Pinned
Because I'm new at tumblr( I've been here for only 3 or 4 months maybe ) and I'm not an elite person ( like @anotherhumaninthisworld or @edgysaintjust or @saint-jussy .) So I ask the all elites of this glorious community ( don't ask why I speak like that just ignore) to give an answer for this good fellow out here.
Because I found it very hard to answer him properly with evidences and sources etc. And I want to give the best answer I can by asking help from you everyone.
A newly graduated Maximilien de Robespierre with his law degree, circa 1781
His hair color is chestnut mabye? .. I like it ..
First, some statistics:
Leaving in the middle of a session due to fighting: Collot (1 time), Robespierre (3 times), Saint-Just (4 times)
Starting to cry during a session: Carnot (1 time), Robespierre (1 time)
Threatening your co-workers: Robespierre (2 times), Saint-Just (2 times, one of them a death threat), Couthon (1 time)
Calling your co-workers traitors/scroundrels/ counter-revolutionaries/aristocrats/conspirators/foreign agents: Billaud (1 time), Saint-Just (3 times), Robespierre (5 times), Collot (2 times)
Accusing your co-workers of aspiring towards dictatorship: Carnot, Billaud, Barère, Collot (1 time)
Accusing your co-workers of wishing to destroy patriots: Robespierre, Collot (1 time)
Using physical violence against your co-workers: Collot (2 times?)
Defending your co-worker against another co-worker in a way that doesn’t at all make it seem like you’re into him: Saint-Just (3 times) Barère (1 time)
Oh, I have one more to add! According to Joseph Carnot in one of the various beefs among the Committee members, Lazare threw a writing case at Robespierre's head.
Source: M. Reinhard, Le Grand Carnot vol. II, p. 145
Thank you a lot for gathering all the CSP drama in a post! Very convenient.
Lindet:
I notice that Lindet mostly stays out of it 😂
Meanwhile, the rest of the CSP:
"Calling your co-workers traitors/scroundrels/ counter-revolutionaries/aristocrats/conspirators/foreign agents: Billaud (1 time), Saint-Just (3 times), Robespierre (5 times), Collot (2 times)"
Oh, you forgot to count Barère saying: "you three are a child, a cripple and a scoundrel".
Oh you’re right there! I’ll fix that, we want to be fair after all!
I will never get bored from the committee's drama ..
Carnot throwing a writing case at Robespierre’s head as Saint Just and Couthon watch on and Collot Dherbois continues ranting
(C’était trop amusant à faire pas 😭)
The committee of public safety drama is good enough to be a great TV series ten times better than the office.
As much as I love La Révolution Française (1989) for simply being the first frev film I’ve watched and the nostalgia that comes along with it, if I see another person post “LRF is the best French Revolution film yet” on reddit or any other social media site then saying every actor was accurate in their portrayal, I’m going to lose my marbles because La Terreur et la Vertu (1964) fucking exists. Watch it you normies. I’ll gouge your eyes out.
Thank u that was me
Nothing can be like la terreur et la vertu this movie is really the goat...
First, some statistics:
Leaving in the middle of a session due to fighting: Collot (1 time), Robespierre (3 times), Saint-Just (4 times)
Starting to cry during a session: Carnot (1 time), Robespierre (1 time)
Threatening your co-workers: Robespierre (2 times), Saint-Just (2 times, one of them a death threat), Couthon (1 time)
Calling your co-workers traitors/scroundrels/ counter-revolutionaries/aristocrats/conspirators/foreign agents: Billaud (1 time), Saint-Just (3 times), Robespierre (5 times), Collot (2 times)
Accusing your co-workers of aspiring towards dictatorship: Carnot, Billaud, Barère, Collot (1 time)
Accusing your co-workers of wishing to destroy patriots: Robespierre, Collot (1 time)
Using physical violence against your co-workers: Collot (2 times?)
Defending your co-worker against another co-worker in a way that doesn’t at all make it seem like you’re into him: Saint-Just (3 times) Barère (1 time)
Oh, I have one more to add! According to Joseph Carnot in one of the various beefs among the Committee members, Lazare threw a writing case at Robespierre's head.
