Please, just give me the FACTS

Danton and Robespierre at first operate in different places — Danton at the Cordelier district and Robespierre at the Jacobin club and the National Assembly. In September 1790, Danton does however come to join the jacobins, where he soon becomes a frequent speaker. He and Robespierre often speak during the same sessions and on the same topic, such as on June 21 1791 where both swore to die for the homeland following the royal family’s flight, and July 13 and 15 of the same year when both are involved in a discussion on the king’s inviobility.

It is however not as often they are recorded to have mentioned the other’s name. The first instance of this occurs on March 30 1791, after Danton has just scolded Collot d’Herbois for having inserted praise of a newly elected minister in one of the club’s minutes while serving as secretary. According to him, someone part of the executive power can no longer be a friend of liberty, and praising someone like that is therefore only something slaves would do. Right after this, Robespierre does however step in, underlining that while he knows Danton to be a good citizen and agrees that it was wrong of Collot to insert praise, he thinks a person appointed agent of the executive power can still be a patriot. Something similar also occurs on March 4 1792, when Danton proposed the club reject a sum of 1445 livres to be donated to the soldiers of Château-vieux, considering the fact 110 of these livres had been a gift from the royal family and accepting the money would mean honoring them. Robespierre opposed this, explaining that while ”there is something true and generous in M. Danton's observations, and these observations are not unworthy of his patriotism,” they should still accept the donation, as they need to focus on the bigger picture. He had his way.

In the big discussion of war and peace that started in late November 1791, Danton and Robespierre at first stood united. On December 14 1791, both of them cautioned against war and proposed the jacobins should follow the Legislative Assembly’s discussion of it closely. Two days later, December 16, right after Brissot had held his very first speech in favour of the idea at the club, Danton, while praising the speaker as an excellent patriot, objected to the thought of a war right at the moment — ”I want us to have war; it is essential. We must have war. But above all, we have to exhaust the means that could save us from it.” Then on December 30, after Brissot had just finished his second speech on the subject, Danton and Robespierre both demanded a change be made to a passage when it got printed. Following this moment, it would however appear like Danton abandons the question. From the notes Robespierre prepared two years later, we can suspect he felt a bit abandoned, as he there accuses Danton of having ”supported [the girondins’] opinion regarding the declaration of war. Then, pressed by the reproach of patriots, whose usurped confidence he didn’t want to lose, he seemed to say a word for my defense and announced that he carefully watched the two parties and withdrew to silence.” Robespierre also claims Danton at the same time in a private meeting had told Legendre: “Since he (Robespierre) wants to ruin himself, let him ruin himself, we do not have to share his fate,” words which Legendre in his turn then had reported to Robespierre.

On May 10 1792, three weeks after war had been declared, Danton did however defend Robespierre when the latter got drowned in murmurs at the jacobins when trying to spek in favour about a motion to only let members who had payed their subsidy enter the hall:

I requested the floor for a simple point of order. The more I approve of M. Robespierre's motion, the more I believe a discussion of it would be worthwhile. M. Robespierre has never exercised anything but the despotism of reason here; it is therefore not love of the homeland, but base jealousy, indeed all the most harmful passions, that incite his adversaries against him with such violence. Well then, gentlemen, it is important for all of us to completely confound those who propose resolutions so egregious to the majesty of the people. (Applause.)

In the night between August 9 and 10 1792, the Tuileries Palace was stormed, and the following day Danton was made Minister of Justice. On August 14, we find the following letter from him to Robespierre (the first of two conserved between them), offering him a job at the Revolutionary Tribunal. As can be seen, it is written in a rather warm tone, though Danton still addresses Robespierre in vouvoiement:

I ask you, my dear friend, to do me the pleasure and to render this service to the public good, to accept a few hours of work per week in the council of justice of which I have appointed you a member. It will only be three times a week and for part of the morning that we will assemble. I have given you three colleagues worthy of you. This is not a position as a public official, but only one more way for your heart and your talents to fight the enemies of liberty and above all to follow the cause of the unfortunate.

Robespierre would however come to decline this offer, probably since he already was occupied at the Paris Commune.

Between September 2 to 6 1792, the September massacres took place in Paris. We have accounts alleging Danton and Robespierre saw each other at least twice during these fatal days. In Histoire générale et impartiale des erreurs, des fautes et des crimes commis pendant la Révolution française (1797) Louis Marie Prudhomme shares the testimony of Théophile Mandar, who claimed that Robespierre in the evening of September 3 visited Danton’s house together with several other politicians to discuss what was to be done in order to save Paris from being invaded by the Prussians. In Discours de Jérôme Pétion sur l’accusation intentée contre Maximilien Robespierre (November 1792), Pétion reveals that, the next day, September 4, Danton and Robespierre showed up at town hall together, after an arrest warrant had been issued against Roland. While Danton put an end to this ”arbitrary and demented act,” Pétion and Robespierre got into an argument over Brissot that Danton at last had to break up — ”Danton became entangled in the colloquy, saying that this was not the time for arguments; that it was necessary to have all these explanations after the expulsion of the enemies; that this decisive object alone should occupy all good citizens.” Robespierre seemingly comments on this intervention in the notes he wrote less than two years later: ”Danton extremely rejected all the proposals which I had made him to crush the conspiracy and to prevent Brissot from renewing his intrigues, under the pretext that he only needed to occupy himself with war.”

Danton seems to have kept this role as mediator between Robespierre and the girondins for the rest of September as well. In J. P. Brissot, député à la Convention nationale, à tous les républicains de France; sur la société des Jacobins de Paris (October 1792) Brissot writes that before the opening of the National Convention, Danton had sought him out and explained he was trying to bring together what he called ”the parties,” adding that both he and Robespierre feared the girondins wanted to establish a federal republic. Brissot had responded this charge was false and Danton brought that information back to Robespierre, without it easing the latter’s suspicion. In Deuxième lettre de Maximilien Robespierre en réponse au second discours de Jérôme Petion (December 1792), Robespierre also reminded Pétion that he had been unable to ”fulfill the commitment you had made with a very well-known man in the republic, to meet that day, at his home, to dine, with me, for an object which essentially concerned public harmony.” Finally, in his notes against Danton, Robespierre reports about a meeting at Pétion’s house around the same time where he was given ”an explanation of the projects of Brissot,” and where ”Fabre and Danton reunited with Pétion in order to certify the innocence of their views.” 

During the same early September days, the elections for the new National Convention began. Robespierre and Danton rounded up as first respectively second deputy of Paris elected to it. In his notes against the dantonists, Robespierre recalls how he had opposed the nomination of Philippe Égalité, but when he had spoken to Danton about it, the latter had instead argued that the nomination of a of blood prince would render the National Convention more impressive to the rest of Europe. To that, Robespierre had replied that there would be even more impressive if he wasn’t nominated at all, but he was unable to convince his colleague.

Danton’s reconciliation attempts had been in vain, as the hostilty between girondins and montagnards showed up almost immediately after the opening of the Convention on September 21. There, Danton, Robespierre and Marat were soon met with attacks of forming a so called ”triumvirate” and having masterminded the September massacres together. They all denied this to have been the case. Danton and Robespierre did however come to adapt the same view of the massacres as a tragic neccessity, on February 4 1793 Robespierre is recorded to have ”[recalled] what Danton said about the days of September 2nd and 3rd, and he proves that they were the necessary continuation of the memorable August 10th.”

They also continued to back each other up at the Convention and jacobin club. On September 25, Robespierre supported a motion put forward by Danton that proposed the death penalty for anyone wanting to destroy the unity of France. On October 28, he held a speech at the jacobins in which he called Danton ”[a deputy] known for the great services he has rendered the Revolution.” After the speech was over, Danton, who presided over the session, ordered for it to be sent not only to the sister clubs but to ”all interested parties.” One day later, October 29, when girondin Louvet came forward with a prepared denounciation speech against Robespierre, shouting ”It is I who accuse you!” Danton stepped in and told the president to ”please allow the speaker to continue, and I too will request the floor after him, it is time to sort all of this out.” Finally, in number 1 (September-October 1792) of his new journal Lettres de Maximilien Robespierre à ses commettans, Robespierre wrote that ”[Danton’s] talent is perfectly complemented by the strength of his voice and his athletic vigor.”

In her memoirs (1834), Charlotte Robespierre tells us her brother and Danton, while never super close, had ”good friendly relations” with each other, even if the big differences in their personalities meant they were held together only by ”love for the homeland.” Charlotte claims to have witnessed their discussions on several occasions — ”they conversed with a great outpouring of their hearts; their conversations almost always focused on the republic” — and that the trial of the dethroned Louis XVI which started on December 3 1793 occupied them a great deal, with the two concerting ”that the monarch who had betrayed France with such perfidy could not enjoy impunity, and would receive the punishment for his crimes.” In his notes against Danton, Robespierre does however contradict his sister somewhat, claiming instead that Danton ”didn’t want the death of the tyrant; he wanted that one settled for banishing him,” and that it was only the force of public opinion that determined him to on January 16 1793 vote for death regardless.

