28 years old, she, Feminist fan of history especially Empire Ottoman, Tudor History, French Revolution and of Algeria. Love Asioaf, Percy Jackson, Magnificent Century...
I introduce myself as 28 years old, a completely failed law student struggling at university and wondering if one day she will have a diploma. Proud to be a feminist, and a lover of history, revolution, the Tudors, the Ottoman Empire.
Watch different series like Magnificent Century, Game of Thrones, House of Dragon and love GRR Martin like everyone else. Donât hesitate to discuss or discuss anything as long as itâs done respectfully!
Here are some posts:
Magnificent century :
https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/743859035572436992/i-repeat-one-of-my-comments-posted-on-youtube-if?source=share How I would write the characters of Mustafa,Bayezid, Mihrimah,Cihangir,Mehmed and Selim
The problem of the sexism of Magnificent century : https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/743846341308006400/the-problem-of-magnificent-century-the?source=share
Fustration in the arc of Safavid in MC and MCKÂ : https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/744149939270123520/one-of-my-many-frustrations-as-an-mc-and-mck-when?source=share
About the historical Bayezid and Mustafa https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/744961298653200384/one-of-my-posts-in-youtube-when-i-see-bayezid?source=share
An horrible emission historical about Suleiman https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/746859397476696064/after-being-critical-about-the-episode-secrets?source=share
French Revolution :
https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/744398816808222720/womens-rights-suppressed?source=share About women right suppressed in french revolution and after under the Empire
Mistakes made by the jacobin ( or Montagnard in the period 1793-1795)https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/745212185045811200/in-your-opinion-what-was-the-most-significant?source=share
About the movie of Heffron about french revolution part IÂ : https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/746585301251670016/analysis-of-the-french-revolution-film-by-robert?source=share
About the movie Danton of Wajda : https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/747406751607947264/the-major-problem-with-wajdas-film-danton-in-a?source=share
About la Camera explore le temps la terreur et la vertu https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/748832638732812288/firstly-even-if-it-may-not-have-been-the?source=share
Critic about Henri Guillemin https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/749461261968883712/critic-about-henri-guillemin?source=share
Beginning critic about Germaine de Stael https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/749468572482453504/before-beginning-this-critique-as-i-have-not?source=share
Napoleonic era:
Hommage to Louis Delgres https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/751677840407330816/on-this-day-die-louis-delgres-freedom-fighter?source=share
Tribute to some womens of Haiti and Guadeloupe against the slavery https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/748481647920480256/tribute-to-all-these-revolutionary-women-coming?source=share
Another Frustration with the Series (Spoiler Alert for Blood and Fire and House of the Dragon) https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/755464059310211072/another-frustration-with-the-series-spoiler-alert?source=share
One of my problem with House of Dragon ( or why GRR Martin's original work was better) https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/755294528246874112/one-of-my-problem-with-house-of-dragon-or-why?source=share
Algeria :
Movie the last queen : https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/743941849968967680/i-recommend-for-those-who-have-not-seen-the-movie?source=share
8 may 1945 in Algeria https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/749903094886907904/8-may-1945-in-algeria?source=share
Fernand and Helene Iveton first part https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/753999134761058304/fernand-and-helene-iveton-a-couple-in-the-algerian?source=share
Fernand and Helene Iveton a couple in the Algerian revolution ( part II): the life and the loss of Henri Maillot https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/754119277224886272/fernand-and-helene-iveton-a-couple-in-the-algerian?source=share
Fernand and Helene Iveton a couple in the Algerian revolution the beginning of the End (part III)
Fernand and Helene Iveton a couple in the algerian revolution (part IV): the difficult ordeal of the trial https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/754386579065389056/fernand-and-helene-iveton-a-couple-in-the-algerian?source=share
Fernand and Helene Iveton a couple in the algerian revolution part V Â : the end of Fernand Iveton https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/754655418751582208/fernand-iveton-at-the-time-of-his-arrest-the
Fernand and Helene Iveton a couple in the algerian revolution part VI epilogue https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/754736214712680448/fernand-and-helene-iveton-a-couple-in-the-algerian
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Context: this concerns the arrests of the Babouvists and after the repression of Grenelle.
Very few people, at that time (although later public opinion would, in some ways, begin to shift in their favor due to several of their actions and strategies), wanted to defend them, and they became the target of a press onslaught.
Interestingly, Babeuf had served under Pache when the latter was mayor of Paris (Babeuf told his wife that he considered him a friend even if in reality it's more complicated than that , and it was one of the rare times when the Babeuf family was free from financial hardship), and he defended him in 1794.
This pamphlet is very virulent against Carnot as one would expect given the relationship between the two as I have already explained. So, although Pache has, in my opinion, many reasons to be angry with Carnot(both for political and personal reasons) , one should not take at face value the part where he talks about Carnot.
J.-N. Pache on Factions and Parties, Conspiracies and Plots, and on Those Currently on the Agenda.
I
There has been a harmful confusion in the use of the words faction, party, conspiracy, and plot; it is
usefulâespecially at a time when these terms are used so frequentlyâto restrict each of them to a specific and proper meaning, in order to achieve mutual understanding. If language does not ensure
this advantage, it ceases to be that fortunate discovery which most powerfully contributes to raising man above the brute and to heralding the long-term improvement of the species. Instead, it becomes a futile invention or a dangerous artifice.
Men live in association, either in the form of a primary or secondary democracy with a government that maintains liberty and equality, or else in a collective under aristocratic or monarchical rule,
which holds them in slavery. In both conditions, one must consider principles and persons.
The word faction seems more suited to express a relation to principles; it carries more consistency and has been more frequently used in this sense.
The word party has more often been used, in contemporary writings, to express a relation to persons. It would suffice simply to stick to these meanings.
In this text, the word faction will constantly and exclusively express a relation to the principles of government; the word party will likewise constantly and exclusively refer to persons.
A man is a factionist as soon as he is in opposition to the principles of the government. But for a faction to exist, several men must be animated by this spirit; a single man does not constitute a
faction.
It is the same for parties; a single man does not form a party.
II
In a state of society, citizens can be divided into two classes: 1)Patriots who are devoted to the
Government; and 2) Factionists who seek to overthrow it in order to establish a form of domination.
There are two kinds of faction: aristocratic and monarchical, and there can be no others. Each of these kinds is subdivided into several varieties.
Patriots often divide into two parties: one supports the individuals in power, while the other rejects them. Each of these parties is also subdivided into various types.
In a state of collective existence under domination, the enslaved are likewise divided into two classes: 1)Patriots who, despite their chains, strive to overthrow aristocratic or monarchical
domination in order to establish a Government on its ruins; 2) Factionists who work to maintain the existing domination, or to replace it with anotherânamely, under monarchical domination, to
substitute aristocratic rule, and under aristocratic domination, to substitute monarchical rule.
These individuals are factionists not because of their efforts to overthrow the existing domination, but because of their efforts to establish another form of domination that is equally opposed to the principles of Government.
Factionists who aim to preserve the existing domination often divide into parties: some remain loyal to the current rulers, while others seek to overthrow them in order to replace them within the same
system of domination.
III
There may be anarchists in a society or in a collective; there may exist certain individuals whom a flaw of temperament or upbringing renders equally incapable of enduring either the salutary restraint of Government or the oppressive yoke of domination. But there can be no anarchist faction; there cannot be a group of individuals who conceive of and desire a permanent gathering of persons without any relations between the members of that gathering.
As soon as there is a gathering, it becomes a moral necessity that the relationships among its members be defined in one of two forms: Government or domination. There isâand can only beâa
moment of anarchy during the transition from domination to Government, or vice versa; anarchy, properly speaking, cannot endure.
A gathering without relations among its members is a moral impossibility; it is an absurdity that, not entering the mind, cannot possibly enter the will of anyone. The phrase anarchist faction is a contradiction in terms.
It has been used and repeatedâlike so many other expressionsâwithout any value or meaning, by the parrots of both factions, just as they repeat trinity in their catechism or liberty under a constitution that establishes monarchy or aristocracyâat best a futile use of
language, if not a pernicious artifice.
IV
In society or in a collective, the most numerous class is always the patriotic one. It can only wish, in the first case, to maintainâand in the second, to establishâa Government that upholds liberty
and equality.
For this class, a Government is everything. It is the source of all improvements in its intellectual, moral, political, and physical conditionâthrough education, the development of sentiment, the
absence of oppression, and the increase of absolute individual well-being, resulting from enhanced intelligence and a better distribution of labor, regardless of differences in relative comfort.
A system of domination, on the other hand, weighs upon it with every form of physical, political, moral, and intellectual suffering: by darkening the understanding, repressing sentiment, degrading it
to the state of purely passive beings, and ultimately imposing excessive laborâunpaid or poorly paidâas a direct consequence. That is all it has to fear.
The traveler sees these truths at a glance; the historian finds them in every memoir; reflection reveals them to philosophers; and every honest soul ardently desires their sincere application to the
nationâeven if it requires the sacrifice of personal advantages rooted in prejudice. But an even stronger instinct makes each individual within the great mass feel them. Hence comeâand will always comeâinsurrections at more or less frequent intervals, until, through a possible perfection of the human species and society, Governments are firmly established and beyond reach of subversion.
In societies, there are rarely factious among the governed; but the Governors often are. They tend to exploit the advantages of their position to alter the Governmentâan unfortunate consequence of
that human weakness which leads men, when not sufficiently enlightened, to desire the growth or preservation of power.
In collectives under domination, the rulers are essentially factious. They maintain their rule as long as possible by rejecting, obscuring, and slandering even the idea of a true Government.
V
In both society and collective gatherings, there are almost always parties among the factionists and among the patriots. The latter, though in agreement on principles, often disagree regarding the individuals in power. Some have perceived certain circumstances that others are unaware of. Thus, differing considered opinions emerge about the same individuals, apart from the diversity of personal feeling that arises from sympathy or antipathy, from similarities or contrasts in characterand demeanor, and also apart from differences stemming from other social relationships.
Patriots, factionists, and partisans all conspire or plot.
VI
To conspire is to aspire together toward the same goal: our wishes conspire toward your return, everything conspires to my happiness.
Applied to politics, conspiracy is, in itself, morally neutral; it is the aim of the conspiracy that determines its nature. One may conspire for or against principlesâthe former type of conspiracy is
as virtuous as the latter is vicious.
It would be useful to have distinct words to express conspiracies related to principles and those related to individuals, and likewise to distinguish between virtuous and vicious conspiracies within
each category. But in its current state, language does not offer sufficient resources for this distinction.
People may conspire without knowing one another, without any communication, without ever having had any prior relationship.
Conspiracy may occur from one end of a state to the other, or from one end of the globe to the other.
Conspiracy is simply a disposition of the soul.
VII
To conspire is to make a mutual promise, a reciprocal oath to help one another achieve, through a public and external act, a common political goal. The promise or mutual commitment may be verbal
or written, conditional or absolute, provoked or spontaneous, bought or disinterested.
Conspiracy is, in itself, as neutral as plot; it is the object of the conspiracy that gives it its moral character.
A conspiracy can be either for or against the principles of government: the first kind is as virtuous as the second is criminal.
A conspiracy can be for or against governing or ruling individuals: the moral quality of those individuals determines that of the conspiracy.
It is false to claim that the success or failure of a conspiracy unfairly distributes admiration or scorn over the memory of the conspirators through the ages. That is a prejudice propagated or maintained
by aristocratic or monarchical rulers to restrain noble spiritsâsouls more devoted to their reputation than to their lives.
