courageous man at its head, M. Tarbé des Sablons. This virtuous
magistrate endeavoured to prove to the multitude, (with which the Hôtel
de Ville was immediately filled by the news, rapidly propagated, of the
arrest of the old Mayor of Paris,) that the passports granted at Nantes,
countersigned at Rennes, showed nothing irregular; that according to the
terms of the law, he could not but set Bailly at liberty, under pain of
forfeiture. Vain efforts! To avoid a bloody catastrophe, it was
necessary to promise that reference would be made to Paris, and that in
the mean time he should be guarded--_à vue_--in his own house.
The surveillance, perhaps purposely, was not at all strict; to escape
would have been very easy. Bailly utterly discarded the notion. He would
not at any price have compromised M. Tarbé, nor even his guard.
An order from the Committee of Public Safety enjoined the authorities of
Mélun to transfer Bailly to one of the prisons of the capital. On the
day of departure, Madame Laplace paid a visit to our unfortunate
colleague. She represented to him again the possibility of escape. The
first scruples no longer existed; the escort was already waiting in the
street. But Bailly was inflexible. He felt perfectly safe. Madame
Laplace held her son in her arms; Bailly took the opportunity of turning
the conversation to the education of children. He treated the subject,
to which he might well have been thought a stranger, with a remarkable
superiority, and ended even with several amusing anecdotes that would
deserve a place in the witty and comic gallery of "les Enfants
terribles."
On arriving at Paris, Bailly was imprisoned at the Madelonnettes, and
some days after at La Force. They there granted him a room, where his
wife and his nephews were permitted to visit him.
Bailly had undergone only one examination of little importance, when he
was summoned as a witness in the trial of the queen.
BAILLY IS CALLED AS A WITNESS IN THE TRIAL OF THE QUEEN.--HIS OWN TRIAL
BEFORE THE REVOLUTIONARY TRIBUNAL.--HIS CONDEMNATION TO DEATH.--HIS
EXECUTION.--IMAGINARY DETAILS ADDED BY ILL-INFORMED HISTORIANS TO WHAT
THAT ODIOUS AND FRIGHTFUL EVENT ALREADY PRESENTED.
Bailly, under the weight of a capital accusation, and precisely on
account of a portion of the acts imputed to Marie Antoinette, was heard
as a witness in the trial of that princess. The annals of tribunals,
either ancient or modern, never offered any thing like this. What did
they hope for? To lead our colleague to make inexact declarations, or to
concealments from a feeling of imminent personal danger? To suggest the
thought to him to save his own head at the expense of that of an unhappy
woman? To make virtue finally stagger? At all events, this infernal
combination failed; with a man like Bailly it could not succeed.
"Do you know the accused?" said the President to Bailly. "Oh! yes, I do
know her!" answered the witness, in a tone of emotion, and bowing
respectfully to Marie Antoinette. Bailly then protested with horror
against the odious imputations that the act of accusation had put into
the mouth of the young dauphin. From that moment Bailly was treated with
great harshness. He seemed to have lost in the eyes of the tribunal the
character of a witness, and to have become the accused. The turn that
the debates took would really authorize us to call the sitting in which
the queen was condemned, (in which she figured ostensibly as the only
one accused,) the trial of Marie Antoinette and of Bailly. What
signified, after all, this or that qualification of this monstrous
trial? in the judgment of any man of feeling, never did Bailly prove
himself more noble, more courageous, more worthy, than in this difficult
situation.
Bailly appeared again before the Revolutionary Tribunal, and this time
as the accused, the 10th of November 1793. The accusation bore chiefly
on the pretended participation of the Mayor of Paris in the escape of
Louis XVI. and his family, and in the catastrophe that occurred in the
Champ de Mars.