If Robespierre was annoyed by Danton’s political conduct, he did however let that drop when on February 10 1793, Danton’s wife Gabrielle died in childbirth. Five days later, he addressed the following letter to his friend, easily the most sentimental of those contained in Correspondance inédite de Maximilien et Augustin Robespierre (1910), and also the first in which Robespierre addresses someone with tutoiement instead of vouvoiement:

My dear Danton, In this sorrow that alone can break a heart such as yours, if the assurance that you have a tender and devoted friend offers any consolation, then I give it. I love you more than ever, until death. In this moment, I am you. Do not close your heart to an expression of friendship that feels all your pain. Let us weep for our friends and let our deep grief defeat the tyrants who are the cause of all our misfortunes, public and private. I would have come to see you except for the respect in which I hold your first moments of grief.  Embrace your friend,  Robespierre

If this letter implies Robespierre had frequented Danton’s house and met his family, the opposite would not appear to have been the case. In her memoirs, Élisabeth Duplay Le Bas, the youngest daughter in Robespierre’s host family, writes the first time she ever saw Danton was in the spring of 1793. If we’re to believe Barras’ memoirs, Danton had however nicknamed Élisabeth’s sister Éléonore ”Cornélie Copeau, the Cornelia who is not the mother of the Gracchi" which on the other hand implies he knew Robespierre’s host family somewhat.

In February 1793, Danton went on a mission to Belgium together which Delacroix. They were back in Paris again by early March. On March 10, Robespierre praised their efforts at the Convention:

Remember, citizens, that the Minister of War was misled by the generals' dispatches; remember that if Lacroix and Danton had not come here to reveal important secrets to you, you would still be in profound ignorance of what was happening in Belgium.

In the same intervention, Robespierre asked for an act of accusation to be issued against Stengel, a general deemed responsible for the Austrian taking of  Aldenhoven on March 1. Right after him, Danton did however intervene to propose Stengel and another general only be sent to be held accountable before the Convention.

On March 26 1793, Robespierre and Danton were both elected for the so called Commission of Public Safety, alongside 23 others. The commission, which consisted of both fervent montagnards and fervent girondins, was however off to a rocky start, and already on April 6 it was put to death and replaced by the Committee of Public Safety.

On April 1, Robespierre accused the girondins of ”want[ing] to deprive us of all means of loyal defense” by ”slander[ing] the patriots and blam[ing] them for all the attacks they are plotting.” He pointed to Danton as an example:

Danton was accused, a pretext was found to slander him because he was too credulous, because he did not take it upon himself to bring charges against Dumouriez, and attempts were made to extend suspicion to all citizens who shared Danton's civic spirit. I must also inform you that, at this very moment, rumors are circulating that the Committee of General Security has arrested Danton. You know with what superiority this patriot crushed his enemies. You know with what energy he uplifted all souls.

On April 10, about two weeks after Dumouriez’s defection, Robespierre excused Danton’s earlier praise of the general, saying that ”it is not surprising that an army commissioner could have been deceived for a moment about Dumouriez’s plans, whom he only saw in his official capacity, in the midst of his army.” Two days later, April 12, he praised him again at the jacobin club:

Danton spoke with a superiority of reason and eloquence that uplifted the spirits of all who heard him, and proposed infallible measures for the public good. Danton proposed placing a price on the heads of the Bourbons, the former Monsieur, and indeed all traitors; he requested that the question raised to destroy one of the most ardent defenders of liberty be referred back to the Committee of Legislation.

The day after that, April 13, Robespierre proposed decreeing the death penalty for anyone who wished to negotiate with the enemy, and was supported by Danton, who nevertheless also underlined this decree could not be given the ”scope which its author did not intend to attribute to it.” He therefore proposed the decree state that ”the death penalty is decreed against anyone who who proposes that the Republic compromise with enemies who, as a preliminary step, do not recognize the sovereignty of the people.” This proposal carried through. 

Charlotte Robespierre writes in her memoirs that her brother and Danton eventually ”turned all their energies against [the girondins]; I heard them say that if they did not finish promptly with the faction of the Gironde, the revolution would miscarry.” But in his notes, Robespierre disagrees, writing instead that from September 1792 and forward, ”one complained in vain to Danton and to Fabre about the Girondin faction: they argued that there was no faction and that all was the result of vanity and of personal animosities.” Indeed, on 12 April 1793, two days after Robespierre had held a long speechdenouncing the girondins and calling for Brissot, Vergniaud, Gensonné and Guadet to be brought to trial, Danton openly declared that ”while recognizing the views and justice of Robespierre, I would not have made the denunciation he threw in this Assembly. […] Robespierre’s denounciation was founded on nothing but political views.” Nevertheless, when things started to get heated on May 27 and Robespierre was refused the floor at the Convention, Danton stood up for him and exclaimed: ”I declare in my own name, and I will sign this declaration, that the refusal to allow Robespierre to speak is a cowardly tyranny!”

When the insurrection of May 31 actually rolled around, Robespierre’s notes claim Danton reacted with ”horror” to it, and that he even had ”sought to abort it or to turn it against liberty,” by asking for the head of the general Hanriot whose troops had been the ones to surround the Convention (I have not found any basis for this last charge). He did however still respect the other man enough to praise and defend him before the Jacobin club on August 5 1793, after Danton had recently faced attacks from the ”énragés”:

Robespierre says that new men, patriots of a day, want to lose the people's oldest friends. He cites Danton as an example, whom they slander; Danton, against whom no one has the right to raise the slightest reproach; Danton, whom they will only discredit after proving they have more energy, talent, or love of country. I do not intend to identify with him here to elevate either of us; I cite him only as an example.

In the middle of September 1793, Danton left Paris for his country house in Arcis-sur-Aube. Illness was the official reason, but according to Dominique-Joseph Garat, anguish over what was soon to happen with the girondins also played a role. In Memoirs of the revolution; or, an apology for my conduct, in the public employments which I have held (1795), Garat recalls going home to Danton and finding him sick. ”It only took me two minutes to see that his illness was above all a deep pain and a great dismay at everything that was coming. ”I won't be able to save them”, were the first words out of his mouth, and, as he uttered them, big tears strolled down his face.” Garat claims he later also went to discuss the upcoming girondin trial with Robespierre, who on the other hand showed no signs of mercy or empathy. In his own notes, Robespierre would indeed go on to accuse Danton of having ”made every effort in order to save Brissot and his accomplices. He opposed their punishment.”

In late November, Danton was back in Paris, where he soon started making some small suggestions to be more moderate with ”the terror” — on on November 22, he told the Convention ”I ask that the blood of men be spared; I ask that you do not lose the means of going home to your enemies, and conciliating them,” on November 26, he proclaimed that ”the people want terror to be the order of the day; but it wants it to be carried out against the real enemies of the Republic, and against them alone,” and on December 1 he warned that ”any man who makes himself ultra-revolutionary will render results as dangerous as determined counter-revolution.” But on December 3, after he at the jacobin club objected to an idea to send a group with a guillotine to Seine-Inférieure in order to deal with rebels fleeing the Vendée and arguing this was going beyond ”the limits of the revolution,” he was met by objections from Coupé d’Oise, who argued that the club must not listen to ”proposals tending to diminish the vigor of the revolutionary movement.” In response, Danton made a long speech defending his patriotism, ending by asking a commission be set up to look over his conduct. After that, Robespierre mounted the tribune as well and spoke for long about his feelings for the other man. Due to way he begins it, some historians have erroneously come to believe it is a denounciation, but it is in fact a rigid defence:

I ask you to make your charges against him more specific. No one speaks? Well then, in that case I will do it. Danton! You (tu) are accused of having emigrated; they say that you went to Switzerland; that your illness was feigned in order to conceal your flight from the people; they say that your ambition was to be regent under Louis XVII; that at a certain date everything had been prepared for proclaiming it; that you were the chief of the conspiracy; that neither Pitt, nor Coburg, nor England, nor Austria, nor Prussia was our real enemy, but that you alone were, that the Mountain was composed of your accomplices, that we should not concern ourselves with the agents sent by foreign powers; that the conspiracies were fables that should be despised; in short, that he must be slayed.

The Convention knows that I have disagreed with Danton; that, at the time of Dumouriez's betrayals, my suspicions preceded his. I reproached him then for not being more incensed by that monster. I reproached him for not having pursued Brissot and his accomplices with sufficient speed, and I swear that these are the only reproaches I made to him... 

Danton! Don't you know that the more courage and patriotism a man possesses, the more the enemies of the public good strive for his downfall? Don't you know, and don't all of you know, citizens, that this method is infallible? And who are these slanderers? Men who appear free from vice [sic], and who have never shown any virtue. Ah! If the defender of liberty were not slandered, it would be proof that we would no longer have priests or nobles to fight. The enemies of the homeland seem to heap praise upon me exclusively; but I reject it. Do you think that alongside these praises recounted in certain newspapers, I don't see the knife with which they tried to slaughter the homeland?

From the very beginning of the Revolution, I learned to distrust all masks. The cause of the patriots is one, like that of tyranny; they are all united. I may be mistaken about Danton; but, as a family man, he deserves nothing but praise. In political matters, I observed him: a difference of opinion between him and me made him scrutinize him carefully, sometimes angrily; and, if he did not always agree with me, would I conclude that he betrayed his homeland? No; I saw him always serve it zealously.

Danton wants to be judged. He's right, let me be judged too. Let them come forward, these men who are more patriotic than we are! I wager they're nobles, privileged men! You'll find a marquis there, and you'll have a true measure of the patriotism of these emphatic accusers. When I saw the slanderous attacks directed against the patriots, when I saw Danton being accused of having emigrated, I realized that the aristocratic, or falsely patriotic, newspapers had long since spread this news. They had announced that his illness was fake, that it was merely the pretext for his emigration, and the means to achieve it. I had to place all the other calumnies directed against Danton on the same level. This is how you yourselves judged them, and I ask these good patriots to unite, to no longer allow Danton to be denigrated in groups, in cafés. It is evident that Danton has been slandered; but I declare that I see in this one of the most important threads of the plot woven against all patriots. I declare to the aristocrats that soon we will know them all, and perhaps this last piece of information was missing from our discoveries. We have it. Furthermore, I ask that everyone, like me, frankly say what they think about Danton. It is here that the truth must be told above all; it can only be honorable to him; but, in any case, the whole club must know it.

