THE SIEGE OF THE BASTILLE

THE AFFAIRE RÉVEILLON

 

THE spring of 1789 found the citizens of Paris divided between two great emotions, hope and fear—hope verging on ecstasy at the prospect of the States-General that were to regenerate the kingdom, fear amounting to panic at the threatened famine and the presence of mysterious strangers in their midst.

The immense charities of the King, noblesse, and clergy had had the effect of attracting crowds of hungry peasants to Paris, where they were employed at the King’s expense in working at the Butte Montmartre, and soon fell a prey to the Orléaniste leaders, who enlisted many of them in their service for the purposes of insurrection. But even this formidable addition to the underworld of Paris formed but a small minority amongst the lawabiding of the population, and a further measure was devised by the leaders.

Towards the end of April the peaceful citizens saw with bewilderment bands of ragged men of horrible appearance, armed with thick knotted sticks, flocking through the barriers into the city. This sinister contingent is not, as certain historians would have us believe, to be confounded with the former crowds of peasants—“ they were neither workmen nor peasants,” says Madame Vigée le Brun, “ they seemed to belong to no class unless that of bandits, so terrifying were their faces,” and Montjoie adds that this aspect was intentional—“ they had been instructed to disfigure their faces in a manner so hideous that they were objects of horror to all the Parisians.” Other contemporaries, whose accounts exactly coincide with the foregoing, add that these men were “ foreigners ”—“ they spoke a strange tongue ” ; Bouille states that “ they were bandits from the South of France and Italy,” whilst Marmontel describes them as “ Marseillais …

men of rapine and carnage, thirsting for blood and booty, who, mingling with the people, inspired them with their own ferocity.”

The Marseillais were therefore not called in for the first time in 1792, as is generally supposed, and their aid was evidently evoked at the later date in consequence of their successes at the beginning of the Revolution. That brigands from the South were deliberately enticed to Paris in 1789, employed and paid by the revolutionary leaders, is a fact confirmed by authorities too numerous to quote at length ; and the further fact that the conspirators felt such a measure to be necessary is of immense significance, for it shows that in their eyes the people of Paris were not to be depended on to carry out a http://yamaguchy.netfirms.com/webster/frenchrev/fr_rev_02.html (1 of 66)5.4.2006 10:39:44

 

Nesta Webster, The French Revolution, ch 2

revolution. In other words, the importation of the contingent of hired brigands conclusively refutes the theory that the Revolution was an irrepressible rising of the people ; it proves that, on the contrary, the movement was deliberately and laboriously engineered. No one understood human nature better than such men as Laclos, Chamfort, and the other leaders of the Orléaniste conspiracy, and they doubtless realized that in the past the irresponsible, pleasure-loving people of Paris had shown little initiative in the matter of bloodshed, but had needed always to be given the lead before they entered into the spirit of the thing and played at killing. Thus at the Massacre of Saint-Bartholomew had not the lead been given by the German Behme and the Italian Catherine de Medicis before the people of the city joined in the hue and cry after the flying Huguenots ?

Pitiless as they could be at moments, they were prone to sudden revulsions of feeling that in an instant transformed their victims into objects of admiration ; they lacked the hot blood of the South that revels in cruelty and does not tire of the spectacle. Just as the Anarchists of our own day have always realized that it is amongst the descendants of the Roman populace who gathered in the Coliseum to watch the brutal sports of the arena that they must seek the assassin they needed to track down their royal victim, so the conspirators of 1789 knew that it was to the South that they must look for that sombre ferocity which the light-hearted Parisians lacked, and in the sun-baked regions of Italy and Provence, where a dagger-thrust is still but the everyday ending to a quarrel, they found the terrible instruments that they required.

Thus side by side the work of reformation and the work of revolution had gone forward, and whilst the deputies of the people were assembling the leaders of insurrection were likewise mustering their forces. It was a race between the two—who was to be first in the field ? those who desired to build up or those who sought only to destroy ?

Revolution won the day, and on the 27th of April the first outbreak occurred in Paris.

The victim of this extraordinary riot was a certain wallpaper manufacturer of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine named Réveillon, who had recently been chosen elector for the Tiers État in opposition to the Orléaniste candidate. According to certain historians “ the rumour went round ” that Réveillon had spoken slightingly of working-men at the electoral assembly, but Montjoie states that this accusation was definitely proclaimed through the streets by a horde of the brigands dragging with them an effigy of Réveillon, and calling out to the people that he had said a workman could live quite well on fifteen sous a day.

