they were the two fugitives he was seeking. Although no one actually witnessed their deaths, both Buzot, thirty-four, and Pétion, thirty-eight, had apparently decided on 18 June to end their lives in the same manner as their friend Barbaroux. They were found in the wheat field, their faces half eaten by wolves or dogs, but still recognizable.10 Buzot had finally taken Manon Roland’s advice “not to allow the mercenaries’ hands to touch you, to die as a free man as you have lived.” 11 Their bodies were buried in the wheat field where they had fallen, known as the Field of the Émigrés.12 A letter to the National Convention from the Jacobin officials in Castillon announced “the arrest of the scoundrel Barbaroux. We dare to assure you that, dead or alive, those treacherous accomplices, Pétion and Buzot, shall soon be within our power.” The letter was signed by “the sans-culottes of the popular and republican society of Castillon,” and printed in Le Moniteur on 7 July 1794, or 20 Messidor, an II. A letter from the club of Bordeaux, read to a meeting of the National Convention on 17 Messidor, brought news of the punishment of Salle, Guadet, and Barbaroux, “conducted to the scaffold accompanied by the sounds of military instruments, of cries repeated a thousand times of Vive la République!” The letter further assured the Convention that Pétion and Buzot had not escaped their vigilance.13 Before Buzot, Pétion, and Barbaroux had fled to that neighboring field in Castillon and Louvet had left for Paris, they had given Madame Bouquey their memoirs as well as “diverse papers” for safekeeping. She, in turn, had hidden these irreplaceable items inside of a tin box. Before she was arrested and taken from her home, Madame Bouquey threw the tin box in a place that she assumed would not be searched: the latrines. However, a domestic servant had observed Madame Bouquey’s desperate efforts to protect the fugitives’ papers. She reported this information to the authorities, who proceeded to descend into the latrines to look for the box. Reportedly, Citoyen Oré was “delighted” when it was found, as we should be also; he had inadvertently performed an

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invaluable service for historians as well!14 The contents of the box were subsequently turned over to Jullien and later deposited in the national library and archives. In addition to the memoirs of the proscrits, the box also contained Buzot’s letters from Manon Roland and a small portrait of her; a tragedy written by Salle and titled Satan cédant le fauteuil à Marat (Satan Surrenders the Throne to Marat); a poem on the art and culture of Provence by Barbaroux; Pétion’s letter to his son (see conclusion); and a “declaration of principles” written by Buzot and Pétion in typical eighteenth-century rhetorical style. According to Dauban, several copies of the declaration exist: one corrected version written by Pétion, and two others, complete and without erasures, one by Pétion and the other by Buzot.15 Buzot and Pétion explained that they wrote the declaration for their fellow citizens and for posterity, to make clear their feelings and the motives behind their conduct. They condemned the system of hereditary monarchy, “a principal source of errors . . . that has degraded men for centuries.” The revolution was intended to end such an absurd system, they wrote, and to replace it with one that respected the rights of men, as proclaimed in the Constituent Assembly. “We have defended, as much as it has been in our power, these eternal principles based on reason, morality and justice. It is on these foundations that we wished to establish a wise and durable liberty.” They insisted that if the king had sincerely accepted the constitution and had not deceived the people, liberty could have been well served. However, they considered the September days (in 1792), those “days of crime,” the turning point in the revolution, when those men with the basest morals were elevated to the most important posts. These men formed a faction which gained strength, they wrote, “by the most odious means,” and who finally became dominant through “the audacity of their heinous crimes.” The declaration stated that these men chased away “the talented and good men” who disagreed with them, undoubtedly a reference to themselves and the other Girondins. “The schools of morality and instruction became the schools of slander, blind and dangerous instruments in their guilty hands.”16 Buzot and Pétion emphasized that they had engaged in “constant efforts” to halt the progress of “this liberticide faction . . . these murders, pillages, proscriptions, violations of home and property, arbitrary arrests, punishments, and atrocities of all kinds which have covered France with sorrow.” Then, perhaps surprisingly, they blamed the “weakness of a party of our own colleagues [the Girondins], the silence and stupor of the nation” for worsening the situation. They admitted that their faction had been conquered by “the

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weapons of intrigue, violence, and slander.” They also noted that they (the Girondins) had not sought a “false popularity . . . so easy to acquire,” but had instead preferred to follow their consciences, despite the ingratitude of the people they had served. They admitted that they had been tempted to resign, but they had felt obligated not to leave their posts.17 After they had fled to Caen in June 1793, Buzot and Pétion had expected the citizens in the provinces to rise up and avenge the injustice of the Girondins’ expulsion from the National Convention. As they wrote in their declaration, they “waited with impatience the great day of national justice, asking to be judged by the nation . . . ” and wanting to see their persecutors judged by an “august tribunal.” They discovered, however, that the radicals had the advantage of cohesion and unity of purpose, while the Girondins remained too divided to act forcefully against their enemies. They observed with sadness “the weakness, lassitude, selfishness, disagreements, and corruption” throughout France, but still they did not abandon their cause. It is obvious that the Girondin fugitives had overestimated provincial reactions to their expulsion from the National Convention. They were disappointed at the lack of concerted action on behalf of their cause, but they were unwilling to accept their minority position and chose to oppose the central government regardless of the cost. Buzot and Pétion admitted that, when they were in Brittany, they could have easily escaped to England, but they chose to remain in their own country, ungrateful though it was. It was better, they wrote, to live each day in danger of losing their lives than to enjoy the peace and liberty of a people fighting against France. “We think, therefore, that our political life in the revolution is exempt from all reproaches,” they wrote, and challenged their enemies to prove otherwise. Finally, they declared that “liberty is lost” and “moral principles and justice are trampled underfoot.” There remained only a choice between two despotisms: “that of the brigands” who have destroyed France or that of a foreign power. “The nation has lost all her dignity and energy,” they despaired, and “we can no longer render any service to our country. . . . We have resolved to give up our lives and to no longer be witnesses of the slavery that is going to desolate our unfortunate country.” They added that “these vile scoundrels who have destroyed liberty and plunged France into the abyss” should be detested forever. In closing their declaration, Buzot and Pétion commended their memoirs to “good people and friends of truth and liberty.” It was signed “ F. N. L. Buzot. Pétion.”18 The declaration of Buzot and Pétion was placed in the Archives of the Empire (now the National Archives) and, according to Dauban, published

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for the first time in his Mémoires Inédits of 1866. He thanked the director general of the archives, le marquis de Laborde, for allowing him access to these “treasures of the archives” so that he could make them available to his readers.19 The last letters of Buzot and Pétion to their wives, and that of Barbaroux to his mother, had been entrusted to Troquart. He, in turn, had given them to Louvet, who had returned to Paris with his wife and infant son after Robespierre’s execution in July 1794. In November 1794, the Jacobin Club was abolished and in December the National Convention voted to readmit the seventy-three surviving Girondin deputies. Louvet, who made sure that his friends would not be forgotten, read their last letters to the assembled members of the Convention, after which they were published in Le Moniteur of 12 July 1795, or 24 Messidor, an III, of the revolutionary calendar.20 In his short letter addressed to “Mme. Buzot, at Evreux,” Buzot explained that the letter, “this last souvenir from a husband who loves you,” had been given to a man (Troquart) who had rendered him a great service. While he admitted that he was surrounded by danger, Buzot assured her that his courage remained strong. The time was short and he must soon leave, he wrote, but he recommended that she reward the carrier of the letter. “He will recount all of our misfortunes.” Buzot closed the letter with these words: “Adieu, I await you at the abode of the just.”21 Despite his acknowledged love for Manon Roland, it would be a mistake to assume that Buzot did not feel any affection for his wife, Anne-Victoire Baudry, who was also his older cousin. They had no children and, as he made clear in his memoir, he worried about her welfare and was especially concerned that his death would leave her destitute. A dispute actually did arise after his death regarding Buzot’s rightful heirs, but his wife was finally judged as his true widow. According to the court records, Buzot had given his wife power of attorney to manage his property and assets on 10 July 1793. It was certainly his intention that she would receive compensation for the losses she had suffered because of him. However, she received nothing more than the small pension allotted to the widows of the deceased Girondins who had been proscribed, which amounted to approximately 666 livres. Madame Buzot died at Evreux on 30 July 1812, a belated casualty of the revolution, which had taken not only her husband, but also her home and most of her possessions.22 Pétion’s last letter to his wife is slightly longer and more personal than Buzot’s letter. He began by writing that “I have lived for you, I have lived for my son, to deliver my country from the infamous scoundrels who have oppressed it, to avenge my assassinated friends . . . to defend my honor.” He declared

