The Storming of the Tuileries, June 1792

Louis XVI dons the Bonnet Rouge

Madame Royale describes the storming of the Tuileries palace on June 20, 1792 and how her family escaped death:

On the 20th of June, about eleven o'clock in the morning, nearly all the inhabitants of the faubourgs Saint-Antoine and Saint-Marceau, where the populace chiefly lived, marched in a body to the National Assembly, to go from there to the garden and plant the liberty-tree. But as they were all armed, which gave reason to suspect bad intentions, my father ordered the gates of the Tuileries to be closed. The Assembly showed great dissatisfaction, and sent a deputation of four municipals to induce the king to order the gates to be opened. These deputies spoke very insolently; said they exacted the opening of the gates in order that those who had come to plant the tree, the sign of liberty, might return that way, inasmuch as the crowd in the rue Saint-Honoré was too great to allow them to pass. My father, however, persisted in his refusal, and they then went and opened themselves the gates of the garden, which was instantly inundated by the populace; the gates of the courtyards and the château still remained locked. 

An hour later this armed procession began to defile before our windows, and no idea can be formed of the insults they said to us. Among others, they carried a banner on which were these words: 

"Tremble, tyrant; the people have risen;" and they held it before the windows of my father who, though he was not visible himself, could see all and hear their cries of "Down with Veto!" and other horrors. This lasted until three o'clock, when the garden was at last freed. The crowd then passed through the Place du Carrousel to the courtyards of the Tuileries, but quietly, and it was generally thought they were returning to their faubourgs. 

During this time our family were in the rooms on the courtyard side, absolutely alone and observing all that went on; the gentlemen of the suite and the ladies dined on the other side. Suddenly we saw the populace forcing the gates of the courtyard and rushing to the staircase of the château. It was a horrible sight to see, and impossible to describe–that of these people, with fury in their faces, armed with pikes and sabres, and pell-mell with them women half unclothed, resembling Furies. 

Two of the ushers wishing to run the bolts of my father's door, he prevented it and sprang himself into the next room to meet the rioters. My aunt followed him hastily, and hardly had she passed when the door was locked. My mother and I ran after her in vain; we could not pass, and at that moment several persons came to us, and finally, the guard. My mother cried out: "Save my son!" Immediately some one took him in his arms and carried him off. My mother and I, being determined to follow my brother, did all we could against the persons who prevented us from passing; prayers, efforts, all were useless, and we had to remain in our room in mortal anxiety. My mother kept her courage, but it almost abandoned her when, at last, entering my brother's room she could not find him. The persons who, on her own order, had carried him away lost their heads, and in the confusion, took him up higher in the château, where they thought him in greater safety. My mother then sent for him and had him brought back to his room. There we awaited, in the silence of profound anxiety, for news of what had happened to my father. 

Returning to him, I must resume at the moment when he passed through the door which was then locked against us. As soon as he thought the danger passed the king dismissed his suite, so that no one was with him but my Aunt Élisabeth, [Maréchal de Mouchy (who in spite of his 77 years and my father's order persisted in remaining), two old ushers, the brave Acloque, commander of the division of the National Guard, an example of fidelity in the uniform of rebellion], ¹ and M. d'Hervilly, lieutenant-colonel of the new King's-Guard, who, seeing the danger, ran to call the Guard and collected about twenty grenadiers, but on reaching the staircase he found only six had followed; the others had abandoned him. My father was therefore almost alone when the door was forced in by one sapeur, axe in hand raised to strike him, but [here] by his coolness and imperturbable courage my father so awed the assassin that the weapon fell from his hand,–an event almost incomprehensible. It is said that some one cried out: "Unhappy man, what are you about to do?" and that those words petrified him; for my part I think that what restrained that wretch was Divine Providence and the ascendancy that virtue always maintains over crime. 

