Fatal Purity: Robespierre and the French Revolution
Page 44
11. Crook (1996), p. 10.
12. The municipality of Arras traced its origins back to the eleventh century.
13. Stage 1 was elections by parish, corporation, or quartier, stage 2 the town assembly, stage 3 the secondary baillage assembly (Artois was divided into seven baillages), and stage 4 the principal baillage assembly, from which the final delegates of the third estate would be chosen.
14. The most notable was Gracchus Babeuf.
15. Hampson (1974), p. 41.
16. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 6, p. 18, gives the precise composition of this assembly.
17. Proyart (1850), pp. 42–43.
18. Ibid., p. 40.
4: Representing the Nation at Versailles
1. Pierre L’Enfant, who designed the 1791 street plan for Washington, D.C., had spent time in Versailles as a child.
2. Young (1929), p. 151.
3. Ibid., p. 13.
4. La Morandière [1764] quoted in Corbin (1986), p. 27.
5. See Alison Patrick’s article in Blanning (1996), pp. 236–66, for a full explanation of how and why the number of deputies fluctuated. Also Tackett (1996).
6. Ferrières (1932), p. 34.
7. Ibid., p. 43.
8. Stäel (1983), p. 140.
9. Mirabeau (1790), p. 40.
10. Dumont (1832), p. 144.
11. Hampson (1974), pp. 17–18.
12. Staël (1983), pp. 313–14.
13. Jones (2002), p. 262.
14. Ibid., p. 310.
15. Doyle (1990), p. 94.
16. Rousseau (1962), vol. 1, p. 255.
17. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 41.
18. Hampson (1974), p. 47.
19. Aulard (1889–97), vol. 1, pp. ii–xvii. The history of the Breton Club is difficult to reconstruct and it is not clear when exactly Robespierre joined it.
20. Schama (1989), p. 331.
21. Dumont (1832), p. 64.
22. Mirabeau (1790), vol. 1, p. 14.
23. Ibid., p. 15.
24. Dumont (1832), pp. 60–61.
25. Ibid., pp. 61–62. The deputy Reybaz, sitting next to Dumont, said this to him.
26. Doyle (1990), p. 105.
27. Dumont (1832), p. 93.
28. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 42.
29. Desmoulins (1980), vol. 1, p. 77.
30. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, pp. 42–50.
31. Schama (1989), pp. 389–94.
32. Godechot (1970), pp. 219–20.
33. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 44.
34. New Annual Register, p. 25.
35. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, pp. 44–45.
36. New Annual Register, p. 28.
37. Doyle (1990), p. 113.
38. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 45.
39. Ibid.
40. Godechot (1970), p. 327.
41. Thompson (1989), p. 46.
42. Godechot (1970), p. 331.
43. Mirabeau (1835–36), p. 204.
44. Dumont (1832), p. 138.
45. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 48.
46. Lefebvre (1973), pp. 35–56.
47. Lefebvre (2002), pp. 135–36.
48. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, pp. 46–47.
49. Dumont (1832), p. 138.
50. See K. M. Baker in Van Kley (1994), pp. 154–99.
51. Archives parlementaires, vol. 9, p. 236.
52. Dumont (1832), p. 140.
53. Ibid., p. 143.
54. Ibid., p. 146.
55. Ibid., p. 147.
56. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 6, p. 58.
57. Ibid., p. 59.
58. Ibid., p. 61.
59. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 6, p. 66.
60. Tour du Pin (1979), p. 100.
61. Robespierre, (1910–67), vol. 6, p. 107.
62. Tour du Pin (1979), p. 104.
63. Ibid., p. 103.
64. Roudinesco (1991), p. 27.
65. L’ami du peuple, vol. 1, p. 249.
66. Révolutions de France et de Brabant, vol. 5, p. 369. Desmoulins’s account of Marat’s involvement in the march to Versailles was retrospective and possibly exaggerated.
67. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 6, pp. 108–9.
68. Ibid., pp. 110–15.
69. Villiers (1802), p. 5.
5: The National Assembly in Paris
1. The house no longer exists. In his correspondence, Robespierre gives the address as No. 30, but for a summary of the dispute about how the house was numbered and where it was in the street, see Thompson (1939), p. 65, and Michon (1924).
2. Villiers entrusted a friend with publishing his haphazard memoirs in 1802. On the dubious status of his evidence, see R. Garmy in Soboul (1967), pp. 19–33.