If any thing in the world appeared evident, even in 1793, even before
the detailed revelations of the persons who took a more or less direct
part in the event, it is, that Bailly did not facilitate the departure
of the royal family; it is that, in proportion to the suspicions that
reached him, he did all that was in his power to prevent their
departure; it is, that the President of the sitting of the Jeu de Paume
had not, and could never have had in any case, an intention of going to
join the fugitive family in a strange country; it is that, finally, any
act emanating from a public authority in which such expressions as the
following could be found: "The deep wickedness of Bailly.... Bailly
thirsted for the people's blood!" must have excited the disgust and
indignation of good men, whatever might be their political opinions.
The accusation, as far as it regarded the murderous fusillade on the
Champ de Mars, had more weight; this event had as counterpoises, the
10th of August and the 31st of May; La Fayette says in his memoirs, that
those two days were a retaliation. It is at least certain that the
terrible scenes of the 17th of July cost Bailly his life; they left deep
impressions in people's minds, which were still perceptible after the
revolution of 1830, and which, on more than one occasion, rendered the
position of La Fayette one of great delicacy. I have therefore studied
them most attentively, with a very sincere and lively desire to
dissipate, once for all, the clouds that seemed to have obscured this
point, this sole point, in the life of Bailly. I have succeeded,
Gentlemen, without ever having had a wish or occasion to veil the truth.
I do no Frenchman the injustice to suppose that I need define to him an
event of the national history that has been so influential on the
progress of our revolution, but perhaps, there may be some foreigners
present at this sitting. It will be therefore for them only that I shall
here relate some details. We must bring to mind some deplorable
circumstances of the evening of the 17th July, when the multitude had
assembled on the Champ de Mars or Champ de la Fédération, around the
altar of their country, the remains of the wooden edifice that had been
raised to celebrate the anniversary of the 14th of July. Part of this
crowd signed a petition tending to ask the forfeiture of the throne by
Louis XVI., then lately reconducted from Varennes, and on whose fate the
Constituent Assembly had been enacting regulations. On that occasion
martial law was proclaimed. The National Guard, with Bailly and La
Fayette at their head, went to the Champ de Mars; they were assailed by
clamours, by stones, and by the firing of a pistol; the Guard fired;
many victims fell, without its being possible to say exactly how many,
for the estimates, according to the effect that the reporters wished to
produce, varied from eighty to two thousand!
The Revolutionary Tribunal heard several witnesses relative to the
events on the Champ de Mars: amongst them I find Chaumette, Procurator
of the Commune of Paris; Lullier, the Syndic Procurator General of the
Department; Coffinhal, Judge of the Revolutionary Tribunal; Dufourny,
manufacturer of gunpowder; Momoro, a printer.
All these witnesses strongly blamed the old Mayor of Paris; but who is
there that does not know how much arbitrariness and cruelty these
individuals, whom I have mentioned above, showed during our misfortunes?
Their declarations, therefore, must be received with great suspicion.
The sincere admirers of Bailly would be relieved of a great weight, if
the event of the Champ de la Fédération had been darkened only by the
testimonies of Chaumettes and Coffinhals. Unfortunately, the public
accuser produced some very grave documents during the debates, which the
impartial historian cannot overlook. Let us say, however, just to
correct one error out of a thousand, that on the day of Bailly's trial,
the public accuser was Naulin, and not Fouquier Tinville,
notwithstanding all that has been written on this subject by persons
calling themselves well-informed, and even some of the accused's
intimate friends.
The catastrophe of the Champ de Mars, when impartially examined in its
essential phases, presents some very simple problems:
Was a petition to the Constituent Assembly illegal that was got up on
the 17th of July, 1791, against a decree issued on the 15th?
Had the petitioners, by assembling on the Champ de Mars, violated any
law?
Could the two murders committed in the morning be imputed to these men?
Had projects of disorder and rebellion been manifested with sufficient
evidence to justify the proclamation of martial law, and especially the
putting it into practice?
I say it, Gentlemen, with deep grief, these problems will be answered in
the negative by whoever takes the trouble to analyze without passion,
and without preconceived opinions, some authentic documents, which
people in general seem to have made it a point to leave in oblivion. But
I hasten to add, that considering the question as to intention, Bailly
will continue to appear, after this examination, quite as humane, quite
as honourable, quite as pure as we have found him to be in the other
phases of a public and private life, which might serve as a model.
