The Life of Marie-Thérèse de Bourbon, Duchess of Angoulême. Part II.

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Duchess of Angoulême, French Revolution, Louis Charles, Louis XVI, Louis XVII, Madame Royale, Marie Antoinette, Marie-Thérèse de Bourbon, Princess Élisabeth de Bourbon, Robespierre, Tuileries Palace

Move to the Tuileries

When the Bastille was stormed by an armed mob on 14 July 1789, the situation reached a climax. The life of the 10-year-old Madame Royale began to be affected as several members of the royal household were sent abroad for their own safety. The comte d’Artois, her uncle, and the duchesse de Polignac, governess to the royal children, emigrated on the orders of Louis XVI.

The Duchesse de Polignac was replaced by Princess Louise-Elisabeth de Croÿ, Marquise de Tourzel, whose daughter Pauline became a lifelong friend of Marie-Thérèse.

On 5 October, a mixed cortège of mainly working women from Paris marched to Versailles, intent on acquiring food believed to be stored there, and to advance political demands. After the invasion of the palace in the early hours of 6 October had forced the family to take refuge in the king’s apartment, the crowd demanded and obtained the move of the king and his family to the Tuileries Palace in Paris.

As the political situation deteriorated, Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette realized that their lives were in danger, and went along with the plan of escape organised with the help of Count Axel von Fersen. The plan was for the royal family to flee to the northeastern fortress of Montmédy, a royalist stronghold, but the attempted flight was intercepted in Varennes, and the family escorted back to Paris.

On August 10, 1792, after the royal family had taken refuge in the Legislative Assembly, Louis XVI was deposed, although the monarchy was not abolished until September 21. On August 13, the entire family was imprisoned in the Temple Tower, remains of a former medieval fortress. On January 21, 1793, Louis XVI was executed on the guillotine, at which time Marie-Thérèse’s young brother Louis Charles was recognized as King Louis XVII of France by the royalists.

Almost six months later, in the evening of July 3, 1793, guards entered the royal family’s apartment, forcibly took away the eight-year-old Louis Charles, and entrusted him to the care of Antoine Simon, a cobbler and Temple commissioner.

Remaining in their apartment in the Tower were Marie Antoinette, Marie-Thérèse and Madame Élisabeth, Louis XVI’s youngest sister. When Marie Antoinette was taken to the Conciergerie one month later, in the night of August 2, Marie-Thérèse was left in the care of her aunt Élisabeth who, in turn, was taken away on May 9, 1794 and executed the following day. Of the royal prisoners in the Temple, Marie-Thérèse Charlotte was the only one to survive the Reign of Terror.

Her stay in the Temple Tower was one of solitude and often great boredom. The two books she had, the famous prayer book by the name of The Imitation of Christ and Voyages by La Harpe, were read over and over, so much so that she grew tired of them. But her appeal for more books was denied by government officials, and many other requests were frequently refused, while she often had to endure listening to her brother’s cries and screams whenever he was beaten.

On 11 May 1794, Robespierre visited Marie-Thérèse, but there is no record of the conversation. During her imprisonment, Marie-Thérèse was never told what had happened to her family. All she knew was that her father was dead. The following words were scratched on the wall of her room in the tower:

“Marie-Thérèse Charlotte is the most unhappy person in the world. She can obtain no news of her mother; nor be reunited to her, though she has asked it a thousand times. Live, my good mother! whom I love well, but of whom I can hear no tidings. O my father! watch over me from Heaven above. O my God! forgive those who have made my parents suffer.”

In late August 1795, Marie-Thérèse was finally told what had happened to her family, by Madame Renée de Chanterenne, her female companion. When she had been informed of each of their fates, the distraught Marie-Thérèse began to cry, letting out loud sobs of anguish and grief.

It was only once the Terror was over that Marie-Thérèse was allowed to leave France. She was liberated on December 18, 1795, on the eve of her seventeenth birthday, exchanged for prominent French prisoners (Pierre Riel de Beurnonville, Jean-Baptiste Drouet, Hugues-Bernard Maret, Armand-Gaston Camus, Nicolas Marie Quinette and Charles-Louis Huguet de Sémonville) and taken to Vienna, the capital city of her cousin, the Holy Roman Emperor Franz II, and also her mother’s birthplace.