The blow having thus failed, the other accomplices, seeing that their leader had let himself be cowed, dared not execute their evil designs. Of all this mass of the populace, there were certainly very few who knew precisely what they were expected to do. To each had been given twenty sous and a musket; they were sent in drunk with orders to insult us in every imaginable way. Their leader, Santerre, had brought them as far as the courtyard, and there he awaited the success of his enterprise. He was desperate on learning that his stroke had missed, and he came near being killed himself by a man in the château, who aimed for him, and was prevented from shooting only by remonstrances as to the danger to which he exposed my father; for if Santerre were sacrificed the brigands would surely avenge him. 

My father was nevertheless obliged to allow all these wretches to go through the rooms of the château, and, standing himself in a window with my aunt, he watched them pass before him and heard the insults with which they overwhelmed him. It was on this horrible day that my father and my aunt each made a memorable speech. At the moment of the greatest danger a soldier came up to the king and said to him, "Sire, fear nothing." My father took his hand and laid it on his own heart. "Does it beat hard, grenadier?" he said. Shortly before, my Aunt Élisabeth, being mistaken for the queen, saw herself exposed to the utmost fury of the brigands; some one near was about to make her known. "Do not undeceive them," cried my aunt with sublime devotion. 

This dreadful situation lasted from half-past three in the afternoon till eight at night. Pétion, mayor of Paris, arrived, pretending to be much astonished on hearing of the danger the king had run. In haranguing the people he had the impudence to say: "Return to your homes with the same dignity with which you came." The Assembly, seeing that the stroke had missed, changed its tone, pretended to have been ignorant of everything, and sent deputation after deputation to the king expressing the grief it feigned to feel for his danger. 

Meantime my mother, who, as I said, could not rejoin the king, and was in her apartment with my brother and me, was a long time without hearing any news. At last, the minister of war came to tell her that my father was well; he urged her to leave the room where we then were, as it was not safe, and we therefore went into the king's little bed-chamber. We were scarcely there before the rioters entered the apartment we had just left. The room in which we now were had three doors: one by which we had entered, another opening upon a private staircase, a third communicating with the Council Chamber. They were all three locked, but the first two were attacked, one by the wretches who were pursuing us, the other by men who came up the little staircase, where we heard their shouts and the blows of their axes. 

In this close danger my mother was perfectly calm; she placed my brother behind every one and near the door of the Council Chamber, which was still safe, then she placed herself at the head of us all. Soon we heard some one at the door of the Council Chamber begging to enter. It was one of my brother's servants, pale as death, who said only these few words: "Madame, escape! the villains are following me." At the same instant, the other doors were forced in. In this crisis my mother hastily ordered the third door opened and passed into the Council Chamber, where there were, already, a number of the National Guard and a crowd of wretches. 

My mother said to the soldiers that she came to take refuge with her son among them. The soldiers instantly surrounded us; a large table standing in the middle of the Chamber, served my mother to lean upon, my brother was seated on it, and the brigands defiled past it to look at us. We were separated from my father by only two rooms, and yet it was impossible to join him, so great was the crowd. We were therefore obliged to stay there and listen to all the insults that these wretches said to us as they passed. A half clothed woman dared to come to the table with a bonnet rouge in her hand and my mother was forced to let her [Page 236] place it on her son's head; as for us, we were obliged to put cockades on our heads. It was, as I have said, about eight o'clock when this dreadful procession of rioters ceased to pass and we were able to rejoin my father and aunt. No one can imagine our feelings at that reunion; they were such that even the deputies from the Assembly were touched. My brother was overcome with fatigue and they put him to bed. We stayed together for a time, the room being full of deputies. An hour later they went away, and about eleven o'clock, after having passed a most terrible day, we separated to get some rest . . . . 

The next day Pétion came again to play the hypocrite, saying he had heard of more assemblings of the people and he had hastened to defend the king. My father ordered him to be silent; but as he still tried to protest his attachment, my father said: "Be silent, monsieur; I know your thoughts." (Read more.)