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that he cared little what others thought of him, because he had done the best he could for his country and his conscience was clear. Having found himself in the cruelest situation, Pétion wrote that he “threw himself into the arms of Providence.” He bid his “dear wife, adieu a thousand times! I embrace you, I embrace my son; my last sighs are for you, that he may remember his father.” Pétion closed the letter by asking his wife to compensate “the brave man who shall carry this letter.”23 Pétion’s wife, Louise-Anne Lefebvre, fared little better than Madame Buzot. Both she and her son had been imprisoned for a short time in SaintePélagie with Madame Roland. She later received a widow’s pension of approximately the same amount as Madame Buzot had received. Several of Pétion’s relatives, including his mother-in-law, who was accused of royalism, were guillotined in 1793 and 1794. His son, however, was spared such punishment. He became a calvary officer and, in 1823, he returned to Chartres to sell what was left of his “mediocre paternal heritage.”24 Barbaroux’s last letter to his mother (there is no mention of “his Annette”), addressed to “la citoyenne Pons-Chalvet, at Marseille,” was brief but heartfelt. He began by writing: “O my mother! My good mother!” He apologized for not having enough time to say very much and assured her that “I surrender myself to the providence of God.” Barbaroux urged his mother not to despair at his “leaving” and asked her to compensate the brave man who carried his letter. In closing he wrote: “Adieu, good mother, your son embraces you.”25 Barbaroux’s mother, Catherine Pons, died in Marseille on 29 October 1820. His son, Charles Ogé Barbaroux, grew up to become a senator. He gave a copy of his father’s unedited memoir to publishers in Paris, Badouin Frères, and it appeared in print in 1822. As noted in chapter 5, Dauban’s 1866 version of Barbaroux’s memoir was based on the 1822 publication. Barbaroux’s son died in 1867.26 As previously noted, Louvet read these three “last letters” from his Girondin friends to the members of the Convention, and they produced just the emotional effect that Louvet had anticipated. He also read a petition by Citoyen Troquart, which was then printed in Le Moniteur of 24 Messidor, an III. Troquart addressed the citoyens représentants as a victim of tyranny, an inhabitant of St. Emilion, where “your unfortunate colleagues, Guadet, Buzot, Pétion, Barbaroux and Salle perished.” He explained that he had hidden and fed Buzot, Pétion, and Barbaroux for five months. For his efforts, he had been imprisoned for eight months and only escaped death because of a serious illness which prevented him from appearing before “the scoundrel Lacombe . . . and his terrible tribunal.” Troquart declared that he had always been poor

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and had used up his resources by providing for the fugitives. Now, he wrote, “I leave it to your discretion to accord me that which appears just to you.”27 After reading the “last letters” and the petition from Troquart, Louvet proposed a decree to the members of the National Convention. The provisions included a payment of 1,500 livres to Troquart and the deposit of the “last letters” in the national library. Subsequently, however, Troquart received only a small portion of the suggested amount.28 Although a law on restitution had been adopted on 21 Prairial, an III or 29 May 1795, it often proved difficult to determine not only “who” but “what” and “how much” should be allotted to the families of the victims of the Terror. A list of exceptions to such restitution included the obvious choices, such as the royal family, but also émigrés, members of the National Convention who had been involved in the events of 9 Thermidor, counterfeiters, and conspirators. On 11 March 1795, Louvet proposed another decree in the National Convention “declaring that all republicans who had taken up arms in protest of June 2 [the expulsion of the Girondins from the National Convention] had served their country well.”29 Although the proposal did not pass, Louvet continued his efforts on behalf of his departed friends and their surviving families. When Louvet, Lodoiska, and their infant son had returned to Paris after 9 Thermidor, he had discovered that much of his property had been stolen in his absence. In a relatively short time, however, Louvet was able to open a small bookshop and publishing business in an office located in the Palais Royal. He published a number of books in his remaining years, notably his own memoirs, Récit de mes périls and Madame Roland’s prison memoir, Appel à l’impartiale postérité in four volumes, edited by her old friend Bosc in 1795. The proceeds from the latter book would be given to the Rolands’ orphaned daughter, Eudora.30 Louvet’s health, never robust, deteriorated rapidly after 1795. He was elected to the Council of Five Hundred, successor to the National Convention, which had dissolved itself in 1795. He represented the department of Haute-Vienne until May 1797, when he decided to seek a diplomatic post. Louvet was exhausted and disillusioned by what he perceived as the increasing royalist strength within the government, and he felt that he could no longer serve in an effective manner. In August 1797, he received an appointment as consul in Palermo, but by that time he was too ill to accept his new position. Louvet died on 25 August at the age of thirty-seven, but appearing much older than his years. He had managed to accomplish a great deal in his short life, and despite his poor health, he had survived long enough to contribute to the rehabilitation of his friends’ reputations. He had been a lucky man in many respects, not the

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least of which had been his choice of a wife. Lodoiska, practical and capable as ever, continued to manage Louvet’s business interests until her death in 1814. Their surviving son led a reclusive life at Montargis, in the department of Loiret, the constituency that had elected his father to the National Convention. He died in 1846.31 The memoirs of Buzot, Pétion, and Louvet, and the letters from Manon Roland to Buzot, which were deposited in the national library, gained new attention in 1864. A catalog published by the library announced the sale of the following items: copies after the original manuscripts of Buzot, Pétion, and Louvet; the original manuscript of a tragedy by Salle; the original letters of Madame Roland to Buzot as well as Buzot’s letter to Jérôme Letellier of Evreux; and several other items.32 The memoirs and the heretofore unknown love letters from Madame Roland to Buzot were purchased by “an unidentified young man,” who sold them to a bookseller on the Quai Voltaire in Paris. The bookseller, who had a keen interest in the revolutionary period, was Noel France, the father of the writer, Anatole France. After purchasing the manuscripts and letters, France published a catalog of his new acquisitions. Suddenly Manon Roland’s secret love life was made public, causing “something of a sensation.”33 She almost certainly would have been angry about this violation of her private life. Yet her public execution and the publication of her prison memoir had made her a heroine in the eyes of many French citizens, and they were excited to discover this surprising, almost scandalous aspect of her life. The memoirs of the proscribed deputies and their correspondence offer tangible evidence that they were primarily concerned to justify their actions for posterity. It was the necessity to provide such a record that sustained them during the months of privation and misery that they endured hiding in St. Emilion. In their last days the fugitives had lost everything that made life worthwhile—their families and friends, their homes, and their country. As Buzot wrote in his memoir, they were “orphans on the earth, abandoned by all, strangers to all, ” awaiting death.34 They were left with only their pens to defend themselves for posterity. Still, considering the intricacies of passing the manuscripts and letters from their hands to Madame Bouquey, and then to Jullien, the representative-on-mission in Bordeaux, and finally to the Committee of Public Safety in Paris, the survival of these papers was not at all certain. In the chaos following Robespierre’s downfall in July 1794 and the years following, the national library and archives faced a daunting challenge in their attempts to preserve the records and papers from the revolutionary period.35 That they succeeded, for the most part, has added immeasurably to the French patrimony. Although Buzot, Pétion, and Barbaroux

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died in June 1794, and Louvet in 1797, their words continue to speak for all those proscribed Girondins who devoted their energies, intellects, and often their very lives to create the first French republic.