January 21, 1793: Execution of King Louis XVI of France and Navarre.

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Archduchess of Austria, House of Bourbon, House of Capet, King Louis XVI of France, Kingdom of France, Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, National Convention, Queen Marie Antoinette

* 1793 – After being found guilty of treason by the French National Convention, Louis XVI of France is executed by guillotine.

Louis XVI (August 23, 1754 – January 21, 1793), born Louis-Auguste, was the last king of France and Navarre before the fall of the monarchy during the French Revolution.

Louis-Auguste de France, who was given the title Duc de Berry at birth, was born in the Palace of Versailles. One of seven children, he was the second surviving son of Louis, the Dauphin of France, and the grandson of Louis XV of France and Navarre and of his consort, Maria Leszczyńska. His mother was Marie-Josèphe of Saxony, the daughter of Prince-Elector Friedrich August II of Saxony, (also King Augustus III of Poland) and Maria Josepha of Austria.

In 1765, at the death of his father, Louis, Dauphin of France son and heir apparent of Louis XV, Louis-Auguste became the new dauphin of France. Upon his grandfather’s death on May 10, 1774, he assumed the title “king of France and Navarre”, which he used until September 4, 1791, when he received the title of “king of the French” until the monarchy was abolished on September 21, 1792.

On May 16, 1770, at the age of fifteen, Louis-Auguste married the fourteen-year-old Habsburg Archduchess Maria Antonia of Austria (better known by the French form of her name, Marie Antoinette), his second cousin once removed and the youngest daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor Franz I of Lorraine and his wife, the Empress Maria Theresa of Austria.

Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette were the parents of four live-born children:
* Marie-Thérèse-Charlotte (December 19, 1778 – October 19, 1851)
* Louis-Joseph-Xavier-François, the Dauphin (October 22, 1781 – June 4, 1789)
* Louis-Charles, Dauphin after the death of his elder brother, future titular king Louis XVII of France (March 27, 1785 – June 8, 1795)
* Sophie-Hélène-Béatrix, died in infancy (July 9, 1786 – June 9, 1787)

In a context of civil and international war, Louis XVI was suspended and arrested at the time of the Insurrection of 10 August 1792; one month later, the absolute monarchy was abolished; the First French Republic was proclaimed on September 21, 1792. He was tried by the National Convention (self-instituted as a tribunal for the occasion), found guilty of high treason, but before the trial started and Louis mounted his defense to the Convention, he told his lawyers that he knew he would be found guilty and be killed, but to prepare and act as though they could win. He was resigned to and accepted his fate before the verdict was determined, but he was willing to fight to be remembered as a good king for his people.

Louis XVI was executed by guillotine on 21 January 1793, as a desacralized French citizen under the name of “Citizen Louis Capet,” in reference to Hugh Capet, the founder of the Capetian dynasty – which the revolutionaries interpreted as Louis’ surname. Louis XVI was the only King of France ever to be executed, and his death brought an end to more than a thousand years of continuous French monarchy. Both of his sons died in childhood, before the Bourbon Restoration; his only child to reach adulthood, Marie Therese, was given over to the Austrians in exchange for French prisoners of war, eventually dying childless in 1851.

This date in History: October 16, 1793: Execution of Queen Marie Antoinette of France and Navarre.

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French Revolution, Gullotine, King Louis XVI of France, King Louis XVIII of France, Kings and Queens of France, Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, Queen of France and Navarre

The last Queen of France and Navarre before the French Revolution was born (Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna; November 2, 1755 – October 16, 1793) an Archduchess of Austria and was the penultimate child and youngest daughter of Empress Maria Theresa of Austria and Franz I, Holy Roman Emperor. She became Dauphine of France in May 1770 at age 14 upon her marriage to Louis-Auguste, heir apparent to the French throne. On May 10, 1774, her husband ascended the throne as Louis XVI and she assumed the title Queen of France and Navarre, which she held until September 1791, when she became Queen of the French as the French Revolution proceeded, a title that she held until September 21, 1792.

On September 21, 1792, the fall of the monarchy was officially declared and the National Convention became the governing body of the French Republic. The royal family name was downgraded to the non-royal “Capets”. Preparations began for the trial of the king in a court of law.

