Elihu Washburne

by Michael Hill

  Elihu Washburne, Paris—to Secretary of State Hamilton Fish, Washington, D.C.—May 23, 1871

  Tuesday morning. It seems difficult to get at anything reliable this morning. The fight continues, and always in the same neighborhood. The firing was terrific all last night. Shells from Montmartre were continually falling in our quarter, but it is extraordinary how little the damage has been. We can see from the top of the Legation building that the red flag, the hated emblem of assassination and pillage, anarchy, and disorder, still flies from the Tuileries and from the Ministry of the Marine. The insurgents are evidently making a desperate resistance . . .

  Diary—May 23, 1871

  The battle raging in the central part of the city. The troops have made progress, but have not yet got the Place Vendôme and the Concorde . . . A battery has been shelling this neighborhood from the Tuileries for the last twelve hours.

  9:30 p.m.—The building of the Legion of Honour was on fire at dinner time. Have just returned from Passy when I went to see Marshal MacMahon at his headquarters about getting possession of the prison of Mazas in order to save the life of the Archbishop of Paris. He hopes they will be there in a day or two. At 4 this p.m. Antoine and I went into the Avenue Montaigne and two shells exploded not far from us.

  In the midst of brutal street-to-street fighting, the desperate Communards finally embarked on what historian Alistair Horne called a “scorched-earth policy,” wickedly intent on burning the city to the ground. The Tuileries, part of the Palais-Royal, the Palais de Justice, and, finally, the Hôtel de Ville were all set ablaze. Wickham Hoffman would later write that in the last days of the Commune “petroleum became the madness of the hour,” with wild rumors circulating about mobs of men, women, and children roaming the streets with petroleum-filled bottles trying to set all of Paris on fire.

  Diary—May 24, 1871

  What a horrid night. At one o’clock this morning I was awakened to see the Tuileries on fire. Dressing hastily I went into the street and then to the house of Dr. Samson where I got a very full view of it. We then thought we would go down nearer the scene and off we started down the Rue François Premier. We soon found difficulty in passing the sentinels and as the abuses were flying and the balls whistling we did not go farther than the foot of the Rue Bayard. We then returned to the Legation and went to the 6th story of the building which completely overlooks the city. The sight was literally awful. The lurid flames from the Tuileries lighted up half the Heavens. There were other fires also—the palace of the Legion of Honour, the Ministry of Finance, the État Major, had been burning since nine o’clock last night. At a little after two o’clock this night it seemed as if the Hôpital des Invalides was on fire and our hearts all sunk within us to think that that grand old home of the soldiers of France was also to be destroyed to gratify the rage and hatred of the demons whose crimes were appalling the world. But as the night wore [on] and daylight appeared it turned out that the fire was farther off . . .

  9:30 A.M. Came to the Legation at half past eight. The morning is beautiful, but the thick smoke in the city obscures the sun a little. We have the most terrible accounts of the fire. I will try and get down town to find out something.

  10 o’clock evening—Went down town at eleven o’clock and I can give no adequate description of what I saw. All the fighting in all the revolutions which have ever taken place in Paris, has been mere child’s play as compared with what has taken place since Sunday and what is now going on. The fighting heretofore has been confined to limited quarters in distant parts of the city, but these battles for these days have been right in the heart of the city and have been desperate to the extreme. You can scarcely imagine the appearance of the streets where the barricades were and where the fighting took place. The biggest sight was at the barricade at the foot of the Boulevard Malesherbes and it lasted two days. It was the key of the insurgent’s position. The sidewalks of that magnificent Boulevard were all covered with horses, baggage wagons, cannon, caissons &c. The houses all riddled and battered, the trees all torn to pieces and the branches in the street. Very near was the dead body of a National Guard . . . Went as far as the burning Tuileries, the front all falling in and the flames bursting out in another part of the building. The whole appearance dreadful. Fires in all directions raging—many of them under the guns of the insurgents so that they cannot be put out.

  That night Washburne scribbled a painful note to his twelve-year-old daughter, Susan.