Notes 1. C. A. Dauban, editor. Mémoires Inédits de Pétion, et Mémoires de Buzot & de Barbaroux, accompagnés de Notes Inédites de Buzot et de nombreux documents inédits de Barbaroux, Buzot, Brissot, etc. (Paris: Henri Plon, 1866), 494–97. 2. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 498; and John Rivers, Louvet: Revolutionist & Romance-Writer (London: Hurst and Blackett Ltd., Paternoster House, E. C., 1910), 279. Troquart’s house was located “at the corner of Grande Rue and Rue Cap-duPont, later renamed rue Guadet,” according to Rivers. 3. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 498–99. See also Owen Connelly, French Revolution/Napoleonic Era (N.Y.: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1979), 163, 168–70. 4. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 499; and Paul R. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire: The Federalist Revolt in the French Revolution (University Park, Penn.: The Pennsylvania State Univesity Press, 2003), 228. See also Alan Forrest, Society and Politics in Revolutionary Bordeaux (London: Oxford University Press, 1975), 236–37. 5. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 499–500. 6. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 500–501. 7. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 502, 508 (note #1). 8. Rivers, Louvet, 274. 9. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 502–3, 508. 10. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 503. 11. Correspondance 1793, Mme. Roland à Buzot. N. A. F. 1730, 8–15. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 12. Rivers, Louvet, 282. 13. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 503–4 (note #1). 14. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, xliv, 505. 15. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 505, xliv (note #1). 16. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, xlv–xlvi. 17. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, xlvi, xlvii. 18. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, xlvii, xlviii. 19. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, xliv (note #1). 20. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 511. See Connelly, French Revolution/Napoleonic Era, 168–70, for the dismantling of the Terror. 21. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 511. 22. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, lxx–lxxiii. 23. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 511–12. 24. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, xlix. 25. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 512.

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26. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 307, 320, 373, 27. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 510. 28. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 512. 29. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire, 233. 30. Rivers, Louvet, 325–26. 31. Rivers, Louvet, 343–47. 32. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits, 513. 33. Gita May, Madame Roland and the Age of Revolution (N. Y.: Columbia University Press, 1970), 265. See also C. A. Dauban, Etude sur Madame Roland et son temps . . . (Paris: Plon, 1864), 61–62. 34. F.-N.-L. Buzot, Mémoires. N. A. F. 1730, 66. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 35. For a detailed treatment of this topic, see Bette W. Oliver, From Royal to National: The Louvre Museum and the Bibliothèque Nationale (Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2007).



Conclusion

In his book, New Travels in the United States of America, 1788, which was published in 1791, Jacques Pierre Brissot made an observation that was true not only for the revolutionary period but for most of the nineteenth century in France as well. Brissot wrote in his preface: “We have won our liberty. We have, therefore, no need to learn from Americans how to attain this blessing; but we do have to learn from them the secret of preserving it.”1 Brissot maintained that the secret could be found primarily in the moral principles and practices of the nation, and he regretted that the French had not yet learned this. He believed that the success of the revolution and the maintenance of liberty depended on upholding such moral principles. The events that followed from 1792 to 1794 gave credence to Brissot’s words. He and his fellow Girondins would pay the ultimate price for the government’s failure to preserve the liberty promised by the revolution. The problem of successfully accommodating dissidence within national unity is one that has plagued French governments, and never more so than during the establishment of the first French republic. Once the monarchy had been abolished, it became increasingly difficult for the republican government to act in a unified manner. While the Girondins still blamed the king and accused him of secret conspiracies to destroy the revolution, their inclination to spare his life became one of the principal points of disagreement between them and the Montagnards. By late 1792 the deputies had separated into bitterly opposed factions unable to agree on the best course for France to follow. The situation continued to deteriorate, culminating with

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the expulsion of twenty-nine Girondin deputies from the National Convention in May–June 1793. Revolutions chart their own courses. The idealism of the early years of the revolution, expressed so eloquently in the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the constitution of 1791, had somehow been replaced by the dictates of the Committee of Public Safety. This transformation had come about as a result of a series of unexpected events, notably Louis XVI’s escape from Paris, his subsequent capture and return, the discovery of his true intentions regarding the revolutionary government and the constitution, and the fear of invasion from foreign powers. As historian Timothy Tackett has pointed out, “there was an unpredictable, unscripted character to the revolution,” and the deputies could not have anticipated some of the hard decisions that they would be forced to make.2 The Terror of 1793–1794 was neither an inherent part of the revolution nor could it have been foreseen, as some historians have suggested. Instead, the machinery of the Terror was set in motion by the inability of the deputies within the National Convention to deal successfully with the rapidly changing scenario and their subsequent separation into irreconcilable factions. The Terror was a last resort formulated by men desperate to preserve the republic in a time of uncertainty and fear. Tackett argues that the term “Terror” signified not only “the judicial apparatus assembled to intimidate and punish the perceived enemies of the revolution, but also the near panic state of fear and suspicion experienced during the period by the revolutionaries themselves.”3 There were no signposts to follow in this new world in which the revolutionaries found themselves besieged by enemies outside of France’s borders as well as those perceived to be enemies (federalists, counter-revolutionaries) within. Lines of social continuity had been “shattered” as the familiar pre-revolutionary past erupted into a strange and dissonant present. Memoirs of this period, as we have seen, are filled with declarations of loss and displacement, especially from those who did not survive. As historian Peter Fritzsche has so aptly phrased it, the people found themselves “stranded in the present,” with no sense of direction.4 Situations changed so rapidly during this period that it became difficult for people to internalize them, resulting in a kind of mental vertigo. “The revolution had broken time, reset the clocks, and torn down the calendars,” wrote Ken Alder in his book, The Measure of All Things.5 The words of the Girondin fugitives bear witness to the unpredictable nature of revolutions and serve to remind us that such upheavals are difficult to control. It will be recalled that Buzot, Pétion, and Robespierre, among others, met several times weekly in the Rolands’ apartment in 1791 when the

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Constituent Assembly was in session. At that time Manon Roland had referred memorably to the three men as “the incorruptibles,” an ironic term which would ultimately be reserved for Robespierre alone. During that period Robespierre and the Girondins, while not especially close, maintained an attitude of civility toward one another. The major break between Robespierre and the Girondins came with the decision to involve France in a war with other European powers, a war that had been urged by Brissot as a preventive measure. Robespierre and the Jacobins feared that France’s involvement in the war would detract from the need to consolidate the gains of the revolution. A willingness to compromise was not forthcoming from either faction, as the conversations recounted by Buzot in his memoir made clear. Buzot had reproached Robespierre for slandering the Girondins and accusing them of a lack of patriotism, asking Robespierre: “Dare you say that Roland sold out to foreigners?” To which Robespierre replied: “No, I don’t accuse him of selling out to foreigners, but I stopped seeing him the moment when he adopted Brissot’s opinion of the war.” Continuing to press Robespierre, Buzot then added: “And Brissot, you accused him of having sold his pen and talents to the enemies of France!” Robespierre replied: “I do not believe that he is corrupt, but his opinion of the war demonstrates to me that he is not a patriot.” Buzot admitted that he felt “an invincible aversion” for Robespierre, “this man with the face of a cat.”6 Likewise, Manon Roland had made it clear that she was repulsed by Danton, “this half-Hercules of gross form,” whom she instinctively distrusted, fearing that he would undermine Roland’s ministry.7 Accusations of being a “false patriot” or a “sly aristocrat” were common from 1792 to 1794; part of, the “us versus them” mentality that prevailed during this period and sometimes resulted in imprisonment or even execution. The government justified the severe measures introduced during the Terror as necessary to protect the unity of la patrie or the nation. Those who dared to oppose such measures thus could be labeled as traitors, just as accusations of federalism could be equated with treason. The Girondin fugitives blamed this divisive situation on the willingness of “the people” to believe the lies they were told by the radical government. Buzot wrote in his memoir that he deplored the naiveté of the people, who believed the Jacobin propaganda, and the “imbecility” of the masses under a corrupt government.8 Pétion regretted that fear “freezes the courage of weak men” and reproached the Parisians for “elevating the brigands who have taken over the city.” 9 The two factions held decidedly different views of “the sovereign people.” While some violence had occurred in the early years of