 

Marie-Antoinette, her children, and Madame de Tourzel face the mob

 

 

 

 

Louis XVI was mocked with the "Red Cap of Liberty" which was displayed at the Paris Olympics. From Daily Sabah:

In the aftermath of the French Revolution, Louis XVI, the last king of France, was depicted in many paintings with a "Bonnet Rouge" (Red Cap) on his head. However, what is the story of this red cap with its long apex bent over to the front, and why was it placed the head of the French constitutional monarch before he was executed?

[...]

In ancient Rome, freed slaves were dressed in a white cap called a pileus. Brutus, who betrayed Caesar, chose this cap, which symbolizes freedom, as an expression of Rome's return to the republic, and engraved it on the coin he minted. But this fez, which looks like the white cap worn by Albanians today, actually had nothing to do with the red Phrygian cap.

With the American Revolution, the pileus became an omen of revolutionaries, anarchists, and republicans. It resurfaced with the protests against the Stamp Act of 1765 when Britain imposed a direct stamped paper tax on the British colonies in America.

In particular, a figure of British parliamentarian John Wilkes – nicknamed the "Devil," and known for his support of the American rebels – with this cap became very popular among the rebels known as the "Sons of Liberty."

French anarchists, who inherited this symbol from the American Revolution, preferred the Phrygian cap instead of the pileus. Thus, this red hermetic cap became the symbol of the French revolutionaries and freedom from 1789 onwards. For example, in a sculpture made by French artist Joseph Chinard in 1794, representing the revolution and the republic, a Phrygian cap was placed on the head of a woman in Roman attire. (Read more.)

Share

Councils in UK Move to Ban Union Jack Flag

 From The Daily BS:

So here we are in modern Britain: the country is in the middle of a World Cup run, streets are draped in red-and-white St. George’s Cross flags, and instead of a bit of national pride, some local authorities appear to see… a public safety emergency.

According to reporting from LBC, residents in Bristol’s Knowle West area say Torrington Avenue has become something of a grassroots celebration zone during major football tournaments, with flags routinely hanging from lampposts and railings.

But not everyone is clapping along. The Green-led administration at Bristol City Council has moved to clamp down on the displays, with council leader Tony Dyer issuing guidance effectively banning flags from public infrastructure. (Read more.)

Share

How Augustus’ Moral Laws Controlled Culture in Ancient Rome

 Believe it or not. From The Collector:

When Augustus emerged as the ultimate winner of the years of civil war that ended the Roman Republic, he set about rebuilding Rome. In truth, he was constructing a new city that reflected his new imperial regime, but this was dressed up as Rome restored to a mythical, glorious Republican past, before the destructive corruption of the late Republic. Augustus was focused on the physical city (turning a city of brick into one of marble) and the city’s soul: its people and traditions. Rome’s population and social norms had been decimated by years of conflict. Augustus tried to restore both through a series of legislation known as his “moral laws.”

When Octavian defeated Mark Antony at the Battle of Actium in 31 BC, he was left the undisputed ruler of Rome. Years of strongmen battling for power in civil wars had left the Republic in tatters and had allowed one man to emerge as an absolute ruler. But while the Republican system may have been broken, it was still beloved, and the assassination of Julius Caesar just over a decade earlier showed that, despite everything, Rome was not ready to accept a king.

This placed Octavian in a predicament. How could he secure and codify his power without invoking the wrath of the fickle Roman people? He did so by cloaking his new position in the traditions of the Republic. He gave up his extraordinary powers and instead used twists on Republican traditions. For example, he was awarded permanent imperium, giving him ultimate control of Rome’s armies, and accepted tribunicia potestas annually, allowing him to propose and veto laws. For his “sacrifices,” Octavian was awarded the name Augustus in 27 BC. (Read more.)