Charged with undermining the First French Republic, Louis XVI was separated from his family and tried in December. He was found guilty by the Convention, led by the Jacobins who rejected the idea of keeping him as a hostage. On 15 January 1793, by a majority of one vote, that of his cousin, Louis Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, known then as Philippe Égalité, he was condemned to death by guillotine and executed on 21 January 21, 1793.

After Louis’ execution, Marie Antoinette’s fate became a central question of the National Convention. While some advocated her death, others proposed exchanging her for French prisoners of war or for a ransom from Franz II, Holy Roman Emperor. Thomas Paine advocated exile to America.

After months of captivity Marie Antoinette was tried by the Revolutionary Tribunal on October 14, 1793. Some historians believe the outcome of the trial had been decided in advance by the Committee of Public Safety around the time the Carnation Plot was uncovered. She and her lawyers were given less than one day to prepare her defense. Among the accusations, many previously published in the libelles, were: orchestrating orgies in Versailles, sending millions of livres of treasury money to Austria, planning the massacre of the gardes françaises (National Guards) in 1792, declaring her son to be the new king of France, and incest, a charge made by her son Louis-Charles, (the nominal King Louis XVII) pressured into doing so by the radical Jacques Hébert who controlled him. This last accusation drew an emotional response from Marie Antoinette, who refused to respond to this charge, instead appealing to all mothers present in the room; their reaction comforted her, since these women were not otherwise sympathetic to her.

Early on October 16, Marie Antoinette was declared guilty of the three main charges against her: depletion of the national treasury, conspiracy against the internal and external security of the State, and high treason because of her intelligence activities in the interest of the enemy; the latter charge alone was enough to condemn her to death. At worst, she and her lawyers had expected life imprisonment. In the hours left to her, she composed a letter to her sister-in-law, Madame Élisabeth, affirming her clear conscience, her Catholic faith, and her love and concern for her children. The letter did not reach Élisabeth. Her will was part of the collection of papers of Robespierre found under his bed and were published by Edme-Bonaventure Courtois.

Preparing for her execution, she had to change clothes in front of her guards. She put on a plain white dress, white being the color worn by widowed queens of France. Her hair was shorn, her hands bound painfully behind her back and she was put on a rope leash. Unlike her husband, who had been taken to his execution in a carriage (carrosse), she had to sit in an open cart (charrette) for the hour it took to convey her from the Conciergerie via the rue Saint-Honoré thoroughfare to reach the guillotine erected in the Place de la Révolution (the present-day Place de la Concorde). She maintained her composure, despite the insults of the jeering crowd. A constitutional priest was assigned to her to hear her final confession. He sat by her in the cart, but she ignored him all the way to the scaffold.

Marie Antoinette was guillotined at 12:15 p.m. on October 16, 1793. Her last words are recorded as, “Pardonnez-moi, monsieur. Je ne l’ai pas fait exprès” or “Pardon me, sir, I did not do it on purpose”, after accidentally stepping on her executioner’s shoe. Her head was one of which Marie Tussaud was employed to make death masks. Her body was thrown into an unmarked grave in the Madeleine cemetery located close by in rue d’Anjou. Because its capacity was exhausted the cemetery was closed the following year, on March 25, 1794.

Both Marie Antoinette’s and Louis XVI’s bodies were exhumed on January 18, 1815, during the Bourbon Restoration, when Prince Louis Stanislas, Comte de Provence ascended the newly reestablished throne as King Louis XVIII of France and of Navarre. Christian burial of the royal remains took place three days later, on January 21, in the necropolis of French kings at the Basilica of St Denis.

This date in History. September 21, 1792: France Abolishes the Monarchy.

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Absolute Monarchy, French Revolution, King Louis XVI of France, Kingdom of France, Legislative Assembly, Louis XVI, Monarchy Abolished, National Constituent Assembly, National Convention, Tuileries Palace

One of the main source of conflict between the Crown and the Revolutionaries was the Revolution’s principles of popular sovereignty, though central to democratic principles of later eras, it marked a decisive break from the centuries-old principle of divine right that was at the heart of the French monarchy. As a result, the Revolution was opposed by many of the rural people of France and by all the governments of France’s neighbors.

Still, within the city of Paris and amongst the philosophers of the time, many of which were members of the National Assembly, the monarchy had next to no support. As the Revolution became more radical and the masses more uncontrollable, several of the Revolution’s leading figures began to doubt its benefits. Some, like Honoré Mirabeau, secretly plotted with the Crown to restore its power in a new constitutional form.