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the revolution, the Girondins feared, correctly as it turned out, that political power in the hands of the popular classes would lead to even greater violence. The Jacobins, however, sought to use the people to support their measures and thus help them achieve their ends. The Girondins envisioned a republic based on the rule of law and supported by those necessary moral principles cited by Brissot at the beginning of this conclusion.10 The Jacobins, on the other hand, embraced popular sovereignty, the will of the people, as a means of legitimizing the republican government. Orderly legal processes could be quickly swept aside by the excesses of popular violence which, in turn, exerted a direct effect on political power. Such excesses were almost impossible to contain once they had gathered momentum. In addition, the Girondins, whom I have earlier described as bourgeois, did not favor allowing uneducated people to govern themselves; instead, they felt that those who were educated and owned property were better suited for governing. As historian Paul Hanson has pointed out, the Girondins’ supporters, the federalists in the provinces, agreed with this view. It followed that the Girondins’ belief in the rule of law was directly opposed to popular sovereignty. Consequently, after they had fled Paris in the summer of 1793, the Girondins could not rally the popular support they needed in the provinces. The radical Jacobins, however, had no difficulty enlisting the people’s support in Paris and used it to their advantage against the Girondins.11 The Girondin fugitives had placed all of their hopes in finding a more enlightened and supportive public spirit in the provinces, but as they discovered in Caen, the citizens were not united behind them. Pétion decried the ambivalence of these “royalists in disguise” and the half-hearted leadership of the departmental forces by General Felix Wimpffen.12 The persuasive orations of Buzot and Barbaroux could not rally the majority of the citizens of Caen, but they did impress Charlotte Corday, who took it upon herself to journey to Paris, where she sought out Marat and killed him. His murder and the letter from Barbaroux carried by Corday only served to convince the government in Paris that the Girondin fugitives were clearly traitors, who deserved to be hunted down, arrested, and brought to Paris for trial. In late July 1793, the fugitives felt that they had little choice but to flee, first to Brittany and then to the Bordeaux area, where they finally found temporary refuge in an abandoned quarry belonging to Guadet’s relatives. The generosity of Madame Bouquey enabled the fugitives to survive long enough to write their memoirs, in which they attempted to explain and justify the tumultuous events they had experienced from 1791 to 1794. Yet, we may wonder: What if those Girondin deputies had not fled from Paris after their expulsion from the National Convention? Their expulsion

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had created numerous problems for the central government as it not only had to deal with protests from the many deputies who remained within the National Convention, but also with protests from the departmental assemblies. The Girondin deputies who had chosen to remain in Paris were placed under house arrest and, according to historian Leigh Whaley, they might have been readmitted to the National Convention eventually had their colleagues in Caen not attempted to instigate a departmental revolt. Yet, after Brissot had been arrested at Moulins on 10 June, he had written a letter asking for a hearing in Paris, but his request had been denied. Then it became known that Buzot had fled to Caen, where he was speaking publicly to arouse the citizens, and that he had been joined there by other proscribed Girondin deputies. There can be no denial of these activities, which were perceived as counter-revolutionary by Robespierre and his cohorts. However, with little chance of a fair trial, the fugitives had seized what they perceived as their only opportunity to survive, which was to get out of Paris before they were arrested. By 8 July, Saint-Just declared that those deputies who had fled to Caen were traitors, and he accused them of trying to cause a civil war to destroy the republic. But it was the assassination of Marat on 13 July which finally determined the fate of the Girondin fugitives: on 28 July they were named traitors in a decree passed by the National Convention.13 As for those Girondin deputies who had chosen to remain in Paris under house arrest, they were declared to be the accomplices of those who had fled. Thus, they were also perceived as traitors, and their executions would follow on 31 October 1793. The question remains: Would any of the Girondin deputies have been executed if Buzot and his friends had not fled to Caen? Yes, probably so, in my opinion, given the toxic atmosphere of Paris during the period of the Terror. The executions of those who had not fled, including Manon Roland, were intended to serve as visible examples of what would happen to those who dared to oppose the central government. The Girondin fugitives would not fail to understand the message. In retrospect, the October executions may seem callous and unnecessary. However, in the eyes of those whose mission it was to consolidate the revolution and to defend it against all who would destroy it, the executions were justified. For the radical Jacobins, there could be no compromises allowed when the survival of the republic was at stake. Any sort of opposition was perceived as counter-revolutionary as well as “preconcerted,” according to the historian M. J. Sydenham: “If all could be accused as conspirators, all could be convicted on a single capital charge.”14 Thus, it was convenient for the radicals to view the Girondin deputies and their sympathizers as a dangerous and united opposition group, or party, even though we have observed that they acted more as individuals.

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The Girondin fugitives, as well as those imprisoned in Paris, also believed that their actions could be justified, and they certainly did not consider their actions to be counter-revolutionary in nature, despite the fact that they had acted outside of the law. Although they had been accused not only of treason but also of wishing to restore the monarchy, it is obvious from reading their memoirs that they desired no such thing. These deputies considered themselves true republicans with a different vision of how best to save the republic. In their eyes, Paris was the cause of everything that had steered the revolution off its course. Buzot wrote in his memoir that Paris was “the inexhaustible source of all the misfortunes of France,” and he regretted that the National Assembly had not remained in Versailles. Buzot believed that the revolution belonged to all of France, not only to Paris, where it had become corrupted and influenced by scandalous journals, especially Marat’s L’Ami du Peuple.15 Pétion, too, found fault with Paris, whose citizens had elected him their mayor with great enthusiasm before later turning against him. He blamed the fickleness of public opinion, and he regretted that those who had once praised him so unreservedly could accuse him of being a traitor.16 Both Buzot and Pétion sought revenge against their persecutors, accomplished, to be sure, by legal means. Pétion wrote in a letter to his son that “forgiveness would be the most criminal of acts,” and he referred to vengeance as “the most sacred of duties.”17 Buzot, for his part, asked in his memoir: “What would become of humanity if Robespierre, Barère, and Danton would die peacefully in their beds?” He desperately wanted those injustices, which had been committed against him and his friends, to be punished by the law.18 As it turned out, Danton was executed in April 1794, followed by Robespierre on 28 July, known in revolutionary parlance as 9 Thermidor, the day when Robespierre and his accomplices were arrested. Barère, who in March 1796 had been sent into exile in Guiana along with Billaud-Varenne, Collot d’Herbois, and Vadier, managed to escape, as did Vadier. Without doubt, Buzot and Pétion would have been pleased to learn that government commissions had been organized to try the “terrorists” in Paris and in the provinces. These actions were carried out amidst the dismantling of the machinery of the Terror and what has come to be known as the Thermidorian Reaction of 1794–1795.19 The Girondin fugitives’ perceptions of events between 1791 and 1794 have formed the substance of this book. It was written to acknowledge their contributions to the creation of the first French republic and to document their year in hiding (June 1793–June 1794), a topic that has received little attention from historians. The fugitives’ memoirs provide ev-

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idence of their beliefs and goals, personal as well as national. While they failed to act in unison to deal effectively with the radicals in Paris, they did uphold the principles of rule by law and individual rights. Unfortunately, the Girondins’ fierce individualism worked against them in their struggles with the Jacobins. In addition, their bourgeois attitudes and preference for the provinces rather than Paris alienated them from the common people. Nevertheless, their memoirs offer us a nuanced and useful perspective on that fragmentation of the past known as the French Revolution, and one hopes that they may be read today with a greater sense of understanding and appreciation. It is appropriate that Louvet, the only one of the group to survive the Terror, should have the last word. He wrote in his memoir, perhaps foreseeing that one day he might return to serve in the government: “The men, the republicans of the eighteenth century, do not belong to it. They belong to the centuries that follow. . . . The memory of virtue does not produce virtue, but at the very least it is to be hoped that in the eternal struggle between republicans and tyranny, free men shall not always fail.”20

Notes 1. J. P. Brissot de Warville, New Travels in the United States of America, 1788. Translated by Mara Soceanu Vamos and Durand Echeverria (Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1964), xi. For the French edition, see J. P. Brissot (Warville), Citoyen Français, Nouveau Voyage dans Les États-Unis de L’Amérique Septentrionale, fait en 1788 (Paris: Chez Buisson, Avril 1791), 3. 2. Timothy Tackett, “Interpreting the Terror,” in French Historical Studies, Vol. 24, No. 4, Fall 2001: 569–78. 3. Timothy Tackett, “Conspiracy Obsession in a Time of Revolution: French Elites and the Origins of the Terror, 1789–1792,” The American Historical Review, Vol. 105, No. 3, June 2000: 691–713. 4. Peter Fritzsche, Stranded in the Present: Modern Time and the Melancholy of History (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2005), 55–56. 5. Ken Alder, The Measure of All Things: The Seven-Year Odyssey that Transformed the World (London: Abacus, 2004), 204. 6. F.-L.-N. Buzot, Mémoires de Buzot. N. A. F. 1730, 71, 74. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 7. Papiers Roland II: Madame Roland. N. A. F. 9533, 39–46. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. 8. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 75. 9. Jérôme Pétion, Mémoires de Jérôme Pétion. N. A. F. 1730, 95–96. 10. See paragraph one of the conclusion.