After Robespierre was finished, Merlin de Thionville picked up his suggestion everyone should say what they truly thought about Danton, hailing him as a patriot and saviour of the revolution. Other than him, no one else spoke up, and Momoro concluded this meant no one had anything to accuse him of. The session therefore ended with Danton getting drowned in applause and embraced by Fourcroy, the current president of the club.

What gets Robespierre to completely change his opinion of Danton sometime following this session is harder to figure out than what one at first might think. If we look at interventions made by the two at the jacobins and the Convention in the weeks that follow, no big ideological differences between them can be spotted. They get into no public arguments, and instead appear rather united in urging their fellow deputies and jacobins to stand together, trust in the government committees, and not be led astray either by ”moderation” or ”extremism.” On December 21, none other than Hébert exclaimed to the jacobins: ”There are two men who have all my esteem and all my confidence: Danton and Robespierre, the two columns of the Revolution. […] Let them be alone, they will be great, and may they crush with us these reptiles which have vowed to lose liberty!” Hébert asked that the two not allow themselves to be mislead by Fabre d’Églantine, Philippeaux and Desmoulins, whom he called ”pygmies who want to rise in the shadow of their patriotism.” Indeed, Robespierre and Danton can at first been seen taking a rather similar stance on these men (who three months later will of course get labeled as Danton’s accomplices and executed alongside him) as well. Already two days later, on December 23, both of them intervened in the Jacobins’ tumultuous discussion about Philippeaux’s recent publication Philippeaux, représentant du peuple, au Comité de salut public, a critique of the French army’s brutality in the war in the Vendée. Neither did however try to defend or denounce the writer, instead just limiting themselves to asking that the debate be kept calm. Two weeks later, January 71794, Desmoulins and Robespierre got into an argument at the Jacobins after the latter had denounced the fifth number of Desmoulins’ new journal Vieux Cordelier as counter-revolutionary, but insisting that its author had been ”led astray by bad company,” and therefore proposing that the Society forgive him and ”just” burn the latest numbers. When Desmoulins refused that ultimatum, the fight worsened until Danton stepped in, again not to defend the accused or his writings, but rather to call for calm and act as meditator:

Danton: Camille mustn’t be frightened by the rather severe lessons Robespierre’s friendship has just given him. Citizens, let justice and cold-headedness always preside over our decisions. In judging Camille, be careful to not strike a deadly blow against liberty of the press

Robespierre did however reflect negatively on this intervention in his notes, writing that Danton had ”dared, at the Jacobins, to demand in [the numbers’] favour the liberty of the press, when I proposed for them the honours of burning.”

The notes also reveal another moment that soured Robespierre’s opinion of Danton. It took place after Fabre d’Églantine on January 13 got arrested for his involvement in the East India Company scandal. The very same day, Danton spoke about this recent development at the Convention. While agreeing to issuing an act of accusation against Fabre and the three other deputies entangled in the same affair, he at the same time proposed it wouldn’t hurt for the defendants to be brought down and heard in front of the Convention. Then on February 2 1794, when Voulland, in the name of the Committee of General Security, suggested releasing the ”hébertists” Ronsin and Vincent, who had been kept imprisoned since December 17, Danton applauded  this move, calling Ronsin and Vincent ”revolutionary veterans who, by public admission, have rendered constant services to liberty,” but followed this up with claiming to have been motivated by the same principles when asking that Fabre and the others be let out to defend themselves a month earlier — ”I defend Ronsin and Vincent against prejudice, just as I will defend Fabre and my other colleagues, as long as no one has carried into my soul a conviction contrary to the opinion I have of them.” 

Shortly thereafter, Robespierre fell ill, and did not show up in public again until March 13. The following night, the ”hébertists” were arrested, and on March 24 they would be executed. Around the same time, there were attempts to bring Robespierre and Danton together to sort out their differences. It would appear word of these meetings got out on the street relatively quickly. Already on April 23 1794, the Swedish newspaper Götheborgs Allehanda does for example report that ”A strange thing has been said, that Robespierre and Danton a few hours before the arrest of the latter had spoken and embraced each other, even though Robespierre had already decided on his fate, and the latter the next day had planned to deliver a big motion against the latter at the Convention.” More detailed accounts of these meetings, of which there were at least two, did however not surface until after thermidor.

In Principaux évènemens, pour et contre la Révolution, dont les détails ont été ignorés jusqu’à présent: et prédiction de Danton au Tribunal révolutionnaire, accomplie (1794) Louis-Marie Villain d’Aubigny reports about a meeting that took place a fortnight before Danton’s death, at the house of Humbert, head of the office of foreign relations. Convention deputies Legendre and Panis, minister of foreign affairs Deforgnes, administrator of military subsistence Jeannet Boursier, secretary general of the same administration Saintin, Villain d’Aubigny himself, and ”several other people” were also present. Arriving at the house, d’Aubigny writes he told Danton and Robespierre, who had both come before him, that their misunderstanding, which couldn’t be grounded in anything but self-love, jealousy or wounded pride, caused harm to the homeland. Danton then took to the floor and regretted that Robespierre had shown himself so indifferent towards him for a time, suspecting this was due to ”the intrigues and the hatred that several members of the Committee of Public Safety have dedicated to me, notably Messieurs Saint-Just and Billaud-Varennes,” and also to the gossip Robespierre’s constantly surrounded with, which ”fills his imagination with a thousand chimeras, by maintaining him only with conspiracies, the guillotine, poison and daggers ready to tear his chest.” He therefore encouraged Robespierre to ”reveal the intrigue, unite with the patriots [and] all walk in good faith, on the same path, […] punish the culprits, the leaders, but pardon error,” while also ensuring him he had not increased his fortune due to the revolution. Robespierre, who up until this point had stayed silent, now opened his mouth and asked Danton: ”But with your principles and your morale, would one ever find culprits to punish?” To this, Danton replied: ”Would you be angry, Robespierre, if there were no culprits to punish?” After this, the reconciliation was seemingly complete and the two embraced. Villain d’Aubigny notes that Danton ”put frankness into it” while Robespierre ”remained cold like marble.”

Legendre, one of the people Villain d’Aubigny designates as having been present for this meeting, seemingly confirmed it when he on March 23 1795 told the Convention about ”a dinner where I had found myself together with Robespierre and Danton. The first told him that the republic could only be established on the corpses of the 73. Danton replied that he would oppose their torture. Robespierre replied that he saw clearly that he was the leader of the indulgent faction.” This could also be the same meeting Billaud-Varennes is referring to when he on August 28 1794 told the same Convention that ”the day before Robespierre consented to abandon [Danton], they had been together in the countryside, four leagues from Paris, and had returned in the same carriage.” The journalist Louis Sébastien Mercier also talks about it in his l’Histoire générale et impartiale des erreurs, des fautes et des crimes commis pendant la Révolution française (1797), claiming that Robespierre, who never got drunk, nevertheless had a lot of champagne during the dinner, and that once he left, Danton exclaimed: ”Fuck! We must show ourselves, there is not a moment to lose.” But these might just be embellishments.

Robespierre mentions a different meeting in his notes against the indulgents, that would have taken place at his house and included him, Danton and the Convention deputy Laignelot, who kept ”stubbornly silent” throughout the whole interview. It is however less clear if this too was a planned meeting mutually agreed upon, or if Danton just unexpectedly showed up at Robespierre’s house. Regardless, Robespierre writes that Danton during this visit talked about Desmoulins ”with contempt,” attributing ”his deviances” to ”a vice that is private and shameful, but absolutely foreign to the Revolution.” Danton also made an effort to cry, that apparently turned out to be ”powerless and ridiculous.” This could be the same meeting Convention deputy Duhem is referring to, when he on October 22 1794 told the jacobins that, ”four days before his arrest, Danton had another meeting with Maximilien about their conspiracy.” That would give us a date for this encounter as well.

Exactly when Robespierre set to work on the notes on Danton and the other ”indulgents” and thereby fully committed himself to the idea of bringing them on trial is of course hard to pinpoint exactly, but given the scope of the notes, as well as the fact Saint-Just would have needed time to convert them into an act of accusation, I think the middle of March 1794, shortly after the dinner Villain d’Aubigny describes, is a probable starting point. The notes deal both with Fabre, Desmoulins, Delacroix, Hérault and Westermann, portraying them as belonging to a faction whose collective goal had been to ”seize power and to oppress liberty by aristocracy in order to give France a tyrant.” The bulk of the notes are however about Danton, who, along with Fabre, gets designated as the leader of the faction. Robespierre also writes Danton had had considerable influence over the works of both Desmoulins and Philippeaux, though without citing any proof.