In the best epochs of the National Assembly, no one who belonged to it
would have dared to maintain, that to draw up and sign a petition,
whatever might be the object of it, were rebellious acts. Never, at that
time, would the President of that great Assembly have called down hate,
public vengeance, or a sanguinary repression upon those who attempted,
said Charles Lameth, in the sitting of the 16th of July, "to oppose
their individual will to the law, which is an expression of the national
will." The right of petition seemed as if it ought to be absolute, even
if contrary to sanctioned and promulgated laws in full action, and even
more so against legislative arrangements still under discussion, or
scarcely voted.
The petitioners of the Champ de Mars asked the Constituent Assembly to
revise a decree that they had issued two days before. We have no
occasion to examine whether the act was reasonable, opportune, dictated
by an enlightened view of the public good. The question is simple; in
soliciting the Assembly to revise a decree, they violated no law.
Perhaps it will be thought that the petitioners at least committed an
unusual act, contrary to all custom. Even this would be unfounded. In
ten various instances, the National Assembly modified or annulled its
own decrees; in twenty others, it had been entreated to revise them,
without any cry of anarchy being raised.
It is well ascertained, that the crowd on the Champ de Mars availed
itself of a right that the constitution recognized, that of getting up
and signing a petition against a decree which, right or wrong, it
thought was opposed to the true interests of the country. Still, the
exercise of the right of petitioning was always wisely subjected to
certain forms. Had these forms been violated? Was the meeting illegal?
In 1791, according to the decrees, every meeting that wished to exercise
the right of petition must consist of unarmed citizens, and be announced
to the competent authorities twenty-four hours beforehand.
Well, on the 16th of July, twelve persons had gone as a deputation to
the municipality, in order to declare, according to law, that the next
day, the 17th, numerous citizens would meet, without arms, on the Champ
de Mars, where they wished to sign a petition. The deputation obtained
an acknowledgment of its declaration from the hand of the syndic
procurator Desmousseaux, who addressed them besides with these solemn
words: "The law shields you with its inviolability."
The acknowledgment was presented to Bailly on the day of his
condemnation.
Had they committed some assassinations? Yes, undoubtedly; they had
committed two; but in the morning, very early; but at the Gros Caillou,
and not on the Champ de Mars. Those horrid murders could not
legitimately be imputed to the petitioners who, eight or ten hours
after, surrounded the altar of their country; to the crowd who fell by
the fusillade of the National Guard. By changing the date of these
crimes, and displacing also the localities where these crimes were
committed, some historians of our revolution, and amongst others the
best known of all, have given, without intending it, to the meeting in
the afternoon, a character that cannot be honestly concurred in.
It is requisite we should know at what hour, in what place, and how,
these misfortunes happened, before we hazard an opinion on the
sanguinary acts of that day, the 17th of July.
A young man had gone that day very early to the altar of his country.
This young man wished to copy several inscriptions. All at once he heard
a singular noise, and very soon after the worm of a wimble shot up from
the planked floor on which he was standing. The youth went and sought
the guard, who raised the plank, and found beneath the altar two
ill-looking individuals, lying down, and furnished with provisions. One
of these men was an invalid with a wooden leg. The guard seized them,
and took them to the Gros Caillou, to the section, to the Commissary of
Police. On the way, the barrel of water with which these unfortunate men
had provided themselves under the altar of their country, was
transformed, according to the ordinary course of things, into a barrel
of gunpowder. The inhabitants of that quarter of the town collected
together; it was on a Sunday. The women especially showed themselves
very much irritated when the purpose of the auger-holes was told them,
as declared by the invalid. When the two prisoners came out of the hall
to be conducted to the Hôtel de Ville, the crowd tore them from the
guard, massacred them, and paraded their heads on pikes!
It cannot be too often repeated, that these hideous assassinations,
this execution of two old vagabonds by the barbarous and blinded
population of the Gros Caillou, evidently had no relation to, no
connection with, the events which, in the evening, carried mourning into
the Champ de la Fédération.