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11. Paul R. Hanson, The Jacobin Republic Under Fire: The Federalist Revolt in the French Revolution (University Park, Penn.: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003), 241–44. 12. Mémoires de Jérôme Pétion, N. A. F. 1730, 113, 122–24. 13. Leigh Whaley, Radicals: Politics and Republicanism in the French Revolution (London: Sutton Publishing Ltd., 2000), 156–65. 14. M. J. Sydenham, The Girondins (London: University of London, The Athlone Press, 1961), 29–30. 15. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 71–72. 16. Mémoires de Pétion, N. A. F. 1730, 81–82. 17. C. A. Dauban, Mémoires Inédits de Pétion et Mémoires de Buzot & de Barbaroux acompagnés de Notes Inédites de Buzot et de nombreux documents inédits sur Barbaroux, Buzot, Brissot, etc. (Paris: Henri Plon, 1866), li. 18. Mémoires de Buzot, N. A. F. 1730, 67. 19. Owen Connelly, French Revolution/Napoleonic Era (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1979), 161, 168–70. 20. J.-B. Louvet, Mémoires de J.-B. Louvet, Tome 1. N. A. F. 1730, 137–38. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits.



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Alder, Ken. The Measure of All Things: The Seven-Year Odyssey That Transformed the World. London: Abacus, 2004. Andress, David. The Terror: The Merciless War for Freedom in Revolutionary France. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005. “Archives parlementaires de 1787 à 1860, recueil complet de débats législatifs et politiques des chambres françaises.” Première série (1787–1799). Ed. Jérôme Mavidal et al., 82 vols. Paris (1867–1913) 28: 326, 362. Arnaud, Claude. Chamfort: A Biography. Trans. Deke Dusinberre. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992. Baker, Keith Michael.”The French Revolution: Possible Because Thinkable or Thinkable Because Possible?” A Response to William Doyle, in Proceedings of the Western Society for French History. Vol. 30, ed. Barry Rothaus (2002): 184–90. Barbaroux, Charles. Correspondance de Barbaroux, Député à la Convention Nationale avec La Municipalité de Marseille, 1792–1793. N. A. F. 6140. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Dept. des Manuscrits. Barbaroux, Charles. Mémoires Inédits de Charles Barbaroux, député à la Convention Nationale, avec des Eclaircissemens Historiques par MM. Berville et Barrière. Paris: Badouin Frères, Libraires, 1822. Blanc, Olivier. Last Letters: Prisons and Prisoners of the French Revolution, 1793–1794. Trans. Alan Sheridan. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (Michael de Capua Books), 1987. Brissot de Warville, Jacques Pierre. New Travels in the United States of America, 1788. Trans. Mara Soceanu Vamos and Durand Echeverria. Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1964.

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Index

Austria: war with France, 13, 73 Austrian Netherlands (Belgium): invasion by General Dumouriez, 13 Barbaroux, Charles: arrest and execution, 92–93; attacking Robespierre, 16; background, 10–11, 65, 66; baptism of his son, 78; on battalion of fédérés from Marseille in Paris, 67; birth of his son, 77; in Buzot’s memoirs, 66; calling for referendum on fate of Louis XVI, 66; capture, 94–95; on commercial matters in Marseille, 68; concerns on the course of the Revolution, 65; considering suicide, 44, 95; correspondence, 65, 66; critical of the Legislative Assembly, 72; death, 101–2; declared as counterrevolutionary, 29; defending Brissot at the Legislative Assembly, 73; defending himself against accusations, 67; defending Louvet at the Legislative Assembly, 73; description of his constituents, 71;

119

escape from Paris, 25, 29; escape to Caen, 35; escape to Finistère, 40; on events preceding the fall of the monarchy, 75–76; on excesses of the central government, 65; execution, 95; expelled from Jacobin Club in Marseille, 66; expelled from the National Convention, 32; final days, 91; on foreign affairs, 67; as founder of the Jacobin Club in Marseille, 66; as fugitive, 71; on Girondins’ expulsion from the National Convention, 19–20; journey from St. Emilion to Paris, 43; last letter to his mother, 98; as lawyer, 5; leaving Madame Bouquey’s home, 81; letters to Marseille municipality, 3, 6, 29, 40, 65, 66, 67–69; meetings with Marat, 75; meetings with Robespierre, 75; as member of the National Convention, 11, 29, 67, 68, 71, 78; as member of the Rolands’ circle, 11; memoirs, 1, 2, 6, 29, 40, 52, 65–78; and municipal officials in Marseille, 3, 14, 19–20,

120

 Index

29, 66, 71–72, 77–78; nomination to the National Convention, 69; on Paris insurrection (20 June 1792), 73–74; on Pétion’s suspension as mayor, 73; publication of correspondence, 69; publication of unedited memoirs, 69; purchasing foreign wheat, 68–69; as representative to the Legislative Assembly, 66, 71–73; as republican, 66; resigning from the National Convention, 68; rhetorical eloquence, 2; sheltered by Thérèse Bouquey, 44–45, 81, 91–92; views on Louis XVI’s sentence, 17–18; views on Revolution, 73, 75, 78; on war, 67, 73; work at the Constituent Assembly, 71; workload at the National Convention, 70–71; writing about Bourbons, 17–18; writing style, 65 Barbaroux, Charles Ogé: baptism, 78; birth, 77; publishing his father’s memoirs, 69 Bayle, Moïse, 69, 70 Belgium. See Austrian Netherlands Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris: Carra as co-director, 70; Chamfort as codirector, 70; Department of Manuscripts, 1, 2, 30, 51, 58, 66, 70, 82, 96, 101 Blanc, Louis: views on the Girondins, 4–5 Bosc, Louis: correspondence with Manon Roland, 9, 11, 46; as editor of Manon Roland’s memoirs, 100; as member of the Rolands’ circle of friends, 10; sending flowers to Manon Roland, 39 Bouquey, Thérèse: arrest, 93, 94; execution, 93, 94; informing the Girondins of Manon Roland’s trial and execution, 47; as keeper of

Girondins’ memoirs, 48, 52, 95–96, 101; securing forged passports for fugitives, 92; sheltering Louvet, Barbaroux, Valady, Pétion, and Buzot, 44–45, 81–82, 91–92, 108 Bourbons: Barbaroux writing about, 17–18; Roland as province administrator, 9 Brissot, Jacques Pierre: arrested at Moulins, 27; attacking Robespierre, 16; background, 11; in Buzot’s memoirs, 66; defended by Barbaroux at the Legislative Assembly, 73; escape from Paris, 25; execution, 51–52; favoring war, 73; on freedom, 105; Girondins’ connections with, 11; journey to the United States, 11; as member of the National Convention, 11; as member of the Rolands’ circle, 10; New Travels in the United States of America, 105; pressing for war against Austria, 13; Robespierre turning against, 13; on success of the Revolution, 105; views on America, 62; views on Louis XVI’s sentence, 17; views on war, 59–60 Brunswick, Duke of: leading Prussian army to Paris, 14 Buzot, Anne-Victoire (née Baudry): as Buzot’s heir, 98; last letter from her husband, 98 Buzot, François: accusing Robespierre of slandering the Girondins, 107; background, 10; Barbaroux in memoirs of, 66; Brissot in memoirs of, 66; comparison between Robespierre’s faction and the Girondins, 54; condemning hereditary monarchy, 96; on the Constituent Assembly, 53, 62; correspondence with Manon Roland, 96; on counter-revolution, 56, 62;

