having caused the death of innumerable innocent persons of both
sexes under pretence of being conspirators; of having on one
occasion sent during the space of three hours eighty persons to
the scaffold without respecting legal formalities; of having
crowded upon carts (prepared in readiness before their trial),
victims who had not had any semblance of justice and whose
condemnations were never signed; of having ordered the execution
of a number of pregnant women.
Fouquier’s defence was as follows:
The Convention having declared Terror to be the Order of the
day, in the same breath ordered the extermination of all rebels.
The prisoners were merely sent before me in order that I might
carry out certain legal formalities. It was therefore your
orders, citizen representatives, that I obeyed. Which of you
ever gave me a word of blame? Blood was the perpetual cry upon
the lips of your orators. If I am guilty, then you are all
guilty. I was but the weapon of the Convention; do you punish
the executioner’s axe?
He was condemned to death with fifteen other persons, and conducted the
following day to the scaffold. The populace followed the cart which
bore him to punishment with yells of execration and insult. He spoke to
them cynically, and to a man who cried out, _Tu n’as plus la parole
aujourd’hui_--the taunt he used to those of his victims who wished
to defend themselves before the Tribunal--Fouquier said:
“And thou, wretched creature, go and claim thy three ounces of bread at
the Section; I at least die with a full stomach and have never known
want.”