  Elihu Washburne—to Susan Washburne, Vieille Église—May 24, 1871, Wednesday afternoon, 31/2 o’clock

  This has been a horrible night. I was awakened at one o’clock to see the Tuileries on fire. At this moment the building seems entirely consumed and the fire appears to be spreading to the Louvre. Several other buildings have been burned and others are still on fire—the palace of the Legion of Honour, the Ministry of Finance, the État Major. I have been watching from the top story of the Legation Building. The horrid flames, the raging battles, the roar of the cannon . . . have all contributed to make this a historic night. The insurgents have had a battery at the Tuileries which has been sending shells to our neighborhood all the time for the last twenty-four hours. It has not fired now for an hour and I guess it has been silenced. Tremendous firing in another part of the city and the windows of the Legation shake. I think the Place de la Concorde and the Place Vendôme have been taken. I fear that the buildings on the Rue de Rivoli are on fire. I shall hope to get out on Saturday. Kissings and blessings for you all.

  As the government troops battled their way into the city, they arrested anyone suspected of being a Communard. On the Place de l’Opéra, Washburne saw a group of some 500 men, women, and children indiscriminately arrested and forced to march to Versailles. Others were shot on sight. Wickham Hoffman recalled “wholesale butcheries committed by the troops,” who believed that every insurgent was “an incarnate devil.” Young children suspected of carrying petroleum to burn buildings were executed on the spot.

  Elihu Washburne, Paris—to Secretary of State Hamilton Fish, Washington, D.C.—May 25, 1871

  When I closed my dispatch last night it was fire and battle. It is the same this morning. There were frightful burnings all night. The great Hôtel de Ville, with all its traditions and souvenirs of history, exist no longer . . . All has been the work of organized incendiarism, and the insurrectionists have done everything in their power to destroy Paris. If the entry of the troops had been delayed much longer, they would certainly have succeeded . . .

  The state of feeling now existing in Paris is fearful beyond description. Passing events have filled the whole population opposed to the Commune with horror and rage. Arrests are made by the wholesale, of the innocent as well as the guilty.

  Last night four Americans—two gentlemen and two ladies—innocent as yourself of all complicity with the insurrection, were seized, while dining at a restaurant, and marched through the streets to one of the military posts. They sent word to me as soon as possible of their arrest, and I lost no time in going to their relief . . .

  I went down in the city this afternoon to see for myself what was the progress of events . . . I passed up the Rue de Rivoli by the smoking ruins of the Tuileries, and had the inexpressible pleasure of seeing for myself that the Louvre, with all its untold and incalculable treasures, had been preserved. As I continued up the street, it seemed as if I were following in the track of an army . . .

  I have not time now to speak more fully of the scenes of carnage, fire, and blood of which Paris has been the theater for the last four days. They are without parallel in all its history . . . The fighting has been long, desperate, and persistent. The insurgents have fought at every step with the fury of despair. Even as I write, at the hour of midnight, the contest is not yet ended, for I hear the booming of the cannon beyond the “Place de la Bastille.” The government troops have displayed great bravery, and have never for a moment recoiled before the formidable and deadly barricades of the insurgents. They ha
ve shown the spirit of the old French army . . .

  That same night Washburne sent a “private” note to Secretary Fish with a souvenir of the Commune.

  Elihu Washburne, Paris—to Secretary of State Hamilton Fish, Washington, D.C.—May 25, 1871, Midnight

  I have neither been excited, nor frightened during all these shocking events, but my time has been completely taken up by the constant calls upon me. When at the smoldering ruins of the Hôtel de Ville this afternoon, I tore from the wall of a house in the neighborhood the enclosed handbill, which is the last note, not of the “dying swan” but the dying Commune. It will have a historic interest.

  On May 26, Washburne drafted another dispatch to the Secretary of State with this dire report.