Index  121

critical of the superiority of Paris vs. provinces, 54, 56, 60; death, 101–2; declaration of principles, 96–98; defending Girondins against charges of federalism, 61–62; denouncing dishonesty of Jacobin leadership, 52, 53; description of, by Manon Roland, 39; on despotism of kings, 54; on the destruction of Lyon, 42, 56; enmity with Robespierre, 59–60, 62; escape from Paris, 20, 25, 29; escape to Caen, 109; on executions of fellow Girondins, 7; expelled from the National Convention, 32; on fate of his memoirs manuscript, 58; final days, 91; flight to Finistère, 40; on freedom of speech, 60; on freedom of the press, 55, 60; on Girondins as fugitives, 57; on Girondins’ death, 63; on Girondins’ honesty, 52; imprisonment, 94; on imprisonment of Girondins, 57; last letter to his wife, 98; last message from Manon Roland, 46; law against provocateurs, 60; as lawyer, 5; leaving Madame Bouquey’s home, 81; on the Legislative Assembly, 53; letter to his wife, 48; letter to Letellier, 48; letters from Manon Roland, 38, 39, 96; on Louis XVI’s ruling principles, 61; love for Manon Roland, 37–38, 39, 46, 48, 57, 98; Manon Roland’s love for, 18, 38; as member of the Constituent Assembly, 10; on memoir writing, 52; memoirs of, 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 29, 48, 51–63, 66, 101; on the monarchy, 52–53; on moral decline of society, 62; on the naiveté of the people, 107; on the National Convention, 54, 62; and news of Manon Roland’s trial and execution, 47–48; Notes sur le Troisième Cahier, 3, 58, 63; Pétion

in memoirs of, 66; on Pétion’s patriotism, 59; on possibility of escape to England, 97; promoting Garat to interior minister, 55; promoting Pache to war minister, 55–56; punishment, 32; on the representatives to the National Convention, 54–55; rhetorical eloquence of, 2; and the Rolands’ salon, 60, 106–7; on the rule of law, 61; on sans-culottes, 62; seeking revenge against persecutors, 110; social views, 53; on sovereignty of the people, 61, 62; suicide, 95; views on America, 62; views on Committee of Public Safety, 63; views on France, 52–53; views on life, 52; views on necessity of justice, 3; views on tyranny of the Jacobin leadership, 3; and wife, 57, 58; as witness to Louvet and Lodoiska’s marriage, 37; writing style, 65 Carra, Jean-Louis: as co-director of the Bibliothèque nationale, 70; execution of, 70; as member of the Girondins, 70; as member of the National Convention, 69, 70 Chamfort, Sébastien Roch Nicholas: as co-director of the Bibliothèque nationale, 70; as Girondin sympathizer, 70 civil wars, 32, 72, 109. See also wars collections. See national collections Committee of Public Safety: Buzot’s views on, 63; criticizing the Jacobins, 56; enacting the Law of the Maximum, 19; establishment of, 19; on federalism, 43; and Manon Roland’s arrest, 38; and MarcAntoine Jullien, 92, 101; and pacification of rebellious areas, 42; preceded by the Committee of

122

 Index

Public Security, 59; replacing Constitution, 106 Commune: asking for the removal of Louis XVI, 14; Danton as member, 16; Jacobins’ popularity with, 19; Marat as member, 16; and Pétion as mayor of Paris, 15; and replacing the Legislative Assembly, 76; Robespierre as member, 16; and writing a new constitution, 76 Constituent Assembly: Barbaroux’s work in, 71; Buzot as member of, 10; Buzot’s views on, 53; Manon Roland attending sessions of, 12; Manon Roland’s views on deputies to, 60; Pétion as member of, 10; Robespierre as member of, 10 Constitution of 1791, 12, 14, 61, 71, 76, 96, 106 constitutional monarchy: Girondins’ support for, 12 Corday, Charlotte: arrested, 33; imprisonment, 38; stabbing Marat to death, 33, 108; supporting the Girondin cause, 32 correspondence: Barbaroux’s to Marseille officials, 3, 6, 29, 40, 65, 66, 67–69; of Buzot, 48; between Louvet and Lodoiska, 88–89; of Manon Roland, 2, 15, 38–39, 46–47; as primary source for historical research, 2; of the proscribed deputies, 6, 101 Council of Five Hundred: Louvet’s election to, 100 counter-revolution: any opposition seen as, 45, 55, 106, 109; in Arles, 72, 78; Buzot’s views on, 29, 56; in Caen, Marseille, and Bordeaux, 62; in Lyon, 42, 62; in Tarascon, 78 Danton, Jacques: as Commune member, 16; conflict with Jean Roland, 15,

16; execution of, 110; and his contemporaries, 2; Manon Roland’s thoughts of, 15, 16, 107; as Minister of Justice, 15, 76 Declaration of the Rights of Man, 106 Dumouriez, Charles (general): declaration of war against England and Holland, 68; defecting to Austria, 21, 68; invasion of Austrian Netherlands (Belgium), 13; pressing for war against Austria, 13; troops defeated, 68 England: France declaring war on, 68; recalling ambassador from France, 19; war with France, 19, 67, 68 federalism: in France, 61–62, 66–67 federalist revolts: in Bordeaux, 42; in Caen, 42; against the Jacobin government, 1, 6, 21, 32; in Lyon, 42; in Marseille, 42–43; threat to the republic, 33 fédérés: of Marseille, 13, 14, 62, 67, 74 First Empire: government under Napoleon I, 4 First French Republic: creation of, 2, 3, 10, 11, 102, 105; government, 4; Jacobins’ fight for survival of, 109; the Terror’s efforts for preservation of, 106 France: declaring war on England and Holland, 68; food shortages, 69; war with Austria, 13, 73; war with England, Holland, and Spain, 19, 67, 68 freedom of speech: in Buzot’s views, 60 freedom of the press: in Buzot’s views, 55, 60 French Revolution: Brissot’s interpretation, 105; Buzot’s interpretation, 6, 38, 55, 60–61, 96, 97, 110; condition of France as a

Index  123

result of, 3, 111; as a decisive point in history, 7, 106, 107–8, 111; early days, 1, 9, 11, 106; fall of the monarchy and, 14; followed by the Terror, 1; Girondins’ views on, 13; government, 4, 12, 13, 61; interpreted by historians, 4, 5; Jacobins’ views, 13; Louis XVI’s conspiracy, 105; outcome, 18; Robespierre’s efforts to preserve unity of, 13; threat to monarchies throughout Europe, 13. See also counter-revolution; revolutionary cause Garat, Dominique: as interior minister, 18 Gasparin, d’Orange, 67, 69, 70 Girondins: accused of treason, 81; accused of wishing to restore the monarchy, 110; belief in the rule of law, 108, 111; in Blanc’s views, 4–5; break with Robespierre, 107; Buzot defending against charges of federalism, 61–62; compared to Robespierre’s faction, 54; correspondence of, 2, 6, 47; declared outlaws in Caen, 37; decrees vetoed by Louis XVI, 14; divergent views from Jacobins, 111; economic interests of, 5; escape from Paris, 20; on excesses of the central government, 65; execution of, 7, 45–46, 52, 109; on executions of their fellows, 46, 81; expulsion from the National Convention, 1, 6, 19, 20, 25, 30, 32, 97, 105–6, 108–9; favoring wars in Europe, 60; flight to Brittany, 1, 6, 34; flight to the Finistère, 40; as fugitives, 6, 31–32, 34, 37, 39–40, 41–42, 57, 81, 92–93, 108; heading to St. Emilion, 43, 44; held liable for