On June 20, 1789, the members of the French Third Estatetook the Tennis Court Oath, vowing “not to separate, and to reassemble wherever circumstances require, until the constitution of the kingdom is established”. It was a pivotal event in the French Revolution. The Oath signified for the first time that French citizens formally stood in opposition to Louis XVI and the National Assembly’s refusal to back down forced the king to make concessions.

Drawing by Jacques-Louis David of the Tennis Court Oath. David later became a deputy in the National Convention in 1793.

As most of the Assembly still favoured a constitutional monarchy rather than a republic, the various groups reached a compromise in designing a written Constitution which left Louis XVI as little more than a figurehead: he was forced to swear an oath to the constitution, and a decree declared that retracting the oath, heading an army for the purpose of making war upon the nation, or permitting anyone to do so in his name would amount to abdication.

Louis XVI was alienated from the new democratic government both by its negative reaction to the traditional role of the monarch and in its treatment of him and his family. He was particularly irked by being kept essentially as a prisoner in the Tuileries, and by the refusal of the new regime to allow him to have confessors and priests of his choice rather than ‘constitutional priests’ pledged to the state and not the Roman Catholic Church.

On June 21, 1791, Louis XVI attempted to flee secretly with his family from Paris to the royalist fortress town of Montmédy on the northeastern border of France, where he would join the émigrés and be protected by Austria. The voyage was planned by the Swedish nobleman, and often assumed secret lover of Queen Marie-Antoinette, Axel von Fersen. The King and Queen were recognized at Varennes and returned to Paris.

The Assembly provisionally suspended the King. He and Queen Marie Antoinette remained held under guard. The King’s flight had a profound impact on public opinion, turning popular sentiment further against the clergy and nobility, and built momentum for the institution of a constitutional monarchy.

In the summer of 1791, the National Constituent Assembly decided that the king needed to be restored to the throne if he accepted the constitution. The decision was made after the king’s flight to Varennes.

That decision enraged many Parisians into protesting, and one major protest devolved into the Champ de Mars Massacre, with 12 to 50 people killed by the National Guard.

After surviving the vicissitudes of a revolution for two years, the National Constituent Assembly dissolved itself on September 30, 1791. The following day, the Constitution went into effect, which granted power to the Legislative Assembly.

The Legislative Assembly was the legislature of France from October 1, 1791 to September 20, 1792 during the years of the French Revolution. It provided the focus of political debate and revolutionary law-making between the periods of the National Constituent Assembly and of the National Convention.

Louis XVI formed a series of cabinets, veering at times as far-left as the Girondins. However, by the summer of 1792, amid war and insurrection, it had become clear that the monarchy and the now-dominant Jacobins could not reach any accommodation.

What happened next was a crucial moment in the downfall of the monarchy. On April 20, 1792, the Legislative Assembly, supported by Louis XVI, declared war on Austria (“the King of Bohemia and Hungary”) first, voting for war after a long list of grievances was presented to it by the foreign minister, Charles François Dumouriez. Dumouriez prepared an immediate invasion of the Austria.

While the revolutionary government frantically raised fresh troops and reorganised its armies, a Prussian-Austrian army under Charles William Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick assembled at Coblenz on the Rhine. In July, the invasion began, with Brunswick’s army easily taking the fortresses of Longwy and Verdun. The duke then issued on July 25 a proclamation called the Brunswick Manifesto, written by Louis’s émigré cousin, the Prince de Condé, declaring the intent of the Austrians and Prussians to restore the king to his full powers and to treat any person or town who opposed them as rebels to be condemned to death by martial law.

Contrary to its intended purpose of strengthening Louis XVI’s position against the revolutionaries, the Brunswick Manifesto had the opposite effect of greatly undermining his already highly tenuous position. It was taken by many to be the final proof of collusion between the king and foreign powers in a conspiracy against his own country. On July 11, 1792, the Assembly formally declared the nation in danger because of the dire military situation.

The anger of the populace boiled over on August 10 when an armed mob – with the backing of a new municipal government of Paris that came to be known as the Insurrectional Paris Commune – marched upon and invaded the Tuileries Palace. The royal family took shelter with the Legislative Assembly.