On the evening of the 17th of July, from five to seven o'clock, had the
crowd which was collected around the altar of their country an aspect of
turbulence, giving reason to fear a riot, sedition, violence, or any
anarchical enterprise?
Relative to this point, we have the written declaration of three
councillors, whom the municipality had sent in the morning to the Gros
Caillou, on the first intimation of the two assassinations of which I
have just spoken. This declaration was presented to Bailly on the day of
his condemnation. We read therein, "that the assembled citizens on the
Champ de Mars had in no way acted contrary to law; that they only asked
for time to sign their petition before they retired; that the crowd had
shown all possible respect to the commissaries, and given proofs of
submission to the law and its agents." The Municipal Councillors, on
their return to the Hôtel de Ville, accompanied by a deputation of
twelve of the petitioners, protested strongly against the proclamation
of martial law; they declared that if the red flag was unfurled, they
would be regarded, and with some appearance of reason, as traitors and
faithless men.
Vain efforts; the anger of the councillors, confined since the morning
at the Hôtel de Ville, carried the day over the enlightened opinion of
those who had been sent scrupulously to study the state of affairs, who
had mixed in the crowd, who returned after having reassured it by
promises.
I might invoke the testimony of one of my honourable colleagues. Led by
the fine weather, and somewhat also by curiosity, towards the Champ de
Mars, he was enabled to observe all; and he has assured me that there
never was a meeting which showed less turbulence or seditious spirit;
that especially the women and children were very numerous. Is it not,
besides, perfectly proved now, that on the morning of the 17th July, the
Jacobin club, by means of printed placards, disavowed any intention of
petitioning; and that the influential men of the Jacobins and of the
Cordeliers,--those men whose presence might have given to this concourse
the dangerous character of a riot,--not only did not appear there, but
had started in the night for the country?
By thus connecting together all the circumstances whence it is proved
that martial law was proclaimed and put in practice on the 17th of July
without legitimate motives, a most terrible responsibility seems at
first sight to be cast on the memory of Bailly. But reassure yourselves,
Gentlemen; the events which are now grouped together, and are exhibited
to our eyes with complete evidence, were not known on that inauspicious
day at the Hôtel de Ville, until they had been distorted by the spirit
of party.
In the month of July, 1791, after the king had returned from Varennes,
the monarchy and the republic began for the first time to be dangerously
opposed to each other; in an instant passion took the place of cool
reason in the minds of the respective partisans of the two different
forms of government. The terrible formula: _We must make an end of it!_
was in everybody's mouth.
Bailly was surrounded by those passionate politicians who, without the
least scruple as to the honesty or legality of the means, are
determined to make an end of the adversaries who annoy them, as soon as
circumstances seem to promise them victory.
Bailly had still near him some Eschevins long accustomed to regard him
as a magistrate for show.
The former gave the Mayor false, or highly coloured intelligence. The
others, by long habit, did not conceive themselves obliged to
communicate any thing to him.
On the bloody day of July, 1791, of all the inhabitants of Paris,
perhaps Bailly was the man who knew with least detail or correctness the
events of the morning and of the evening.
Bailly, with his deep horror for falsehood, would have thought that he
was most cruelly insulting the magistrates, if he had not attributed to
them similar sentiments to his own. His uprightness prevented his being
sufficiently on the watch against the machinations of parties. It was
evidently by false reports that he was induced to unfurl the red flag on
the 17th of July: "It was from the reports that followed each other," he
said to the Revolutionary Tribunal, on being questioned by the
President, "and became more and more alarming every hour, that the
council adopted the measure of marching with the armed force to the
Champ de Mars."
In all his answers Bailly insisted on the repeated orders he had
received from the President of the National Assembly; on the reproaches
addressed to him for not sufficiently watching the agents of foreign
powers; it was against these pretended agents and their creatures, that
the Mayor of Paris thought he was marching when he put himself at the
head of a column of National Guards.