Marat’s death, 34; hiding in St. Emilion, 1, 43, 44, 52, 82, 91, 92, 94, 99, 101; historical approaches to, 4; honesty of in Buzot’s views, 52; under house arrest, 25, 109; imprisonment in Paris, 41; individualism, 111; informed of Manon Roland’s trial and execution, 47; intensified division with Jacobins, 13; journey to Bordeaux, 1, 6; in Lamartine’s view, 4; leaders of, declared traitors at the National Convention, 32; leaving for Bordeaux, 41; legacies of, 6–7; memoirs, 1, 2, 3, 81, 101, 106, 110–11; in Michelet’s view, 4; myth of, 3–4; named traitors by National Convention, 109; opposing the Law of the Maximum, 19; petitions to the Revolutionary Tribunal, 63; political activities (1789–1794), in historical research, 2; portrayal of during and after the Second Empire, 5; portrayal of during the Third Republic, 5; as prisoners, 46; promotion of the federalist revolt, 1, 6; prospective death, 63; in Quinet’s view, 5; readmitted to the National Convention, 98; refuge in Caen, 32, 33; rehabilitation of reputation, 100; remaining in Paris, 109; replaced in the National Convention, 34; republican views, 31; and the Rolands, 9; separating into factions, 105–6; sheltered by Thérèse Bouquey, 44–45, 81–82, 91–92; social beliefs, 6; as subject of historical research, 2, 4–5; support for Constitutional monarchy, 12; urging Marat’s impeachment, 34; viewed as constitutional monarchists, 4; views on Louis XVI’s sentence, 17, 18;

124

 Index

views on monarchy, 31; views on the republic, 108 Gorsas, Antoine Joseph: escape from Paris, 25; expelled from the National Convention, 32; murder of, 51–52 Guadet, Marguerite Elie: arrest and execution, 92–94; attempted suicide, 93; escape from Paris, 25–27, 29, 40; final days, 91; finding shelter for the Girondins, 42; heading to Landes, 43; journey to St. Emilion, 43; leaving Madame Bouquey’s home, 81–82; sheltered by Thérèse Bouquey, 91–92; as witness to Louvet and Lodoiska’s marriage, 37 historical research: correspondence as primary source, 2; memoirs as primary source, 2 Holland: France declaring war on, 68; recalling ambassador from France, 19; war with France, 19, 67, 68 Jacobin Club in Marseille: abolition of, 98; Barbaroux as founder of, 66; enmity within sections, 66; expelling Barbaroux, 66; expelling Rebecqui, 66 Jacobins: divergent views from Girondins, 5, 13, 17, 19, 59, 108, 111; expelling Girondins from the National Convention, 1; featured in Buzot’s memoirs, 52; federalist revolt against, 1, 6, 21; government, 1; intensified division with Girondins, 13; leadership, 1, 3, 19, 20, 42, 52, 53, 68; legacies of, 6–7; as members of national assemblies, 2; opposing war against Austria, 13; political activities (1789–1794) in historical research, 2; popularity with the Commune, 19; propaganda, 107; social beliefs, 6; as subject of

historical research, 4; on survival of the republic, 109; undermining the sovereignty of the people, 61; views on Louis XVI, 17; views on the people, 108; views on the republic, 108; against wars in Europe, 60. See also Montagnards Jullien, Marc-Antoine: on capture of Barbaroux, 94–95; chasing Girondin fugitives, 92–93; depositing Girondins’ memoirs at the Bibliothèque Nationale, 96, 101 Lamartine, Alphonse de: views on the Girondins, 4 Lanjuinais, Jean Denis: escape from Paris, 25 Lauze-Deperret, Charles R., 69, 70 Law of the Maximum, 19 Legislative Assembly: Barbaroux as representative, 66, 71–72; Barbaroux critical of, 72; Barbaroux defending Brissot and Louvet, 73; to be replaced, 76; Buzot’s views on, 53; dissolution, 76; on Louis XVI’s title of “majesty” vs. “King of the French,” 71; Loys as representative to, 72; replaced by National Convention, 61 Letellier, Jéroˆme: letter from Buzot, 48, 58, 111; suicide, 48 Louis XVI: Barbaroux calling for referendum on fate of, 66; Commune asking for removal of, 14; conspiracy to destroy the Revolution, 105; escape from Paris, 106; events preceding the fall of the monarchy, 75–76; execution of, 17; flight from Paris, 12; Girondins’ views on, 3, 105; imminent downfall, 74; judgment method, 76–77; letter from Roland, 14, 72; National Convention ordering imprisonment

Index  125

of, 68; Philippe d’Orléans as opponent, 68; Robespierre opposing referendum on fate of, 66; ruling principles, 61; title of “majesty” vs. “King of the French,” 71; trial of, 17; vetoes Girondin decrees, 14 Louvet, Jean-Baptiste: attacking Robespierre, 16; as author of Faublas, 2, 11, 85; background, 11; at the Brémonts’ house, 85–86; considering suicide, 44; critical of Danton, 16; critical of Girondins, 17; critical of Marat, 16; defended by Barbaroux at the Legislative Assembly, 73; description of, by Manon Roland, 45; on the destruction of Lyon, 42; deteriorating health, 100; diplomatic career, 100; as editor, 15; election to Council of Five Hundred, 100; escape from Paris, 3, 20, 25, 29, 87–88; escape to Caen, 35; expelled from the National Convention, 32; flight to the Finistère, 40; journey from St. Emilion to Paris, 3, 43, 44, 82–85; last letter to his mother, 98; as lawyer, 5; learning about Girondins’ deaths, 84; leaving Madame Bouquey’s home, 81–82; and Lodoiska’s arrest, 40; marriage to Lodoiska, 29, 37; as member of the National Convention, 11; memoirs, 1, 2, 3, 6, 29, 81–89, 101; narrative of the early days of the Revolutoin, 3; preparation for capture and death, 41; as publisher, 5, 100; reading the Girondins’ letters to the National Convention, 98, 99–100; refuge in Switzerland, 3, 6, 88–89; and rehabilitation of Girondins’ reputation, 100; return to Paris, 100; reunion with Lodoiska, 85–86; sheltered by Thérèse Bouquey, 44–45, 81–82; as survivor of the

Terror, 111; views on Louis XVI’s sentence, 17–18; walking with Pétion to Caen, 35 Louvet, Lodoiska: arrested, 40; death of, 101; following the Girondins, 39; marriage to Louvet, 29, 37; reunion with Louvet, 85–86; in Switzerland, 88–89; taking shelter in Quimper, 41, 89; waiting in Paris, 43 Marat, Jean-Paul: assassination, 33, 93, 108, 109; as Commune member, 16; David’s painting The Death of Marat, 33; as editor of L’Ami du Peuple, 16, 33, 60, 110; Girondins call for impeachment of, 34; Girondins held accountable for death of, 34; and his contemporaries, 2; Manon Roland’s thoughts of, 15; meetings with Barbaroux, 75; provocations printed in his journal, 60; Salle’s tragedy Satan cédant le fauteuil à Marat, 96 Marie Antoinette: execution of, 17 memoirs: of Barbaroux, 1, 2, 6, 29, 40, 52, 65–78; Bouquey as keeper of Girondins’ memoirs, 48, 95–96, 101; of Buzot, 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 29, 48, 51–63, 66, 101; of Girondins, 1, 2, 3, 81, 101, 106, 110–11; of Louvet, 1, 2, 3, 6, 29, 81–89, 101; of Manon Roland, 38, 100; of Pétion, 1, 2, 3, 25–29, 30–31, 52; as primary source for historical research, 2; published by Louvet, 100; safekeeping, 48, 52, 81, 95–96, 101 Michelet, Jules: views on the Girondins, 4 monarchy: abolishment, 4, 13, 14, 53, 72, 75, 78, 105; in danger throughout Europe, 13; fall of in France, 1792, 13; Girondins’ views

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on, 31; regaining power, 12; restoration, 4, 63, 110; war with Austria, 73 Montagnards: contacts with Jacobins, 56; disagreements with Girondins, 105; dominating the National Convention, 27, 30–31; information from, censored, 32; and law against provocateurs, 60. See also Jacobins

declaration on Britain, Holland, and Spain, 19 national museum: role of collections, 15

national collections: role of, 15 National Convention: Barbaroux as member of, 11; Barbaroux’s workload, 70–71; Brissot as member of, 11; Buzot views on, 54; Buzot’s views on representatives, 54–55; Carra as member, 69, 70; decree naming Girondins as traitors, 109; decree on Buzot’s punishment, 32; deputies elected by the Avignon assembly, 69–70; dominated by Montagnards, 27, 30–31; Girondins expelled from, 1, 6, 19–20, 21, 25, 27, 29, 30, 32, 66, 72, 84, 97, 106, 108–9; hostility within, 30; inability of deputies to compromise, 106; laws proposed by Louvet, 100; Louvet as member, 11; Louvet reading the Girondins’ letters to, 98, 99–100; Manon Roland’s appearance before, 18; ordering imprisonment of Orléans family, 68; Pétion as member, 11; readmitting surviving Girondins, 98; Rebecqui as member, 69; removal of Girondins, 19, 34; replacing the Legislative Assembly, 61; Robespierre as member, 11, 16, 19; Roland’s report to, 17, 18; siege by the Commune, 20; struggle between Robespierre and Tallien, 92; suspending local elections, 43; vote on Louis XVI, 17; war