Louis XVI was officially arrested on August 13, 1792 and sent to the Temple, an ancient fortress in Paris that was used as a prison.

From 1789 until August 10, 1792 during the French Revolution, France was first controlled by the two-year National Constituent Assembly and then by the one-year Legislative Assembly. After the great insurrection of August 10, 1792, The National Convention was created.

The Convention’s députés were instructed to put an end to the crisis that had broken out after the bloody capture of the Tuileries (August 10, 1792). The middle-class origin and political activity meant that most members of the Convention bore no sympathy for the monarchy, and the victory at the battle of Valmy on 20 September (the revolution’s first military success) occurred on the same day as their meeting, thus confirming their convictions.

Proposition for abolition

When the député for Paris, Jean-Marie Collot d’Herbois, proposed abolition he met with little resistance; at most, Claude Basire, friend of Georges Jacques Danton, tried to temper the enthusiasm, recommending a discussion before any decision. However, abbé Henri Grégoire, constitutional bishop of Blois, replied strongly to any suggestion of discussion.

What need do we have of discussion when everyone is in agreement? Kings are as much monsters in the moral order as in the physical order. The Courts are a workshop for crime, the foyer for corruption and the den of tyrants. The history of kings is the martyrology of nations!

Jean-François Ducos supported him in affirming that any discussion would be useless “after the lights spread by 10 August.”

The summary argument served as a debate and the decision taken was unanimous: On September 21, 1792 the National Assembly declared abolished the monarchy abolished and France as a Republic. Louis XVI was stripped of all of his titles and honours, and from this date was known as Citizen Louis Capet.

End of an era

In the wake of the proclamation, efforts grew to eliminate the vestiges of the ancien regime.

As the date of the Republic’s first anniversary approached, the Convention passed a set of laws replacing many familiar ancien systems of order and measurement, including the old Christian calendar. This dramatic change was powerful encouragement to the growing wave of anticlericalism which sought a dechristianisation of France.

The new French Republican Calendar discarded all Christian reference points and calculated time from the Republic’s first full day after the monarchy, September 22, 1792, the first day of Year One.

This date in History: August 13, 1792. The arrest of King Louis XVI of France and Navarre.

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Bastille, French Revolution, Holy Roman Emperor, Holy Roman Empire, King of France, King of Prussia, Leopold II, Louis Capet, Louis XVI, Reign of Terror

After the storming of the Bastille on July 14, 1789 Louis XVI eventually became a constitutional monarch. However, Louis’s conservatism and belief in the divine right of kings made that possibility that a Constitutional Monarchy in France would be successful, less and less a possibility.

Louis XVI, King of France & Navarre

The other monarchies of Europe looked with concern upon the developments in France, and considered whether they should intervene, either in support of Louis XVI or to take advantage of the chaos in France. The key figure was Marie-Antoinette’s brother, the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold II. Initially, he had looked on the Revolution with equanimity. However, he became more and more disturbed as it became more and more radical. Despite this, he still hoped to avoid war.

Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor

Friedrich Wilhelm II, King of Prussia

In the summer of 1792 Emperor Leopold II and King Friedrich Wilhelm II of Prussia, in consultation with émigrés French nobles, issued the Declaration of Pillnitz, which declared the interest of the monarchs of Europe in the well-being of Louis and his family, and threatened vague but severe consequences if anything should befall them. Although Leopold saw the Pillnitz Declaration as an easy way to appear concerned about the developments in France without committing any soldiers or finances to change them, the revolutionary leaders in Paris viewed it fearfully as a dangerous foreign attempt to undermine France’s sovereignty.

Carl-Wilhelm-Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick

While the revolutionary government frantically raised fresh troops and reorganised its armies, a Prussian-Austrian army under Carl-Wilhelm-Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick assembled at Coblenz on the Rhine. In July, the invasion began, with Brunswick’s army easily taking the fortresses of Longwy and Verdun. The duke then issued on July 25, a proclamation called the Brunswick Manifesto, written by Louis’s émigré cousin, the Prince de Condé, declaring the intent of the Austrians and Prussians to restore the king to his full powers and to treat any person or town who opposed them as rebels to be condemned to death by martial law.