Share

The Flight to Montmédy

  On June 21, 1791, Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette, and their family were captured at Varennes after escaping from the Tuileries in Paris. The King begged the the grocer Sauce and his family not to hand them over to the authorities, saying:

I am your King; this is the Queen and the royal family. Surrounded in the capital by daggers and bayonets, I have come to the country, into the midst of my faithful subjects, to seek the peace and liberty you all enjoy. I could not stay in Paris; it would have been death to myself and my family. I have come to live among you my children, whom I will not forsake....Save my wife, save my children." (Webster, Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette during the Revolution, p.149)

His entreaties fell on deaf ears; the royal family were sent back to Paris where they all, except for young Madame Royale, met their deaths. It was Corpus Christi; the Royal Family passed the small home altars all along their route back to Paris and prison.

Some people find it interesting how a quatrain in the prophecies of Nostradamus appears to allude to the capture of the royal family at Varennes.

De nuict viendra par le forest de Reines,
Deux pars, vaultorte, Herne la pierre blanche,
Le moyne noir en gris dcdans Varennes:
Esleu Cap. cause tempeste, feu, sang, tranche.

By night shall come through the forest of Reines
Two parts, face about, the Queen a white stone,
The black monk in gray within Varennes.
Chosen Cap. causes tempest, fire, blood, slice.

Whether the prophecy genuinely refers to the night of Varennes or not, it was indeed the night that spelled the end of the monarchy.

Vive la Reine on some common misconceptions. [Falsehoods are in bold type]

Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette and the royal family were fleeing to the town of Varennes

The intended destination of the royal family was actually the royalist fortress of Montmedy.

Louis XVI intended to flee France

Louis XVI firmly refused to leave the country and, according to biographers such as Fraser, Webster, Hardman and more, turned down several flight routes to Montmedy which would have been much faster and safer because they briefly took him across the French border.

The coach which carried the royal family was recognized because it bore their royal arms/was too extravagant

The coach, presumably ordered by Axel Fersen, was large but not unusually so and was in fact based upon previously drafted plans for a Parisian’ companies carriage. It was not decorated with the arms of the royal family and, on the outside, was nothing out of the ordinary. The coach featured a variety of traveling amenities often used by those who could afford them - including a larder, cooker, fold-up table and chamber pots - because it was necessary for the flight to eliminate the need for its passengers to stop or leave the carriage. (Read entire post.)

The Royal Family returns to Paris after being captured at Varennes

Share

Wes Moore Wants to Choose His Opponent

I have already voted for Hale, during early voting. From Direct Line News:

In the closing days before Maryland’s June 23 Republican gubernatorial primary, something unusual is happening on television, on Facebook, and in mailboxes across the state. Governor Wes Moore’s reelection campaign and the Maryland Democratic Party are spending real money on advertising aimed squarely at Republican voters. The ads attack the two leading GOP candidates, Dan Cox and Ed Hale Sr. The stated rationale from Democrats is simple: they say they are informing the public. Republicans say the operation is designed to pick Moore’s preferred opponent in November.

[...]

Republican candidates have had enough of it. Cox and Hale both publicly condemned the effort as Democratic interference. Their frustration is understandable. The 2022 cycle demonstrated the danger of this strategy, not because Democrats openly backed Cox, but because the amplification of his conservative credentials helped him consolidate a primary coalition. Cox’s nomination handed Moore exactly the general election opponent Democratic strategists wanted. The strategy worked. Now Democrats are running it again.

The key question is whether it will work a second time. Sam Novey, chief strategist at the Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement at the University of Maryland College Park, offered a candid assessment. The jury, he said, remains out on pied piper effectiveness. Is spending money to elevate a weaker candidate worth the risk that the ads fail to move primary voters, while the funds could have gone elsewhere? And then there is reputational backlash. Republican activists who feel their primary has been manipulated have a way of channeling that anger into November turnout.

Democrats ran this play in 2022 and it worked. Cox won the primary. Moore won the fall by 35 points. Maryland Republicans cannot afford to let history repeat itself.

What Republicans Must Understand

There is a lesson here that Maryland Republicans need to absorb, and absorb quickly. When an incumbent governor with the resources of a statewide campaign apparatus and the backing of his state party is spending money in your primary, it is not because he fears you. It is because he has done the math. Moore’s team has made a calculation about which Republican candidate poses the lesser challenge in November. The advertising campaign is the logical result of that calculation. (Read more.)