The picture Robespierre’s notes otherwise paints of Danton is that of an immoral man who has in fact been a false patriot since day one of the revolution, and whose supposed reputation for civism has been built on nothing but ”the work of intrigue.” Danton has ”never defended a single patriot, never attacked a single conspirator,” ”chosen retreat in all crises,” and come across ”no liberticide measure which he hadn’t adopted.” Among the more concrete things Robespierre accused him of included having been too soft on the girondins and always willing to hold out an olive branch to them, having wanted an amnesty for ”all guilty people,” and having enriched Fabre with 10 000 francs from the treasury while serving as Minister of Justice. He also assigned him part of the blame for the massacre on Champ-de-Mars due to having been the editor behind the petition presented there alongside Brissot, as well as for not having had his back enough during the time of the Convention: ”Robespierre was accused; he didn’t say a single word if it wasn’t for isolating himself from him.” A lot of the other charges Robespierre directs at Danton are things that, it should be said, could just as easily be used against himself. For example, he accuses Danton of having been ”seduced” by Mirabeau when it was he himself who had suggested putting the latter’s body in the Panthéon on April 3 1791, of being a false friend to Desmoulins by first praising the Vieux Cordelier and then speaking ill of the author in private, when he too had encouraged Desmoulins to keep write the journal on December 14 1793 only to then turn his back on him a month later (and, it should perhaps be underlined, is writing this charge while at the same time working out Desmoulins’ actual indictment), of having wanted to sleep through the Insurrection of August 10, when he is not recorded to have played any active role in it either, and of along with Lacroix getting a decree passed abolishing slavery on February 4 1794, when he too had lobbied for abolishing it back in 1791.

Finally, Robespierre also threw shade on Danton’s moral qualities, claiming he surrounded himself with ”rascals” and tolerated ”vicious living,” had quipped that public opinion is a whore and posterity a folly, that his most solid virtue was the one which he practiced with his wife every night, and that what rendered their cause weak was the fact that the severity of their principles frightened a lot of people. 

Robespierre then handed these notes over to Saint-Just, who began constructing an act of accusation with the title Rapport sur la confirmation ourdie pour obtenir un changement de dynastie. After finishing the first draft, Saint-Just handed it back to Robespierre, who  annotated it and suggested some additions. 

On March 20, six days after the arrest of the ”hébertists” and four days before their execution, Robespierre warned the Convention this would not be the end of the political killings: ”It is true that a faction which wanted to tear the fatherland apart is about to expire; but the other has not been defeated.” The next day, March 21, he declared that ”the Convention is determined to save the people by crushing at the same time all the factions that threaten liberty.” After that, he kept silent for ten whole days, speaking neither at the jacobins nor the Convention, but remaining active at the Committee of Public Safety.

On March 30 1794, Robespierre, alongside seventeen others, signed the arrest warrant for deputies Danton, Desmoulins, Philippeaux and Delacroix. If we’re to believe the pamphlet À Maximilien Robespierre aux enfers (1794) by Taschereau de Fargues and Paul-Auguste-Jacques (who in their turn claimed to have gotten the anecdote from Committee of General Security member Vadier), Robespierre and Saint-Just had wanted the implicated men to be present in the Convention when the report against them got read, after which they would be arrested, fearing that arresting them beforehand was an approach that ”sooner or later would be seen as reprehensible.” Their colleagues did however manage to convince that would be too risky of a move to make.

If stories about Danton and Robespierre meeting in the weeks preceeding Danton’s arrest is something we’re far from lacking, there’s even more anecdotes about Danton being warned of his upcoming arrest and doing nothing about it. Antoine-Clair Thibaudeau claimed in his memoirs (1827) to on March 24 or 25 have exclaimed to Danton: ”Your carelessness surprises me, I understand nothing of your apathy. Don’t you see Robespierre is conspiring to lose you? Won’t you do nothing to prevent it?” To that, Danton would have angrily replied: ”If I thought that he has so much as thought about it, I would eat his entrails!” In Histoire de la Révolution française: 1789-1796 (1851) Nicolas Villiaumé also claims that Albertine Marat, having been informed of the signing of the arrest through ”the indiscretion of an employee of the Committee of Public Safety,” went to warn Danton in the middle of the Convention, encouraging him to mount the rostrum. Danton says: ”I would have to proscribe them, because I know Billaud and Robespierre: they are relentless,” to which Albertine responds: ”But since they want your head, take, if necessary, theirs, remember that, without you, Robespierre will very quickly be swallowed up himself. […] If he abandons you, his friend, you, the man of August 10, he is only a villain; he must perish. Collect your thoughts for an hour, and mount the rostrum: change the committees; proscribe them if necessary.” Nevertheless, Danton didn’t do anything, choosing instead to calmly hand himself over to the guards who in the night between March 30 and March 31 came to take him to the Luxembourg prison.

In the morning of March 31, as news of the nightly arrests started to spread, the deputy Delmas mounted the rostrum of the Convention and asked that the members of the two government committees be invited to immediately present themselves there, a proposal which was adopted. Legendre then followed, asking that before any report was read the four arrested deputies should be taken there as well so that they could explain themselves and be either accused or absolved by the Convention — ”Citizens, I declare that I think Danton to be as pure as myself, and I don't think anyone can accuse me of an act that offends the most scrupulous integrity…” When Legendre’s proposal was drowned in murmurs, president Tallien called for order, evoking liberty of opinion, and Legendre could keep talking, reminding the Convention of Danton’s past services and warning them that they were making a mistake. Immediately after this, Fayau opposed Legendre’s motion, citing the fact one should not look at people’s past action but at what they are doing here and now. After him, Robespierre took to the floor and firmly cemented that none of what Legendre had suggested would be happening, and that this was ”a question of knowing whether the interests of a few ambitious hypocrites should prevail over the interests of the French people.” Robespierre did not shy away from admitting he had once been close with the now imprisoned Danton, but that such bonds meant nothing once someone proved themselves to be an enemy (Moniteur, number 192, page 775-776):

…People wrote to me, Danton's friends sent me letters, obsessed me with their speeches. They believed that the memory of an old liaison, that an ancient faith in false virtues, would determine me to slow down my zeal and my passion for freedom. Well, I declare that none of these motives have touched my soul with the slightest impression. I declare that if it were true that the dangers of Danton were to become mine, that if they had made the aristocracy take one more step to reach me, I would not regard this circumstance as a public calamity. […]  I used to be a friend of Pétion, as soon as he was unmasked I abandoned him. I also had liasons with Roland, he betrayed us and I abandoned him. Danton wants to take their place, in my eyes he’s nothing but an enemy of the homeland.

Robespierre had his way, and two days later, April 2, Danton and the other indulgents got transferred from the Luxembourg prison to the Conciergerie in time for their trial to begin. If we’re to believe Honoré Riouffe, him too kept imprisoned in the Conciergerie, Danton was heard making many bild statements to his fellow prisoners, among them:  ”What proves Robespierre is a Nero, is that he never spoke as kindly to Desmoulins as on the day before his arrest.” (Mémoires d’un detenu pour servir à l’histoire de la tyrannie de Robespierre (1795), page 88)

On April 3, the second day of the trial, Danton was allowed to defend himself. According to number 22of the tribunal’s official journal Bulletin du tribunal révolutionnaire, one of the very first things he stated after being given the floor was: ”I must talk about three flat rascals that have lost Robespierre.” The famous claim that Danton after having been sentenced to death on April 5 muttered to his fellow convicts: ”If only I could leave my legs to Couthon and my balls to Robespierre, the committee might go on for some time” would however appear to not be that well backed up. The same thing can be said of the idea that Danton shouted something threatening to Robespierre when the tumbril passed by his window on the way to the guillotine, a scene that shows up in several 19th century works but which no contemporary source can attest to.

The very same day Danton got executed, Robespierre was at the jacobins, concluding that ”an event of interest to liberty” had just taken place, and that ”the sublime operations of the Convention have once again saved the homeland.” The same session, he also got Dufourny expelled from the club, accusing him among other things of having feigned an illness and reminding him that ”Fabre d’Eglantine and Danton did the same thing, both of them thought they could close our eyes by speaking about their bad temperament.” One month later, May 7, he mentions Danton’s name yet again, this time in his big report on religious and moral ideas and national holidays. A bit into the speech, Robespierre starts talking about former faction chiefs — Lafayette, Brissot, Hébert and Danton — that the government has stopped. But while the first three get away with rather simplistic descriptions of their misdeeds, Danton gets a longer and more passionate one:

Danton, the most dangerous of the enemies of the homeland, if he had not been the most cowardly; Danton, sparing all crimes, linked to all plots, promising protection to the scoundrels, loyalty to the patriots; skilled at explaining his betrayals by pretexts of public good, at justifying his vices by his supposed defects, had his friends indict, in an insignificant or favorable manner, the conspirators close to consummating the ruin of the Republic, to have the opportunity to defend them himself; compromised with Brissot, corresponded with Ronsin, encouraged Hébert, and arranged at all times to profit equally from their fall or their successes, and to rally all the enemies of liberty against the republican government. […] Danton, who smiled with pity at the words virtue, glory, posterity; Danton, whose system was to debase that which can elevate the soul; Danton, who was cold and mute in the greatest dangers to liberty, spoke after them with great vehemence in favor of the same opinion.

Three weeks later, May 25, Robespierre expelled Alexandre Rousselin from the Jacobin club after accusing him, among other things, of during Danton’s trial having sought to ”divert attention from this scoundrel, by holding a dangerous speech, and having been sent to make it by Minister Paré, friend of Danton.” The suspicion towards men who had previously been allied with Danton can also be seen in the private notes on five different Convention deputies Robespierre jotted down somewhere after the passing of the Law of 22 Prairial on June 10 1794. Two of these, Thuriot and Delmas, get accused of in different ways having tried to save Danton after the latter’s arrest.

In the tumult that followed when Robespierre a month later was himself overthrown, Billaud-Varennes  is recorded to have exclaimed: ”the first time I denounced Danton to the committee, Robespierre rose like a madman and declared that he saw my intentions, that I wanted to lose the best patriots.” (Moniteur, number 311, page 1272) Billaud did however not specify exactly when this denounciation had taken place, nor if he had suggested to actually arrest and execute Danton or just that the committee ought to keep an eye on him.