Contrary to its intended purpose of strengthening Louis XVI’s position against the revolutionaries, the Brunswick Manifesto had the opposite effect of greatly undermining his already highly tenuous position. It was taken by many to be the final proof of collusion between the king and foreign powers in a conspiracy against his own country. The anger of the populace boiled over on August 10 when an armed mob – with the backing of a new municipal government of Paris that came to be known as the Insurrectional Paris Commune – marched upon and invaded the Tuileries Palace. The royal family took shelter with the Legislative Assembly.

Louis XVI was officially arrested on August 13, 1792 and sent to the Temple, an ancient fortress in Paris that was used as a prison. On September 21, the National Assembly declared France to be a Republic and abolished the monarchy. Louis XVI was stripped of all of his titles and honours, and from this date was known as Citizen Louis Capet.

The Girondins* were partial to keeping the deposed king under arrest, both as a hostage and a guarantee for the future. Members of the Commune and the most radical deputies, who would soon form the group known as the Mountain**, argued for Louis’s immediate execution. The legal background of many of the deputies made it difficult for a great number of them to accept an execution without the due process of law, and it was voted that the deposed monarch be tried before the National Convention, the organ that housed the representatives of the sovereign people.

* From 1791 to 1793, the Girondins were active in the Legislative Assembly and the National Convention. Together with the Montagnards, they initially were part of the Jacobin movement. They campaigned for the end of the monarchy, but then resisted the spiraling momentum of the Revolution, which caused a conflict with the more radical Montagnards.

** The Mountain were the most radical group and opposed the Girondins. The term, first used during a session of the Legislative Assembly, came into general use in 1793. By the summer of 1793, that pair of opposed minority groups divided the National Convention. That year, led by Maximilien Robespierre, the Montagnards unleashed the Reign of Terror.

The Fall of Louis XVI of France and Navarre: Part I

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Austria, French Revolution, House of Bourbon, Kings of france, Louis XV of France., Louis XVI, Louis XVI of France, Marie Antoinette

I have always had a soft spot for King Louis XVI of France and Navarre. I am not a fan of capital punishment to begin with and it always seems a sense of injustice for Louis to have loss his head during the french Revolution. Another interesting part of the life of Louis XVI I like to examine is how did he go from King to a prisoner that was executed? What were his faults that led him down that path? Was it all his fault? Once the revolution began was the fall of the monarchy inevitable? Was he a scapegoat? Could he have done something different to have influenced the outcome of his circumstances? Those are some of the things I would like to investigate in this short series.

Louis XVI is an example of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. He was an absolute monarch who did not posses the abilities for the office for which he was born. Despite lacking the ability to be an absolute monarch he was, by all accounts, a very decent human being who did not deserve the fate that he experienced.

HRH Prince Louis Auguste de Bourbon of France was born  August 23, 1754 to HRH The Dauphin (Prince Louis Ferdinand, son of King Louis XV) and his second wife Maria Josepha of Saxony (daughter of Imperial Prince-Elector Friedrich August II of Saxony, King of Poland and HIH Archduchess Maria Josepha of Austria). When Louis was born he had an elder brother ahead of him in the line of succession behind their father the Dauphin. Louis Joseph Xavier, Duke of Burgundy died in at the age of 9 and when Louis XVI was born his other elder brother, Xavier Marie Joseph de Bourbon of France had died that previous previous March 5 months prior to his birth. At his birth the future Louis XVI was created Duke of Berry by his grandfather, King Louis XV.

Because Louis was not the heir upon his birth, he spent the first seven years of his life feeling neglected due to the fact that his parents lavished their attention and affection on his older brother, Louis Joseph Xavier, Duke of Burgundy, until the young dukes death at the age of 9 in 1761. As Louis grew to maturity he excelled in his studies of Latin, history, geography, and astronomy. Other than speaking his native French Louis became fluent in both Italian and English. It was during these formative years that Louis developed his life long, and well know, hobby of being a locksmith. Despite all these successful endeavors Louis was always a shy, hesitant and indecisive individual.

In 1765 Louis’ father, the Dauphin, died from tuberculosis and within two years his mother also died, leaving the young Louis, now Dauphin of France, in the care of his grandfather, King Louis XV. Many historians have theorized that had Louis’ parents lived to mount the French throne, the Revolution of 1789 may have never happened or it would have been delayed. This is another “what if” in history. It is said that the Dauphine, Maria-Josepha, was a very kindly woman who had a compassion for the poor, something that it is said the future Marie Antoinette greatly lacked.