Respect surrounds the Sixteenâconspirators who, according to a royalist historian, were as feared by the leaders of the League, the Lorrainer and the Spaniard, as they were by the heir to the crown
âbecause they aimed at a democratic government. Respect surrounds them even though a new coalition of parliamentarians, Sorbonne scholars, and high bourgeoisâwho secretly still favored
inequalityâsuddenly formed among them, split off, and then established tactics and intrigues designed to weaken them, at which they were more skilled. In the end, these men handed themselves over to Mayenne to betray the democrats, causing the generous enterprise to fail.
Contempt surrounds the Count of Brissac and his staffâconspirators who, upon seeing the growing strength of public spirit after the fall of the Sixteen and the peopleâs subsequent indifference to a
Revolution benefiting only a handful of aristocrats, secretly negotiated with the King of Navarre.
They sold him Paris for a Marshalâs baton and pensions, delivered him its gates, and thus this flat, aristocratic coalition of parliamentarians, Sorbonne scholars, and high bourgeois plunged once again into slaveryâdragging the rest of France with them.
Respect surrounds the people of La Rochelle and Guitonâconspirators for the establishment of a Republic whose system might have extended over all Gaul. For this sacred cause, they endured one
of the longest and most brutal sieges. Guiton even offered his life and body to the most starving among them to prolong the fight in hope of external aid. Respect surrounds them despite their lack
of success.
Hatred and contempt cover the conspirators Louis XIII, Richelieu, and his hordeâbathing in the blood of these unfortunate republicans, feasting on their provisions, and committing all sorts of
cruelties to gain over their exhausted remains a rule that bored the first, who was so burdened by it that he debased himself before the second, who was willing to relieve him. Meanwhile, the second
was in turn equally exhausted, his soul as cowardly as it was fierce, constantly prey to such fears that he dared not move from one room to another without guards.
One can transform a conspiracy into a conjuration through several methods. Those who bring about the change, those through whose intervention the conspirators become the conspirators, are the heroes or the criminals, since without them, without their transformative actions, there would have been no conjuration, and the conspirators would have remained simple conspirators.
IX
The conjuration, once formed by this change, has different degrees of consistency at different times. There are the plans for actions, and there is their execution: there are preparatory acts, intermediate acts, and the final act.
Those who move the conjuration from one degree to anotherâfrom the plan of actions to their execution, or from the preparatory acts to the intermediate acts, or from the intermediate acts to the
final act, or from certain plans to others, or from certain preparatory or intermediate acts to othersâ are still the heroes or the criminals, since, without them, the stationary conjuration would not have
progressed in either plans or actions, whether preparatory, intermediate, or final.
X
The conjuration, at any time and at any degree, must be considered in terms of the means that make the final act possible, or that reduce it to a daydream, chatter, or scribbling. It is the possibility of the final act, through the means at the disposal of the conspirators, that makes the conjuration a serious matter and worthy of occupying a nation and posterity.
It is not enough to dream of a revolution, to discuss it with three or four patriots while promising to help one another if circumstances allow for its possibility, in order to receive the honors due to the
benefactors of humankind; one must either have executed it, or after taking preparatory actions and gathering solid means that make the success of the conjuration highly probable, one must at least
have begun executing the intermediate acts.
It is not enough to dream of a revolution, to discuss it with three or four accomplices while promising to help one another if circumstances allow for its possibility, in order to receive the
punishments due to criminals of lese-humanity; one must have executed it, or after taking preparatory actions and gathering solid means that make the success of the conjuration highly
probable, one must at least have begun executing the intermediate acts.
I have seen a royalist speaker say that in conspiracies, in the absence of deeds, the intention should be punished. This proposition is not that of a Barbarian. Barbarians do not possess the civility of
civilized men, but they are not devoid of natural feelings, and they do not dilute them with vain subtleties. It is the proposition of one of those men whose moral organs are reversed, like the
physical organs of those monstrous children who have their esophagus at their backside; it is the proposition of one of those men who, thus organized against nature, has lived in a state contrary to
nature. Indeed, it is within dominations that this maxim was invented. Tyrants sought to impose fear through the threat of punishments, and what punishments! I will not go back to the bull of Phalaris,
but we have all seen, under the reign of humanity, human parliamentarians order, at the request of the human Louis XV, that a man be clamped by his nipples and other sensitive parts of his body,
that molten lead be poured onto his bleeding wounds, and that eight horses then rip apart all the nerves of his four limbs through quartering. His painful and agonizing screams still echo in our ears.
This fear of punishments for the slightest offense was not enough for them; they devised ways to make people fear even their thoughts, to add to terror the guilt of conscience; they went so far as to
make man responsible for his dreams, and they were aided by priests and judges degraded by slavery. But in a society, there can be no rewards or punishments distributed in such a manner.
There must be 1) facts, and 2) intent. With intent but no facts, just as with facts but no intent, there are neither punishments nor rewards; both are graduated according to the facts.
XI
In every gathering, the essentially patriotic people are in permanent conspiracy for a Government against domination: from time to time, there are conspiracies. Their intervals are determined by the
concurrence of several constants.
The factious rulers are in permanent conspiracy and conjuration against the principles of the Government and against all means that would lead to its establishment.
In every society, some factious individuals, among whom we can unfortunately almost always count rulers, are in permanent conspiracy against the principles of governments.
There is very rarely conjuration on the part of the governed factious, but there is ordinarily permanent conjuration on the part of these factious rulers.
In every gathering, the factious, party men, are in permanent conspiracy against the rulers, and from time to time, there are conspiracies on their part.
In every society, the parties among the patriots conspire against the rulers, and sometimes this leads to conjuration.
XII
In any society where the rulers fulfill their duties, conspiracies and conjurations are not dangerous.
If it is the governed who attack the principles of the Government, a vast majority defends them.
If it is patriots, patriotic men, who mistakenly attack these good rulers, a vast majority defends them.
XIII
In any society where the rulers do not fulfill their duties, there are two cases. The conspirators and conspirators are either rulers or the governed.
If it is the rulers who attack the principles of the Government, the conspiracy is dangerous; for although a vast majority supports these principles, the means of seduction and force employed by
these factious rulers can temporarily harm the public good.
XIV
If it is the governed who are the conspirators and conspirators, or if they are factious individuals who want to overthrow the Government, they are not dangerous, as we have seen, because a vast
majority supports it against their weak attacks. Or if it is patriots who, not as party men, but as patriots, attack the bad rulers who are enemies of the principles of the Government; in this case, the
conjuration, far from being dangerous, is salutary, it is desirable; there are too few of this kind. It saves the public good.
XV
In these circumstances, the great art of factious rulers is to make people believe that the generous patriots are themselves factious, to make them so, if not in reality, at least in appearance.
They would not dare to claim that conspiring against their persons is conspiring against the State.
This maxim is reserved for dominations, where it is proven to the incredulous by tearing them apart, just as the non-existence of the antipodes was proven to other skeptics by burning them. One would
laugh in the face of the sophists in their pay if they were to propose such a statement; even children today know that the rulers are not the Government, and therefore that conspiring against the rulers
is not conspiring against the Government.
In this predicament, they resort to all possible tricks to create some circumstances or inspire certain acts from which it can be inferred, as it suits their interests, that these generous patriots who attack
their persons also want to attack the Government.
XVI
The number of conspiracies in any society is the measure of the qualities of the rulers.
If this number is small, the rulers are tolerable.
If it is large, the rulers are necessarily very bad.
What good and prudent rulers must do is reduce this number: 1Âș by enlightening the factious about the principles, in order to attach them to the Government; 2Âș by rectifying their own conduct, so as
not to be justly disapproved and pursued by the patriots, who will always prevail in the long run because they have the right and reason on their side.
A Government is not instituted, nor are rulers maintained, to kill men abruptly; one institutes the former and maintains the latter to bring back lost citizens to the principles, or to restore embittered
citizens to better feelings, by superiorly directed means, according to circumstances and minds, by gentle, humane, social, and skillful ways; it is not to crush factions, to crush parties against each
other with colossal force, it is to alleviate them through the influence of reason, the attraction of methods, the charms of gentleness; it is not to make criminals of weak men in order to punish them
according to severe laws, it is to strengthen them, to prevent them from falling into crime, and to avert the misfortune of having to inflict terrible punishments on them; it is not to inoculate the virus
of crime into men whose temperaments are already too harsh, it is to keep away even the miasma of contagion from them; it is not to destroy, it is to preserve, and to preserve through the preventive
method: if it deserves preference in physical medicine, it is a perfect and rigorous duty in political medicine.
XVII
Rulers who suppose conspiracies are therefore fools, who proclaim their own ineptitude or vices in front of their contemporaries and posterity, unless they are driven by some major personal interests,
and the discovery of these personal interests usually transforms them from fools into factious individuals.
If they use these supposed conspiracies as a means to shed innocent blood, they are criminals.
XVIII
Rulers who do not merely suppose, but actually create conspiracies, are either fools or factious individuals with an additional degree of malice. If they use the conspiracies they have created as a
means to shed blood, they are criminals of a higher degree.
When, shortly after, I learned of the Grenelle affair and that they were being shot in large numbers, I said to myself, with bitterness in my heart: another conspiracy! A movement of the conspirators! It
is impossible that Huguet, Cailleux, Gagnant, Javogues, Cussetâwhose names were presented to meâare anti-republicans. The rulers, as I see it, suppose conspiracies and plots against the state,
when at most there are conspiracies and plots against their persons, which is not the same thing. By doing so, they first show that they are bad rulers; they let it be presumed that they may have ulterior
motives. Then they somehow legitimize these conspiracies and plots, they elevate the conspirators to the Pantheon, but since itâs by making them pass through a murderous pit, they are criminals.
It is the duty of the rulers to monitor the conspirators against the Government; it is in their interest to monitor the conspirators against their own persons, even to introduce among both groups men
who can report everything that happens, in order to prevent harm, to correct the opinions of some, and to correct themselves according to the disapproval of others. But it is a horror to provoke evil in
these two classes of conspirators, whoever they may be, in order to have the right to punish them; to transform them, almost against their will, from conspirators into plotters, or from plotters into
projects, into active conspirators, in order to have the legal right to kill them.
"It is difficult," you will say, "to draw the line and to limit oneself to observation without provoking in order to make them confess." â No, it is not difficult; and if you do not know how to do difficult things, go plant your cabbages; if, not knowing how to do what is difficult, you substitute it with an act of wickedness, your names will forever be held in horror.
Surveillance is indispensable in a city as large as Paris, with a population as numerous as Olympian, where both virtues and talents from both worlds converge for the games, and where all that is most
subtly vicious gathers as well; but it is the surveillance of a father. He suspects that, despite his instructions and reproaches, his son has acquired the habit of going to gambling dens; he sends a
trusted man to watch him. This man must advance into the familiarity of the lost young man, to be able to accompany him everywhere. But it is not by provoking him to gamble, it is not by inflaming him even more with that fatal passion. You would reply, "We need intelligent and honest agents to grasp and apply these nuances, but all we have are Malo, Grisel." Well, do not degrade them, you
will have what you need. Be good and delicate yourselves, do not give infamous commissions, and then these can be carried out by men who are at once skilled and virtuous. This too is a service to
the Republic. Moreover, good faith is there. It is fixed; no human force can move it, distance it, or bring it closer.
Anything that exceeds it is a crime that puts the Republic in greater danger than remaining below it; for conspiracies of governed factious people are always less perilous than attacks by rulers, and it
would rather be against the latter that the phrase Salus populi prima lex could apply, though this should be used sparingly: it cannot and should not be a maxim of everyday life.