Number 573 (July 29 1794) of the journal Annales patriotiques et littéraires de la France, et affaires politiques de l'Europe also records an unknown deputy to have shot back ”You didn’t want us to hear Danton” after Robespierre had exclaimed: ”So I will never have the floor.”

The famous claim that someone would have shouted ”The blood of Danton chokes you!” to Robespierre, whereupon the latter would have replied ”So it is Danton you want to avenge. Cowards, why didn’t you defend him?!” does however, interestingly enough, not show up in any minutes documenting the session in question. According to 9-thermidor.com, its first attested apperence is in fact from a whole year later, when the pamphlet Histoire de la conjuration de Maximilien Robespierre(1795) attributes it to the deputy Garnier de l'Aube and has it go as follows: ”You’re not going to speak, the blood of Danton is falling back on your head, it flows into your mouth, it chokes you!” No alleged reply from Robespierre is included. The idea that some of Robespierre’s last recorded words were about Danton does in other words appear to be just as much of a myth as the idea some of Danton’s last words were about Robespierre…

Contemporary descriptions of the relationship that I could not fit in anywhere else 

Danton and Robespierre were linked by the knots of an apparent friendship: they esteemed each others’ talents. Causes secrètes de la révolution du 9 au 10 thermidor (1794) by Joachim Vilate

That’s none of your business.

Do you know citizen Robespierre?

No, that’s why I asked to get to know him.

What was it that determined you to get to know him?

To see if he was OK with me (s’il me convenait).

I ask you to clearly explain what you mean by these words: ”to see if he was OK with me.”

I have nothing to respond. Don’t interrogate me more.

When you presented yourself at citizen Robespierre’s house, did you not express anger over the fact he wasn’t there?

Yes.

Do you know of rue de l’Estrapade?

No, I don’t know of it and I’ve never been there.

Do you know someone named Catherine Théos [sic]?

No.

Do you know an individual by the name of Dom Gerle?

No.

Have you ever heard Dom Gerle or Catherine Théos [sic] speak?

I have never heard anyone speak.

Did you tell the citizens who came to arrest you at citizen Robespierre’s house that if needed, you would spill all your blood in order to have a king?

Yes, I said that.

Do you stand by it?

Yes.

What are the motives which determined and still determine you to desire a tyrant?

I desire a king, because I would prefer that over fifty thousand tyrats, and I only went to Robespierre’s house to see what a tyrant looks like.

When the CPG searched Renault, two small knives were found on her. It was also discovered that, before going to visit Robespierre, she had left a package to one citizen Payen. The package was opened before Renault, and was shown to contain a full set of women's clothing. The interrogation then continued as follows:

What were your intention in providing yourself with these various items?

Fully expecting to go to the place where I would surely be taken, I would be happy to have linen for my use.

What place are you talking about?

About prison, to from there be sent to the guillotine.

What usage were you planning to make of the two knives that were found on you?

Nothing, I wasn’t planning to harm anybody.

Signed: Voulland, Dubarran, Amar, David, Moïse Bayle, Vadier, Élie Lacoste, Lavicomterie, Jagot, Louis du Bas-Rhin. As for her, she refused to sign.

After this interrogation, Renault was sent from the Committee of General Security to the Conciergerie prison. The following day, May 24, she was interrogated by the president of the Revolutionary Tribunal, René-François Dumas:

What is your name, age, profession and recidence?

My name is Aimée-Cécile Renault, I’m twenty years old, I live with my father, paper merchant, on rue de la Lanterne, close to rue des Marmousets, section de la Cité. I have three brothers, one of which, a 32 year old, lives in the same house, and the other two have left, one with the battalions sent to the department of Eure, the other with the first requisition.

Do you have any particular liasions or associations?

No.

Who are the people who visit your father’s house with the most frequency?

Nobody.

What are your opinions on the Republic and the government?

I want a king, because I’d prefer the power to be in the hands of a single person rather than of forty or fifty thousand tyrants.

How can you suppose that the power of the people, exercised through itself,  its representatives or its mandataires to be tyrannical?

I don’t want to share my opinions.

Were your opinions inspired by anyone?

No, and I have no accountability.

Have your manifested your opinions in front of anyone?

No.

Have you in the revolution experienced any loss or been forced into any sacrifice that has been able to serve as a pretext for your opinions?

No, I want a king, I don’t have any other motives.

Do you have the hopes of bringing back a king?

Yes, and it doesn’t matter to me which one.

How do you imagiene the royalty could be reestablished?

Through the success of the armed coalition powers.

Do you have any reports or intelligence that put you in a position to base your hopes on the allied powers on something?

No.

Did you intend to contribute to the re-establishment of royalty?

Yes.

How did you intend to contribute?

I would have contributed with financial assistance and by all means that would have been in my power; I would also have contributed, depending on the circumstances, to destroying the government and those who exercise its power.

Have you made any attempt to carry out your plan?

No.

Have you written any anonymous letter against the government, or know anyone who has done so? 

No.

Have you presented yourself at the house of any representative of the people?

I presented myself yesterday at Robespierre’s house, around nine o’clock in the evening.

What was your plan in going to Robespierre’s house.

To talk to him in person.

What did you want to talk to Robespierre about?

I don’t want to give any response or explanation regarding this question.

Do you realize that your answers lead one to believe you had the intention of committing a crime, and that you must explain your intentions?

She does not want to explain further, and adds that she intended to ask him for instructions on the situation and the strengthening of the Republic.

Do you realize that your declarations and obstinacy to not want to explain yourself cannot be reconciled with such a plan, which is why I’m again asking you to explain yourself?

She persists in not wanting to answer.

Did anyone propose to you the plan of going home to Robespierre and did you tell anyone about it?

No.

Did you go to Robespierre’s house several times during the day?

No.

When you went to Robespierre, did you have with you knives, and of which sort?

I had in my pocket two folding knives, one in tortoiseshell and the other in ivory, both trimmed in silver: the one made of ivory was given to me by my brother in 89, having found it at Prés-Saint-Gervais. The other was given to me by my grandmother three or four years ago. It was loaded with rust; I cleaned it and tried to remove the rust by scraping the blade with another knife, eight or nine days ago. I rarely use it.

Do you regularly carry two knives?

I carry the tortoiseshell one regularly, the ivory one showed up in my pocket, I didn’t know it was there.

When you went home to Robespierre, did you have the intention of using these knives to kill him?

No, moreover, you can judge as you please.

When you yesterday left your father’s house, did you tell anyone?

No.

When you left your house, did you carry with you a package containing clothes, and for what purpose had you brought this package?

I had taken this package containing clothes and linen, because I anticipated that by going to Robespierre I would get arrested.

End of the interrogation.

Renault’s house was searched the night between the 23 and the 24. Suspect things found included two paintings “bearing the effigy of the tyrant and his wife” hidden in a cupboard, ”several papers bearing the signs of feudalism” and two national guard rifles belonging to the father and son. Under the bed in Renault’s room was found a banner on which was a crown surrounded by fleur-de-lis printed in large size. In her father’s room was also discovered the following letter to his son:

Paris, January 3, Year II of the Republic. I’ve seen the letter from your good mother, through which you show that the citizens of the province where you find yourself desire that the former king not be condemned to death. As of now, one can’t tell you anything, because nothing is over yet, but I think that, for the sake of the good and calm of the Republic, it would be desired if he was not executed. Renault. To M. Renault, corporal at the depot of the Théâtre-Français battalion, garrisoned in Berlemont.

The father was interrogated on the spot and revealed he had three brothers, two sisters, three sons and one daughter ”who left his house on 4 prairial around six in the evening and who he didn’t know the location of.” Soon, both he, his sister and his youngest son were arrested and seals placed on their belongings. Arrest warrants were also issued against the two oldest sons of the family, but with both away in the armies they escaped the fate of their relatives.

The Renaults’ neighbours were interrogated in order to find out more about them. One femme Papin, who made sure to underline she was not close to Cècile, had the following to say regarding her disappearance:

Citizen Renault, instructed of his daughter’s absence, appeared desolute, and went to his place to check if his daughter hadn’t taken anything with her. He came back saying that the trouble which agitated him robbed him of the ability to see if she had taken anything. Renault then closed his boutique and went to his place. [Femme Papin] went home as well, after having checked, by going home to citoyenne Gentilhomme, citoyenne Bouchot and others, that [Cécile] was not in the neigbourhood. She went to bed, and sometime after having fallen asleep, she was woken up by the son of Renault who asked her to look after their cat. She accepted this without thinking about any consequences, without suspecting that in this moment, Renault was being put under arrest. The next day, femme Papin’s oldest daughter learned from citoyenne Besençon, baker, of the arrest of father and son Renault, and it was also said that fille Renault, having learned of the arrest of her brother and father, had fled the house to save herself from the same fate. Six o’clock in the morning, she found herself at the house of citoyenne Julles, talking with her about this arrest, when citoyenne Prévôt entered and told them that fille Renault had been arrested as well, and this while having wanted to kill Robespierre.

Femme Papin’s fifteen year old daughter also came forward, explaining that, on May 23:

Leaving her work and passing by Renault’s boutique, fille Renault knocked on the window, invited her in, and gave her the task of handing over 16 sols to citoyenne Julles. Then she chatted with her for about a quarter of an hour after which she went up to her place. Then she came back down and went out, saying she would not come back. Renault’s brother, not seeing his sister return, was worried to the point that he fell ill.