Source: M. Reinhard, Le Grand Carnot vol. II, p. 145
Thank you a lot for gathering all the CSP drama in a post! Very convenient.
Lindet:
I notice that Lindet mostly stays out of it 😂
Meanwhile, the rest of the CSP:
"Calling your co-workers traitors/scroundrels/ counter-revolutionaries/aristocrats/conspirators/foreign agents: Billaud (1 time), Saint-Just (3 times), Robespierre (5 times), Collot (2 times)"
Oh, you forgot to count Barère saying: "you three are a child, a cripple and a scoundrel".
Oh you’re right there! I’ll fix that, we want to be fair after all!
I will never get bored from the committee's drama ..
Do we know the favorite books that the French revolution figures liked to read? (It could be anyone, Robespierre or Saint just or Louis xvi it doesn't matter).
Much like this old ask about revolutionaries’ favorite dishes, I can’t say I know of any instance of someone exclaiming: ”this is 100% my favorite book,” but at tops people mentioning books that they thought were good or bad:
In his memoirs, Brissot writes he’s picking up Rousseau’s Confessions for the sixth time, so I guess that could qualify as a favorite book? send help
We have this list of books seized at Robespierre’s place after his death.
According to the memoirs of Élisabeth Duplay, Robespierre would read ”the works of Corneille, Voltaire and Rousseau” for her family in the evenings.
In a short biography over Desmoulins written in 1834, Marcellin Matton claims his favorite book was René Aubert de Vertot’s Histoire des révolutions arrivées dans le gouvernement de la République romaine (1719), of which he always carried a copy. Matton is an infamous romanticizer it’s from him we have the stupid leave myth for example, but I’m willing to give him some leeway here since he could have obtained the information from Camille’s mother-in-law and sister-in-law, who were his friends:
In one of his first classes, he received Vertot's Révolutions romaines as a prize. Reading this work transported him with admiration; in the future, he always had a volume in his pocket. It was for him an indispensable companion, it was his vade mecum. He used or lost at least twenty volumes. It is perhaps to this excellent work and to the particular work that he did on the discourses of Cicero and especially on his Philippics, that we owe the lively and sharp style which distinguishes all the writings coming from the pen of Camille .
Desmoulins was however less fond of Rousseau’s Confessions, in number 55 (December 1790) of Révolutions de France et de Brabant he admits that he abandoned the book after getting infuriated by it:
Not that I idolize J.J. as I did in the past, since I saw in his Confessions that he had become an aristocrat in his old age. How far he was from looking at an Alexander with the pride of this Cynic, to whom he is compared, and how painfully I saw that he united the opposite faults of Diogenes and Arisippus! It is a pleasant thing to hear the author of the Social Contract protest in his Confessions about the simplicity of the commerce of such great lords (M. and Madame de Luxembourg) he cries with joy, he wants to kiss the feet of this good marshal, because he wanted to accompany one of his friends, an office clerk, for a walk. Is there anything smaller, more ridiculous? I received, he says elsewhere, the greatest honor that a man can receive, the visit of the Prince de Conti, (an honor that Rousseau shared with all the girls of the Palais-Royal.) At this point I tossed away the book out of spite, and I admit, that I had to reread the speech on equality of conditions, and Julie's novel, in order to not hate the philosopher of Geneva, like Durosoy and Mallet du Pan; for the same principles, in the mouth of such a great man, are more condemnable and worthy of aversion than in the mouths of our two gazetteers, whom God created poor in spirit, and predestined as such to the kingdom of heaven.
In a diary kept over the summer of 1788, Lucile Desmoulins mentions reading L’Âge d’Or (1782) by Sylvain Maréchal (of which she also copied two verses, Le Trésor and Le contrat de mariage devant la nature, in a notebook the year earlier), Les Idylles et poèmes champêtres (1762) by Salomon Gessner, L’Hymne au soleil, suivi de plusieurs morceaux du même genre qui n’ont point encore paru (1782) by Abbé de Reyrac (where she wrote down the verse La Gelée d’avril), Nouvelles lettres anglaises, ou Histoire du Chevalier Grandisson (1754) by Samuel Richardson and Les Noces patriarchales, poëme en prose en cinq chants (1777) by Robert Martin Lesuire.
