Timeline

First posted on December 5th 2006

A.) FRENCH REVOLUTION : THE PRELUDE

Due to overspending and the lack of opening up additional sources of revenue Louis XIV. had relied upon (Mercantilism), France, under Louis XV. (1715-1774; in control since 1724), was heading toward the state of bankrupcy. When advised to cut down on expenses and balance the budget, Louis XV. said "Apres moi, le deluge" (after me, the flood). Louis XVI. (1774-1793) personally avoided the festivities and performances at Versailles, but maintained to finance its expenses in order to please his wife Marie Antoinette. Louis XVI.' economic advisors Turgot, Necker and Calonne pressed for reforms intendeing to balance the budget, which, in one form or another, would tax the nobility; the latter, in control of the regional parlements, blocked such reforms. France's participation in the American War of Independence 1780-1783, while ending in victory, resulted in additional costs which made an mmediate solution imperative.

The French populace was overtaxed; in addition to feudal dues and regular taxes, the French faced a number of indirect taxes, such as the Gabelle, a tax on the sale of salt. French peasants and townsfolk faced regulations such as hunting being a privilege of the nobility; if a peasant suffered damage to his harvest because of wild animals, he was not allowed to take action by himself, but had to report it to the local noble. The latter would take care of the problem, but the hunting party might create more damage than the animals, by trampling down much of the crop. Violations of rules, on the side of the peasants or townspeople, were often answered with severe, excessive punishment - the galley, for minor offences.
Enlightenment philosophers had identified the peasants and artisans as those who produced the GNP, the nobles and clergy, in essence, as parasitic segments of society; both philosophers and mercantilist economists advocated lessening the burden of the peasants, the potection of them against abuse by the nobles, even freeing the serfs. King Louis XVI. had followed this advise and freed the serfs living on royal domain; most nobles and the church did not follow his example.
Among the French peasants, during the 1770es and 1780es there was a growing expectation of measures to improve their lives. Due to their obstinate attitude and continued public display of a luxurious lifestyle in the face of poverty, the vast majority of nobility and much of the leading church hierarchy had lost any credibility (the areas which later proved strongholds of the Royalists being an exception). The performance of "The Marriage of the Figaro", a theatre play in which the barber (a commoner) outwits the nobleman and gets the girl, describes this situation.
Having freed the serfs living on royal domain, Louis XVI. should have been exempted from this public fury. Yet his unwillingness to take drastic measures, his lack of charisma lost him the credit withy the people. Marie Antoinette, in the Diamond Necklace Affair (1784-1785), had lost the sympathies of many, and been a victim of character assassination ever since her coronation in 1774 ("Let them eat cake"). "La Autrichienne", the Austrian. Poor harvests in 1788 and 1789 only exacerbated the situation. The bastille, a fortified prison identified in public view (and partly due to Masonic propaganda) with torture and abuse of justice, was widely hated. The French navy (which used the galley slaves), the army (which could press individual Frenchmen into service, paid little and applied draconic punishment for minor offences, could order owners of houses in cities to provide quarter for a soldier), the officers of which were mostly noblemen, were seen as part of a hated system oppressing the people.
Political change did not only happen in France. The United States had declared independence in 1776 and achieved recognition of such by Britain in 1783. In the Dutch Republic, a reform movement, the Patriots, had achived a number of reforms until suppressed by invading Prussian troops in 1787. Refugee Dutch patriots took up residence in - Paris.
France's Estates General, which Louis XVI. called to assemble in 1789, had not done so since the early years of Louis XIII. (1619); thus when elections for representatives of the Third Estate were called, noone remembered how this was done in the past. A progressive clergyman, Abbe Sieyes, wrote an influential pamphlet - "What is the Third Estate ?", which suggested the Curia of Deputees of the Third Estate to be renamed National Assembly. He called upon nobles and clergymen to renounce their privileged status (as he himself did) and join this National Assembly.


