French Revolution – Ingliando

The Women’s March on Versailles

5th October 1789

On this day, less than three months after the Storming of the Bastille, in the marketplaces of Paris where food shortages and the price of bread had become intolerable, the women of the French capital rose up in a massive rebellion. Instantly encouraged by revolutionary agitators seeking liberal political reforms and a constitutional monarchy for France, the swelling crowd, set out on a six-hour march to Versailles where they besieged the Palace and pressed their demands on King Louis XVI. Forced to return to Paris with his family, the king’s independence was effectively brought to an end. The event heralded a new balance of power that would ultimately displace the established, privileged orders of the French nobility in favour of the common people, collectively known as the Third Estate. By bringing together people representing the sources of the Revolution in such large numbers, the march on Versailles proved to be a defining moment of the French Revolution.

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The Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen

26th August 1789

On this day, during the period of the French Revolution, the National Constituent Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen as the first step toward writing a constitution for France. The declaration was initially drafted by Marquis de Lafayette with assistance from Thomas Jefferson, but the majority of the final draft came from Abbé Sieyès. The concepts in the Declaration were heavily influenced by the political philosophy of the Enlightenment and the principles of human rights, principles that were widely shared throughout European society at that time, rather than confined to a small elite as in the past. The Declaration was attached as a preamble to the French Constitution of 1791 and was incorporated into the current Constitution of France in 1958.

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The Storming of the Bastille

14th July 1789

On this day in Paris, France, the medieval armoury, fortress, and political prison known as the Bastille was stormed by revolutionary insurgents. The Bastille represented royal authority in the centre of Paris and was seen by the revolutionaries as a symbol of the monarchy’s abuse of power. After four hours of fighting and 94 deaths, the insurgents managed to enter the Bastille where the governor and several members of the garrison were killed after surrendering. Two days after the storming of the Bastille the British ambassador to France is reported to have said, “Thus, my Lord, the greatest revolution ….. has been effected with, comparatively speaking, ….. the loss of very few lives. From this moment we may consider France as a free country, the King a very limited monarch, and the nobility as reduced to a level with the rest of the nation.” The fall of the Bastille is seen by many as being the flashpoint of the French Revolution.

Read Bob Lynn’s short story “The Certainties of a Doomed Man”
about the fall of the Bastille HERE

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King Louis XVI of France Beheaded

21st January 1793

On this day in the Place de la Révolution (today’s Place de la Concorde), King Louis XVI of France, was beheaded by the guillotine having been found guilty of conspiracy and attacks upon public safety. The French Revolution, which had started in 1789 with the Estates General and the storming of the Bastille, had led to the abolition of the monarchy and the birth of the French Republic. The new French government was undecided regarding the fate of Louis, but in the end it was the more radical Robespierre who swung the vote in favour of the death penalty with his lapidary words, “Louis must die so that the nation may live.”

Read Bob Lynn’s short story “The Last Supper of Reason”
about the French Revolution HERE

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