This gives us some background on Louis and it will help to understand some of his later behavior. In Part II I will examine his marriage to Marie Antoinette, Archduchess of Austria, and the early reign of Louis XVI. In Part III I will look at another great “what if” in history and examine where Louis XVI went wrong and where was his point of no return and what could he have done differently to save his throne if he could have done things differently?

 

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

Tags

1789, Bastille Day, Charles I of England, Colonel Thomas Pride, English Civil War, French Revolution, July 14, Long Parliament, Lord Strafford, Louis XVI, Oliver Cromwell, Parliament, Pride's Purge

Saturday is Bastille Day where they celebrate the 1789 storming of the Bastille which was the start of the French Revolution. Since I don’t write long posts on the weekends I thought I would take the celebration of Bastille Day to examine how monarchies adapt and survive. Although Louis XVI and his Queen, Marie Antoinette, did not survive the French Revolution the monarchy in France did limp on for a few decades after it was restored following the Napoleonic period. The question I ask is where did Louis XVI go wrong? Where did Charles I of England & Scotland go wrong in the 1640s culminating in his beheading in 1649? Did each have a part to play in their demise? Ah, so many questions. I often think history is complex and I personally eschew simple cause and effect answers. Generally many factors play into the events of history. So in this small little blog I will examine some of the factors that caused the downfall of these people and also examine, in the big picture, how monarchies that survive to this day, have been able to adapt.

Louis XVI, King of France and Navarre (1774-1792)

Shortly after the storming of the Bastille the French royal family was forcibly removed from the opulent Palace at Versailles to the Tuileries Palace in Paris where they lived as virtual prisoners. For a brief period of time Louis did enjoy a considerable level of popularity. Initially the abolition of the monarchy was not the goal of the revolutionaries. If they had a clear goal it was to end the absolutist nature of the crown and to bring it under the control of a constitution which limited its powers. Much of the fight was between those supporting changes, sometimes radical changes, and those who wished to preserve the monarchy. Louis was indecisive and in his heart he was the King and his heritage and tradition taught that it was the king that wielded the reigns of power. Other factors were his unpopular wife, and Austrian royal by birth, and many rightfully feared that the king and the queen would draw Austria and other absolute monarchies to their side. Invasion of France by foreign powers in support of the monarchy was a constant threat. There was distrust all around on both sides.

In the end because of their shoddy treatment Louis and his family tried to escape their prison like existence in the Tuileries Palace but were caught and returned to Paris. Louis was also secretly planning, with the aid of loyal ministers, his escape once again and the appeal to foreign powers for their aid in restoring the monarchy and ending the revolution. Before they could implement these plans Louis and Marie Antoinette were arrested and the evidence of their dealings with foreign powers to regain power was their undoing and the reasons for being executed for high treason. What if questions are impossible to answer. Had Louis not conspired with foreign powers, had his queen been more popular, would he have lost his head, or was it inevitable?

Charles I, King of England, Scotland and Ireland (1625-1649)

For eleven years Charles ruled as an absolute monarch in a country not used to absolute monarchs. during that time he ruled without calling Parliament. Even his more powerful predecessors, Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, still had to wrestle with ministers and Parliament from time to time. Henry had a formidable will and Elizabeth also had a formidable will along with diplomatic skills and feminine charm. As with the case with Louis XVI the seeds for revolution were sown in the past. For Charles the problem concerned with who wielded the power, the Crown or Parliament? The struggle for power between the two entities had a long tradition and in viewing the threads of history it can be seen that the the two would eventually bump heads. Charles did abuse his power during those eleven years of personal rule. He raised taxes illegally and forced loans upon his people.

In 1640 the call of war beckoned in the form of the Bishops War when Charles wanted to force an episcopal style of worship on his Scottish subjects. In order to accomplish his tasks he needed to raise funds and for that he needed Parliament. Charles called two Parliaments within a short time which were distrusting of the king. There was actually distrust on both sides. Despite many concessions given to Parliament by the king there was still a struggle between both the Crown and Parliament. An event that pushed the two parties closer to war was the handling of Lord Strafford. Lord Strafford was the king’s deputy in Ireland and when Parliament could not prove a charge of treason against him the House of Commons resorted to passing a Bill of Attainder which did not require proof of guilt for the conviction of high treason only the king’s signature.