A girl who had come over to the Renault house to buy a pen declared that Cécile had told her that she had just bought a piece of muslin worth 25 livres from a dressmaker by the name of Sonnet, something which the latter’s wife confirmed to be true. The Renault’s maid declared that she had a bundle of Indian fabrics to redo a taffeta dress for Cécile, and Barbe-Françoise-Antonine Cruel, femme Martin, a different seamstress, reported that Renault had ordered a muslin dress made for her in secret, urging her to get it done as quick as possible since she had to attend the wedding of one of her cousins and because she could get guillotined before it. To that, femme Martin had responded that ”when one does no harm, one should fear nothing.” The revelation Renault possessed several expensive garments, along with information she had had contacts with a young man by the name of Admirat, believed to possibly be related to the Henri Admirat who had made an attempt on Collot d’Herbois’ life a mere day before Renault’s visit to Robespierre, were the main topics for the third interrogation with Renault, held on May 25:

What does your father give you in order to provide for your maintenance?

My dad provides for me, but he only gives me 15 sols per week for personal expenses. 

Is it your father or you yourself who buys your clothes? Does he give you a lot and does it vary between different seasons?

He gives me that which satisfies me, and he was the one who bought them. 

Do you consider that, holding the trust of your father and being the one who keeps the house running, it seems surprising that it was your father who bought your clothes; and that in general, these kinds of purchases are a thing of the past for women?

She persists in her former response.

Did you, a little while ago, buy different outfits, and do you in this moment have different clothes at the seamstresses?

I bought six ells of muslin, 25 livres per ell, from Sonnet, a haberdasher, living opposite my dad, and I owe him the price. I gave an Italian taffeta dress to citoyenne Dematin, seamstress, living on l’Île de la Fraternité, I believe in a street near the barracks, opposite or nearby an apothecary, and whose name I do not know, to make a sheath out of it for me. I also gave her a muslin sheath, and the six ells of muslin already mentioned, with the exception of the portion which was taken from it to make the garnish, by citoyenne Gentilhomme, linen worker, living with my father. I gave a pierrot de taffetas to lengthen my petticoat to my friend citoyenne Petit, living in Marché-Neuf, with a locksmith, on the fourth floor. My dad doesn’t want me to see her often, observing that she since about a year has been married to a chariot adjutant whose name I don’t know.

Do you understand that one cannot be convinced that, receiving only fifteen sols per week from your father, and this according to your own admission, he would provide you with such a big and beautiful wardrobe?

She persists in declaring that it was her father who bought her the various effects, except for the muslin, and adds that she owes citoyenne Petit, from Marché-Neuf, around forty livres.

Can you explain how, having only 15 sols per week to provide for your particular expenses, you intended to pay the six ells of muslin which you just declared to have purchased on credit, without your father's knowledge. Isn’t it obvious that you could not pay the price of this muslin without some other special resources?

The confidence the merchant, or better yet his wife, had in me, determined them to make this supply on credit and have me pay it off when I could, in ten or twenty years. I intended to ask my dad for fifty livres when I found the opportunity and give it to them.

Do you remember that in the interrogation held yesterday you declared that you would provide money to those who would help you in your counter-revolutionary projects to re-establish the monarchy in France?

I remember saying that.

How can you reconcile this offer of relief with the shortage in which you declare yourself to be?

I acknowledge the shortage in which I find myself, but I would have sold my belongings to provide for the expenses of the armies allied against the Republic.

How long has it been since you went to confession?

I have no accountability for this. Moreover, churches and priests were suppressed a long time ago.

Who was your confessor when the priests exercised their functions?

I have never been to confession.

Have you been to the house of any priest after they stopped holding office, and has any priest frequented your father’s house?

No.

Have you, since the supression, been at the house of the priest of la Magdeleine?

No, because I knew he was a firm patriot, and that he didn’t share my opinions.

Have you sometimes gone to the curé of Saint-Landry, or had any relations with him?

No, I don’t know him, I only know his name.

Do you know citizen Admirat, aged 16 or 17, who sometimes came to see the son of widow Joyanvad, marchande épicière, rue de la Lanterne, at the corner of rue des Marmouzets?

I’ve seen him five to six times only, but I have never spoken to him. I’ve seen him at my father’s house, which is next to that of citoyenne Joyanval.

Have you been to café Payen?

I have not gone into the café, but I left my package to citizen Payen and asked him where Robespierre lived. He sent me to the guardhouse of the firefighters, who gave me the adress.

Were you not surprised one wouldn’t give you Robespierre’s adress, and did you tell them you were going to see a man who today was a lot and tomorrow would be no more?

I might have, I don’t remember. But speaking to the fireman, I told him: ”Robespierre is somewhere.” The fireman having answered that he was president of the Committee of Public Safety, I replied ”So a king then?”

Have you considered that the various admissions made by you in the previous interrogations, together with those recorded in this one, announce that your visit to Robespierre had any other aim than that of discussing only government affairs?

She persists in her previous responses in this regard.

Are you on the point of marrying?

No.

When did you become a royalist?

I have always been one.

I ask you again what it was that determined you to go home to Robespierre was and what your plan was.

She persists in her previous responses, and adds that she would not say more about this; that moreover, it is up to us to guess the rest. (6 prairial, 6 o’clock in the morning)

Soon, Renault did however start having a guilty conscience over having denied her faith, and seven o’clock in the evening the very same day she gave the names of the two late priests that had been in charge of her communion to a judge of the tribunal. When asked if she since then had performed any religious act and who the persons who had made her do that were, Renault simply responded that that was a secret and she had nothing more to say.

During the trial of public prosecutor Fouquier-Tinville one year later, the registrar Wolff claimed that Renault was stripped of her own clothes, covered in rags and threatened during her interrogation:

To force her to make the confession that they wanted to extract from her, she was applied to a type of questioning so ridiculous that it should have made the justice system blush. As the taste of this young girl, who was quite pretty, was to be well dressed, she was stripped of her clothes and covered with dirty and disgusting rags, and in this state she was taken up to the council chamber where she underwent a new interrogation and where the same demands and the same threats were made against her; to which she replied the same way she had already done, adding jeers and mockery against the judges who had the pettiness to use such a ridiculous type of question against her. She was threatened with taking her father and her entire family with her if she did not confess to this alleged assassination.

As Renault was being interrogated, the city section where her family lived also carried out an investigation against them, and through it, even more compromising details came floating up to the surface. It was reported that the family, after the overthrow of the monarchy, had had the words ”the nation, the law and the king” on a cartridge box (giberne), words which they at first refused to delete, though they would eventually do so with the ”king” part. Renault’s father, speaking of the murder of Lepeletier in January 1793, was said to have had stated ”Well! One also wants the death of the king, that will cost them dearly,” while his son had openly lamanted the king’s and queen’s imprisonment in the Temple while serving as guard there. His statement had been reported to the rest of the guard unit, but he had ignored it, simply saying that he thought what he thought.

Renault’s three arrested family members — father, brother and aunt — were all interrogated on May 28:

Antoine Renault, 62 years old.

Do you know who the people are that your children frequent and have relations with?

I only know of indifferent relations to neighbors or relatives. A sister of mine, a former nun, called sister gray, came to my house and conferred with my daughter, without me remarking anything in particular between them. Said sister is very attached to religion.

Learning that we were writing down this part of his response, he wanted to cut it out.

Does your daughter have any fanatical prejudices and any passions typical for her age?

I haven’t noticed in my daughter any religious affections, she appears rather indifferent when it comes to this subject. There exists no clue she has any passions, on the contrary, she is watched over and never leaves the house alone, except for when she rarely goes to the market. When she goes out, I always accompany her. I add here that my daughter is very attached to her aunt.

How do you provide maintenance for your daughter?

I myself buy what is necessary for her.

Where were you the fourth (23rd) this month?

I stopped working (j’ai descendu la garde) at two a’clock, I had dinner at my place with my son and daughter. Five o’clock, being on the point of going to bed, my son and daughter engaged me to go out to relax. I did so, carrying with me 25 livres that he owed to a laundress. I returned home at eight o'clock in the evening, where I found my son and the fille Pepin (Papin), both in anguish, and the former troubled because my daughter, who had been gone since six o’clock, had not returned. They told me that before leaving, she had told them to wait for her, that she would return, without saying where she was going. I had as my plan to go see if my daughter was at her aunt’s house, so I left my house, but fearing to meet her on the way, I went inside and went to bed, as did my son, and we got arrested in the night. I don’t know what has become of my daughter since this moment.

He is asked about the small pieces of furniture (petits meubles) that his daughter owned.

I know of scissors, a bad knife with an ivory handle, which was given to her by her brother; another knife with a scale handle, from my dead sister. She does not usually carry them and often has neither.

Do you know what your daughter’s opinion is on the revolution?

She is a good patriot, she loves the republic very much.

Does your daughter miss the tyrant and has she shown that she desires to see a king reestablished in France?

No.

Have you yourself, in your house, sought to inspire your children with dispositions contrary to the Republic and the current government?

No. 

One shows him the letter dated January 3 1793 written by him to his son, the two portraits of the king and the queen found, the two small knives, scissors and a case that he recognizes as belonging to his daughter.

He responds to questions asked regarding the denounciations of which he has been the object. He has never heard his daughter talk about Robespierre or her plan.

Does your daughter know how to read and write?

No, moreover, my daughter has so little inclination towards fanaticism that she has never taken what is called first communion, and has never approached a priest to make what is called confession.

The same day, Antoine-Jacques Renault, 31 years old.

Did you know that the paintings were being kept in a cupboard?

Yes.

Have you served as guard at the Temple? 

Yes, two times.

He denies the conversation attributed to him by a denouncer. He is asked again if priests came to his house and if they declaimed against the Republic?