In his memoirs, Buzot mentions enjoying the works of Rousseau and Plutarch:
With what charms I still remember this happy period of my life which can no longer return, when, during the day, I silently roamed the mountains and woods of the city where I was born, reading with delight some works of Plutarch or of Rousseau, or recalling to my memory the most precious features of their morality and their philosophy. Sometimes, sitting on the flowering grass, in the shade of some thick trees, I indulged, in a sweet melancholy, in the memories of the sorrows and the pleasures which had in turn agitated the first days of my life. Often the cherished works of these two good men had occupied or maintained my vigils with a friend of my age whom death took from me at thirty, and whose memory, always dear and respected, has preserved from many errors!
Wow any chance you can sound even more like an 18th century man stereotype, Buzot?
…and that’s basically all I can come up with for the moment. But add on if you know anything more! @louis-antoine-leon-saint-just @lazarecarnot maybe you would like to share your favorite books with us if you have any?
I read once somewhere that Louis xvi was a book worm and his favorite book was an adventure book but unfortunately I forget what it was .. nor do I remember where I read the info.
Jean-Paul Marat — In Histoire de la Révolution française: 1789-1796 (1851) Nicolas Villiaumé pins down Marat’s height to four pieds and eight pouces (around 157 cm). This is a somewhat dubious claim considering Villiaumé was born 26 years after Marat’s death and therefore hardly could have measured him himself, but we do know he had had contacts with Marat’s sister Albertine, so maybe there’s still something to this. That Marat was short is however not something Villaumé is alone in claiming. Brissot wrote in his memoirs that he was ”the size of a sapajou,” the pamphlet Bordel patriotique (1791) claimed that he had ”such a sad face, such an unattractive height,” while John Moore in A Journal During a Residence in France, From the Beginning of August, to the Middle of December, 1792 (1793) documented that ”Marat is little man, of a cadaverous complexion, and a countenance exceedingly expressive of his disposition. […] The only artifice he uses in favour of his looks is that of wearing a round hat, so far pulled down before as to hide a great part of his countenance.” In Portrait de Marat (1793) Fabre d’Eglantine left the following very detailed description: ”Marat was short of stature, scarcely five feet high. He was nevertheless of a firm, thick-set figure, without being stout. His shoulders and chest were broad, the lower part of his body thin, thigh short and thick, legs bowed, and strong arms, which he employed with great vigor and grace. Upon a rather short neck he carried a head of a very pronounced character. He had a large and bony face, aquiline nose, flat and slightly depressed, the under part of the nose prominent; the mouth medium-sized and curled at one corner by a frequent contraction; the lips were thin, the forehead large, the eyes of a yellowish grey color, spirited, animated, piercing, clear, naturally soft and ever gracious and with a confident look; the eyebrows thin, the complexion thick and skin withered, chin unshaven, hair brown and neglected. He was accustomed to walk with head erect, straight and thrown back, with a measured stride that kept time with the movement of his hips. His ordinary carriage was with his two arms firmly crossed upon his chest. In speaking in society he always appeared much agitated, and almost invariably ended the expression of a sentiment by a movement of the foot, which he thrust rapidly forward, stamping it at the same time on the ground, and then rising on tiptoe, as though to lift his short stature to the height of his opinion. The tone of his voice was thin, sonorous, slightly hoarse, and of a ringing quality. A defect of the tongue rendered it difficult for him to pronounce clearly the letters c and l, to which he was accustomed to give the sound g. There was no other perceptible peculiarity except a rather heavy manner of utterance; but the beauty of his thought, the fullness of his eloquence, the simplicity of his elocution, and the point of his speeches absolutely effaced the maxillary heaviness. At the tribune, if he rose without obstacle or excitement, he stood with assurance and dignity, his right hand upon his hip, his left arm extended upon the desk in front of him, his head thrown back, turned toward his audience at three-quarters, and a little inclined toward his right shoulder. If on the contrary he had to vanquish at the tribune the shrieking of chicanery and bad faith or the despotism of the president, he awaited the reéstablishment of order in silence and resuming his speech with firmness, he adopted a bold attitude, his arms crossed diagonally upon his chest, his figure bent forward toward the left. His face and his look at such times acquired an almost sardonic character, which was not belied by the cynicism of his speech. He dressed in a careless manner: indeed, his negligence in this respect announced a complete neglect of the conventions of custom and of taste and, one might almost say, gave him an air of ressemblance.”
