The Impact Of The Terror

The Terror begins

It was in the regions, not Paris, where the real bloodshed was to take place and first to feel the vengeance of the committee was the second city of France, Lyon, which had rebelled against the course the revolution was taking. The revolutionary army, controlled by The Committee of Public Safety, crushed the rebels after a protracted siege and so determined were they to make an example of Lyon to the rest of France that the guillotine simply couldn’t keep up with the numbers who were condemned, usually without any kind of trial. Men were simply shot to pieces by grape shot fired at them at close range by cannon. A far more efficient way of despatching the nearly two thousand who were condemned vs the clinical, but considerably slower guillotine. Toulon also felt the wrath of the committee as it too quickly surrendered. At least 800 were shot, again with no trial, again the guillotine was deemed as insufficiently speedy to keep up with the numbers who needed to be executed.

Finally the Vendée needed to be brought back under control, and by the end of October 1793 the remnants of the rebellious army had been soundly beaten with a furious vengeance soon to follow. So ‘infernal columns’ of the French army roamed across the Vendée region looking for anyone suspected of being complicit in the rebellion. Thousands of men, women and children were summarily executed (summarily: without trial) as an orgy of bloody revenge was brought down on the Vendéans.

Almost as soon as it began, doubts began to emerge inside the committee that the extreme violence and seemingly arbitrary nature of the persecution was likely to do more harm than good. Previously representatives of the Convention were sent out across France to oversee the implementation of its revolutionary goals. In essence these representatives could act as dictators in the region they were sent to, seemingly interpreting the law as they saw fit. The slaughter at Nantes is an example of how one representative called Carrier, was deemed to have gone too far not only in the scale of the imprisonment and executions but so random were they, it was felt that loyal patriots to the revolution had been unfairly caught up in his wave of repression. He was quickly recalled for fear that such mass arrests might do more harm than good and turn people further against the revolution. In other regions, the designated representative acted with considerable leniency. For many in the Convention, and the Committee, they were too lenient. It was this inconsistent approach in different regions that would be a factor in the Committee of Public Safety taking control to ensure that revolutionary principles were implemented consistently.

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Attacks on the Church

The Terror also saw further attacks on the Catholic Church. Not only were many Priests who had still refused to swear an oath of loyalty to the revolution, killed, their churches were ransacked as the revolutionary armies swept across France like locusts pillaging anything they could, not simply for personal gain, but also to be used for weaponry. Church bells could be melted down and turned into cannons and even the most modest catholic church was usually rich in iron, silver and gold and offered rich pickings. Despite the limiting of the power of the Church that had already happened (for example The Civil Constitution of the Clergy) many of the more radical revolutionaries argued the revolution would never be safe whilst the Church, a rival source of power, was in existence. Athiesm thus became a policy objective.

But as a further example of the strongly atheist undertones that had always been present amongst the more radical revolutionaries, the Christian calendar, starting as it did from the death of Christ (i.e. AD) was ripped up. No longer would the date be 1793 but year 2 i.e. anything after the 22nd of September 1793 which was the anniversary of the birth of the French Republic. The 12 months prior were of course simply known as year 1. Months were renamed, for example July became Thermidore, the 11th month in the new dechristianised calendar. Weeks were now 10 days in length, with 3 per month. Images of Saints or other religious symbols were torn down, some simply replaced by a bust of Marat. The traditional clerical dress of priests and bishops was banned and priests could be deported from the country if they were denounced by 6 citizens should they feel that particular priest was not behaving in a suitably revolutionary manner.

The student of this period should be fully aware that amongst the revolution’s many themes there was a conscious effort to further dechristianise France in this period and an atheistic undercurrent was increasingly prevalent in the announcements of the Committee of Public Safety. Whilst Christianity was not banned, the destruction of hundreds of Churches, the execution of priests and the humiliation of those left alive were hardly in the spirit of the Declaration of the Rights of Man, written just 4 years earlier which enshrined that religion was a private matter and no business of the state to either promote or disembowel. Unsurprisingly, Robespierre felt uneasy at this continued attack on the once dominant Catholic Church and many who were not part of the thuggish attacks on local churches by the revolutionary army, were increasingly disillusioned by the undermining of what for the vast majority, was still very dear to them.