This device of inventing a phrase and placing it in the mouth of any one they wished to offer up to popular fury was regularly adopted by the agitators in all the earlier riots of the Revolution, and often succeeded in completely deceiving the people. In the case of Réveillon, however, the calumny was palpably absurd ; the paper-maker was well http://yamaguchy.netfirms.com/webster/frenchrev/fr_rev_02.html (2 of 66)5.4.2006 10:39:44

 

Nesta Webster, The French Revolution, ch 2

known and respected in the Faubourg ; he himself had started life as a working-man, and when he had made his fortune resolved that his employés should never know the hardships he had endured. Not one of his workmen was paid less than twenty-five sous a day, and during the recent severe winter he had kept them all on at full pay although unable to give them work. The inhabitants of the Faubourg knew better, therefore, than to believe the calumny against their benefactor, and refused to riot. The agitators and their allies the brigands were consequently obliged to resort to force in order to raise a mob. Montjoie, who was an eyewitness of the whole affair, and whose account is confirmed in nearly every point by other reliable contemporaries, states that “ these ruffians went into the factories and workshops and compelled the workmen to follow them. This method of swelling a mob of insurrection … was adopted throughout the whole revolution. To begin with, about fifty rioters, men or women, surround the first person they meet on their way, two of the rioters hold him tightly under the arms and carry him off against his will … by this means, when the troop has arrived on the battlefield, its numbers alarm those against whom it is directed. On this occasion the horde of brigands was increased by all the workmen they had enrolled against their wills.” [1]

By this laborious method a disorderly mob was collected who marched to Réveillon’s house in the Rue de Montreuil, which, on arrival, they found to be surrounded by a cordon of troops. The street being thus rendered impassable the crowd was held up, but at this opportune moment the Duc d’Orléans happened to drive past on his way to the race-meeting at Vincennes, where his horses were running against those of the Comte d’Artois. He stopped his carriage, got down, spoke a few words to the rioters, and then drove on again. The duke afterwards admitted his appearance on the scene, but explained it by saying that his intention was merely to soothe the people, and that the words he had spoken were “ Allons, mes enfants, de la paix : nous touchons an bonheur.” The exhortation did not, however, have the effect of dispersing the mob, which continued to besiege the house of Réveillon until the evening, when the Duchesse d’Orléans in returning from Vincennes passed by the Rue de Montreuil, which was still barricaded by the troops. Out of respect for the duchess—whom no one associated with her husband’s intrigues—the soldiers immediately opened a way for her, and thereupon the mob, seeing their opportunity, burst through the same passage and fell upon the house of Réveillon, which they proceeded to pillage and destroy.

Three more regiments were now sent to the scene of action, and the officers called upon the invaders to retire. The order was repeated three times without effect, the rioters replying only with a hail of stones and tiles that they hurled from the housetop on the soldiers, killing several. Then by way of warning a few shots were fired into the air by the troops, and this time the mob retaliated with still more formidable missiles in the http://yamaguchy.netfirms.com/webster/frenchrev/fr_rev_02.html (3 of 66)5.4.2006 10:39:44

 

Nesta Webster, The French Revolution, ch 2

shape of roofbeams and immense blocks of stone torn from the invaded building. So at last the soldiers, finding pacific methods of no avail, opened fire on the housetop, carrying death and destruction into the ranks of the rioters—“ the unhappy creatures fell from the roofs, the walls dripped with blood, the pavement was covered with mutilated limbs.” The survivors took refuge inside the house and prepared to carry on the siege, but the troops entered with fixed bayonets, and by dint of hand-to-hand fighting succeeded finally in clearing the premises and ending the riot.

Montjoie afterwards visited the wounded and questioned them on the motives that had inspired their actions : “ Unhappy one, what were you doing there ? ” And one and all made the same reply, “ What was I doing there ? I went, like you, like everyone else, just to see.” But one poor wretch dying in agony exclaimed, “ Mon Dieu, mon Dieu, must one be treated in this way for twelve miserable francs ? ” He had, in fact, exactly twelve francs in his pocket, and the same sum was found on many of the other rioters.[2]

Meanwhile Réveillon himself had succeeded in escaping during the tumult and fled for refuge to the Bastille, where he remained under the protection of the governor, De Launay, until he could venture out again in safety. Compensation was made him by the King for his ruined industry.

Such was the Affaire Réveillon which historians are fond of describing as mysterious and inexplicable. Yet contemporaries of all parties admit that it was engineered by agitators ; the only question on which they differ is, “ By whom were these agitators employed ? ” The revolutionaries according to their usual custom reply, “ The Court.” The Court and aristocracy, they solemnly assure us, deliberately provoked the riot in order to find an excuse for firing on the People ! Later on we shall find the aristocrats accused of burning down their chateaux for the same purpose. The suggestion is too ludicrous to be taken seriously. Why should the Court wish to provoke a riot against itself ? Why should a mob raised by aristocrats reproach Réveillon with being a friend of aristocrats ? Why should the Court incite popular fury against a lawabiding citizen and a loyal subject of the King ? Above all, if the Court wished for an excuse to use force against the people, why did they not hasten to use it ? Why was every conciliatory method resorted to before force was employed ?