The king knew Strafford to be innocent of the charges and yet the king also knew to ignore the Bill from the House of Commons would trigger war. So the king sent Strafford to slaughter as a sacrificial lamb. Upon Straffords death Ireland fell into chaos fearing reprisals by a protestant army. As tensions continued to rise Charles entered Parliament with 400 troops to arrest 5 members on charges of treason. This failed miserably as the members had been tipped off and flew the coup. The speaker of the House of Commons told the king he was a servant of Parliament and not the king.

Fearing for his safety Charles left London and the English Civil War had begun. It would last, off and on, until 1649 with the defeat of the king and his execution for high treason. Even with an assured victory for Parliament at the end of the war it was still possible for the king to keep not only his head but his crown as well. Toward the end of 1648 the king was willing to negotiate and accept the concessions of Parliament and rule with limited powers. Parliament was willing to accept him and have him return to power. So what happened? Colonel Thomas Pride and his troops scored a military coup d’état and purged Parliament of all those that supported the king. With nothing left but the rump of the Long Parliament and the remaining members who were anti-monarchist, Charles was convicted of high treason and executed.

I could go one with more examples, such as Wilhelm II of Germany, Nicholas II of Russia, Constantine II of Greece etc. It may be impossible to examine these monarchies and answer the question “was there something these monarchs could have done differently to save either themselves or their thrones?” Was their demise inevitable? We’ll never know. One thing I do observe from the tapestry of history is that the monarchies that have survived were the ones that were willing to adapt to changes. Those that wanted to keep the status quo and retain power were the ones that failed and ended up in the trash bin of history. The source of the change seems to have come from the majority of the people in these states and the problem seems to be that the monarchies would not, or could not, either listen to the changes in the wind or see the proverbial hand writing on the wall.

Royal Numbering ~ France Part II

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Benito Juárez, France, Franz Joseph of Austria-Hungary, Henri V, House of Bourbon, Kingdom of France, Louis Napoleon, Louis XIX, Louis XVI, Louis XVII, Louis XVIII, Maximilian of Mexico, Napoleon Bonaparte

Although the name Charles is the only name which is off by one, as mentioned in yesterday’s blog, it is interesting to see how ordinal numbers have been handled in other situations.

There were 18 kings of France named Louis, beginning with Louis I, the Pious, in 814 who was the only surviving son of Charlemagne and ended with Louis XVIII in 1824. Louis XVII, son of the ill-fated Louis XVI, never reigned but is numbered among the kings of France and his reign is said to be nominal. In 1830 the last bourbon king, Charles X, abdicated in favor of his eldest son, Louis Antoine, Duc d’Angoulême who is said to have been King Louis XIX of France and Navarre for 30 minutes until he, in turn, abdicated his claim to the throne to his nephew Henri of Artois, Count of Chambord. The Count of Chambord claimed the throne of France as Henri V until the National Assembly declared his distant cousin, Louis Philippe, Duc d’Orléans King of the French on August 9, 1830.

There is a similar situation with the Napoleonic line of French Emperors. Napoleon Bonaparte ruled as Emperor of the French as Napoleon I from 1804 to 1814/1815. France was again under the rule of a Bonaparte when Napoleon’s nephew, Louis Napoleon, President of the Second French Republic had himself proclaimed Emperor Napoleon III in 1852. Louis Napoleon chose to reign as Napoleon III because he recognized the nominal rule of Napoleon II. Napoleon II was the ill-fated son of Napoleon I and his second wife Archduchess Marie Louise of Austria. Napoleon II never ruled but held the title King of Rome during his father’s reign and he was considered titular Emperor for two weeks after his father’s final defeat. Napoleon II moved to Austria after his father’s exile and assumed the name Franz (after his grandfather, Holy Roman Emperor Franz II), and was granted the title of Duke of Reichstadt. Known to French history as “the Eaglet” the Duke of Reichstadt died of tuberculosis at Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna on July 22, 1832. Although he never married some historians conjecture he had an affair with his cousin, Princess Sophie of Bavaria, mother of Emperor Franz Joseph of Austria-Hungary (1848-1916) and was the father of her son, Archduke Maximilian of Austria, who became Emperor of Mexico until his assassination via a firing squad at the hands of Benito Juárez in 1867.