Albertine Marat — both Alphonse Ésquiros and François-Vincent Raspail who each interviewed Albertine in her old age, as well as Albertine’s obituary (1841) noted a striking similarity in apperance between her and her older brother. Esquiros added that she had ”two black and piercing eyes.” A neighbor of Albertine claimed in 1847 that she had ”the face of a man,” and that she had told her that ”my comrades were never jealous of me, I was too ugly for that” (cited in Marat et ses calomniateurs ou Réfutation de l’Histoire des Girondins de Lamartine (1847) by Constant Hilbe)
Simonne Evrard — An official minute from July 1792, written shortly after Marat’s death, affirmed the following: “Height: 1m, 62, brown hair and eyebrows, ordinary forehead, aquiline nose, brown eyes, large mouth, oval face.” The minute for her interrogation instead says: “grey eyes, average mouth.”Cited in this article by marat-jean-paul.org. When a neighbor was asked whether Simonne was pretty or not around two decades after her death in 1824, she responded that she was ”très-bien” and possessed ”an angelic sweetness” (cited in Marat et ses calomniateurs ou Réfutation de l’Histoire des Girondins de Lamartine (1847) by Constant Hilbe) while Joseph Souberbielle instead claimed that ”she was extremely plain and could never have had any good looks.”
Ma-rat is the tiniest and that's cool .. :)
This document is Parish Certificate of Baptism of Robespierre, if you look close enough you can see the name of his parents being mentioned in it (obviously) and the document was signed "Robespierre" by Maximilian's father barthélémy Maximilian Robespierre.
I wished I'd found the full document tho.
Date : May 6, 1758
Place : Paroisse Sainte-Marie-Madeleine - Arras
I understand the story of marat and his assassination event
But who is lepeletier?
Because I saw a drawing for him by louis David and I learned about his death which happen to be the same as Marat so yeah .. I wanna know about him.
According to the biography Michel Lepeletier de Saint-Fargeau, 1760-1793 (1913), its subject of study was born on 29 May 1760, in his family home on rue Culture-Sainte-Catherine, a building which today is the Bibliothèque Historique de la Ville de Paris. His family belonged to the distinguished part of the robe nobility. At the death of his father in 1769, Lepeletier was both Count of Saint-Fargeau, Marquis of Montjeu, Baron of Peneuze, Grand Bailiff of Gien as well as the owner of 400,000 livres de rente. For five years he worked as avocat du roi at Châtelet, before becoming councilor in Parliament in 1783, general counsel in 1784 and finally taking over the prestigious position of président à mortier at the Parlement of Paris from his father in 1785. On May 16 1789, Lepeletier was elected to represent the nobility at the Estates General. On June 25 the same year he was one of the 47 nobles to join the newly declared National Assembly, two days before the king called on the rest of the first two estates to do so as well. A month later, during the night of August 4 1789, he was in the forefront of those who proposed the suppression of feudalism, even if, for his part, this meant losing 80 000 livres de rente. Four days later he wrote a letter to the priest of Saint-Fargeau, renouncing his rights to both mills, furnaces, dovecote, exclusive hunting and fishing, insence and holy water, butchery and haulage (the last four things the Assembly hadn’t ruled on yet). When the Assembly on June 19 1790 abolished titles, orders, and other privileges of the hereditary nobility, Lepeletier made the motion that all citizens could only bear their real family name — ”The tree of aristocracy still has a branch that you forgot to cut..., I want to talk about these usurper names, this right that the nobles have arrogated to themselves exclusively to call themselves by the name of the place where they were lords. I propose that every individual must bear his last name and consequently I sign my motion: Michel Lepeletier” — and the same year he also, in the name of the Criminal Jurisprudence Committee, presented a report on the supression of the penal code and argued for the abolition of the death penalty. After the closing of the National Assembly in 1791, Lepeletier settled in Auxerre to take on the functions of president of the directory of Yonne, a position to which he had been nominated the previous year. He did however soon thereafter return to Paris, as he, following the overthrow of the monarchy, was one of few former nobles elected to the National Convention, where he was also one of even fewer former nobles to sit together with the Mountain. In December 1792 he started working on a public education plan. On January 20 1793, he voted for death without a reprieve and against an appeal to the people during the trial of Louis XVI (Opinion de L.M. Lepeletier, sur le jugement de Louis XVI, ci-devant roi des François: imprimée par ordre de la Convention nationale). After the session was over, Lepeletier went over to Palais-Égalité (former Palais-Royal) where he dined everyday. The next day, his friend and fellow deputy Nicolas Maure could report the following to the Convention:
Citizens, it is with the deepest affection and resentment of my heart that I announce to you the assassination of a representative of the people, of my dear colleague and friend Lepelletier, deputy of Yonne; committed by an infamous royalist, yesterday, at five o'clock, at the restaurateur Fevrier, in the Jardin de l'Égalité. This good citizen was accustomed to dining there (and often, after our work, we enjoyed a gentle and friendly conversation there) by a very unfortunate fate, I did not find myself there; for perhaps I could have saved his life, or shared his fate. Barely had he started his dinner when six individuals, coming out of a neighboring room, presented themselves to him. One of them, said to be Pâris, a former bodyguard, said to the others: There's that rascal Lepeletier. He answered him, with his usual gentleness: I am Lepeletier, but I am not a rascal. Paris replied: Scoundrel, did you not vote for the death of the king? Lepelletier replied: That is true, because my confidence commanded me to do so.Instantly, the assassin pulled a saber, called a lighter, from under his coat and plunged it furiously into his left side, his lower abdomen; it created a wound four inches deep and four fingers wide. The assassin escaped with the help of his accomplices. Lepeletier still had the gentleness to forgive him, to pray that no further action would be taken; his strength allowed him to make his declaration to the public officer, and to sign it. He was placed in the hands of the surgeons who took him to his brother, at Place Vendôme. I went there immediately, led by my tender friendship, and my reverence for the virtues which he practiced without ostentation: I found him on his death bed, unconscious. When he showed me his wound, he uttered only these two words: I'm cold. He died this morning, at half past one, saying that he was happy to shed his blood for the homeland; that he hoped that the sacrifice of his life would consolidate Liberty; that he died satisfied with having fulfilled his oaths.
This was the first time a Convention deputy had gotten murdered, and it naturally caused strong reactions. Already the same session when Maure had announced Lepeletier’s death, the Convention ordered the following:
Do we have access to saint-just's personal letters if there any of them even exists? (I mean by personal is the letters he wrote to his family and relatives or friends etc.)
(The same question for robespierre, marat, camille, danton, desmoulins, the duplay family and other people from your personal choice if you find something)
We don’t have any complete correspondence from Saint-Just that I’m aware of, but some of his letters have been published within Oeuvres de Saint Just (1908) volume 1 (7 letters), volume 2 (2 letters). Of these, I would say the most personal ones are this letter SJ sent his brother-in-law in December 1791, congratulating him on his marriage, as well as this letter to Daubigny written the following year, which contains the (in)famous words: ”go and see Desmoulins, embrace him for me, and tell him I shall never see him again.” There’s also Lettres inédites de Saint-Just (five letters, half of which are work related and written while on mission) and Deux nouvelles lettres de Saint-Just à Garat (two letters). This last article includes the following letter, which I suppose also qualifies as personal:
Paris, July 8 Citizen and friend, It’s been a while since I’ve given you news of mine, nevertheless I have forgotten none of the testimonies of friendships that you’ve given me. When shall I have the pleasure of seeing you here again, the same time as last year when we saw each other? I have little leisure, I do what I can to respond to your trust and provided that I give an account of my moments to the people, friendship will not be more severe. I’m going to occupy myself with citizen Chassie, with the affair of citizen Bailli whom I pray you to assure of my most sincere attachment. If it pleases you, tell our common acquaintances that I have not forgotten them. I embrace your wife, your children and you. Saint-Just.