As we have seen, it is a perfect and rigorous duty for you to work towards preventing harm. You can never provoke it in order to have the right to punish it. It would be in vain for you to say that you
provoke a particular evil in order to prevent a general evil by punishing it. It is an execrable sophism, since by taking the opposite side and preventing the particular evil, you would also
prevent the general evil, and thus you would have nothing to punish. Provoking the particular evil is therefore an unnecessary act for the public good, for the salvation of the state, for the salvation of
the people.
You can only be led to it by selfish and interested motives, or else you falsely wish to present yourselves as saviors of the homeland, which was not in danger, by simulating placing it in danger
yourself to appear to bring it out. Or perhaps you have an even more culpable thought.
In all things and despite all the claims of genius, there is no society, no government, without morality. It is necessary; it is sufficient.
I soon realized, through an undeniable fact, that the rulers were employing means opposed to those allowed by morality in the precautions required by politics.
XXI
The Minister of Police, Cochon, stated in his report of [date] that he had been informed for a month that there was a royalist agent in Paris, that this agent was supposed to, etc., etc., that he was to
incite a movement in the suburbs and among the citizens who, according to Capet and the royalists, the modern aristocrats also call anarchists, and that these suburbs and anarchists were also working
toward the royalists' goals.
It was wisely observed in the Council of Five Hundred that the documents and charges presented nothing of this last circumstance, which seemed to be the imagination of Minister Cochon or his
informants.
Letâs see what was happening a month before this report from Minister Cochon.
XXII
Announcing a tendency toward a movement in any newspaper is not always the same as provoking it; however, it is known that the most effective way to make it seem probable, to make it happen, to
activate it, is to have an accredited newspaper spread the word that a person in whom the people have trusted is taking an active part in it, meaning that he considers the movement necessary and
certain to succeed. A larger number of citizens will pay attention, engage with it, and discuss it; atthe slightest opportunity, the group grows; its aggregation attracts proportionally more curious onlookers, and a gathering, a movement, is created.
This is not an ordinary journalist, someone whose newspaper is known for publishing news that is sometimes true, sometimes false, due to his frequent inability to verify the facts. This is Mr.
Delagarde, the Secretary-General of the Directory, and editor of the official newspaper of this power, reputed in these two capacities to be informed about what is happening, especially in matters
as important as a subversive or conservative movement regarding the established regime. It is this privileged journalist who announces the tendency toward a movement, adding the detail that Pache
is walking through the streets of Paris on this matter, thereby taking an active part.
The rulers, under whose watch Mr. Delagarde writes his newspaper, could not have been unaware that I was as calm here as I had been in the ChĂąteau de Ham when, during the Prairial movement,
the Grand Master of the high Convention works, who was in service with all the factions that were successively dominant, devised the motion to have me judged by a military commission without
being moved; I certainly never left Thim, just as I never left Ham; the rulers and Mr. Delagarde know this.
The official editor, the mouthpiece of the rulers, thus knowingly and deliberately placed this false article in his newspaper, a month before the time of Minister Cochonâs report.
XXIII
What could his aim have been? After all, a man like Mr. Delagarde does not knowingly insert a false article into such a serious newspaper on such an important matter without having a purpose.
He has so many other things to discuss for the satisfaction of his subscribers and non-subscribers; the work of the Directory provides him with so many instructive or interesting notes that he cannot
afford to indulge in inventing or collecting trivialities, or to entertain the public with my supposed walks, as some journalists lacking such valuable material might do. Close to that enormous heap of
well-nourished sheaves, he is spared from having to glean. So what was his purpose?
As far as I am concerned, it was to compromise me by placing my name in this movement.
But as for the public good, the purpose is much more serious. I do not delude myself about my real influence; however, the long and atrocious persecutions of which I have also been the victim, under
all the factions, prove that a great deal was presumed about my influence, whether personal or nominal. And in this assumption, my name being placed in this context must awaken the attention
of many citizens, attract more participants to the movement, make it more likely, bring it to fruition, and activate it.
XXIV
The rulers therefore wanted a movement from the suburbs and from those they called anarchists, at that time, about a month before the report of Minister Cochon. They were composing it within
themselves; they were gathering its elements; those who were missing, they made them intervene; unable to involve me personally, they used my name; they determined a movement at the cost of the
truth, and through a deliberate lie.
XXV
However, the rulers, who were thus creating a movement, were surely not slow in taking precautions and preparing the means to suppress it; by giving orders to Mr. Delagarde, the inciter, they were surely preparing them for Mr. Malo, the suppressor. All of this is a perfidy, a Nero-like behavior, or rather a new aristocratic dogmatism to me.
XXVI
If this infamous expedition had not been thwarted by republican journalists, who mocked Mr. Delagarde, his hunting horns, his Pache, and who enlightened the people about the trap being set for
them, it would have been possible for groups of discontented citizensâ not with the government, but with the rulersâ to form; that curious onlookers would have swollen their ranks, that Grisel, by
carrying out insurrectionary acts commanded and paid for by the rulers, would have drawn in, by the powerful means of mechanical imitationâ too little considered in the judgments of the Military
Commissionsâ some few thoughtless citizens; that some would have been sabred by Mr. Malo, and others transformed into conspirators, sentenced to be shot by a new Military Commission of the Temple.
Thus, in my name, by the actions of the rulers, a crowd of good citizens would have been dragged into this double slaughter! I shudder at the thought.
XXVII
To cover up all these horrors, a proclamation and a message would have been made, in which the nation and the legislature would have been informed that the suburbs and the anarchists had formed
a great conspiracy that was putting the Republic in danger; that they were, at least at that time, collaborating with the royalists, with whom a conspiracy was being fabricated or spun on the other
side, in order to discover it in time. The good modern aristocrats would have loudly demanded honorable mention for the zeal of these good rulers, who so skillfully uncovered the conspiracies
they had created; who bravely sabred the gatherings they formed, and they would have supported, alongside the royalists, the military commission to have those who escaped the sabre shot. Poor people, poor legislators, guilty rulers!
This personal event has completely opened my eyes to their conduct.
Apart from the crime of leading innocent people to their death, one must consider the objective, one must consider the major private interest that forces the rulers to endure the shame of declaring
themselves inept or vicious through this multiplication of conspiracies and movements of conspirators, which they boast of discovering.
This is the main point of this writing. The rulers must monitor the governed conspirators to discover if any of them adopt a seditious spirit and bring them back. The governed must monitor the rulers to
discover if any of them adopt a seditious spirit and contain them. Patriotic rulers must deliver the governed, seditious conspirators, to the courts; patriotic citizens must deliver the rulers, seditious
conspirators, to national opinion.
While a high jury is occupied with judging the accused governed, the nation must be concerned with judging the accusing rulers, and I bring them before its tribunal.
One does not torment undeniably patriotic citizens, nor kill others through such infernally devised machinations, when one desires only the Republic, when one wants only to fulfill their duty through
the faithful execution of the Constitution.
It is remarkable that it is Carnot who holds the leading position; it is Carnot who confers with Malo, Grisel, who directs them, who pushes them, who fulfills, who oversteps the functions of the
Minister of Police. This matter belongs more to Carnot than to the Directory. Thus, it is the revived system, but extended, but amplified, of the Septemvirate, of which he was a part, and a very
essential part, for all that the Septemvirs did that was reprehensible.
XXXI
When, through the commendable work of the twelve members of the Committee of Public Safety, either within the Committee or outside it, affairs were brought to a point where there was no longer
any doubt about the Republic's existence, and when people began to feel secure about its future, an almost imperceptible coalition gradually formed, through a tacit agreement, that was successively
expanded to seven members. They ceased to argue, ceased to oppose one another, at least publicly, and appeared to pool their ambition and resources.
The royalist factions being dormant and silent, the Septemvirate enjoyed, for a time, the power with considerable satisfaction. One becomes accustomed to it easily. An unwise continuation of the same members within the Committee strengthened within them the fatal habit and gave rise to the vague and obscure desire to see their rule extended even further. This desire is such a natural consequence
of the strongest inclination of a man in his thirties that it is not to be blamed, and one should have expected it. These vague desires were naturally followed by a distaste for any arrangement that
would bring this power to an end, and a tendency towards any circumstance that would prolong it.
Soon came the schemes to dismiss some and provoke others, then the calculated plans, and eventually their execution.
However, the parties that, in ordinary circumstances, should not see this prolonged appropriation of power without some concern, began to feel anxious. It was believed, not without some foundation,
that they might be jealous of the power. People feared it; they feared that these factions might seek to remove it, and feared losing it. This fear only attached itself more strongly to the power, like all
other real and illusory possessions. The rulers then definitively sought ways to preserve it. One of the methods that presented itself to certain minds was to destroy the men of the opposing party. A pretext was needed. It was not possible to have known republicans perish without first giving an apparent reason to those Convention members they were seducing, who were forming into a
Septemvirate faction, and then to the people. It was suggested and circulated among the first that the popular faction was not strong enough to completely dismantle the royalists, who were pretending
to be dead; that to ensure the Republic and the Convention (the Septemvirate), it was necessary to rid themselves of the popular faction that displeased the middle class, which would rally behind
them and be more capable, through its mass, of stabilizing affairs and the Convention (the Septemvirate). The extreme royalism in the proscription was understood to be in conjunction with
the extreme patriotism because if only patriots had been sent away, the scheme and its purpose would have been too obvious. Those who had the greatest desire to destroy the patriots never ceased
to complain, within the Committee, about the troubles they caused. They became accustomed to viewing them with suspicion, desiring their downfall, and planning to achieve it without remorse.
Jealousy, envy, and all base passions completed the work. The final rallying cry was for "both extremes." As for the pretext for the people, they relied on their confidence, hoping to seduce them with trivial reconciliations.
It was then that the most trivial and false pretexts were sought to sacrifice any patriot who, either through party spirit or immutability, was suspected of not supporting the views of the Septemvirate,
either now or in the future. They exhausted, irritated, embittered, divided, and assassinated them. I saw the play of personal hatreds; I saw Robespierre yield to Billaud, and Billaud yield to Robespierre, with alternating satisfaction visible in each of their expressions; but I saw a constant joy on Carnot's face for the destruction of all. It was then, finally, that in order to cover up the intrigues against the patriots in the eyes of the people, they increased the intrigues against the royalists
Despite my warnings when I saw the progress of the false and especially treacherous idea, I pointed out the horror; I observed that the popular faction was sufficient to contain or even overthrow the
royalists; that the consequences being drawn from it were, moreover, immoral and politically unwise; that it would only serve to drive the enemy to despair on one side, while on the other, it
would treacherously shoot our light troops; and that, with the forward positions destroyed, the main army would run a great risk of being surprised and overwhelmed. Passions had formed a callus
around the hearts, blocking the brains. Patriots were killed. Carnot took pleasure in this.
XXXII
They were killed, and quite obviously because there was a desire to prolong the exercise of power, to establish a form that would secure its duration or make its return easier, rather than adhere to the
order set forth by the suspended Constitution, as was originally presumed. They wanted something other than the democratic Constitution that had been solemnly accepted and proclaimed. I can still hear Carnot, sometime after the first three or four massacres of the Conventionâs patriots and those outside of it, swaying by the fireside with a self-satisfied air, sneering as he said to me: âWell,
Citizen Mayor, there will be changes to the Constitution after all.â And changes were indeed made â they cost the blood of the best republicans. Were they worth the blood they cost?
The great majority of the Septemvirs were originally patriots, I am willing to admit that; but at that fatal time, they had become factious. They had drunk from the cup of power, and one of them â
more enslaved by the love of privilege due to the early hopes of his first profession, and also more cunning than the others â took advantage of their intoxication. As factional rulers, they used the
national force for their own gain; they sought to rid themselves of any obstacle or even any scrutiny.