Bailly did not even know the cause of the meeting; he had not been
informed that the crowd wished to sign a petition; and that the
previous evening, according to the decree of the law, there had been a
declaration made to this effect before the competent authority. His
answers to the Revolutionary Tribunal leave not the least doubt on this
point!
Oh Eschevins, Eschevins! when your vain pretensions only were treated
of, the public could forgive you; but the 17th of July, you took
advantage of Bailly's confidence; you induced him to take sanguinary
measures of repression, after having fascinated him with false reports;
you committed a real crime. If it was the duty of the Revolutionary
Tribunal, of deplorable memory, to demand in 1793 from any one an
explanation of the massacres of the Champ de Mars, it was not Bailly
assuredly who ought to have been accused in the first place.
The political party whose blood flowed on the 17th of July, pretended to
have been the victim of a plot concocted by its adversaries. When
interrogated by the President of the Revolutionary Tribunal, Bailly
answered: "I had no knowledge of it, but experience has since given me
reason to think that such a plot did exist at that time."
Nothing more serious has ever been written against the promoters of the
sanguinary violences on the 17th of July.
The blame that has been thrown on the events of the Champ de Mars has
not been confined solely to the fact of proclaiming martial law; the
repressive measures that followed that proclamation have been criticized
with equal bitterness.
The municipal administration was especially reproached for having
hoisted a red flag much too small; a flag that was called in the
Tribunal _a pocket flag_; for not having placed this flag at the head
of the column, as the law commands, but in such a position, that the
public on whom the column was advancing could not see it; for having
made the armed force enter the Champ de Mars, by all the gates on the
side towards the town, a manoeuvre that seemed rather intended to
surround the multitude, than to disperse it; for having ordered the
National Guard to load their arms, even on the Place de Grève; for
having made the guard fire before the three required summonses were
made, and fire upon the people around the altar, whilst the stones and
the pistol shot, which were assigned as the motive for the sanguinary
order, came from the steps and benches; for allowing some people who
were endeavouring to escape on the side towards l'Ecole Militaire, and
others who had actually jumped into the Seine, to be pursued, shot, and
bayonetted.
It results clearly from one of Bailly's publications, from his answers
to the questions put to him by the President of the Revolutionary
Tribunal, from the writings of the day:
That the Mayor of Paris gave no order for the troops to be collected on
the 17th of July; that he had had no conference on that day with the
military authority; that if any arrangements, culpable and contrary to
law were adopted, as to the situation of the cavalry, of the red flag,
and of the Municipal Body, in the column marching on the Champ de Mars,
they could not without injustice be imputed to him; that Bailly was not
aware of the National Guard having loaded their muskets with ball before
quitting the square of the Hôtel de Ville; that he was not aware even of
the existence of the red flag, with whose small dimensions he had been
so severely reproached; that the National Guard fired without his
order; that he made every effort to stop the firing, to stop the
pursuit, and make the soldiers resume their ranks; that he congratulated
the troops of the line, who under the command of Hulin, entered by the
gate of l'Ecole Militaire, and not only did not fire, but tore many of
the unfortunate people from the hands of the National Guard, whose
exasperation amounted to delirium. In short, it might he asked, relative
to any want of exactness attributable to Bailly in that unfortunate
affair, whether it was just to impute it to him who, in his letters to
Voltaire on the origin of the sciences, wrote as follows in 1776:
"I am unfortunately short-sighted. I am often humiliated in the open
country. Whilst I with difficulty can distinguish a house at the
distance of a hundred paces, my friends relate to me what they see at
the distance of five or six hundred. I open my eyes, I fatigue myself
without seeing any thing, and I am sometimes inclined to think that they
amuse themselves at my expense."
You begin to see, Gentlemen, the advantage that a firm and able lawyer
might have drawn from the authentic facts that I have just been
relating. But Bailly knew the pretended jury before whom he had to
appear. This jury was not a collection of drunken cobblers, whatever
some passionate writers may have asserted; it was worse than that,
Gentlemen, notwithstanding the deservedly celebrated names that were
occasionally interspersed among them: it was--let us cut the subject
short--an odious, commission.