Aside from that:
Correspondance de Maximilien et Augustin Robespierre (1926) (I’ve already talked about in which letters you might find the most personal details in this old post)
La correspondance de Marat (1908) (not looked enough on this to say how many letters are personal and how many are strictly business related)
Correspondance de George Couthon (1872) (only work related letters as far as I’m aware, no letters to loved ones etc)
Correspondance inédite de Camille Desmoulins (1836) (quite a lot of personal details in the many letters Camille sent his father. English translations of letters to his father, Lucile and her mother can be found here. Here is also a long, personal letter Camille wrote in 1782, the oldest conserved one from him that I’m aware of.)
Danton — for being a ”main revolutionary” we have surprisingly few letters from him. All I know of at this point are presented in this post.
Duplays — the only personal Ietter I’m aware of is this one which Madame Duplay adressed to her second oldest daughter Sophie written 1793. Two letters from Robespierre to Maurice Duplay can also be found in the former’s correspondence.
Correspondance de Brissot (1912)
Two cute letters from Philippe to Élisabeth Lebas, both from November 1793. Many letters from Lebas to his father can also be found within Le Conventionnel Le Bas… (1901)
Was robespierre nicknamed also "crazy hyena" ?
I saw a post said that he was nicknamed like this by his enemies.
I can’t recall having seen Robespierre being nicknamed that anywhere, but it certainly doesn’t sound impossible, mean nicknames after all being something politicians have always had to deal with.
Tbh I kinda loved it ...
What was your plan in going to Robespierre’s house.
To talk to him in person.
What did you want to talk to Robespierre about?
I don’t want to give any response or explanation regarding this question.
Do you realize that your answers lead one to believe you had the intention of committing a crime, and that you must explain your intentions?
She does not want to explain further, and adds that she intended to ask him for instructions on the situation and the strengthening of the Republic.
Do you realize that your declarations and obstinacy to not want to explain yourself cannot be reconciled with such a plan, which is why I’m again asking you to explain yourself?
She persists in not wanting to answer.
Did anyone propose to you the plan of going home to Robespierre and did you tell anyone about it?
No.
Did you go to Robespierre’s house several times during the day?
No.
When you went to Robespierre, did you bring with you knives, and if yes, of which sort?
I had in my pocket two folding knives, one in tortoiseshell and the other in ivory, both trimmed in silver: the one made of ivory was given to me by my brother in 89, having found it at Prés-Saint-Gervais. The other was given to me by my grandmother three or four years ago. It was loaded with rust; I cleaned it and tried to remove the rust by scraping the blade with another knife, eight or nine days ago. I rarely use it.
Do you regularly carry two knives?
I carry the tortoiseshell one regularly, the ivory one showed up in my pocket, I didn’t know it was there.
When you went home to Robespierre, did you have the intention of using these knives to kill him?