Share

An Irishman Against American Slavery

From A Catholic Bard:

Daniel O’Connell  (August 6, 1775 – 15 May 15, 1847) hailed in his time as The Liberator, was the acknowledged political leader of Ireland’s Roman Catholic majority in the first half of the 19th century. His mobilisation of Catholic Ireland, down to the poorest class of tenant farmers, secured the final installment of Catholic emancipation in 1829 and allowed him to take a seat in the United Kingdom Parliament to which he had been twice elected. –Wikipedia

Gentlemen:

We have read, with the deepest affliction, not unmixed with some surprise and much indignation, your detailed and anxious vindication of the most hideous crime that has ever stained humanity—the slavery of men of color in the United States of America.

We are lost in utter amazement at the perversion of mind and depravity of heart which your address evinces.
How can the generous, the charitable, the humane, the noble emotions of the Irish heart, have become extinct among you? How can
your nature be so totally changed as that you should become the apologists and advocates of that execrable system which makes man the property of his fellow-man destroying the foundation of all moral and social virtues—condemns to ignorance, immorality, and irreligion, millions of our fellow-creatures—renders the slave hopeless of relief, and perpetuates oppression by law ; and, in the name of what you call a Constitution!

It was not in Ireland you learned this cruelty and inhumane.
Your mothers were gentle, kind, Their bosoms overflowed with the honey of human charity. Your sisters are, probably, many of them still among us, and participate in all that is good and benevolent in sentiment and action.
How, then, can you be so depraved? (Read more.)

 

Another Communist invention? From Tierney's Real News:

Portugal and Britain were the biggest slave-trading countries in the world - providing about 70% of all Africans transported to the colonies to work. Britain sent some 3 million African slaves to its colonies in the Caribbean, North America and South America from 1610-1807. How did they get them? They paid African leaders to “capture” and enslave their own brothers and sisters and sell them to British slave traders.

Black Muslims, who sold their own, were the WORST and most prolific slavers in history. They enslaved MILLIONS and still traffic and enslave their own in Africa TODAY in open slave markets on the streets.

Among the first documented Africans in British North America were approximately 20 men and women who arrived at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1619. They were seized by private slave traders from a slave ship bound for Mexico and traded in Virginia. The Africans worked the tobacco fields in Jamestown along with white indentured servants. Early Africans were also held as slaves by Native Americans, the original slave traders in North America, who enslaved other tribes as well.

The British were aided by loyal Native American tribes, slaves from Africa and Hessian troops from Germany to fight AGAINST American patriots.

IN OTHER WORDS, BLACK SLAVES WERE EXPORTED TO AMERICA BY THE BRITISH AND THEN BLACK SLAVES FOUGHT WITH AMERICAN INDIANS AND THE BRITISH AGAINST AMERICAN PATRIOTS.

In other words, black slaves and American Indians in America tried to STOP America from becoming a free and independent nation! They fought with their masters (the British) to try to defeat American patriots! That’s the truth that they refuse to tell us!

Therefore, the historical reality of the Revolutionary War directly challenges the idea that Juneteenth represents a more unifying national independence story than July 4th. IT DOES NOT.

During the Revolutionary war, thousands of enslaved individuals defected to the British military following Lord Dunmore’s Proclamation, taking up arms against the American Patriots. By fighting alongside the British Crown, these individuals actively worked to defeat the American revolution and preserve British colonial rule over the continent.

Juneteenth should be celebrated as a milestone of freedom, but it cannot replace the holiday that marks the birth of the very Republic that made that freedom legally possible. (Read more.)

Share

The Jewels of Marie-Antoinette

It is well-known that Marie-Antoinette had a fondness for diamonds, although she never even thought of purchasing Boehmer's necklace of the scandal; she preferred the money to be spent on ships for the French navy. The diamond necklace was not to her taste, anyway, which tended towards light, aerial creations. 