No.

Do you know Admirat? 

No.

When your sister went out, why were you so worried?

As my sister usually doesn’t go out, I was worried over not seeing her again.

Do you observe that the situation in which you find yourself does not indicate simple concern, but deep affection to dreadful events?

He persists in his answer.

Do you know that your sister planned to assassinate members of the Committee of Public Safety, and were you involved in the plot?

No.

The same day Edme-Jeanne Renault, 60 years, former nun, rue de Babylone, 698. 

Do you often go home to your brother, Antoine Renault?

I go there at least once every décade.

Which priests do you know?

I haven’t seen one in two years. 

Have you had any particular conversations with fille Renault?

I view her as my niece, without particularities.

Do you know someone named Admirat, and do you know that he was known to your niece?

No.

Did you know about your niece’s plan? Were you an accomplice? Do you know who inspired it? Did conversations hostile to the republic take place in your house?

No.

The same day her three relatives were heard, Renault was her too picked in by Dumas for a fourth interrogation:

Eight days before your arrest, did you not strongly press a seamstress to carry out work that you had given her?

Yes, and these works were garments.

Did you say to this worker that you were in a hurry for these clothes, and that you didn't know what could happen, and that you could get guillotined in eight days?

I may have said that.

How is it that eight days before your arrest, you could foresee that you could get guillotined?

I have no idea.

Did your family know that you were preparing for first communions?

Never.

How did you know that Blondeau, priest of Saint-Denis-du-Pas, died last Pentecost?

It is only too true that the good priest is dead, I do not want to say from whom I learned of his death.

Do you want to declare that it was he who suggest to you the plan that you attempted to carry out?

Nobody did.

Do you often see your aunt, the former nun?

About every fortnight, and not as often as I would have desired.

She doesn’t want to make more declarations.

She declares that she doesn’t know how to sign.

Signed only F. Girard.

Renault was not perceived as some ”lone madwoman” by the authorities. Instead, they viewed her alleged assassination attempt as part of a bigger conspiracy, connected first and foremost to Henri Admirat’s attempt on Collot d’Herbois life one day earlier. Admirat and Renault were in their turn believed to be accomplices of Baron de Batz, a royalist and former member of the National Assembly, who had since turned against the revolution and was currently in hiding. According to letter written by the Committee of General Security to the public prosecutor exactly a month before Renault’s visit to Robespierre, de Batz had tried to rescue the royal family from the Temple by pretending to serve a guard there, tried to rally a mob to save the king on the day of his execution, held an Austrian committee directed by Marie-Antoinette, tried to bribe the authorities, and had contacts with both William Pitt, the Vendée, Toulon, Lyon, Marseille and the émigrés, all with the goal ”to assassinate the national representation, the object of his constant rage.” The letter ended by declaring de Batz was officially outlawed and any means were allowed when it came to capturing him.

In the weeks following Renault’s arrest, she would be joined by more people accused of belonginh to this alleged conspiracy, among them de Batz’ mistress, lodger and secretary, a domestic and seamstress, a former marquis and his son, a banker, a confident of Fabre d’Églantine and Hérault de Séchelles, parisian prisoners de Batz was believed to have influenced, and even several men currently employed in revolutionary administrations believed to benefit the enemy. On June 14, the Convention unanimously decided to immediately send the total of 40 accused before the Revolutionary Tribunal, following a report on the conspiracy read by the Committee of General Security’s Élie Lacoste (the total number would however have been bumped up to 54 once the trial began). The main objective of the conspiracy had according to Lacoste been ”the abduction of Capet's widow, the dissolution of the National Convention, and finally counter-revolution.”

The trial started on June 17 and lasted only for a few hours (I’ve unfortunately not discovered the minutes for it). All of the 54 accused, with the exception of Admirat, denied having been involved in any assassination plan. That was however not enough to stop the tribunal from sentencing every single one of them to death. They were executed at four o’clock the very same day, all dressed in red shirts, which the penal code of 1791 had proclaimed all condemned murderers were to wear.

Though Robespierre never so much as saw Renault or Henri Admirat, the assassination attempts are still often seen as a contributing factor to a decline of his mental health in the last months of his life. Already on May 25, he was the author of the following CPS decree, rather panicky in tone, asking Saint-Just, who was currently away with the armies, to return to Paris:

Dear collegue,  Liberty is exposed to new dangers; the factions arise with a character more alarming than ever. The lines to get butter are more numerous and more turbulent than ever when they have the least pretexts, an insurrection in the prisons which was to break out yesterday and the intrigues which manifested themselves in the time of Hébert are combined with assassination attemps on several occasions against members of the Committee of Public Safety; the remnants of the factions, or rather the factions still alive, are redoubled in audacity and perfidy. There is fear of an aristocratic uprising, fatal to liberty. The greatest peril that threatens it is in Paris. The Committee needs to bring together the lights and energy of all its members. Calculate whether the army of the North, which you have powerfully contributed to putting on the path to victory, can do without your presence for a few days. We will replace you, until you return, with a patriotic representative.  The members composing the Committee of Public Safety. Robespierre, Prieur, Carnot, Billaud-Varennes, Barère. 

The next day, May 26, after Barère in the name of the CPS had read a report to the Convention regarding the assassination attemps (calling Renault ”a royalist as fanatical as the most inveterate of couriers”) and using them as a weapon against the English, Robespierre mounted the roatroom and held a fiery speech — ”calumnies, treasons, fires, poisonings, atheism, corruption, famine, assassinations, have all lavished their crimes; there still remains assassination, and then assassination, and then again assassination.” He appeared at the Jacobins the following day but after that he didn’t speak in public again until June 8, the day of the Festival of the Supreme Being. The Convention deputy Joachim Vilate claimed in the pamphlet Causes secrètes de la révolution du 9 au 10 thermidor (1794) that Robespierre during the last months of his life ”spoke only of assassination, again assassination, always assassination. He was frightened his own shadow would assassinate him. One month before his overthrow I had only set foot in his house and was given worried and threatening looks.”

in 1782 The Economy of Human Life by Robert Dodsley

in 1783 A New History of England, from the earliest period to the present time by “Reverend Cooper” (Richard Johnson)

In 1783, while both were in England, Brissot translated David Williams's Letters on Political Liberty "with the help of his wife" (p. 882)

in 1786 possibly A History of England by Oliver Goldsmith. There are mixed attributions for this one: Antoine-Alexandre Barbier — who Bour points out could've had firsthand information — in his Dictionnaire des ouvrages anonymes et pseudonymes (1806-09) claims Félicité as the translator, but the 1790 edition of A History of England says “M. Brissot de Warville”. Claude Perroud, in his edition of Brissot’s Memoires, also gives the attribution to Félicité, but Brissot's own announcement of the second edition in his own newspaper Le Patriote Français, on 27 October, 1789, names himself as the translator. Brissot claims this again in his Memoires.

-> Here I’d like to point out that Brissot had earlier tried to dissuade his wife from putting her own names on her work and once said "'Does the public need to have your name? You know that I don’t like lady writers... Besides, a translation is nothing much'" (Bour p.884-885) So it's possible that regardless of who did the work, he either did not think it appropriate for her to be publicly recognized or he didn’t see it as significant.

-> Bour concludes: “for [A History of England] and others that followed, it is impossible to attribute the translation to Brissot or to his wife singly with any certainty: they most probably tended to collaborate” (p. 881)

Some of Boer’s initial arguments are extremely speculative — basically, that Félicité would’ve had the opportunity to do the translation and would’ve wanted to undertake the project for intellectual, personal, and political reasons:

“Félicité Brissot, though she had three boys to look after, was very often on her own in the rue Grétry, off the rue de Richelieu or, in the summer months, in Saint-Cloud where she went in search of fresh air and more natural surroundings. As Eloise Eller[y] notes [here], she was often lonely." (Boer, p. 883)

“Both Brissots would have been aware of Wollstonecraft’s Vindication of the Rights of Men (1790); though this book was not translated, it made its author famous in France as well as in Britain. So, another work whose title echoed the first would also have caught their attention. Further, we know from a letter of Brissot to his friend Jean-Marie Roland de la Platière that important books published in England were sent to him: “ (p. 883)

“In 1792, though she was still very fond of her husband, she deplored that she saw so little of him and that they had not kept up the intellectual closeness that existed during their engagement and early on in their married life.” (p. 883)

“Félicité Brissot would have found the time to translate a work which mirrored her own preoccupations and enabled her to give vicarious expression to her disappointment and her frustration. It also probably meant that she could earn a little much needed money, as the Brissot couple were not rich. Furthermore, translating Wollstonecraft was a way of serving the Revolution, of embodying her reformist views, of outlining a future for women which the Revolution was only fitfully interested in.” (p. 884)

Boer does acknowledges the speculative nature of her analysis and recognizes that there are others, all from the Girondin circle, who could've done the translation, namely:

Sophie de Grouchy, Condorcet’s wife, who translated Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments in 1798

François Lanthénas, who translated Thomas Paine’s books & speeches “and moved in the same Girondin circles as Wollstonecraft”

(“most probably”) Jean-Henri Bancal des Issarts, who also translated some of Paine’s speeches was in Britain in 1791 (p. 879)

However, there are other references that point to one or both Brissots as the translator(s)/annotator(s) in this case.

Importantly, the notes in the translation of Vindication indicate two translators, one man and one woman. As mentioned above, it's likely that Félicité and her husband had collaborated on translations.