Pétion, Jéroˆme: background, 10; in Buzot’s memoirs, 66; condemning heraditary monarchy, 96; death, 101–2; declaration of principles, 96–98; escape from Paris, 3, 25–29; expelled from the National Convention, 32; in favor of plebiscite on Louis XVI’s sentence, 17; final days, 91; flight to the Finistére, 40; imprisonment, 94; last letter to his wife, 98–99; as lawyer, 5; leaving Madame Bouquey’s home, 81; as mayor of Paris, 2, 15, 73; meeting his family in Caen, 35; as member of the Constituent Assembly, 10; as member of the National Convention, 11; memoirs, 1, 2, 3, 25–29, 30–31, 52, 101; patriotism, 59; on possibility to escape to England, 97; refuge in Caen, 3, 35; and Robespierre during the Commune, 15; and the Rolands’ salon, 60, 106–7; seeking revenge against persecutors, 110; suicide, 95; suspension as mayor, 73; views on General Puisaye, 34; views on General Wimpffen, 34; views on the National Convention, 27; views on the people, 107–8; walking to Caen, 34–35; as witness to Louvet’s marriage to Lodoiska, 37; writing style, 65

Orléans, Philippe (Philippe Egalité): as opponent of Louis XVI, 68; as potential replacement of Louis XVI, 74; reign of, 68 Orléans faction, 68

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Pétion, Louise-Anne (née Lefebvre): last letter from her husband, 98–99; as Petion’s heir, 98 press. See freedom of the press Puisaye, Joseph (general), 34 Quinet, Edgar: views on the Girondins, 5 Rebecqui, François: expelled from the Jacobin Club in Marseille, 66; as liberator, 77; as member of the National Convention, 69 republic. See First French Republic; Second Republic; Third Republic Republican cause, 6, 10, 11, 34 Republicans: deputies, 5–6; Girondins as, 4, 31, 66, 70, 105, 108, 110, 111; split in two factions, 3 Revolutionary Tribunal: Girondins’ petitions to, 19, 63; Manon Roland before, 39, 47; punishments by, 31, 45 revolutionary cause, 15, 70 Robespierre, Maximilien: accused by Buzot of slandering the Girondins, 107; accused by Jean Roland, 17; agents of, discovering the Girondins, 1; attacked by Girondins, 16; as Commune member, 16; efforts to preserve unity of Revolution, 13; enmity with Buzot, 59–60; execution of, 110; Girondins break with, 107; and his contemporaries, 2; letter from Manon Roland, 47; Manon Roland’s thoughts of, 15; meetings with Barbaroux, 75; as member of the Constituent Assembly, 1; as member of the National Convention, 11, 16, 19; as occasional member of the Rolands’ circle, 10; opposing referendum on fate of Louis XVI, 66; and Pétion

during the Commune, 15; policies of, opposed by the Rolands’ salon, 11–12; and respect for the people, 62; and the Rolands’ salon, 60, 106–7; struggle with Tallien at the National Convention, 92; turning against Brissot, 13; turning against Roland, 13, 16, 18; turning against the Girondins, 16; viewed as incorruptible by Manon Roland, 10, 60, 107; views on war, 59–60, 107 Roland, Jean Marie de la Platière: accusing Robespierre, 17; adopting Barbaroux’s views on war, 73; adopting Brissot’s views on war, 59–60, 73; appointing Carra and Chamfort as co-directors of the Bibliothèque Nationale, 70; background, 9; conflict with Danton, 15, 16; as example of honesty, 52; as interior minister, 2, 10, 11, 13, 15, 18, 70, 72, 76; letter to Louis XVI, 14, 72; losing Manon Roland’s love, 18; pressing for war against Austria, 13; protection of national collections, 15; receiving funds for the revolutionary cause, 15; receiving news of Manon Roland’s execution, 47; report to the National Convention, 17, 18; Robespierre turning against, 13, 16, 18; and the September massacres, 16; suicide, 47, 84; as writer, 9 Roland, Marie Jeanne (Manon), née Phlipon: appearance before the National Convention, 18; Appel à l’impartiale postérité, 100; arrest, 25; autobiographical memoirs, 38; background, 9–10; on Barbaroux’s views on war, 73; Bosc sending flowers to, 39; Buzot’s love for, 39, 46, 48, 57, 98; charged with conspiracy, 12; considering

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Robespierre as incorruptible, 10, 60, 107; considering suicide, 46; correspondence with Bosc, 9, 11, 46; correspondence with Buzot, 96, 101; correspondence with Girondins, 2, 47; on deputies to the Constituent Assembly, 60; description of Buzot, 38; description of Louvet, 45; execution, 7, 47, 81, 83–84, 109; imprisonment, 37, 38, 39, 46, 47, 99; intent to flee to Switzerland or America, 53; last message to Buzot, 46; last words of, 2, 47; letter to Eudora, 47; letter to Garat, 55; letter to Louis XVI, 14, 72; letter to Robespierre, 47; letters to Buzot, 38, 39; love for Buzot, 18, 101; memoirs, 38, 100; and news of Girondins’ execution, 46; Oeuvres de Madame Roland, 58; published correspondence, 11; secret love life made public, 101; thoughts on Danton, 15, 16, 107; thoughts on Marat, 15; thoughts on Robespierre, 15; views on events of the Revolution, 38; views on persecution of innocent victims, 38; views on women authors, 9–10; Voyage en Suisse, 58 the Rolands: as Anglophiles, 17; correspondence with the Girondins, 6; as couple, 9; favoring constitutional government, 10; hosting the salon, 11, 60, 106–7; involvement with the Girondins, 9–10, 38; political views, 10; salon opposing Robespierre’s policies, 11–12; and their circle of friends, 10–11, 60 Salle, Jean Baptiste: arrest and execution, 92–94; final days, 91; as fugitive, 40, 43, 44, 81, 82, 92; on Girondins, 17; leaving Madame

Bouquey’s home, 81–82; manuscripts, 101; punishment, 95; tragedy written by, 96, 101; as witness to Louvet and Lodoiska’s marriage, 37 Second Empire: government under Napoleon III, 4; portrayal of the Girondins during and after, 5 Second Republic: government, 4 September massacres, 16 Spain: recalling ambassador from France, 19; war with France, 19, 67 the Terror (1793–1794): America as an escape from, 62; in Buzot’s view, 51, 54, 56; causes of, 106; as a decisive point in history, 7; efforts to preserve the republic, 106; escalation, 87; factional divisiveness leading to, 6; federalist threat to the republic, 33; following the French Revolution, 1; Louvet as survivor of, 111; in Paris, 45, 109, 110; retreat time during, 86; severe measures during, 107; status of Girondin fugitive wives’ friends, 89; victims of, 100 Third Republic: Girondins during, 5; government, 4 Valady, J. G.: abandoned by friend, 87; arrest and execution, 81–82; as fugitive, 40, 41, 42, 44, 81–82; leaving Madame Bouquey’s home, 81–82; sheltered by Thérèse Bouquey, 44–45 wars: against Austria, 13; between France and other European powers, 3, 107; France declaring war on Britain, Holland, and Spain, 19. See also civil wars Wimpffen, Felix (general), 30, 32, 34, 35, 108



About the Author

Bette W. Oliver of Austin, Texas, is an independent scholar with a PhD in Modern European History from the University of Texas at Austin. A specialist in eighteenth-century France, she is the author of From Royal to National: The Louvre Museum and the Bibliothèque Nationale (2007). With an educational background in both journalism and history, she served as the associate editor of the interdisciplinary journal Libraries & Culture from 1986 to 2005. In addition to her work as a historian, she is the author of eight volumes of poetry, much of it about France.

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