They destroyed the patriots under the pretense of crushing, with giant arms, the parties one against the other; in this terrible clash, skulls and bones were shattered, shreds of brains and marrow
spurted out, and your faces are still stained with it: such were the fruits of these ambitious and spiteful schemes.
Carnot got away with it. He claimed, I was told, that he signed everything on trust, and he even abandoned those he had once openly supported when he thought a powerful faction would back
them and share the spoils with him. But tell me, whom exactly was he trusting when he signed?
Was it Robespierre, Couthon, and Saint-Just? No. Was it Billaud and Collot? No; those men had always regarded him as a hypocritical royalist, a shamefaced Jacobin, and treated him with
contempt and harshness that could never breed confidence. Was it BarĂšre? I never saw between them the kind of intimate relations, the complete surrender of judgment, where one manâs opinion
becomes the otherâs without question or difficulty.
But did his so-called trust go so far as to prevent him from hearing the debates in the Committee before decisions were made and minutes were drawn up? Did it stop him from hearing what was
said to him outside the Committee about the actions that resulted from the orders he signed? I saw him constantly at that Committee, seated at the round table, taking part in every deliberation, giving
his opinion not only on military matters but on every other issue, domestic and foreign policy alike.
No one was more assiduous than him in that Committee. BarĂšre, Robespierre, Collot, Saint-Just, and the others sometimes arrived late because they went to the theater or to the Jacobins; Carnot,
morning and evening, was always the first to arrive and the last to leave. There is no member whose signature appears more often on the minutes of orders than Carnotâs.
It seems he also excused himself by claiming he had been afraid. That, I can believe â deeply afraid; I would gladly write him a certificate of fear should he ever need one. But that fear did not
date from the time he wormed his way into the Septemvirate and outbid everyone else in the use of the most extreme words and measures. Indeed, he would have been afraid of his own shadow.
XXXIII
Why does Carnot, who had patriots killed at that time because he wanted changes to the Constitution of Year II, have patriots killed today? It is because he feels about the Constitution of
Year III in much the same way he felt about the other one. He still destroys patriots because they stand in his way, and in order to make their destruction acceptable, as he did in the past, he
sacrifices royalists. The patriots inconvenience him. Although they may not have any enthusiasm for the Constitution of Year III, at least they want its faithful observance; they want this Constitution
not just in name, but in practice, since it still contains the two foundations of democracy: the inviolability of the Constitution accepted by the people and the freedom of elections; since it can be
perfected by revision assemblies; and finally, since it is being put into execution.
XXXIV
This crime of killing patriots in order to have free rein was that of the Septemvirs, who had become factious in the final days of their session, and notably of Carnot. The same machinations, in the
same positions, are part of the same projects; they are part of the same plans, especially when it is the same principal man directing them. This was Carnot's crime in the Septemvirate, and it is his
crime in the Directory; it is that of his collaborators in the creation of conspiraciesâCochon, Malo, Grisel, and Delagardeâand of his collaborator in the semi-legal assassination of the supposed
conspirators of Grenelle, Merlin de Douai.
And it must be admitted that the situation is tightly tied. With a member of the Directory who has appropriated military details, a minister of general police, and a minister of justice, one can go very
far in a short amount of time. The modern aristocracy, if they don't play along, and, as a result, or in the final analysis, the royalists owe them strong protection.
XXXV
But Carnot, he serves the Republic, he repaired what Aubry had done. He repaired only partially in all areas, and in a manner that suited his particular direction; the losses resulting from his direct
orders are double those of Aubry, and the share he has in the benefits does not compensate. Take these two men; it does not take a very strong hand to balance the scale.
You will find that, for the Republic, Carnot is no better than Aubry; in fact, he is more dangerous. A hidden enemy harms more than an open one; and considered by himself, Carnot was more seriously
concerned with the destruction of the patriots than with that of the Austrians. I saw in him a more vivid enthusiasm, a stronger determination for the first than for the second; it was with the blood of the patriots that he was most animated, and where his speech or pen flowed most easily.
But I am very certain that our army in Italy would have fought just as well, that Bonaparte would have behaved just as perfectly, even if, according to Carnot's plans, Drouet and Cordas had not been
on trial for a year; even if Huguet and Cailleux had not been killed; and that these tyrannical actions could not have diminished in any way our losses on the other side of the Rhine and at Kingsal.
I am very certain that our army in Italy would still cover itself with glory and that, in the future, we could avoid losses on the other side of the Rhine and at Kingsal, even if Messrs. Delagarde, Grisel,
Malo, Merlin, Cochon, and Carnot were not governors or agents of governors, and I firmly believe that if they had stopped meddling in public affairs a year ago, the internal situation would not be in
worse condition.
XXXVI
I do not know what position the legislature will take regarding them, but being personally convinced of their atrocious perfidy in what they call the movement of conspirators, and that they
are factious rulers, dangerous conspirators against the Republic, I publicly devote them to the execration of the French people and of men from all countries and all opinions who have any sense
of morality. I am authorized in this by my personal experience. There is no doubt that I did not leave.
Thim; there is no doubt that Mr. Delagarde and these rulers were perfectly aware of my whereabouts; one cannot doubt that it was by a deliberate lie that they placed my name in the
announcement of a movement; one cannot doubt that placing my name there was meant to contribute to realizing and activating it, and that thus these rulers themselves were composing the
movement; one cannot doubt that they were simultaneously preparing the two terrible means of
repression, the sabre and the military commission. Although thwarted by the patriotic journalists and by the good sense of the people, this plot still sheds light on other movements, other
conspiracies, and on the unbearable aristocratic dogmatism that will dominate and be called the Republic, awaiting a royal scene, if these treacherous schemes are not revealed by all those for
whom the personal circumstances make them sensitive, and if these factious rulers and their supporters are not covered with the shame and hatred they deserve.
As a society, we now know how to give space to women's perspectives, so we can see practical need to survive behind forward behaviours in a society where most of the time women had that as a main resource.
Not to mention that she also was invested in political matters, I believe @nesiacha talked about some of her opinions about education. Madame de Staël wasn't the only intellectual.
Noâthey are mainly criticized for having lived âlooseâ lives (while men did the same and faced no criticism) and for wanting a role in politics.
Likewise, a more honest woman (in the sense of being financially incorruptible) such as Sophie Momoro, widow of Antoine-François Momoro, would likely receive the same misogynistic treatmentâfor having had a lover during her second marriage and for having publicly supported her husbandâs career (notably by playing the role of the Goddess of Reason).
Furthermore, Theresia is sometimes wrongly portrayed as having mistreated Tallien or abandoned him, whereas in reality, although separated from him, she often helped him financially. (Yes, there are even writings defending Tallien by portraying him as an incorruptible man of great ideals who was supposedly abandoned by an ungrateful TheresiaâI am not joking. Yet anyone with even minimal knowledge of Tallien knows that the word âincorruptibleâ is utterly incompatible with him.)
Strangely, Germaine de StaĂ«lâwho also had lovers (although that was entirely her private affair), was opportunistic, and involved herself heavily in political lifeâhas largely been given a free pass. I personally find her greatly overrated, and she was certainly not âthe only opponent who refused to submit to Bonaparte,â contrary to what hagiographic portrayals suggest. In fact, to me, she was one of the weaker female opponents of Napoleon compared to other women who resisted him from the very beginning and sometimes paid for that opposition with their lives, despite being forgotten today, as you can see here: https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/798948052816838656/germaine-de-sta%C3%ABl-an-essay-in-demythologization?source=share
Even Madame Royale, during her childhood, has been described on certain forums I have read as an inherently âbadâ person from birth because she displayed behavioral problems as a childâas though that were not common among children in general. Worse still, I have read writings claiming that the women who demanded the executions of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette were merely âwomen of loose virtue thirsty for blood,â as though they had no legitimate reasons to resent the royal coupleâespecially Louis XVI. But we know the saying: no matter how many reasons people may have to resent a highly protected and glorified historical figure, it is always the critics who are portrayed as being at fault.
Request for information about the relationship between the future King Louis-Philippe I and Dumouriez
I do not think very highly of King Louis-Philippe I because of the political choices he made during his reign.
However, there is one point that has always greatly puzzled me: his flight with Charles François Dumouriez in 1793.
Dumouriez became one of the most widely hated figures of the French Revolution because of his betrayal. Nearly every political camp turned against him: the republicans because of the scale of his treason and because he handed over the Minister of War to the Austrians; many people, such as Jean-Nicolas Pache and Lazare Carnot, had already distrusted him long before that (which frustrates me even more, because could they not have set aside their hostilities for a while in order to deal with the real problem, namely Dumouriez?). In my view, it is rather tragic that more was not done to stop him. Bonapartists and even royalists such as Louis Antoine de Bourbon also despised him, believing that he had simply âjoinedâ their side after betraying his own.
Was the young Louis-Philippe directly involved in this betrayal? Or did he realize too late what Dumouriez had done, only when they crossed the border?
Honestly, I hope it was the second possibility, because otherwise it would mean that in 1830 a man who was not even king yet was placed on the throne of a country after having taken part in one of the gravest betrayals in the history of France( or at least help it).
Iâve read in the memoirs of AdĂšle d'Osmondâand also seen mentioned on a few forumsâthat as an adult, she may not have held Marie Antoinette in particularly high esteem.
She clearly revered her father, Louis XVI.
But when it comes to her mother, things seem⊠more complicated.
Thereâs even an anecdote (though I have no idea how reliable it is):
a royalist supposedly offered her a medallion containing Marie Antoinetteâs hairâand she threw it into the fire.
Iâve also come across a claim (again, unsourced) that Louis XVIII may have tried to convince her that her younger brother was actually the son of Fersen.
If true, that would say a lot about the political environment she returned to.
So if Madame Royale really did distance herself from her motherâs memory, what could explain it?
I tend to lean toward a different hypothesis.
I talked about this more in detail here in Defense of Marie Antoinette: https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/748299652332486656/in-defense-for-marie-antoinette?source=share
But in short: Marie Antoinette became a convenient scapegoat for some royalists.
And whatâs striking is the ironyâ
many of the same aristocrats who helped damage her reputation later turned her into a martyr.
Not out of pure admiration, but often to:
absolve themselves
shift blame
or even protect the image of Louis XVI
We also know that Louis XVIII himself was often critical of Marie Antoinette.
So imagine the situation:
When Madame Royale was finally released, she returned to a world where her mother was widely blamed by certain members of the aristocracy who emigrated
Itâs not hard to see how her perception might have been shaped (Plus, she was a teenager, so easier to manipulate.).
Especially if she was led to believe that her mother bore primary responsibility for the Revolutionâwhich is, at best, a major oversimplification.
What makes this even more tragic is that, by all accounts, Marie Antoinette deeply loved her children and remained loyal to her husband despite her flaws.
And thereâs another irony I find fascinating:
Marie Antoinette disliked rigid court etiquetteâ
yet her daughter later became extremely strict about it.
Given everything she went through, that shift actually makes a lot of sense.
To be clear: Iâm not trying to ârehabilitateâ Marie Antoinette.
She did commit acts that were considered high treason at the time. She is primarily responsible for her own execution (as Louis XVI and Madame Ălisabeth are for their own fates) not the revolutionaries. .
But reducing the fall of the monarchy to her alone is far too convenient.
In reality, Louis XVI held far more political powerâand therefore far more responsibilityâthan he is often given today (I've already written a post about him) .
Iâd be really curious to know:
Has anyone come across solid sources about Madame Royaleâs attitude toward her mother?