3. Villiers (1802), p. 1.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid., p. 2.
6. Ibid., p. 5.
7. Ibid., p. 3.
8. Ibid., p. 2.
9. One other scrap of possible evidence turned up in 1909 in the form of a drawing of a woman by Claude Hoin, inscribed La dévouée Hortense Delannoye, maîtresse du traître Robespierre; see Thompson (1939), p. 66.
10. On Robespierre’s relations with women, see Fleischmann (1908) and Mantel (2000).
11. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 57.
12. Ibid.
13. Dumont (1832), p. 280.
14. Doyle (1990), p. 123.
15. Villiers (1802), p. 3.
16. Hufton (1974), p. 23.
17. Thompson (1939), pp. 82–83.
18. Sieyès (1989), vol. 2, sec. 13, pp. 1–2.
19. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 6, pp. 349–50.
20. Sieyès (1989), vol. 2, sec. 11, p. 41.
21. Ibid., sec. 16, pp. 14–15.
22. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 6, p. 319.
23. Ibid., p. 193.
24. Ibid., pp. 386–87.
25. Walter (1989), pp. 144–45.
26. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 82.
27. Villiers (1802), p. 4.
28. Hampson (1974), p. 35.
29. English historians differ over whether to describe this building as a convent or monastery, but since the occupants were male, the latter seems more appropriate, even though the French word is couvent.
30. Initially, Robespierre resisted officially adopting the name Jacobins, because he thought it more pejoratively suggestive of factionalism than “The Society of the Friends of the Constitution”; see Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 8, pp. 206–8.
31. Ibid., vol. 3a, p. 73.
32. Ibid., pp. 73–74.
33. Ibid., p. 82.
34. Ibid., p. 68.
35. Ibid., p. 69.
36. Ibid., p. 71.
37. Chronique de Paris, 11 October 1790.
38. Archives parlementaires, vol. 15, p. 517.
39. Croker (1857), p. 107.
40. Révolutions de France et de Brabant, vol. 4, p. 191.
41. Ibid., pp. 192–93.
42. The identity of the priest is disputed: some say it was Denis Bérardier from Louis-le-Grand, others that it was M. de Pancemont of Saint-Sulpice. One account of the wedding claims that Camille was moved to tears by the religious ceremony and that Robespierre said nastily, “Cry then, hypocrite!” See Paris (1870), p. 26, and Le vieux Cordelier, pp. 4–6.
43. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, pp. 87–88.
44. Ibid., p. 83.
45. Schama (1989), p. 509.
46. McManners (1998), p. 8.
47. Thompson (1989), p. 43.
48. Ibid., p. 52.
49. L’ami du peuple, vol. 2, p. 1121.
50. Thompson (1989), p. 171.
51. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 6, p. 497.
52. Ibid., p. 489.
53. Hampson (1974), p. 64.
54. The deputy was Duquesnoy.
55. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 6, p. 490.
56. Dumont (1832), p. 283.
57. Thompson
(1989), p. 219.
58. Ibid., p. 29.
59. Ibid., p. 33.
6: The Constitution
1. Dumont (1832), pp. 266–67.
2. L’ami du peuple, vol. 3, p. 1826.
3. Dumont (1832), pp. 22–23.
4. Cabanis (1791), p. 11.
5. Dumont (1832), p. 310.
6. Cabanis (1791), p. 60.
7. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 7, p. 178.
8. Mirabeau (1835–36), p. 216.
9. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 7, p. 235.
10. Ibid., vol. 3a, p. 99.
11. Dumont (1832), p. 290.
12. Jones (2002), p. 226.
13. Foucault (1979), p. 4.
14. Archives parlementaires, vol. 26, p. 332.
15. Croker (1857), p. 525.
16. Ibid.
17. Ibid.
18. The last execution with the Halifax gibbet was in 1648.
19. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 7, p. 433.
20. Croker (1857), p. 318.
21. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 7, p. 325.
22. Ibid., p. 138.
23. The advertisement appeared in L’orateur du peuple, vol. 6, no. 18; see Thompson (1939), p. 138. There is no record of the speech’s being found.
24. Andress (2000), p. 64.
25. Ibid., p. 48.
26. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 6, p. 611.
27. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 100.
28. Ibid., vol. 6, p. 622.
29. Ibid., vol. 7, p. 266.
30. Wrigley (2002), pp. 135–86.
31. Ibid., p. 151.
32. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 7, p. 268.