Boer sees in some notes echoes Brissot’s anticlericalism, criticism of Anglicanism, and support of Quakers, and other ideas and experience that crop up in his background:

“Other notes seem to bear his stamp, like one that defends some British academics, whom Wollstonecraft denigrates unsparingly, characterising them as ‘the pedantic tyrants who reside in colleges’... Brissot mentions the Scottish historian William Robertson and another Scot, Hugh Blair, professor of rhetoric and belles lettres, as being worthy of esteem. (Robertson is also mentioned in a note in the Preface to the Lettres philosophiques et politiques, xv)” (p. 889)

There is also “a note about a girls’ school in ‘Queen’s Square’ (now Queen Square) in Bloomsbury, very near the street where the Brissots lived, at 26 Newman Street..." (p. 889)

"In [the same] note the annotator identifies himself as a man: ‘Montaigne who on occasions is quite unsparing with the sex on the whole thinks that it is roughly worth as much as our own’... This contrasts with the note at the beginning of Chapter VI in which the annotator unambiguously identifies herself as a woman.” (p. 889)

“The annotator, in Chapter XII, knows Milton’s works well–Brissot had been consulted about translating Paradise Lost as part of a commercial venture. The plan did not come to fruition, though he did translate two Books (Memoirs I, 208). Towards the very end of the Vindication, where Wollstonecraft writes ‘What are the cold, or feverish caresses of appetite, but sin embracing death...’ the French annotator remarks: ‘This is a conceit of Milton’s’” (p. 889)

“Brissot’s conservatism when it comes to women’s place in society is palpable here and there, as in this note: … ‘There is a great deal of truth in what the author says about the need to strengthen the body and the soul of women. Condemned by nature to give birth in pain, and to be subject to all the illnesses to which the noble and touching charge of maternity exposes them, they should early on strengthen their constitution; but let them not move too far away from nature. Much of their charm and their sway is due to their weakness; a Woman must be a Woman in all possible ways.’ This opinion, which is poles apart from the first note in Chapter VI, seems to confirm that the note is Brissot’s: his intellectual mentor was Jean-Jacques Rousseau, whose Profession de foi du vicaire Savoyard radically altered the nature of his religious faith; as he says in his Memoirs (I, 38), ‘it was the first book which caused the scales to fall from his eyes’. He visited Switzerland in 1782 partly to see where the philosopher hailed from. The end of the note is a kind of paraphrase of the end of Chapter V of Emile, where Rousseau says that a woman wins sway through gentleness (l’empire de la femme est un empire de douceur)." (p. 889)

There are references to Richard Price & Joseph Priestly, whom Brissot knew: “A passage, in Chapter I, concerns men ‘who are reviled as despisers of God, and enemies of men’, though they are ‘roused by the sight of human calamity’... Wollstonecraft goes on to say: ‘These are bitter calumnies, yet they reached one of the best of men’; in a note to this last phrase she writes ‘Dr Price’. The translator has inserted this note into the main text which reads: ‘Ce sont-là des calomnies bien atroces; eh! bien, elles ont été versées à grands flots sur (le docteur Price) un des meilleurs des hommes ’ [These are truly atrocious slanders; and yet, they were poured out in great torrents upon (Dr. Price)—one of the best of men.] There is a further note on Price on page 340 of the translation. Let us also mention here that there are three references to Richard Price in the notes to Goldsmith’s Lettres philosophiques et politiques sur l’histoire de l’Angleterre—notes that, it will be remembered, were attributed to Brissot in the second French edition of that book.” (p. 885) “A note at the end of the book jointly mentions Richard Price and Joseph Priestley: as with Price, Brissot had met Priestley thanks to Richard Kirwan.” (p. 887-888)

Other notes echo Félicité’s writings in her private letters.

For example, Boer picks up on the Vindication translator's use of the word nullité ("nullity" or "non-entity"), a word which was rare in 18th century French:

“...the substantive nullité was used overwhelmingly in a legal context. The 1771 edition of the Dictionnaire de Trévoux has no other acceptation. Nullité is only attested in the sense of ‘what is valueless’ from 1747 and in the sense of ‘worthless person’ from 1812 (1798 in the Dictionnaire de l’Académie française)

Félicité uses this same unusual word used to describe the situation of women in a 1792 letter to her sister Nancy:

“The wife who readily understands the non-entity she has become for her husband often smothers her misery in silence, for the sake of her darling family.” (Bour p. 884)

"...admittedly," Bour says, "there was always a time-lag between usage and the record of new words and phrases in dictionaries. Still, Félicité Brissot’s choice of word is bold; it would have stood out for her readers—both her sister and the readers of the Défense. She was at pains to make it clear that a woman and a wife can be erased, nullified.”

Although I find the linguistic analysis fascinating, and possibly convincing, I feel like I have to point out the fact that despite its technical usage and relative rarity, it must've been in wider circulation than the written sources imply. Nullity is also not a common English word, and it's one I first saw in Baudot's description of Augustin Robespierre. From the biography by Mary Young, p. 165-166:

“ 'He was,' says Baudot, regarded as ‘such a nullity that he could have stayed unnoticed on 9 Thermidor."

The biography cites Baudot, A., Notes Historiques sur la Convention Nationale, le Directoire, l’Empire et l’Exil des Votants, published in 1893, so I don't know when Baudot would've actually written those words, but Wikipedia says he died in 1837; who knows when this word would've entered his vocabulary.

Brissot himself also uses nullité, (and in a kind of ironically similar sense to Félicité) on p. 36 of his memoires:

"...I must be myself. To be given a model, to be bound by specific forms and rules, is to reduce me to utter nullity." (c'est me réduire à la nullité”)

So, it might not've been that unusual and can't exactly be taken as ironclad evidence. Still, there are other echoes of Félicité's private letters in the notes of Vindication. Compare, for example, this 1791 letter with the two notes from Chapters VI and XII:

Letter: “ 'I think no marriage should take place without a preliminary course of education taken in a family. Both men and women should undergo this trial. I could go on and on if I told you about all that I think is to be done to the married state. The main thing is to tell young women that they must be completely selfless and have no desires other than their husband’s, while being clever enough to have him believe that he gives more than he demands.' ” (Bour, p. 887)

Note in Vindication, Chapter VI: “ ‘The position of women in society is singular indeed, though they are burdened with tasks as onerous as men, or perhaps more so! When single, it would be in vain for them to acquire speculative or practical knowledge greater than that of the most promising young men, for men in their inconsistent nature and exclusive pride forbid them to show it, deny them the use of it; as wives, their non-entity is more complete, if possible; indeed, though learned and brave, the wife of a fool and a coward will never enjoy any consideration, for the consideration given her is bound up with that shown to him, who deserves none; as a mother and a widow, she is still confined within the narrow bounds of domestic duties; if she is rich, she will at best be privileged to do without a steward and to be her own first housekeeper! Why equip ourselves to do great things when we are doomed to do small ones only!’ ”

Note in Vindication, Chapter XII: “The author means France here. Indeed, the revolution makes it possible to do something for Women who have for too long been treated with apparent respect, but actual contempt. They must be given a better education; for mothers are the first masters that nature and society give children. They must be able to divorce, which only the tyranny of priests has robbed them of. Many of them have proved that they were worthy of liberty; they only want enlightenment now. Once enlightened, they will be more virtuous, and happier. They must also obtain redress for all the gothic crimes of feudalism towards them, as far as wills are concerned, etc.; for, if nature seems to deny them political rights, they have as much entitlement as men to civil rights; in a word, it is for them to strengthen the new régime. Since the French nation has shaken off its yoke, there has been a lot of talk of counter-revolution. Law-makers! Do not shut your eyes to the fact that were a counter- revolution possible, women would impel it. Ensure that women take the constitution to heart; what you will do for them will not be wasted. They are the main custodians of the charges you have put under the authority of fathers, so that it be transmitted to future generations.”

In conclusion, there's not much hard proof to identify the anonymous translator/annotator of A Vindication of the Rights of Women. The women of the Revolution must've shared ideas, experiences, interests, and even linguistic quirks. They would've likely been familiar with the same publications and and prominent figures. I definitely don't know enough about Sophie de Grouchy, François Lanthénas, or Jean-Henri Bancal des Issarts to assess whether any of Bour's evidence is really exclusive to Félicité Brissot. A lot of the ideas sound like they could come from any number of revolutionary women.

Still, I think the author presents a compelling, if speculative case based on:

Vindication having two translators/annotators, a man and a woman and Brissot & Félicité having likely collaborated on translations previously.

Repeated, specific references to people & places the Brissots were familiar with (the girls' school in Queen's square, Richard Price, Joseph Priestly, William Robertson [whom the annotator defends, despite Wolstoncraft's criticism, and whom Brissot had mentioned in another translation])

The echoes of Félicité's letters, not just generally the same progressive ideas, but thoughts articulated fairly closely to the notes in Vindication. I can't say that I think the word nullity is proof, but the similarities between the letters and notes, both in ideas and articulation, at least make the attribution plausible.

So I don't know 100% if she was responsible for this work, but I enjoyed learning more about Félicité's translation background and how her intellectual work may have provided an public outlet for her thoughts, frustrations, and dreams for the Republic, for herself and other women. Brissot might've learned eventually to appreciate their contributions more, but like many women, Félicité's work and life were completely eclipsed by those of her husband. I like having the opportunity to bring her to light. She was not a nullity ❤️ ~~~~~

[if you need a copy of the article below, let me know and you can borrow my pdf 😊]

Article: Isabelle Bour (2022) Who translated into French and annotated Mary Wollstonecraft’s Vindication of the Rights of Woman ?, History of European Ideas, 48:7, 879-891, DOI: 10.1080/01916599.2021.2022081