Godfather of the Revolution by Ambrose Tom

Author:Ambrose, Tom
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Peter Owen Publishers
Published: 2008-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

12

THE ESTATES GENERAL

ON 13 JULY 1788 France had experienced the most violent and sustained hailstorm in its history which devastated the most fertile land and ruined the harvest. There were persistent rumours at the time, related in great detail by the historian Montjoie, that the Duc d’Orléans had taken full advantage of this natural calamity to acquire the remaining grain and ship it to England. This had been made possible under the calamitous free-trade agreement signed a year earlier by the Finance Minister, de Brienne. The plan appears to have been devised by Laclos and to have been executed by the Marquis Ducrest. The intention was to hold the grain in England until famine forced the King to abdicate and then ship it back to a grateful France. This was certainly a dangerous and callous scheme to inflict on starving people and reflects Laclos’ ruthless approach to politics. It is hard to understand why Louis Philippe Joseph, with his sincere and well-established reputation for charity and concern for the poor, agreed to it.

The misery and starvation that had characterized the terrible winter of 1788 continued into the following spring when melting ice flooded the fields. Grain prices rose even higher, and the poor, kept alive by the four-pound loaf of bread, now found even that debased with cheap additives. As the preliminary meetings of the Estates General were taking place the hunger of the people exploded into serious riots in Flanders and Brittany. But the most dangerous of all occurred in Paris, provoked by a rumour that Jean-Baptiste Réveillon, a self-made paper manufacturer in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, was threatening to cut the wages of his already desperately poor workforce. In reality he had merely said that the price of bread was too high and should be allowed to find its correct level in the open market rather than be controlled by the state, but this innocent remark was seized upon by the crowd that gathered in the street leading to the Réveillon factory, and the resentment that had festered throughout the long winter months of hunger now exploded into violence that struck Paris like a thunderclap. Armed with sticks and cudgels, the mob began shouting, ‘Death to the rich! Death to the aristocrats! Death to the capitalists!’ Soon there were over 500 people marching towards the factory, at their head a mock gallows bearing a dummy of Réveillon himself. Two respected members of the local community courageously offered to speak to the crowd and with great difficulty managed to persuade them that Réveillon should not be hanged from the nearest lamp-post.

The following day the mob returned, its numbers swollen by the many unemployed dockers, tanners and brewery workers from the Saint-Marcel and Saint-Antoine districts. Now numbering over 10,000 it was opposed by only a small detachment of the newly raised gendarmerie, the gardes françaises, standing at a barrier with fixed bayonets. As each side hesitated, a carriage suddenly appeared carrying the Duc d’Orléans and his guests along the Faubourg Saint-Antoine on their way to the races at Vincennes.

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