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Charles Germain, Babouvist: A Letter to Napoleon and a Life in Exile
As a reminder, Charles Germain was one of the leading figures of the Babouvist movement who were condemned to deportation during the VendĂŽme trial.
Imprisoned in Cherbourg alongside men like Buonarroti, Cazin, Moroy, Blondeau, Vadier, he decided to write directly to Napoleon Bonaparte, then First Consul.
On 6 Frimaire Year VIII, he sent the following letter:
âHe remained there for several years. The governor, General Hugues, enlisted certain exiles on privateers maintained for the defense of the colony. Some deportees from Cayenne were wounded while fighting the English off the coast of Africa. Germain, one of the most indomitable republicans of his time, was captured in one of these engagements and taken aboard English prison hulks. He never ceased to preach to French sailors and soldiers, his companions in misfortune, a love of the Republic and hatred of Bonaparte.â
Meanwhile, in January 1809, a Portuguese fleet and an English corvette attacked Cayenne, forcing Governor Hugues to capitulate. A prisoner of the English, Germain was still held on prison hulks in 1810; he did not return to France until 1814.
Nothing is known about him after that date (although there are some hypothesesâbut that will be for a future post).
Iâm not infallible, so feel free to correct me. Also, this is just my opinion on Hortense de Beauharnais, so please donât take what I say at face value.
I have read (at least part of) the memoirs of Hortense de Beauharnais. Before reading them, I did not feel much sympathy for herâexcept regarding her marriage, for which I tend to place greater responsibility on Napoleon Bonaparte, as he brought together two clearly incompatible individuals who likely had little choice in the matter, and the death of her sons, which I could genuinely sympathize with. After reading her memoirs, however, I find myself feeling even less sympathy.
First of all, am I mistaken, or does it seem that most women are subjected to criticism or at least diminished in comparison to herâsometimes even to the point of being misrepresented, along with their relationships? At times, I even wonder whether she may have experienced a degree of jealousy or an inferiority complex (though that may be an overinterpretation, so I will not insist on it).
I am not suggesting that everything in her memoirs is fabricatedâsome passages appear authentic and can be historically verifiedâbut still. As for her idealization of her mother, I do not blame her; this is entirely natural, and other, more reliable historical figures have done the same with those close to them. Nevertheless, it remains somewhat irritating: she presents herself as a faultless victim, entirely selfless, admired by nearly everyone (she even gives the impression she means all of France), with only a few exceptionsâand, according to her, any hostility is entirely their fault.
That said, in fairness, there are also arguments in Napoleonâs defense. At the time, the separation between public duties and private interests was not clearly defined, and no precise legal framework governed conflicts of interest in such matters. Moreover, his connections to the Bank of France were not concealed; there was a degree of transparency, even if this aspect is often overlooked today.
Nevertheless, this still suggests that Hortense was not entirely selfless.
What frustrates me most is that she is the figure I most feel inclined to âshakeâ while reading her memoirsâeven though she is far from the only writer to produce selective or misleading accounts.
Take the memoirs of Philippe Buonarroti, for example. He often tells the truth, and when he omits or minimizes certain roles, it is largely to protect the living, since the Babouvists were viewed very negatively at the time. His severity toward figures such as Paul Barras is understandable, and even when he is critical of Lazare Carnot (whom he otherwise treats with relative moderation), his hostility can be explained by historical circumstances.
Then there are the memoirs of Ămile Babeuf. He clearly falsifies aspects of his familyâs social originsâfor instance, claiming that his paternal grandfather held a high command under the Habsburgs, that his mother was a noblewoman, or that he himself had been a colonel. These are rather blatant fabrications, which is frustrating, as his real life was far more compelling than the fictionalized version he constructed.
However, when one considers the harshness of his lifeâfrom childhood onwardâit becomes easier to understand why he wrote in this way. As illustrated here:
https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/797365648777953280/the-beginning-of-the-revolutionary-period?source=share
He endured constant persecution due to both his name and his political engagements, bore heavy expectations from an early age, witnessed the near destruction of his family, and lived under regimes in which the name âBabeufâ was widely condemned. I believe that the âpatriotsâ affair,â in which he was arrested on trivial grounds, imprisoned, and nearly deported during the White Terror following the Second Bourbon Restoration, marked a psychological breaking point. In my view, there is a clear distinction between Ămile Babeuf before and after 1817.
He likely wrote these misleading memoirs partly to idealize his parents and partly because, following a reactionary shift, he chose to focus primarily on himself and his close circleâeven if it meant diminishing other historical figures (this remains, of course, a hypothesis). This does not excuse his distortions, but it does help explain them.
I would estimate that roughly 90% of her memoirs are misleading; however, she is more convincing than Hortense in her distortionsâand, frankly, more engaging. One can observe how skillfully Charlotte navigated successive regimes in order to survive and secure a pensionâsomething Hortense did not accomplish as effectively (though that may be a somewhat unfair comparison).But perhaps I'm being too harsh on Hortense, given that most films and books portray her as almost a saint. It's possible, like Charlotte's, that her memoirs were convincing.
That said, while this does not excuse such claims, his bitterness is understandable: he believed the Bourbons were responsible for his brother Michelâs death, and during the Restoration they persecuted his adopted son Ămile (as well as several of his associates). Maybe the killing of Ămileâs brother, Caius Babeuf, during the allied invasion of 1814 intensified this resentment. His tribute to Carnot is also understandable, even if it was not widely shared among his Babouvist peers (with a few exceptions, such as Toulotte and maybe Emile Babeuf).
Nevertheless, I found his memoirs easier to read than Hortenseâs. His political intelligence is undeniable, and one can understand how he managed to survive so many successive regimes (assuming he is indeed the one who wrote his memoirs) .
In comparison, I found Hortenseâs memoirs far more difficult to engage with.
I should probably read the memoirs of Louis Bonaparte in order to gain the other perspective on this marriage.
Here are my personal thoughs on the matter, whom I invite people to discuss upon as always, I'll be glad to hear yours too.
It's well known how Napoleon hated women being active and outspoken in political matters, and he certainly didn't encourage his own wife to be so. And he himself would NEVER take political decisions based on such "irrational" things such as feelings - for a woman, of all things. Being a mysoginist and emotionally constipated were the undersides of the intention of being the as rational and level-headed as possible in a leading role, I guess.
I think that behind the decision of reinstating slavery there was rather a comparison with the British Empire, whose economy thrived thanks to colonialism like nobody else. He couldn't cut them from their colonies in West Asia during the campaign of Egypt, so he would try to compete with them on the economic level. So a very pragmatic reason. Not that it makes the decision of reinstating slavery better.
I don't remember if he did it before or making peace with England at Amiens, but they were rivalries no matter the good relationship (which was fragile anyway as we know).
We also know how partial she was when it came to support friends. Being both a survivor and a woman (=socially underprivileged) taught her not to hold on political ideals but rather on relying on personal relationships, which also came from her Martinican background. Sadly, that also means that she was friends with many other slave owners who had the best interest in maintaining slavery.
So believing that she may have influenced Napoleon in some way the decision of reinstating slavery is the opposite of nonsense.
Hope it's a good answer, I did my best even if I'm not the most expert when it comes to topic of slavery in the Carribean and Napoleon, so I would love to be checkedđ I loved writing this anyway, bisousâšïž
Yes, these men, who did everything to restrict womenâs political rights, were nevertheless surrounded by strong and politically intelligent womenâa rare point of commonality between them. Quite ironic when you think about it.
I do not know whether all of this is entirely accurate, but far be it from me to portray EugĂšne and Hortense as slave ownersâthere is no evidence of that. Please do not make me say what I did not say; they absolutely were not.
In the first days of this month, Monsieur Sorin, secretary of the government, brought to the prefectureâs office three requests for freedom: two were from Madame de La Pagerie, mother of Her Majesty the Empress, and one from the Misses Hurault.
It was in this context that the three requests reached me.
I did not hesitate to immediately send the deeds of manumission for the first twoâsigned by myselfâto the Chief Justice, asking him, after signing them in turn, to deliver them to Madame de La Pagerie, who is staying with the Captain General in Fort-de-France. I included a clause exempting them from any manumission tax. I believed that such consideration was owed to Madame de La Pagerie. I had also heard that one of her enslaved women was a milk-sister of Her Majesty the Empress.
As for the third request, submitted by the Misses Hurault, I postponed it for the moment due to the situation in which I found myself.
I explained my reasoning to the Chief Justice: âMy stay in this country may not be long. If it is prolonged, I will still have time to reconsider this postponement.â Such was my reasoning.
Two days later, Madame de La Pagerie informed me through the Chief Justice that she took a personal interest in the third request.
This verbal report was sufficient. I immediately wrote, on the 6th of the current month, to Madame de La Pagerie to assure her that I would set aside my principles and hasten to comply with her wishes. However, since the matter did not concern her directly and personally, I considered it my duty to require a manumission tax in accordance with the ordinances and your instructions. The mulatto woman in question was forty years old and had a male child aged eight. I set the tax at 3,000 francs in French currency.
Madame de La Pagerie was staying with the Captain General, where she is surrounded by a crowd to whom he, his family, and his entourage set the example of commentingâvery freely and quite favorablyâon my words and actions. They succeeded in portraying my conduct negatively in her eyes, leading her to perceive it as improper treatment toward her, even toward Her Majesty the Empress, her daughter. As a result, I received an ill-tempered letter expressing dissatisfaction and containing threats, very unpleasant for me and quite undeserved.
It was then, Monseigneur, that I learned for the first time:
1° that Madame de La Pagerie had requested these three manumissions from her august daughter, Her Majesty the Empress;
2° that Her Majesty the Empress had personally intervened in the matter and had written to her mother about it;
3° finally, that the third manumission had been arranged by Madame Villaret for the mulatto woman Rosalie and her son, as a reward for the care she had provided to Madame Villaret over the past three or four years.
And yet, the Captain General had the unworthy audacity to accuse me of creating difficulties regarding these manumissions because of the interest that he and his wife took in them.
I give you my word of honor that I was entirely unaware of this, and that without this incident, I would still not even know that a certain Rosalie existed in their household.
Nevertheless, I was deeply distressed to see that such serious trouble had been created for me in a matter where my conduct had been so straightforward and innocent.
I replied to Madame de La Pagerie by sending her the third manumission, identical to the other two.
It is impossible to find, anywhere under heaven, a more noble soul or greater kindness than that of Madame de La Pagerie. She inspires universal respect and asks so little that one feels fortunate to be able to grant her wishes. She has consistently observed how deeply I share these sentiments and how much I am committed to demonstrating, through her, my devotion to Their Majesties. I must also give thanks to her superior judgment, for although she is constantly surrounded by individuals intent on undermining me, she has largely resisted their insinuations. She was even kind enough to repair, through a letter she honored my wife with yesterday, the distress caused by the one I had previously received.
You require us to report immediately any manumissions we authorize. I therefore hasten to fulfill this duty.
It is possible that these cases may be used as a pretext to slander me from afar, just as attempts have been made locally. For this reason, Monseigneur, it was important for me to inform you in advance through the explanations I have provided. You will be able to verify them easily by questioning the Chief Justice himself, who will likely be the bearer of this letter.
List of the individuals granted freedom mentioned in this dispatch:
1° At the request and by the grant of freedom from Madame de La Pagerie, mother of Her Majesty the Empress:
In fact, in Guadeloupe, slavery was illegally reimposed by Richepanse (under Bonaparteâs orders). It was only promulgated locally in 1803, according to the jurist Auguste Lacour (although Lacour does not provide sources to confirm this).
