history

The Great French Revolution

Part 2, including the Napoleonic Era

Following the overthrow of the limited monarchy on August 10,

1792, a National Convention consisting of representatives was

elected and began work on a new constitution in September

1792. The National Convention became known as the First

French Republic.

Initially controlled by Girondins. These were moderate

republicans whose leaders came from the Gironde, a department

of France. The Girondins were opposed by the more radical

Jacobins.

Republicans in this context=those favoring a government

without a king.

Department=a large administrative unit; sort of like provinces or

states.

The most radical Jacobins belonged to “the Mountain”*; the

most famous was Maximilien Robespierre (known as the

“Incorruptible”).

The Jacobins took over the National Convention on June 1793

following an uprising by the sans-culottes (more on them a little

later).

*Mountain: because they sat in the highest benches in the room

where the National Convention met. It was shaped like our

classroom.

Georges Danton, 1759-1794,

early Jacobin leader

Maximilien Robespierre, 1758-1794,

the “Incorruptible,” leader of the Mountain,

the radical Jacobins

Among the most enthusiastic supporters of the Jacobins

were the sans-culottes (“without britches),” mostly

radicalized shopkeepers and craftsmen, who were well-

organized and staged several huge demonstrations.

The Convention eventually (April 1793) created a 12-man

Committee of Public Safety, which became the executive

arm of the Convention.

A sans-culotte Sans-culottes

The Jacobin led government built up the army (to a million men, by mid-1794),

and tried to mobilize the entire population for the war effort. Remember from

the previous lecture, France was at war.

Also, it instituted “terror” (especially, widespread use of the guillotine or

“blade of liberty”) against real and alleged enemies of the revolution.

Most of the enemies were in the Vendée region in western France, where

priests and nobles had stirred up the peasants in a rebellion against the

revolutionary government in 1793. This counter-revolution was put down

with enormous loss of life (ca. 70,000).

A “reign of terror” was introduced, especially in Paris, to deal

with real and imagined enemies of the revolutionary

government. The guillotine “blade of liberty”) was the principal

means used to deal with “enemies.”

Louis XVI was executed in January 1793; Marie Antoinette in

October 1793; there were 25,00-40,000 executions in all.

These included 1300 executions in Paris in June-July 1794.

Many of those killed were good revolutionaries. The revolution

had begun devouring its own children, so to speak.

Parisians finally turned against the terror. Robespierre was

blamed for the excesses, and he met the “blade of liberty” on

July 28, 1794.

The Convention eventually wrapped up its work and created yet

another government, a republic consisting of a legislative assembly

and a five-man executive body, the Directory.

This government lasted from November 1795 to November 1799.

It was known for its corruption but benefited from good harvests

and a general economic turnaround in France.

Meanwhile, the war continued and victorious generals emerged

as superstars; also, popular enthusiasm for the revolution waned.

Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821), who came from the minor nobility, was the

biggest superstar among the generals.

1. With the aid of a pair of accomplices and his troops, he seized power in a coup

d'état on November 9, 1799—the 18th Brumaire, according to the revolutionary

calendar.

2. He assumed the title of First Consul (an ancient Roman title), and in December

1804, crowned himself emperor of the French.

3. One of his achievements was the Code Napoleon, a law code that solidified

some of the gains of the revolution (e.g., security of property rights, equality

before the law for men, and equality of opportunity), yet treated women as

inferior, and accepted the traditional double standard for relations between

husbands and wives.

Napoleon as Emperor Napoleon as General

4. He also made peace with Catholic Church, then headed by Pope Pius VII;

Napoleon broke to some extent with Revolution's anticlericalism (opposed to the

influence of the clergy)*; Catholic worship protected by law, but state continued

to have upper hand in relations with Catholic Church; church lands not returned.

5. He established principle of government by experts to produce efficiency, one

of the hallmarks of modern society: government by those with specialized

expertise.

6. Finally, he hanged basis of governmental authority in France: Napoleon could

not claim to rule by tradition or divine sanction; instead, he claimed to represent

the nation (thereby tapping into the popular nationalism instigated by the

revolution).

*Early on, the revolutionaries had confiscated church land to sell for money to

pay off the national debt.

Napoleon, continued:

He was most famous as a military commander. The warfare that had begun a

decade earlier ceased temporarily with the Treaty of Amiens in 1802. It flared up

again in 1805.

Napoleon wanted to invade Britain, but the French navy was defeated by

Lord Horatio Nelson's British warships at Trafalgar (near the coast of

southwestern Spain) on October 21, 1805.