  Elihu Washburne, Paris—to Secretary of State Hamilton Fish, Washington, D.C.—May 26, 1871

  The fighting is still going on this forenoon in the remote parts of the city, and new fires have broken out. I have no news of the fate of the Archbishop, but the general belief is that all the hostages have been shot . . .

  As the final savage battles continued throughout the city, Raoul Rigault was as defiant and sadistic as ever, rushing everywhere and demanding his “assassins” carry out his last-minute “bloody decrees” of death. “His activity in these moments in the work of blood was something amazing,” Washburne would recall.

  Rigault was determined that if the Commune were destroyed, the hostages should perish with it. Only days earlier, on May 22, and unbeknown to Washburne, Rigault had ordered the execution of the Archbishop and sixty-three others held at La Roquette prison.

  Diary—May 28, 1871

  Sunday morning. Yesterday I went out to Versailles and returned late in the afternoon. I first went to the headquarters to ascertain the fate of the Archbishop, but they knew nothing . . . The fighting went on all day yesterday . . . the insurgents holding desperately, but always driven back. There was firing all last night and it continues this morning showing that the insurrection is not suppressed. As soon as I came to the Legation this morning I sent a messenger to General MacMahon to enquire after the Archbishop and he has this moment returned with the horrible news that he was shot yesterday at the prison. Oh! Heavens, what horror! No language can characterize the acts of these barbarians . . . Were there ever such atrocities heard of in the history of civilization as Paris has been the theater of for the last eight days? They make the blood curdle. I had become intensely interested in the fate of the good old Archbishop and had prayed that his life might be spared . . . I saw him at half past four or five o’clock last Sunday afternoon. I had been to see him on Friday and found him so feeble that I thought I would go again on Sunday to see how he was. The Versailles troops had already entered the gate of St. Cloud on the other extreme of the city, but of course no one knew it where we were. The National Guard delegated to the prison was drunk and everything was very disagreeable inside. They would not let me enter the cell of the Archbishop as I had been in the habit of doing, but insisted he should come out to see me in a vacant cell. I regretted that for I knew how weak and feeble he was. But he soon came in, looking very badly, but with the same pleasant countenance and the same warm thanks. I told him I was sorry I could bring him no news, but that I had felt so anxious about his health that I had come to see how he was. He replied that he was a little better. We talked of the situation and of the probabilities of the speedy delivery of Paris. I told him I thought the end was near and that I hoped I should soon have the pleasure of seeing him at liberty. He replied that I was always so amiable and so kind and that if it were the will of God that he should be spared that it would be his greatest pleasure to tell the world of all I had done for him . . . I think he had a prescience of his coming fate.

  Elihu Washburne, Paris—to Adele Washburne, Vieille Église—May 28, 1871

  The insurrection is suppressed but alas! The poor old Archbishop was shot on Tuesday night last with some 70 priests. The horrors have been shocking beyond expression. There is great prejudice here against the Americans and indeed all foreigners but it will soon blow over. The Versailles people don’t like very much that I stayed here during the insurrection. But I cannot help that. I had to do my duty . . .

  Diary—May 29, 1871

  After eight of the most horrible days the world has ever known, the . . . suppression of the insurrection was finished yesterday afternoon. The whole thing has been awful beyond description and perhaps human belief. There has been nothing but a general butchery since Wednesday last: men, women and children, innocent and guilty alike. The rage of the soldiers and the people knows no bounds. No punishment is too great, or too speedy, for the guilty, but there is no discrimination. Let a person utter a word of sympathy, or even let a man be pointed out to the crowd as a sympathizer and his life is gone. In fact let a cry be raised against any man no matter how strong he may be against the Commune and his life is in danger. A well dressed, respectable looking man was torn into a hundred pieces . . . by the crowds yesterday, for expressing a word of sympathy for a man who was a prisoner and being beaten almost to death. Mr. Carter, an American merchant here, a thoroughly peaceable and inoffensive man, had a cry raised upon him yesterday in the Boulevard Haussmann, was set upon by the crowd who yelled a mort, a mort and struck him and beat him. His life was only spared by some line officers who surrounded him and rescued him from the very jaws of death.