The Consular Constitution certainly placed the colonies under a special legal regime (Article 91: âThe regime of the French colonies is determined by special lawsâ), but a priori not in a way that could justify such a breach of the principles of the Revolution and the Rights of Man, because lawsâeven âspecialâ onesâmust respect the Constitution, or at least its spirit.
Yet these rights to liberty and equality were set aside by Bonaparte and the colonial lobby in the name of the security and prosperity of the colonies, political and geopolitical interests, and more fundamentally, the supposed incapacity of Black people for liberty and equality. However, none of these arguments are legal.
Beyond philosophical condemnation, the law of May 20 and especially the decree of July 16 are legally open to criticism. This represents a clear reaction not only against revolutionary principles but against revolutionary laws themselves.
The Constitution provided for special laws governing the coloniesânot simple regulatory measures. Moreover, while the laws of 1794 and 1798 could be considered repealed by the law of May 20 in certain colonies, this was not the case for others such as Guadeloupe. Therefore, those revolutionary laws theoretically remained in force there, and a simple decree could not repeal them.
Bonaparte and his advisers were aware of this legal difficulty and attempted to resolve it. One option was to use a senatus-consultum, but this was abandoned. Another was to rely on Article 4 of the law of May 20, which delegated authority to the First Consul. However, this delegation itself was likely unconstitutional.
The government rejected the only fully legal solution: passing a law. This reveals both embarrassment and caution.
The issue of publication is also revealing. The decree of 27 Messidor was not published in the Bulletin of Laws, and Bonaparte specified that it should only be communicated to the Minister of Colonies. This suggests an attempt to keep the measure secret and reflects awareness of its weak legal basis.
This lack of publication further undermines its legality and demonstrates arbitrariness and contempt for the rule of law typical of the most extreme forms of colonialism. It also explains why this text was âforgottenâ for so long.â
Furthermore, from an economic perspective, this policy was pointless. Saint-Domingue was no longer prosperous. Leclerc himself noted that the resources provided by Bonaparte were insufficient, as Bonaparte believed that âwar must pay for war,â which shows a clear disconnect from reality on these.
Moreover, this policy cost him many promising officers, such as DelgrĂšs, Dumas and others. It also alienated groups of formerly enslaved fighters who had previously fought against the British using guerrilla tactics. One example is their victory at the Battle of Rabot in 1795, with the support of Governor Victor Hugues (one of the symbolic figures associated with this movement was Flore Bois Gaillard).
Ultimately, the decision to restore slavery benefited no one.
As for Lentz and Branda, they have written very good historical articles, particularly on Saint-Domingue, but I disagree with them on certain points (this is a subjective matter they are very good historians whose work should be read.). I sometimes feel that they attempt to downplay the destruction caused by Bonaparte in the restoration of slavery by emphasizing atrocities on both sides. Yes, that is trueâbut the brutality came primarily from the French side, as I have already explained here: https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/758502228409614336/here-we-come-about-a-shocking-act-by-french-army?source=share
The first oneâironically often promoted by the same people who condemn the revolutionaries of Year IIâclaims that Napoleon restored slavery simply because it was âof his timeâ (which is false), and fully justifies it as a form of necessary pragmatism. By that logic, Turreauâs âinfernal columnsâ should also be seen as ânecessary pragmatism.â Some even go further and argue that since slave owners had not been compensated, restoring slavery was therefore justified (yes, that argument actually exists).
The second school of thought goes to the opposite extreme: it compares Napoleon to Hitler on this issue ( stupid thing to do), claiming that he sought to create a ânew manâ by massacring as many Black people as possibleâwhich is just as absurd.
There is a third, somewhat more serious school of thought that Ő°ŐĄÖÖ whether Napoleon may have been racist. The problem is that the word âracistâ did not exist at the time, even though the attitude itself certainly did. Personally, I do not think Napoleon acted primarily out of such attitudes, but rather out of opportunism.
Once again, I am not infallible, so please feel free to kindly correct me if I am mistaken.I don't know much about this Valais affair under Bonaparte's Consulate. I had to take the only two documents I could find. Please don't hesitate to provide any information if you know.
Note: warning regarding domestic violence, illness, etc...
I would like to apologize for any lack of fluency of these post, as well as for certain language errors or repetitions. My computer is currently experiencing serious issues, and I am at risk of losing this file. For that reason, I am publishing it here as it stands; I plan to revise and improve it later, as I have already been working on it for several days.
From the clauses of this contract, it can be deduced that Ronsin possessed no personal fortune, and that his future wife, while comfortably situated, did not have considerable resources.
"The general declared in writing on October 29, 1806: 'I declare positively that after many refusals by Mrs. Turreau to go to France, in accordance with my orders as her husband and as plenipotentiary minister of His Imperial and Royal Majesty, my intention was to use force to make her go; that, therefore, after preparing her departure on a ship (in Annapolis), I gave her repeated orders to leave, when her screams, despite my efforts to calm her, attracted a crowd of citizens (Americans) around my house; and despite my public position as minister to France and the privileges that it entails, I went to the door of my house, where a magistrate among them told me that the people had gathered due to the noise they had heard from my house; to which I asked him to enter my house to see the interior and satisfy his fellow citizens.'"
Magistrate Thornton declared to him:Â "In consequence of the invitation given above to the aforementioned magistrate (W. T.) as well as to Wm P. Gardner, last night around ten o'clock, we went to the house of the French minister and were led to an upstairs room where we found his wife with three French sailors or soldiers who were ready to take her by force. She tearfully declared that she sought the protection of the United States from such violence. The general turned to the sailors and said: 'Mark this, citizens; she is asking for the protection of the United States and thus renounces mine.' She said that the French government would not protect her now, but that she would seek protection from France later. We intervened in a friendly manner and asked if it would not be more appropriate, in the title of an officer of the Legion of Honor, to allow his wife to leave in peace, rather than subject her to the brutal insults of ordinary sailors who had been ordered to take her by force? It was also mentioned to her by W. T. that the crowd was waiting quietly to see if an attempt would be made to take her by force; for if that was attempted, they had said they were determined to free her. He said that the heartbreaking details of the separation are omitted, except to say that, on her knees, she pleaded to see her children one last time, and at his categorical refusal, he finally gave in, but only at the prayer of her foreign friends in his arms to 'take the infant.' She left the house, at the corner of Seven Buildings (Pennsylvania Avenue and 19th Street), with the magistrate and his associate."
Furthermore, she had a great sense of humor. Not to mention that it was she who prevented Kalbermatten from being mistreated, even though she considered him an enemy.
I have a hypothesis to better understand her personality: I think that yes, she indeed possessed all the qualities mentioned above, that she was surely demonized to better destroy her first husband's reputation, first by people like Philippeaux, then by others when she surely married Turreau (like many women of the French Revolution), but that she also believed that when the homeland was in danger, the most extreme means should be used to save it, even if it meant employing Turreau's methods. Similarly, when a territory needs to be annexed, if she felt anti-French sentiment in opposition, she could use unfair methods. This was not out of sadism, but because she wanted the safeguarding of France and the revolutionary gains above all (even if at times this actually worsened the situation, as happened after the Infernal Columns). Nevertheless, she believed in the right to a trial, even for those she disliked, and was opposed to lynching her adversaries.
She also possessed diplomatic qualities, as seen in America, where she was sincerely loved by the American elite( or at least by a lot of them).
"Two women, born into the Russian aristocracy, could have had brilliant marriages and lived out lives of ease in the highest ranks of St. Petersburg society â at least until 1917. One of them, Katerina Dolgorukoya, abandoned her youth, her beauty, her family, all worldly pleasures, and her place of first rank in the aristocratic world of her birth for a life of luxurious imprisonment in the inner chambers of the Winter Palace as the mistress of Aleksandr II. She was convinced she was carrying out a noble purpose of bringing happiness to a melancholy monarch and encouraging him to make concessions "to the people." The other woman, Sof'ya Perovskaya, abandoned a similar heritage for the turbulent life of a revolutionary, and in the end sacrificed her life to what she believed to be the cause of freedom for her country"
Margaret Maxwell, Narodniki women: Russian women who sacrificed themselves for the dream of freedom
I came across this excerpt, and I personally find it very well written, even though I absolutely do not subscribe to the idea of Alexander II of Russia as âthe great liberator of the peopleâ (contrary to what Iâve seen on some websites) even though he abolished serfdom, nor do I support the methods used by Narodnaya Volya, one of which was assassination. In my view, that achieves nothing except turning the ruler into a martyr and giving the ruling class an excuse to increase repression. If they truly wanted to get rid of the system, they should have overthrown it rather than killing a single leader.
That said, letâs be honest: Catherine Dolgorukov was subjected to some criticism that, in my opinion, was often sexist, particularly regarding her morganatic marriage (after the death of his first wife) to Alexander II. Some people placed more blame on her than on the ruler himself, even though he was the one who held the power to make the final decision. Of course, it must have been extremely difficult for his first wife, Maria Alexandrovna of Russia (born Marie of Hesse-Darmstadt), to witness this during her lifetime, on top of the hardships she already endured but the first person at fault in this case is her husband.. Dolgorukov was even blamed sometimes for unpopular decisions made by Alexander II, which is unfairâhe was an autocrat with full power, so the decisions were his, not hers.
As for Sofia Perovskaya, she faced even harsher trials. Despite having everything, she chose to sacrifice it all for what she believed was the cause of the Russian people and freedom. Unfortunately, Iâve read articles that criticize her just as harshly, suggesting that she rose up against the tsar for little reason, as if she were âblindâ and refused to see his supposed qualities (a view that relies on the idealized image of Alexander II). Even worse, Iâve come across claims that she became a determined opponent of tsarism only because of Andrei Zhelyabovâas if, because she was a woman, she needed a man to think for her.
Seriously, assassinating the tsar was, once again, a grave mistake (not to mention the civilians harmed in these attacks). However, people like her did have real grievances against him, and she was perfectly capable of thinking for herself.
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Naturally, I could not rely on Wikipedia, even though there is a page dedicated to him. However, I did find a short biography written by the historian Robert Legrand in his book Babeuf et ses compagnons de route. And from what I read, it is quite intriguing:
However, several points here raise questions for me. How could Talleyrand have been in contact, at one point, with a man even loosely connected to the Babouvist conspiracyâsomeone who had friends in that circle, even if he played no direct role? It is quite clear that this was not his political inclination (and likely not a mutual affinity either).
Secondly, what was the secret mission Talleyrand assigned to Jorry? Did Jorry really steal from him? If so, why was he acquitted of fraud?
âMassard returned last night from Versailles with his travelling companions. He brought back some money given to him by Lepeletier, both for himself and for other agents to whom he is to distribute it today. [âŠ] No decision was taken at this meeting in Versailles; as in all the others, it consisted merely of declamations against the government, wishes for an imminent change, and the distribution of Lepeletierâs money.â
(Police report, 30 Prairial, 19 June 1800)
The fact remains that Jorry associated with individuals hostile to Bonaparte during this period. It almost seems remarkable that, given his reputation, he was not arrested during the repression following the âmachine infernaleâ affair, when others were deported or executed for far less during these period.
However, not only is this unreferenced, but it also seems unlikely: the Consulate at that time was still too fragile to openly attack the neo-Jacobins . So no other reason is needed to explain why Jorry and his political associates are being spared for the moment. After the Battle of Marengo and the Rue Saint-Nicaise attack, however, the situation changedâthe regime became stronger, and Bonaparte took the opportunity to eliminate the Jacobins, even though he knew they were not responsible for the attack.
Or is there another reason, such as the fact that he had high-ranking allies who ensured he was not disturbed (as was the case for some others)?