No, moreover, we can judge as we please. Interrogation of Cécile Renault, held on May 24 1794
At that time, the indictment that I (Lecointre) was preparing against the traitor (Robespierre) and his accomplices was completed; Fréron who helped me with his insights, Barras, Rovère, Thirion, Courtois, Garnier de l'Aube, Guffroy and Tallien etc advised me to attack him in person, so that success would be more certain. The roles were divided to support my opinion, and to combat with force the sophisms of Robespierre, but they were of the opinion that the memoir should be printed and distributed an hour before being read at the National Convention: Guffroy was in charge and had promised, from the 6th, to have it printed; and it was solemnly sworn by us that if the truth succumbed, we would immolate the tyrant in the middle of the Convention. Conjuration formée dès le 5 préréal [sic] par neuf représentans du peuple contre Maximilien Robespierre, pour le poignarder en plein sénat: rapport et acte d’accusation dont la lecture devoit précéder dans la Convention cet acte de dévouement (1794), page 4
Bourdon de l'Oise, rightly frightened by the ease with which, until then, several batches of his colleagues had been delivered to the proscriptions of this tribunal, had wanted to exclude from the number of defendants, whom the two committees alone could bring there, any representative of the people: he had insisted that the decision could only emanate from the Convention itself, and by a special decree. On this subject, a great rumor arose within the assembly: the members of the two committees, whom Bourdon's motion implicitly accused of wanting to get hold of their antagonists, with Couthon and Robespierre at the forefront, had strongly qualified him as a caluminator. Robespierre, in his fury at being thus unveiled, had forgotten himself to the point of throwing the epithet of ”scoundrel” against Bourdon; and, far from retracting Bourdon's claim, he had insinuated that the latter was on his way to get arrested; that the committees could provoke it.
Bourdon, after this stormy session, had felt only too well that it was a fight to the death which had just begun between him and Robespierre: he had resolved to guarantee his own head, by the precipitous fall of that of Robespierre. It was with his own hand that he wanted to destroy this tyrant of the fatherland, this proud usurper who did not hesitate to degrade the national representation, in order to sacrifice it in detail to his disproportionate ambition. Once this decision to get rid of Robespierre by the dagger had settled in his head, Bourdon thought of taking, before the assassination attempt, some measures relative to his fortune. He took the keenest interest in a woman and several young children whose fate was linked to his own, and had made arrangements in their favor.
Now, it was me that Bourdon had chosen, to be both the preserver of his final wishes and the protector, after him, of these beings he loved. The day after 23 Prairial, Bourdon brought me to his house, making me believe that it was just a simple dinner. He then occupied a small bachelor's accommodation on rue des Saints-Pères in a house on the left, which only had a narrow door, without a doorman. His apartment was pointed out to me by a woman who was coming out, in despair at not having been able to get him to intercede for her husband. I had barely entered when Bourdon, without further circumlocution, said to me: “Listen, we’ve known each other for a long time; I know that you are a moderate patriot, that you are not very passionate about the republic; but you are an honest man, a good friend; and it is for these two reasons that I was able to open up to you about my projects and the measures they involve. Robespierre is my personal enemy; he attacked and threatened me in the middle of the Convention: he wants to kill me, in order to be able to more easily dominate the Convention and seize absolute power. I want to thwart his ambitious designs by immolating him with my own hand.”
At the same time, and as if he felt the need to convince me even more of the strength of his mind, he took out from under his bed an oblong casket, in which was tucked the coat he had worn on the day of the storming of the Bastille, the hat which, in the Vendée, had adorned his forehead as a representative of the people, and a large cutlass with which he was always armed on his expeditions. He took great care to point out to me that his coat was still covered with stains from the blood he had spilled at the Bastille, that his hat was riddled with the bullets of the Vendéens. As for the cutlass, he had more than once plunged it into the hearts of his enemies; it was the weapon with which he intended, at the first opportunity which presented itself, to strike Robespierre. I trembled lest the wall, which received these terrible confidences together with me, should share a syllable with anyone. Bourdon, to reassure me, said that for the development of his plan, he needed someone discreet enough to remain silent before and after the action; faithful enough to keep his will; zealous enough and enlightened enough to have it executed in due time. “It is you,” he said to me, “who will be my devoted confidant, I count on it and no longer worry about anything.” He immediately gave me his will with his instructions and some important titles.