  Elihu Washburne, Paris—to Secretary of State Hamilton Fish, Washington, D.C.—May 31, 1871

  After an insurrection of seventy-one days, such as has never been known in the annals of civilization, Paris was finally delivered on Sunday, the 28th instant; the last positions held in the city by the Commune having been taken, and their last troops captured at four o’clock on the afternoon of that day . . . The reign of the Commune for ten weeks, pursuing its career of murder, assassination, pillage, robbery, blasphemy, and terror, finally expired in blood and flame . . . The incredible enormities of the Commune, their massacre of the Archbishop of Paris and the other hostages, their countless murders of other persons who refused to join them in their fiendish work, their horrid and well organized plans of incendiarism intended to destroy almost the entire city, and which resulted in the destruction of so many of the great monuments of Paris, are crimes which will never die . . .

  That same day he sent a dispatch to fellow diplomat George Bancroft, the American Minister to Germany.

  Elihu Washburne, Paris—to Honorable George Bancroft, May 31, 1871

  I remained here during the whole period of the infernal insurrection and I saw it go out in fire and blood and amid scenes which have no parallel in the history of civilization. No consideration on earth, except one of the highest, that of the discharge of a sacred public duty, could ever induce me to go through [that] which I have passed through for the last nine months, and more particularly the last ten weeks. But it is a pleasure for me to know that I have been able to protect the lives and property of all the Americans and I believe all the Germans in Paris, but it has been at a fearful risk . . .

  The suppression of the insurrection brings with it a military rule (perhaps necessary) of terrible severity. No persons are permitted to leave Paris at present and I do not know how long people are to be shut in . . .

  Two days later a worn and distraught Washburne visited the empty prison cell of the Archbishop of Paris.

  Diary—June 2, 1871

  Things are greatly quieted down. The indiscriminate killing and shooting has stopped. All Paris has come out of doors, the streets are crowded. The smoldering fires are being extinguished and the tottering walls pulled down. The shops are being opened and omnibuses and carriages are moving. I made a long trip yesterday—went to the prison La Roquette, saw the cell from which the Archbishop was taken to be shot—saw the very spot in the prison yard where he was shot, standing against a wall. His abdomen was then ripped open by the fiends and his body with others thrown into a common ditch at Père la Chaise [Cemetery] . . .


  Ten days earlier—just after he had ordered the execution of the Archbishop of Paris—Raoul Rigault had taken to the streets, directing and rallying the Communards in their final desperate struggle against the government troops. But as the Commune disintegrated, Rigault fled the scene, hiding out in a hotel under a false name until hunted down by the Versailles troops. After being seized and dragged into the streets, he cried out, “Vive la Commune!” Moments later he was executed on the spot, shot through the head several times. He was dumped in a nearby gutter and, for two days, Rigault’s body lay there, kicked, stripped, and spat on by disgusted passersby.

  EPILOGUE

  On the morning of June 7, 1871, Elihu Washburne attended the funeral services of Archbishop Darboy at Notre-Dame Cathedral. At ten o’clock the Archbishop’s cortege, drawn by six horses, made its way to the church. Cannons fired in tribute from the Invalides and spectators, overcome with “regret and pity,” lined the streets. At Notre-Dame the Bishop of Versailles and the Papal Nuncio, Monsignor Chigi, presided at the service. Washburne was deeply moved by the ceremony, describing it as “one of the most emotional and imposing funeral services that I ever attended.”

  Afterward, letters from Catholic organizations everywhere expressed thanks to the American Minister for his efforts to save Darboy’s life. The Catholic Union of New York wrote:

  You beheld around you God’s temples desecrated, and the ministers of His Holy religion hunted down like wild beasts, by an infuriated rabble. Eminent among the victims was the venerable Archbishop of Paris. He was “sick and in prison,” and in obedience to the divine commandment, you visited him; sympathized with him in his sufferings, consoled him in his affliction, and endeavored, at no small risk to yourself, to save his precious life.