33. L’ami du peuple, vol. 5, pp. 2745–51.
34. Blanning (1986), pp. 69–96.
35. Archives parlementaires, vol. 25, p. 201.
36. Croker (1857), p. 121.
37. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 7, p. 514.
38. Thompson (1989), p. 74.
39. Shuckburch (1989), pp. 170–71.
40. Ibid., p. 82.
41. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 7, p. 519.
42. Croker (1857), p. 150.
43. Tackett (2003), pp. 116–18.
44. L’ami du peuple, vol. 3, p. 1870.
45. Archives parlementaires, vol. 27, pp. 602–60. Tackett (2003), p. 134.
46. By one count, seventeen petitions of this kind were drawn up between 21 June and 17 July and rejected out of hand by the assembly; see Tackett (2003), p. 113.
47. Thompson (1939), p. 162.
48. Laponneraye (2002), p. 73.
49. Robespierre still gave his address as rue Saintonge on 9 August, which suggests a brief period of transition between the two lodgings; see Thompson (1939), p. 178.
50. The fact that the assembly voted to exonerate Louis XVI after the flight to Varennes is difficult to explain, given both the fierce opposition of radical deputies like Robespierre and hostile public opinion. The final vote on this issue was not recorded. See Tackett (2003), p. 141.
51. There is dispute about the exact date of the premature welcome party; see Walter (1989), p. 204.
7: War
1. Robespierre had already demanded a serious discussion of the émigré problem earlier in the Revolution; see Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 7, pp. 87–88.
2. Ibid., vol. 3a, p. 127.
3. Burke (1989), p. 469.
4. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, pp. 127–28.
5. Ibid., pp. 129–30.
6. Ibid., p. 130.
7. Ibid., vol. 8, p. 26.
8. Walter (1989), p. 257. By this point, the circulation of major speeches had become customary, so the long debate provoked by Robespierre suggests the Parisian Jacobins were deeply divided over Brissot’s speech.
9. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 8, pp. 47–48.
10. Ibid., pp. 128–32.
11. Doyle (1990), p. 179.
12. Thompson (1939), p. 209; Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 8, p. 151.
13. Robespierre resigned his job as Public Prosecutor on 10 April 1792. The court to which he had been appointed only came into existence in February 1792, and he resigned before its first formal session. See Thompson (1939), p. 225.
14. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 8, p. 248.
15. Hardman (1999), p. 43.
16. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 8, p. 157.
17. Ibid., pp. 160–61.
18. Ibid., p. 165.
19. Ibid.
20. Guillaume Tell, a drama set to music by A. E. M Gréty, was performed for the first time at the Comédie italienne, Paris, on 9 April 1791. Voltaire’s Brutus, first staged in 1730, was popular during the Revolution. M. J. Chénier’s Caius Gracchus opened at the Théâtre de la République on 9 February 1792.
21. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 8, pp. 179–80.
22. W. A. Miles to H. J. Pye, 1 March 1791; quoted in Thompson (1989), p. 143.
23. Belloc (1910), p. 191.
24. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 4, p. 92.
25. Shuckburch (1989), p. 61.
26. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 139.
27. Ibid., vol. 4, p. 34.
28. Ibid., vol. 8, p. 315.
29. Ibid., vol. 8, p. 90.
30. Ibid., vol. 8, pp. 59–60.
31. Ibid., p. 233.
32. Ibid., pp. 233–34.
33. Ibid., p. 241.
34. Hardman (1999), p. 34.
35. Thompson (1939), p. 184.
36. Ibid., p. 183.
37. Ibid.
38. Madame Élisabeth (1868), p. 416.
39. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 147.
40. Danton (1910), pp. 28–32.
41. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 8, p. 313.
42. Aulard (1889–97), vol. 3, p. 576.
43. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 4, p. 2.
44. Ibid., p. 9.
45. Ibid., p. 33.
46. Danton (1910), p. 28.
47. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 160.
48. Ibid., vol. 8, p. 163.
49. Ibid., vol. 4, p. 52.
50. Shuckburch (1989), p. 62.
51. Doyle (1990), p. 185.
52. Thompson (1989), p. 57.
53. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 8, p. 383.