The problem is that Jorry is one of those largely forgotten figures, and in my view, this question has not been sufficiently explored. I am especially curious about the political nature of his relationship with Talleyrand. Did he really steal from him? Or was it Talleyrand who deceived him (which seems more likely to me)? And above all, what was this secret mission?
If you have any further information, please feel free to share it with me.
Yet there is an interesting detail: Ălisabeth Le Bon, Joseph Le Bonâs wife, who was as politically engaged as he was (as you can see in her own short biography here: https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/796013800067416064/elisabeth-le-bon-loyal-companion-in-the-struggle?source=share), seemed to hold Vadier in high esteem, though she was disappointed that he had escaped (since she shared her husbandâs legalist mindset, according to which a man, whether guilty or innocent, must place himself entirely in the hands of justice and submit to its judgment). She wrote to her husband from prison:
âIt is a weakness unworthy of an honest man,â she wrote upon hearing of Vadierâs escape to avoid certain sentencing. âYou once wrote to me: âLove me, cherish a proscribed man.â Yes, my dearest, I love that proscribed man more than ever. I cherish your person, but your soul and courage captivate meâŠâ
I wonder what the relationship between the Le Bon couple and Vadier was.
I am curious how they reacted to the fact that he bore some responsibility for the death of Philippe Le Bas, and yet continued to appreciate him (this is not a reproach or a judgment, but a line of inquiry worth exploring).
Historiansâand even amateur historiansâof this period should perhaps investigate this angle further (just my opinion) .
His wife should also be studied. She did not hesitate to walk miles in terrible conditions to support him at the VendĂŽme trial and did everything she could to settle near him in Cherbourg. Taffoureau seemed to hold her in high esteem, and Buonarroti mentioned her from time to time when visiting the Vadier couple. Respect to this womanâthough it would be interesting to know more about her own views.
Napoleon's alleged esteem for his mother and women
Have you ever found weird that Napoleon put his "strong" and "masculine" mother on a pedestal yet despised strongheaded women as a whole?
I must warn you this is also going to be quite an anti-Letizia rant, I'm sick of her being over-glorified because of how âšïžpiousâšïž and âšïžmodestâšïž she was, or because of how her BIG red flags as a mother are framed as character-building and positive for Napoleon.
Usual disclaimer: the following is my own personal interpretation of mostly psychological dynamics around these characters, and it's based mostly on emotional intuition.
I think that Napoleon didn't actually appreciate his mother. The more he gained power, the more Napoleon became self-conscious about his behaviour building an ever-lasting image, so he had a habit of saying/doing things because he rather thought they were the best/most convenient thing to say rather than because they were heartfelt. He also likely became genuinely very disconnected from his emotions, but more on that later.
And I believe that even about his own mother Napoleon's mouth wasn't where his heart was.
Letizia was sometimes downright cruel when he was a child. Like in that episode when she tricked Napoleon as a child and made him change so that she could surprise him and beat him, because of some crap he had done HOURS earlier that day. It's scarring for life when such treason comes from your own mother.
She pushed him the most to stay in those dreaded French military schools, even drowned in discrimination and bullying, because earning money for the family was more important than his own happiness. We know how much pain and nostalgia Napoleon felt for his family and life at home as a child thanks to his writing. I'd argue his obsession with Corsican independence was a way to express his own wish for freedom from all his ties to France. But his mother never aknowledged any of this, he was the main breadwinner. And even in a dangerous situation such as the Terror and post-Terror she pushed him to thrive even better. Like girl, have you no care for your son's safety either??
Another sign of her complete neglect of Napoleon's emotional needs could also be her missing his coronation, either because of Josephine or - MUCH more likely - because her repressed ass and poverty trauma found the slightest lavishness and aknowledgement of success a direct invitation for God to punish them.
Such is the youth and such is the mother Napoleon build his whole personality and character from. He had so many feelings, so many emotional needs to be aknowledged and met, but all in his life situation framed them as insignificant against the greater circumstances and social expectations. He had to survive psychologically other than physically, so he trained to repress and neglect his own emotional side himself, as everyone around him did. He obsessed over valuing rationality and pragmatism and despising expressions of emotion or instincts. Being culturally raised during the Enlightenment sure helped him adopting this value system. As I said, he did resonate with the Pre-Romantic culture as well, but it stayed very private.
I would add that an experience such as the failure of his political career in Corsica was very influent too. He had poured so much passion and wish of self-realization in that dream to escape from a career in France, and it had been shattered ending with a pursuit and his home burned.
I think that his failed relationship with Paoli and his whoke experience in Corsica are very underrated when it comes to explain Napoleon's personality. Many underestimate the impact of Corsica in him, given that it was his formation years.
He was the embodyment of the saying "Within a cynical there's a let down idealist".
He must have felt guilt about his idealism and feats of passion so much that he must have overcompensated with an obsession for hyper-rationality.
First of all, I would like to thank you for breaking the myth surrounding Laetizia Bonaparte. She was not an evil woman; however, within the Bonaparte family, she is often wrongly portrayed (in my opinion, especially in films and series) as an almost ideal figure, sometimes even wiser than Napoleon himself. Overall, she seems to benefit from a kind of âfree pass,â much like Hortense de Beauharnais. Yet, the more I learn about them, the less they appear entirely reasonable, innocent, or beyond reproach.
There is a clear conflict of interest for Napoleon, who acted both as a statesman and as a shareholder, promoting laws (such as monopolies and controlled governance) that directly benefited a bank he partly controlled. This illustrates how power could be used for personal gain, both for himself and for those close to him. He therefore supported legislative decisions that served his private interests. Furthermore, there are signs of favoritism: the first major fortunes tied to the bank (such as Perregaux and Le Couteulx) were closely linked to Bonaparte. Favoring financial allies in public affairs can reasonably be interpreted as a form of systemic corruption.
However, to be fair, there are also arguments in Bonaparteâs defense. At the time, the separation between public duties and private interests remained unclear, and there were no precise laws governing conflicts of interest in certain areas. Moreover, Napoleonâs ties to the Bank of France were not hidden; there was a degree of transparency, even if this aspect tends to be overlooked today.
Still, the mere presence of Laetizia Bonaparte among these shareholders shows that we are far from a position of complete disinterest.
Moreover, Laetizia displayed a certain hypocrisy when speaking about loyalty. After the death of Joachim Murat, she reportedly said to Caroline (who had taken the title Countess of Lipona), regarding their âbetrayalâ of Napoleon:
"If you couldnât influence him, you should have at least opposed him. But what kind of opposition did you put up? Was any blood spilled? Only over your dead body should your husband have struck your brother, your benefactor, your master!"
If she truly said this, then before condemning Joachim and Caroline Murat, she should have applied the same moral standard to Napoleon himself when he was in power. He had been a Jacobin; yet later, instead of sharing the hardships of his former allies during their downfall (which would have been understandable), he chose to crush them in order to consolidate his power (I'm less understanding about this)L
Indeed, according to historians such as Bernard Gainot, Pierre Serna, and Annie Jourdan, the coup of 18 Brumaire was not motivated by immediate national security concerns. France was not in imminent danger at that moment. One of the less honorable reasons was that wealthy landowners feared the forced loan proposed by Lindet and the neo-Jacobins, which also alarmed bankers. The fact that sincere republicans like Carnot initially supported Bonaparte as First Consul does not negate these underlying motives.
Until the Battle of Marengo, Napoleon could not openly attack his former Jacobin allies, as the regime remained fragile. However, after the Rue Saint-Nicaise attackâand there are reasons to believe he knew from the outset that the Jacobins were innocentâhe unleashed a harsh repression against them.
Even more troubling, he sent to the scaffold Ceracchi, someone who had helped him in 1796 (having been introduced to him by Barras), (Ceracchi had become disillusioned after 18 Brumaire of Bonaparte and became one of his opponents). According to some historians, Ceracchi was involved in the so-called âConspiracy of the Daggers,â while others argue he was innocent and that the affair was largely fabricated. What is certain is that he was forced to confess and to accuse Topino Lebrun (possibly under torture), whom most historians now consider innocent.
This, to me, constitutes a genuine betrayalâyet Laetizia does not seem to have criticized her son for such actions, at least to my knowledge. I am not suggesting that Napoleon was a bloodthirsty monsterâthat would be inaccurateâbut this less flattering aspect of his rule is rarely discussed.
It therefore appears that Laetizia applied the concept of âbetrayalâ primarily within her own family. Furthermore, many historians today adopt a more nuanced view of Joachim and Caroline Murat and no longer see them as the selfish traitors often portrayed in films.
We might even conclude that when Laetizia encouraged Napoleon to push himself during the Revolutionary yearsâeven under the harshest circumstancesâit was not purely out of patriotism, but also out of financial opportunism.
According to Clara Tschudi (whose reliability I cannot confirm), Napoleon allowed his mother and uncle to oversee certain affairs in Corsica. Here is the text excerpt:
" It is to be feared that this system can scarcely have conduced to efficiency, since the prejudice which Letizia and, in a less degree, her brother always cherished against those who had taken part against the Bonapartes in 1793 must have excluded from the administration many persons whose character and abilities would have ordinarily ensured their promotion; while, at the same time, others with nothing to recommend them save some distant relationship to the Imperial Family found themselves selected for lucrative and important posts".
Yet when one holds political responsibility, one ought to set aside personal resentments for the greater good (if what Clara Tschudi states is accurateâthis should be taken with caution).
That said, I do believe Laetizia genuinely loved her son, as suggested by evidence of her maternal devotion, particularly during his exile and her reaction to his death. If she was so harsh with himâeven in the most difficult timesâit may also have been because she wanted him, and her other children, to have opportunities she herself never had, given the hardships of her life.
This brings to mind other historical figures whose parents loved them but were excessively harsh, even punitive, believing it would benefit them in the long runâthough it often did not. Such attitudes were not uncommon at the time, even if they are clearly unacceptable by modern standards.
Moreover, some of the historical figures I study from the French Revolution behaved like loving but overly demanding parents toward their childrenâuncompromising and unable to understand why their children sometimes neglected their duties in the most difficult moments, wrongly believing that such severity would be good to their kids. So why not extend the same benefit of the doubt to Laetizia Bonaparte on this matter?
Finally, I wonder whether Laetizia herself may have contributed to shaping Napoleonâs views on women. Could she have played a role in transmitting certain misogynistic attitudes?
On the other hand, heâand he aloneâmade these decisions, including the restriction of womenâs freedoms, which made them more vulnerable. The responsibility, therefore, ultimately lies with him.
