Nasty subject, but...

[victoriavandal.livejournal.com]

I don't think any of the history books I've read have ever really gone into this, but - presumably, as originally intended, the Thermidor plot was to have Robespierre and co. arrested, imprisoned, and then, presumably, put on trial before the Tribunal. Could they have seriously been confident in a conviction? Some accounts of the day suggest that the Robespierristes were reluctant to be 'freed' because it appears they reckoned a trial was a better option for them, Marat style. It would also have given Robespierre's supporters more time to organise. So, what were the plotters thinking? Just 'it's now or never and we'll work the next bit out when we come to it'? Any thoughts on this?

Another bit of unpleasantness on the same subject - I recently came across an account that suggests there wasn't any lead in the wound in Robespierre's jaw, i.e., that it was a shot from a pistol charged with gunpowder but no lead bullet: that would still cause a fair bit of damage, specially if fired into your mouth, which is the suicide method, but wouldn't smash your skull...sorry, I've had toothache all week so that's the sort of thing I've been wondering about!

Comments

[wolfshadow713.livejournal.com]

I think had there been some sort of official "gardening leave", the French Revolution could have run a quite different course. But then again, argueably Danton's mistake was ducking out of politics. But, had the respective leaders of the Mountain and the Brissotins been made to go calm down, things could have been rather different.

[victoriavandal.livejournal.com]

Even modern cabinets fight like rats in a sack - the revolutionary ones must have been living with a few hours sleep snatched in the committee rooms themselves, fuelled by coffee and alcohol, fighting wars on all fronts whilst trying to reshape a nation - I'm actually amazed they last as long as they do: I read accounts saying that days are like weeks and weeks like years. They must have been frazzled.

[hanriotfran.livejournal.com]

I think I've already said it...But every time I read about these last weeks at the Committee or watchs a movie about it, I get so nervous that I can't barely bear myself! The issues they were duscussing about were really very delicate, and these men were used after five Revolution's years. I think they all need a few days taking a good holiday at the mountains or the beach, but unfortunately, they couldn't. Too many troubles, too many people wanting to overthrown the Revolutionnary Governement, the war...It was impossible for them to take some rest. And there were not nerve pills!

HanriotFran (Vanesa)

[wolfshadow713.livejournal.com]

I wonder if things would have been better off had the National Assembly stayed at Versailles. True, they would be in less immediate control of Paris and he who loses Paris loses France. But, in Paris, to control Paris, they let it control them, so perhaps some physical distance between themselves and the angery sans-culottes would have been a healthy thing?
It's hard to govern rationally when you know radicals, enemies, etc are beating on the door demanding that you listen to them or there'll be an insurrection. When the sense of imediate physical danger is that real, decisions are bound to be more motivated by panic and fear of things falling apart than rationality. Had the deputies not felt so imediately threatened by the crowds gathering outside, would they have expelled the Girondins? Would a lot have happened?

[victoriavandal.livejournal.com]

I think the Assembly would have been nipped in the bud, the left marginalised out of existence and a settlement nice for maybe the upper echelons of the middle classes arrived at, but that'd be it. Paris gives it a sort of fortified protection from the court and without that, I think the court/nobility would have won, by force of arms if need be. Catch 22 - then Paris becomes what (depending on your political point of view!) could be seen as the Convention's jailer (no, that's not the right term - arm twister, maybe, bouncer), not just for the Girondins but also the Montagnards on 5th September etc. The very thing they need to survive is the thing that threatens it...I think a lot of things in the Revolution are like that, though - viz, Robespierre's temperament: without that extraordinary, inflexible drive ("above all, tenacious") the project would never have got so far, but sadly I think politicians need flexibility, compromise, etc. to survive in the long term (Vetinari, the benign tyrant in the Discworld books, was described by Terry Pratchet as a cross between Robespierre and Machiavelli - that sort of thing's what you need!) I also think, though, the bourgeois Convention members don't really comprehend the fears of the working classes over various issues until they have snowballed (I really need to get a good book on the Enrages and co.!)

[hanriotfran.livejournal.com]

Yes. But in that case, the French revolution would stayed in the "moderate" face...And if you read my username, you'll understand that I'm not precissely against the Girondins being expelled from the Convention...*cough*

HanriotFran (Vanesa)

[wolfshadow713.livejournal.com]

It depends on how we define the moderate phase. In the early days of the National Assembly, the leaders of what would later become the Girondin/Brissotin and Montagnard/Jacobin factions shared a lot of the same ideas of radical social reform--even total moderates like Lafayette did--and what drew a number of politicians away from liberalism (including the Montagnards, when you consider their later support of sensorship, etc) was, aside from fear of invading armies which nothing could have helped, fear of the power of the mob.

[victoriavandal.livejournal.com]

But there's also the influence of the right - the influence of pressure and bribery from the aristocracy/court undermining many (willingly or just going with the flow). The third estate are new to politics, and as they're finding their feet (forgive tortured metaphor here!) they keep having the rug pulled from under them by discovering betrayal after betrayal (Mirabeau etc.). Trust and confidence in your presumed colleagues vanish very quickly in that atmosphere.

[victoriavandal.livejournal.com]

Something I'd forgotten - the British House of Commons chamber is designed so that the rival seats are two-swords-lengths apart, and there are lines painted on the floor you are not allowed to step over, so you can't kill each other (in the chamber, at least!).