In the famous ensemble painting by Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun, the queen is shown wearing only a few pearls, while sitting near the jewel cabinet. The symbolism of this has been discussed by J.M. Charles-Roux and by some art historians. It was to emphasize that for Marie-Antoinette her children were her true jewels. When the painting was begun in 1786, the queen was expecting baby Sophie; the gown she is wearing is a maternity gown, as can be seen by the open and adjustable front. The emphasis of the painting was supposed to be the other children getting the cradle ready for the new baby. However, by the time the picture was completed in 1788, little Sophie had been born and had died. Hence, the cradle is shrouded in mourning cloth.

After the death of her oldest son Louis-Joseph, Marie-Antoinette had the image hidden away; she could not bear the sight of it. Nevertheless, it was considered a highly accurate likeness of her. Louis XVI declared to the artist when first gazing at the portrait of his wife and children: "I do not understand much about painting, but you make me love it."

Share

Trump Changed the Math

 From Direct Line News:

We have an Iranian Peace framework deal that doesn’t sell out our allies, to judge every Iran agreement against the same standard: did it stop the bomb? That is the wrong question. The right question is simpler and far more revealing. Did it change Iran? By that measure, the 2015 Obama nuclear agreement was a polished failure wrapped in diplomatic ribbon. And by that same measure, the Trump framework now taking shape is something categorically different.

Critics of the emerging Trump deal have been quick to note surface similarities to the Obama-era Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. Both involve inspections. Both involve enrichment caps. Both involve sanctions relief. But this comparison confuses the instrument with the goal. The JCPOA was a transaction. The Trump approach is a transformation. Or at least it must become one, because anything less will leave America managing a threat it should have ended years ago.

Let us be honest about what the JCPOA was and was not. It was a nuclear agreement. Nothing more. Iran’s enrichment capacity was capped, its stockpiles were reduced, and international inspectors were invited to monitor compliance. Supporters argued, with some justification, that it extended Iran’s theoretical nuclear breakout time from months to roughly a year. That is not nothing.

But here is what the deal did not touch. Iran kept thousands of centrifuges spinning. It retained its enrichment infrastructure intact. The agreement included sunset clauses that would eventually expire, at which point Iran would be legally entitled to expand its nuclear activities far beyond pre-deal levels. Most critically, the JCPOA said precisely nothing about Iran’s ballistic missile program, and not a word about Hezbollah, Hamas, or the network of regional proxy forces that Iran used to destabilize Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen. (Read more)

Share

The Christology of the Stairs: Medieval Raised Sanctuaries vs. Modern "Worship Spaces"

 From Hilary White at The Sacred Images Project:

Visitors to the medieval churches of Umbria and Tuscany are often surprised by an architectural feature that is found surviving in great abundance in our area; raised or elevated sanctuaries in our most ancient churches. That is, the place where the liturgical actions happen, that we are used to seeing conducted right in front of us, is set on a high platform, sometimes as much as 15 feet above the level of the nave, and mostly impossible to see.

We’re used to the sanctuary part of the church being raised at least a few feet above the level of the nave, often with the altar raised again on a stepped platform, but several meters? So high the congregation can’t see anything?

Architecture always catechizes. We all know that Catholic church architecture is used to express particular beliefs about the nature of reality, Christology, man’s relationship with God and his proper place in creation. Most Catholic churches, until the middle of the twentieth century, were built on a cruciform floor plan. The church itself is the image of the crucified Christ; the faithful literally enter into the symbol. Medieval builders extended this symbolic language far beyond the floor plan. Every aspect of the building could be made to communicate theological truths. These ancient stone churches emerge from a worldview that understands reality itself as hierarchical, which the designers of the elevated sanctuaries took very literally.

 Why are so many ancient churches in Umbria and Tuscany built with sanctuaries raised high above the congregation, sometimes so high that much of the liturgy would have been difficult to see? It has very little to do with practicality and a great deal to do with how medieval Christians understood Christ, the Mass, heaven, earth and the structure of reality itself. (Read more.)

Share