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Here is what Elisabeth Le Bas writes in her memoirs after learning that Guffroy had made slanderous remarks about her to her future husband, Philippe Le Bas:
âThis wicked man was poorly regarded in more than one respect; he did nothing but speak ill of everyone. He was despised by all and disliked by his colleagues. He was, I believe, a deputy for the Pas-de-Calais department, but I never saw him at my fatherâs house. The two Robespierre brothers held him in great contempt.â
Elisabeth Le Bon, imprisoned like her husbandâand whom Guffroy would do everything to destroy, even resorting to slandering the coupleâwrote to her husband Joseph Le Bon regarding Guffroyâs pamphlets:
âThe masterpiece of falsehood you mentioned hasnât reached me yet, but I am sure it will. I do not need to see that monsterâs works to know what to think of him. I am no more curious to read what he says about me than what he says about other patriots. Still, I must praise himâit seems he is becoming an honest man. Follow his actions and you will see: he has not strayed for even a minute in the past nine months from serving his paymasters. Write on, sir, keep buying calumniesâthe true patriot finds comfort in the good he has done.â
Later, after reading one of Guffroyâs volumes, she wrote again to her husband:
âYou were right to tell me I was not spared. But he is a crude liar. Fortunately, his career will soon be over, for even his clients will abandon him. The aristocrats will not be pleased with his work; for their money, he ought to have given them something better.â
As for Marie-Anne Babeuf, the wife of Gracchus Babeuf, she initially helped print her husbandâs writings at Guffroyâs press after Thermidor, spending so much time there that Gracchus wrote:
âMy wife (Marie-Anne) and my son, aged nineâboth as devoted and republican as their husband and fatherâassist me in every possible way. They make the same sacrifices. They spend day and night at Guffroyâs print shop, folding, distributing, and dispatching the newspaper. Our home is abandoned. Two younger children, one only three years old (likely Camille and Sophie, the latter having died of malnutrition), are left alone, locked inside for a month. This neglect causes them to waste away, yet they utter no complaints; they already seem filled with patriotic love and prepared to make all sacrifices. No meals are cooked anymore; during the publication period, we lived on bread, grapes, and nuts.â
âGuffroy shamelessly steals from me. He reaps all the rewards of my labor. My earliest issues were printed in duplicate; he sold many copies, kept all the revenue, accepted all subscriptionsâand I never saw a single penny.â
âThe previous issues are our joint property. However, your wife (Marie-Anne) took them against my wishes. They will all be yours if you pay me for the printing.â
The dispute escalated to the point that Guffroy expelled Marie-Anne and Ămile and declared to them that he would denounce Gracchus, to the Committee of General Securityâa threat he carried out.
Yet months later, when Gracchus was imprisoned, he wrote insincere letters of friendship (notably in hopes of being released) to several figures, including Guffroy, on Marie-Anneâs advice. This does not seem to have worked, as Guffroyâs wife gave Marie-Anne a hostile reception.
I wonder whether Elisabeth Le Bon, Elisabeth Le Bas, and Marie-Anne Babeuf interacted much with one another. We know that Ămile Le Bon, son of Elisabeth Le Bon, got along well with Philippe Le Bas junior; moreover, Philippe Le Bas and Joseph Le Bon were friends, and both women remained loyal to their husbandsâ names and political legacies. Like the others, Marie-Anne Babeuf never abandoned her husbandâs name, even during periods when it was dangerous to keep it.
Furthermore, although Ămile Babeuf later wrote an article on Philippe Le Bas that Philippe Le Bas Jr. considered very poor, Buonarroti wrote to Ămile in 1830 asking, among other things, for news of Elisabeth Le Bas and the Duplay family.
Interestingly, both Marie-Anne Babeuf and Elisabeth Le Bon were viewed very negatively by certain Napoleonic authorities and were kept under close surveillance.
There would, however, be a major point of divergence between Marie-Anne Babeuf and Elisabeth Le Bon. The former would have had no scruples about helping her allies and political friends escape if she deemed it necessary (after all, Gracchus had entrusted her with his own escape attempt, and she covered for him several times whenever he fled from the judicial authorities pursuing him). Elisabeth Le Bon, on the other hand, was a fervent legalist, like her husband. For her, whether a person was innocent, guilty, or unjustly persecuted, they should not escape but instead face their trial. Hence her disappointment when she learned that Vadier, a man she seems to hold in high regard, had escaped.
In any case, one can imagine the conversation these three women might have had about Guffroy, if such a meeting ever took place.
To learn more about the collaboration and eventual break between the Babeuf couple and Guffroy, see:
https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/780339711912869888/the-collaboration-and-eventual-break-between?source=share
For a detailed look at Babeufâs false letters of friendship (including those addressed to Guffroy), as well as Marie-Anneâs letter about her visit to the Guffroy couple, see:
https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/813012577104871424/the-fake-letters-of-friendship-written-by?source=share
For more on the life of Ămile Babeuf and his trajectory from a revolutionary child to a reactionary royalist, see:
https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/797365648777953280/the-beginning-of-the-revolutionary-period?source=share
For more on the life of Elisabeth Le Bon, see:
https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/796013800067416064/elisabeth-le-bon-loyal-companion-in-the-struggle?source=share
For links to documents explaining in detail the conflict between Joseph Le Bon and Guffroy, see:
https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/780574222159331328/links-to-documents-on-the-le-bon-vs-guffroy?source=share
I once received a question asking which historical female figure of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic era suffered the most or had the most tragic fate (unfortunately, I lost the question).
Sorry for the poor organization of this text, which I will correct later. I preferred to publish it rather than risk losing it permanently due to my temperamental computer.
Content warning: this text contains descriptions of executions (including those involving children) and suicide, which may be distressing for sensitive readers.
Before giving my answer, I want to make it clear that this is not about minimizing the suffering of other women. Their suffering was very real, and this is not a competition.
The Duplay sisters also suffered after Thermidor: temporary imprisonment, the loss of loved ones to the guillotine, and the demonization of their name (the black legend surrounding people like Robespierre had already begun).
Albertine Marat and Simone Evrard endured imprisonment and poverty. Despite their efforts to preserve the legacy of Jean-Paul Marat, they saw him vilified and remained under police surveillance during the Directory, under Bonaparte, and even under the monarchy.
Henriette Simonin, widow of Chaumetteâwhom I discussed here:
https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/804044312295964672/the-information-i-have-been-able-to-find-about?source=share
âsurvived her husbandâs execution, likely witnessed the rise of his âblack legend,â lost their daughter, and was imprisoned after the attack on the Rue Saint-Nicaise during the repression of the Jacobins.
Ălisabeth Le Bon, whose life I discussed here:
https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/796013800067416064/elisabeth-le-bon-loyal-companion-in-the-struggle?source=share
was imprisoned with her two children.
Sophie Carnot also experienced tragic moments, as shown in this post of @aedislumen :
https://www.tumblr.com/aedislumen/782234046319280128/hello-do-you-know-anything-or-have-any-resources?source=share
She and her husband first had a stillborn child, then lost another son in 1795. When Carnot was proscribed during Fructidor, their property was seized. She initially refused to divorce him (which would have protected her), until both her father and husband persuaded her to do so. This allowed her to assist him more effectively while he was in exile, though she had to endure slander in the press and pamphlets. After Brumaire, when he was able to return to France, the divorce was annulledâyet this still illustrates the tragedies she endured.
After her release, she remarried one of her husbandâs friends, Turreau. However, in addition to losing a child, her husband proved to be a cruel man who beat her (with whips or a cane, in front of their crying children). Hardly anyone dared to help her, except for her friend Dolley Madison, Thornton, and a few americans. Out of revenge, Turreau left her in poverty with their children; even after the divorce, he lived comfortably while she and her children struggled to obtain even minimal financial support. Her plan to return to America during the Restoration and open a school also failed, and she died in poverty (as did her daughter Alexandrine).
Marie-Anne Babeuf lived in constant poverty, saw her husband executed, and lost many friends. She was imprisoned twice under harsh conditions and subjected to police surveillance and proceedings multiple times. She outlived at least four of her five children (possibly all) and lived under the stigma of the Babeuf name. She also witnessed her son Ămile gradually abandon revolutionary ideals and distort the truth as demonstrated here https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/797365648777953280/the-beginning-of-the-revolutionary-period?source=share .
Suzanne Le Peletier fought to marry the man she loved but suffered a disappointing marriage and the loss of children. She remarried, was later widowed again, and gradually turned toward religion and royalism under the weight of her personal tragedies as we can see here https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/795252246414819328/the-relationship-between-f%C3%A9lix-le-peletier-and?source=share .
Charlotte Robespierre lost both her brothers on the same day and was never able to reconcile with them.
Even if one may criticize Madame Royale for what she later becameâespecially after returning to France as the Duchess of AngoulĂȘme, as discussed here https://www.tumblr.com/mathildeaquisexta/778220050110922752/i-quite-agree-with-everything-written?source=share âshe endured imprisonment as a child alongside her younger brother and witnessed members of her family die one after another. (Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette, and Madame Ălisabeth bear responsibility for their political fate, but Madame Royale and her brother were innocent and should never have suffered such a fate.)
Many women suffered at the hands of foreign troops, who showed little mercy during the sack of towns and villages during the frev revolution.
Others suffered during the famine of Year III or from violence by the Muscadins. Some mothers, driven to despair, committed suicide with their children by throwing themselves into the Seine.
Madame Dunel represents this extreme despair: persecuted and crushed by inequality and repression, she poisoned her entire family and herself. Only her husband, who was being pursued by the police, survived.
Women affiliated with the Jacobin movement suffered greatly after the repression ordered by Bonaparte, as you can see here:
https://www.tumblr.com/nesiacha/804861309236674560/the-role-of-women-supporting-the-jacobins-in-the?source=share
They fought in vain to prevent their husbands from being deported and risked insults and physical violence in the streets. Madame Dufour, a mother of six whose neo-Jacobin husband had been deported, gave public speeches in support of the Jacobinsâbut to no avail, as he had already died. Many of these women fell deeper into poverty, as their husbands had been their main source of income, which only added to their suffering. Furthermore, they were betrayed by a former comrade-in-arms, Parein du Mesnil, who had gained their trust during difficult times in order to better report their conversations to the government.
One could also mention the wife of General Maurepas, who died on September 19, 1802, in Haiti when Napoleon attempted to restore slavery. Here is how the Maurepas family died (the general had been suspected of participating in the Haitian revolt after surrendering to the French army in February 1802):
âHe is immediately seized by several sailors (he is then aboard the flagship off Tortuga), stripped in a frenzy, and tied to the mainmast. The French officers are astonished by the calm and resignation of this warrior, as well as by the superhuman courage of his wife, who urges him to die as a hero. Maurepas sees his wife and his children hanged from the yards. Insults fly from all sides, but his lips express only indignation at such crimes. â (Thomas Madiou)
Even though she showed great courage, it was a tragedy for this mother to be hanged alongside her two young children. Unfortunately, when Bonaparte restored slavery, such atrocities were all too common.
I think that, whether or not one agrees with what these women did, one can only admire how they faced their tragedies.
At least all the women mentioned above experienced, at some point, at least a measure of freedom, love, or human connectionâeven if fleeting.
Others never had that chance.
Women like her were born into bondage, deprived of legal protection, separated from their families (whether they will see each other again depends entirely on the will of their owners)and subjected to violence and exploitation. Even the small freedoms they had were merely survival strategies.
When Ămilie was accused of attempting to poison Rose Claire des Vergers de Sannois, one must remember that the slaveholding class imposed a regime of terror. At the slightest suspicion or rumor, Black peopleâincluding free people of colorâcould be executed without trial or tangible evidence. After slave revolts, suspicion weighed especially heavily on enslaved domestic workers like Ămilie. For many slave owners, every Black person was seen as a âpotential poisoner.â No proof or witnesses were required: mere suspicion could send someone to the stake. It was also a convenient pretext to eliminate enslaved individuals no longer trusted.
Ămilie only confessed to the accusations (which may well have been false) in an attempt to save her mother and sisters. She was not granted the âmercyâ of the guillotine but was executed by burning. No influential figure intervened on her behalf or that of her family, even though others under the Empire, far more âguiltyâ than she, sometimes benefited from such support.
This woman was simply trying to survive in an inhuman systemâand she was killed for it, a victim of paranoia and the slaveholdersâ thirst for vengeance.
At least women executed such as Marthe Rose Toto and Rosalie (known as Solitude) in Guadeloupe were able to fight alongside their companions against the restoration of slavery before being executed by hanging. Ămilie, by contrast, never took up arms nor attempted to oppose the Bonapartist regime, despite having every reason to do soâyet this did not spare her tragic fate.
Women like Ămilie, in my view, suffered the most tragic destinies of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic era.