God knows with what agitations this gift filled my soul, what bad nights I passed with the possession of this perilous deposit! At the slightest suspicion, at the slightest word of revelation, I would have been a dead man. What would happen if Bourdon had gotten arrested before or after the consummation of his revenge and the slightest indication of correspondence with him was administered against me? The sixteen days I spent in this state of uncertainty felt like centuries. Finally arrived, against all foresight, and without the isolated provocation on the part of Bourdon de l'Oise, this day, forever precious for humanity, of the 9th of Thermidor. Souvenirs de M. Berryer, doyen des avocats de Paris (1839)
Tallien: I demanded earlier that one tears apart the veil. With pleasure, I just saw that it is torn apart entirely, that the conspirators have been unmasked, that they will soon be annihilated, and that liberty will triumph. (Loud applause.) Everything announces that the enemy of the national representation will fall under its blows. We give a proof of our republican loyalty to our nascent republic. I forced myself to remain silent until now, because I knew of a man who approached the tyrant of France, that he had formed a proscription list. I did not want to remonstrate, but I have seen the session of the Jacobins yesterday: I have trembled for the patrie ; I have seen the army of a new Cromwell forming itself, and I am armed with a dagger in order to pierce its breast, if the National Convention did not have the courage to issue a décret d'accusation against him. (Loud applause.) Tallien at the Convention, July 27 1794
The only thing robespierre didn't get is a bounty poster for him.
A rare portrait of Lazare Carnot. Maybe he was around 30s~40s from this portrait. This portrait is so different from his other portraits, but the nose always remains alike. This portrait is from the book Lazare Carnot 'Organizer of Victory - Huntley Dupre (1975), an English version of the biograph of him.
And I also have found an online version of a book written by the same writer about Lazare Carnot on this site (This resource is also kept by an American University):
You can have an overview and details of Carnot's life，and find some interesting facts about him. Now I am reading it and finding it remarkable.
The rare portrait of him is from this site:
I remember an anecdote that mentioned Robespierre talking to his tobacconist. I think it was common (at least for men) at the time but I’m not sure how trustworthy that writing was. Do we know if Robespierre or any other frev figures frequently used tobacco?
The story of Robespierre using tobacco I remembered from Peter McPhee’s biography, where he writes the following:
[Robespierre] is said to have commented to his tobacco-seller, Mme Carvin, early in Thermidor that ”we’ll never get out of this mess; I’m worried sick (bourrelé); I’m going crazy (j’en ai la tête perdue).”
Peter you missed a golden opportunity to write ”I’m losing my head” instead of ”I’m going crazy.”
McPhee cited Alphonse Ésquiros’ Histoire des Montagnards (1851) as his source for this. Checking that book, it can however be discovered that Madame Carvin only gets described as ”a tobacco seller,” not ”Robespierre’s tabacco seller,” seemingly destroying the claim that Robespierre used it (even though I suppose it’s not impossible he went there to both talk and buy tobacco for himself).
At the end of a century which had profaned love, Robespierre distinguished himself by the purity of his morals and by the delicacy of his procedures towards a sex, which the literature of the time regarded as born almost solely for pleasure. Above all, he respected the marital bed. Attracted by habit, he went every day to a tobacco seller, Madame Carvin, who was very pretty. He liked to chat with her, but without ever deviating from the most respectful forms. His face expressed sadness when he spoke of the affairs of the day. ”We will never get out of this mess; I'm worried sick; I’m going crazy.”
Esquiros does however not cite any source for this anecdote, nor does he mention any madame Carvin under the section titled ”my witnesses” so not sure where he got this information from…
As for if any other revolutionary used tobacco, I currently only know of Philippeaux, who while in prison wrote the following to his wife:
Send me, I beg you, half a pound of tobacco; because I’ve been short of it since yesterday evening, and I would say almost like the good Swiss, that it’s as if I was out of bread.
I honestly think that he didn't take any tobacco because no one (who knows him personally) speak of it like Charlotte or élisabeth in their memorie, or even mentioned in letters by others or something, .. but what i say is not 100% true so yeah ..
i found this super interesting paper in French about the Law of 22 Prairial, summed up by the author Anne Jourdan like this:
The 22 Prairial law has a very bad reputation. But do we know it well? I am not sure. That is why I decided to study its reception, its implementation and its consequences. It allowed me to discover that historians are forgetting an important fact: that the repression and coercion of 1794 did not mean that injustice and terror were on the agenda. Conversely, there were institutional devices which made it possible to liberate patriots in custody. Studying this law and its implementation also enables to discover the networks for or against Robespierre and to investigate the part they were playing during the so-called Terror.