Henceforth, Napoleon had to concentrate on gaining supremacy on the continent.

Napoleon’s greatest achievements as general occurred during the so-

called wars of the Third and Fourth Coalitions: France vs. Britain,

Prussia, Austria, and Russia, in 1805-07.

Napoleon defeated the Austrians and Russians at Austerlitz on

December 2, 1805. Then he crushed the Prussians at Jena and

Auerstadt on October 14, 1806, and defeated the Russians at Friedland

on June 13, 1807.

Shortly thereafter, he negotiated an alliance (the Treaty of Tilsit) with

Russia’s Tsar Alexander I (July 7 and 9).

Battle of Friedland

Napoleon set up the “Continental System”: meant to bar the British from

trading on the continent. Napoleon didn't have the means to prevent a

significant amount of smuggling of British goods into Europe.

The system also antagonized Europeans. Napoleon further angered them

with his plans for redrawing the map of Europe, creating satellite

kingdoms for France at the expense of Prussia, Austria, and Russia, and

placing relatives and generals on the thrones of the new countries.

Problems for Napoleon:

1) guerilla warfare against French in Spain:

dates from 1809 (Napoleon had seized Spain and Portugal in 1808).

2) Napoleon's worsening relationship with Alexander I,

which led to invasion of Russia by the “Grand Army”

(420,000 troops; eventually 600,000, vs. 200,000 Russians,

eventually circa 400,000) in June of 1812. Napoleon drove

deep into Russia, aiming for Moscow.

Alexander I of Russia, 1801-1825

Field Marshal Michael Kutuzov

The biggest battle: Borodino (75 miles from Moscow) on

September 7. Napoleon threw 120,000-130,000 troops against

Michael Kutuzov's 100,00-112,000 Russians. Russians

suffered 40,000-58,000 casualties, the French and their allies

28,000-50,000: but the battle was essentially a stand-off.

A week later, on September 14, Napoleon led his army into

Moscow. He stayed there about a month. Unable to feed his

large army and confronted with the prospect of an early winter,

he beat a strategic retreat that turned into an epic military

disaster that claimed all but about 50,000 of his men.

Russian guerrilla units sprang up to shoot at Napoleon’s army

until its remnants left Russian territory

Napoleon made it back to France and raised yet another

army.

• Defeated at Leipzig: the Battle of Nations in October,

1813.

• Napoleon abdicated in early April, 1814; went into exile

on island of Elba.

• Returned to France on March 1, 1815; defeated at

Waterloo by British and Prussians under the Duke of

Wellington on June 18, 1815.

• Died of stomach cancer in exile on remote island of St.

Helena on May 5, 1821.

The weird epilogue. After his body was exhumed in 1840

(and sent to France), it was well preserved. O)new theory is

that on St. Helena someone actually murdered him, slowly,

by spiking his wine with arsenic, a preservative

Duke of Wellington

Effects of French Revolution & Napoleonic Era:

1. popularized new political ideas and ideals: especially

a. civil equality;

b. rights (encapsulated in the slogan “liberty,

equality, fraternity”) as opposed to privileges;

c. constitutionalism—written constitutions to codify and

protect rights;

d. popular sovereignty—government belongs

to the people;

e. revolution—to change society and government;

f. nationalism

2. Inaugurated nationalism and mass-based politics

(key example of latter: the sans-culottes)

3. Gave impetus for revolutions in Latin America against

European (French, Portuguese, Spanish) rule as native

populations took advantage of turmoil in Europe to fight

for national liberation.

4. Eventually furnished inspiration and an enduring model

of revolution for radical-minded political activists of

the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, spawning the

idea of professional revolutionaries.

5. Induced a backlash or counter-revolution across Europe (1815-

1848). A Holy Alliance—consisting of the Russian Empire,

Austrian Empire, and Prussia—to combat revolution was formed on

26 September, 1815.

It was dedicated to the principle of ruling on the basis of the

"sublime truths which the Holy Religion of Our Savior teaches."

British Foreign Secretary Robert Stewart Castlereagh called the

Holy Alliance "a piece of sublime mysticism and nonsense.“

The Holy Alliance made war on a concept: revolution.

Our leaders don’t learn from the past: war on terror=war on a

concept (so far at least $7 trillion + a lesson yet to be learned).

6. Chronic political instability in France, which came to be viewed

as the homeland of revolution

7. helped create the modern spectral view of politics or political

spectrum

Next up: The effects of the French Revolution and European

Politics from 1815 to 1848.

Attendance question: What is a republican form of

government?