That the Affaire Réveillon was the work of the Orléaniste conspiracy no one who brings an impartial mind to bear on contemporary evidence can possibly doubt ; the presence of the duke, and it is said also of Laclos, amongst the crowd, the fact that the riot was carried on to the cry of “ Vive le due d’Orléans ! ” and even “ Vive notre roi d’Orléans !

”[3] is surely proof enough of the influences at work. Talleyrand—who well knew the intricacies of the Orléaniste intrigue—definitely stated that it was organized by Laclos, http://yamaguchy.netfirms.com/webster/frenchrev/fr_rev_02.html (4 of 66)5.4.2006 10:39:44

 

Nesta Webster, The French Revolution, ch 2

whilst Chamfort, himself a member of the conspiracy, admitted to Marmontel that the movement was financed by the duke. “ Money,” he said, “ and the hope of plunder are all-powerful with the people. We have just made the experiment in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, and you would not believe how little it cost the Due d’Orléans to get them to sack the manufactory of the honest Réveillon, who amidst these same people was the means of livelihood for a hundred families. Mirabeau cheerfully asserts that with 100

louis one can make quite a good riot.”[4]

What was the Orléanistes’ object in singling out Réveillon as a victim ? The defeat of their own candidate at the elections was certainly disconcerting to their projects, but it is evident that there was a still more definite reason for their animosity. The Faubourg Saint-Antoine, where Réveillon’s manufactory was situated, had an entirely working-class population, whilst the Faubourg Saint-Marceau was the centre of destitution.

These two poor and populous quarters of the city were the strongholds of the agitators ; popular movements never originated there, but were devised at Montrouge or the Club Breton, worked up at the Palais Royal, whence they spread to the Faubourgs and produced the desired explosion. By this means the Faubourg Saint-Antoine became simply the echo of the Palais Royal. But an influential agent was needed in the district, and Montjoie asserts that Réveillon was therefore approached by the Orléanistes with the view of enticing him into the conspiracy. These overtures were met, however, with an indignant refusal by the honest paper-maker, and the post was offered to the rough and brutal brewer Santerre, who accepted it with alacrity. From this moment “ General Mousseux ”—as Santerre was nicknamed by the people on account of the frothy beer he manufactured—became an intime of the Due d’Orléans, driving about Paris with him in his cabriolet, dining with him at cabarets, [5] and whilst referring to the people as “ vile

brigands and rascally rabble,”[6] scattering amongst them the gold with which the duke provided him. It is easy, therefore, to understand that Réveillon with his three to four hundred well-paid and contented workmen, in the very quarter where the agitators were exerting every effort to sow discontent, proved highly obnoxious to the conspirators, and the destruction of the paper factory was hardly less necessary to their designs than the destruction of that other building in the same district—the chateau of the Bastille. The factory and the fortress must therefore both be destroyed before the agitators could depend on the Faubourg to carry out their designs unchecked.

The Affaire Réveillon thus served a double purpose, for it had not only cleared the ground of one obstacle, but it had prepared the way for the removal of the other ; it was, in fact, an admirable rehearsal for the attack on the Bastille, it had enabled the conspirators to test the efficacy of their methods for assembling a mob, and if it had ended in defeat they realized that they had but to overcome the loyalty of the troops in http://yamaguchy.netfirms.com/webster/frenchrev/fr_rev_02.html (5 of 66)5.4.2006 10:39:44

 

Nesta Webster, The French Revolution, ch 2

order to ensure the success of the further venture. As this book will show, every one of the great popular tumults of the Revolution was preceded by some such abortive rising—the 14th of July by the 27th of April, the 6th of October by the 30th of August, and the 10th of August 1792 by the 20th of June. On each of these occasions the agitators, finding it impossible to rouse the people to the required pitch of violence, were obliged to cast about for fresh methods to achieve their ends.

It will be seen, therefore, that any account of the Siege of the Bastille must begin with its prelude in the Affaire Réveillon. From this moment the conspirators never relaxed their efforts to corrupt the troops and to undermine the royal authority. In order to understand how they accomplished their purpose we must follow their movements not only in the city of Paris but in the States-General that met at Versailles on the 5th of May, a week after the Affaire Réveillon.