54. Croker (1857), p. 185.
55. Archives parlementaires, vol. 45, pp. 411–12.
56. Croker (1857), p. 199.
57. Madame Élisabeth (1868), pp. 416–21.
58. Thompson (1989), p. 57.
59. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 4, p. 225.
60. Ibid., p. 232.
61. Ibid., p. 259.
62. Ibid., vol. 3a, p. 150.
63. Ibid., p. 151.
64. Aulard (1889–97), vol. 4, p. 160. Brunswick’s manifesto was dated 25 July 1792, known in Paris on 28 July, and published in Le moniteur on 3 August.
65. Thompson (1989), p. 118.
66. Rœderer (1853–59), vol. 3, p. 221.
67. Desmoulins (1995), p. 94.
68. Rœderer (1853–59), vol. 3, p. 226.
69. Doyle (1990), p. 189.
70. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 4, p. 352.
8: The King’s Trial
1. Mathiez (1921), p. 83.
2. Thompson (1939), p. 274.
3. Croker (1857), p. 246.
4. Blanc (1847–69), vol. 7, p. 192.
5. Croker (1857), p. 535.
6. Danton (1910), p. 52.
7. Belloc (1910), p. 225.
8. Doyle (1990), p. 193.
9. Croker (1857), p. 343.
10. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 8, pp. 460–61.
11. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 152; Thompson (1939), pp. 263–64.
12. Croker (1857), p. 348.
13. Ferrières (1932), p. 43.
14. Of the 749 deputies elected to the National Convention, only 83 had sat in the National Assembly, compared with 200 who had sat in the Legislative Assembly. This time there was no self-denying ordinan
ce precluding members of the earlier assemblies from standing for election to the National Convention. See Doyle (1990), p. 193.
15. Price (2003), pp. 315–16.
16. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 5, p. 17.
17. Rousseau (1962), vol. 2, p. 51.
18. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 5, p. 19.
19. Ibid., vol. 9, p. 20.
20. Archives parlementaires, vol. 52, p. 158.
21. Thompson (1989), p. 171.
22. L’ami du peuple, vol. 7, p. 3965.
23. Ibid., vol. 8, p. 4756.
24. Ibid., p. 4757.
25. Ibid., p. 4790.
26. Asprey (2000), p. 61.
27. Archives parlementaires, vol. 53, p. 49.
28. Ibid., p. 53.
29. Croker (1857), p. 358.
30. Chronique de Paris, 9 November 1792.
31. Walter (1946), p. 634.
32. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 9, pp. 80–81.
33. Ibid., p. 93. The one innocent victim whom Robespierre alluded to was an alleged case of mistaken identity.
34. Ibid., p. 89.
35. Ibid., p. 88.
36. Thompson (1989), p. 102.
37. Laponneraye (2002), p. 75.
38. Ibid., p. 76.
39. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 9, p. 144.
40. Thompson (1939), pp. 295–96.
41. L’ami du peuple, vol. 5, pp. 2649–50.
42. Walzer (1974), p. 111.
43. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 3a, p. 87.
44. Walzer (1974), pp. 121–25.
45. Ibid., p. 131; Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 9, pp. 121–22.
46. Walzer (1974), p. 138; Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 9, p. 122.
47. Walzer (1974), p. 133; Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 9, p. 123.
48. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 9, p. 89.
49. Ibid., p. 122.
50. Ibid., p. 130.
51. Saint-Just (1908), vol. 1, p. 2.
52. Ibid., pp. 298–99.
53. Archives parlementaires, vol. 55, p. 7.
54. Walzer (1974), p. 176.
55. Walzer (1974), p. 192; Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 9, p. 198.
56. Walzer (1974), p. 192; Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 9, p. 198.
57. Croker (1857), p. 360.
58. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 9, p. 205.
59. Thompson (1939), p. 308.
60. Mercier (1800), pp. 230–31; Croker (1857), p. 361.
61. Belloc (1910), p. 243.
62. Robespierre (1910–67), vol. 9, p. 228.
63. Ibid., p. 232.
64. Croker (1857), p. 257.
65. Mme d’Angoulême quoted in Croker (1857), p. 257.
66. Jones (2002), p. 6.
67. Prudhomme quoted in Croker (1857), p. 560.
68. Croker (1857), p. 259. The April 1770 date was that of Marie Antoinette’s marriage by proxy, a familiar practice where the marriage of a princess to a foreigner was concerned; see Fraser (2001), p. 40. Her wedding in France took place later, on 16 May 1770.