B.) Constitutional Monarchy, 1789-1792

The deputees of the third estate were elected in the cities and regions of France; voters did not trust their representatives and drew up lists of matters they expected their representatives to address (Cahiers). When the representatives assembled in Paris, they declared themselves to be the National Assembly, called upon nobles and clergymen to renounce their privileges and join them, and swore the Tennis Court Oath - not to disband until the king signed the constitution, based on the principles of liberte, egalite and fraternite. Shortly after, the mob of Paris 'stormed the Bastille' (July 14th, France's national holiday). Actually it was not the romantic fight as which it is often portrayed; the officer in charge of the Bastille, on his way to work and unsuspecting, was taken hostage and forced to have the building opened, the prisoners released, all 7 of them.
In order to address the immediate revenue problem, the land holdings of the church were confiscated by the state (on the suggestion of Abbe Sieyes, a clergyman), and Assignats (paper money) were issued. Guilds were dissolved, privileges of nobility and clergy dissolved. Louis XVI. signed the constitution, France became a constitutional monarchy (Louis XVI. retained a veto right). France administratively was reformed; counties, duchies and baronies replaced by Departements. Meanwhile the Paris mob had forced the royal family and court to move to Paris (Tuileries), where they felt prisoners. In May 1791, Swedish nobleman and admirer of Marie Antoinette, Axel von Fersen, organised the flight of the Royal Family (Flight to Varennes); they were stopped at a road block and returned to Paris.
The National Assembly dissolved itself, universal adult manhood suffrage was introduced and elections for a Legislative Assembly were held (representatives of the National Assembly barred themselves from running in the election for the Legislative Assembly, which resulted in the radicalization of the latter. The newly elected representatives had not accomplished anything yet, their predecessors had.
Foreign merchants did not accept assignats, which resulted in a coin shortage. France was heading for a crisis, as public trust in the royal family had suffered from the Flight to Varennes and Louis XVI.'s use of the veto. The Legislative Assembly broke up in three major camps, the Royalists, the Gironde (moderate reformers) and the Jacobins (radical reformers).
In 1792, Emperor Francis I., brother of Marie Antoinette, created the First Coalition; a combined Austro-Prussian army under the command of the Duke of Braunschweig ('Brunswick') invaded France with the aim to restore the Ancien Regime; the coalition also included the United Kingdom, Spain and Savoy-Piemont as members. Numerous French officers (noblemen) deserted to join the ranks of the invaders; in some areas of France, the Royalists were in control, openly collaborating with coalition forces; the Royalists handed over the fortresses guarding Toulon to the British.
Among the Jacobins, actions such as these were interpreted as treason. Volunteers from cities all across France, organized in battalions, marched on Paris to deal with the problem, the most famous of these being those of Marseille ("La Marseillaise"). Meanwhile, the Duke of 'Brunswick' issued a manifesto calling upon the Parisians not to resist the invading forces, a manifesto Louis XVI. ordered to be published in the streets of Paris.

We should be aware that the longing for political change was not limited to France. Belgium in 1789-1790 saw a revolution (different in nature than the French, as the revolutionaries were nobles and notables, aiming at preserving regional autonomy - the Brabant Revolution). Poland saw a reform parliament, the Sejm, debate a constitution which would reduce the privileges of the magnates and create a manageable Polish state. The bourgeoisie, the intellectuals outside France - except for countries where the church had held on to control over society, such as Spain, the Papal State, and the Kingdom of Naples, largely sympathized with the French revolutionaries. The monarchs, nobles of Europe largely were concerned. Monasteries in Westphalia and the Rhineland, for instance, provided refuge for French monks and priests; exile French nobles gathered in places such as Koblenz.


C.) National Convention, 1792-1794

Now Louis XVI. was seen as a traitor to the nation. Referred to as Citoyen Capet, he was arrested, and so were Marie Antoinette and her children. Parliament decided over how to deal with the king : a majority of one sentenced him to death. This matter resulted in the breakup of the Legislative Asembly, as the Royalists moved out, the Gironde broke up over the issue.
New elections, for a National Convention, were held, dominated by Jacobins. The country not only faced invading foreign armies, but also a full-scale civil war. Royalists controlled considerable parts of the country, most notably the Vendee.
The Levee en Masse was introduced (mandatory military service), the Austro-Prussion invaders stopped in the Canonade of Valmy. French armies battled coalition forces on a number of fronts, and pushed beyond France's borders (pressing money out of occupied lands, carrying valuables off, while claiming to liberate these lands from feudalism and establishing French-type satellite republics). Within France, war against the Royalists was fought with an intensity not seen in Europe for centuries; the entire population of areas of the Vendee 'liberated' by revolutionary forces was massacred; the first case of genocide in modern history.
In Paris and other cities held by the revolutionaries, a policy of terror was implemented. Nobles not wearing the Coquarde were in danger of being hung at the next lanternpost. The Comite for Public Security (presided by Maximilien Robespierre) sentenced many nobles and others deemed beneficiaries of the Ancien Regime to be sent to the guillotine; victims included Louis XVI., Marie Antoinette, their children, Madame du Barry, numerous nobles, chemist Antoine Lavoisier and feminist Olympe de Gouges. This wave of terror only strengthened the Royalists in their resolution to stand up to the revolutionaries (which they called regicides and atheists) and caused Charlotte Corday (her husband had been guillotined) to assassinate Marat.
The National Convention was the most productive period in terms of reforms passed. A currency reform introduced the Franc, based on the decimal system; the revolution introduced the metric system. The christian calendar was abolished, replaced by the revolutionary calendar. The Catholic Church herself was abolished, temporarily replaced by a Cult of Reason. Slavery was abolished (which resulted in the export of terror to Haiti, and the loss of the latter).
The terror in France was terminated by a counterrevolution, the Thermidor Reaction; Robespierre and St. Just were the last persons to be guillotined.

The War of the Coalition had resulted in the export of the revolution into Belgium, the German Rhineland, areas the control of which repeatedly changed. Support of the French Revolution among intellectuals outside of France declined, as many, among them English politician and essayist Edmund Burke, rejected the terror; others, such as Beethoven, continued to be sympathetic to the revolution. In Poland, efforts of the reform Sejm intensified; the Sejm adopted a constitution (1791) - only to see Poland occupied and partitioned by Russia, Prussia and Austria (1793, 1795).


D.) THE DIRECTORATE, 1795-1799

In 1795 the National Convention was abolished, replaced by a Directorate consisting of 5 politicians alternating in office every 2 weeks. The dominant figure was P.F.J.N. Barras.
The revolution provided an excellent career opportunity for ambitious young officers. Practically the entire officer corps of the French army sympathized with the enemy and declined to do their job properly. At Toulon, young officer Napoleon Bonaparte took the initiative and expelled the English from the forts guarding the port. Barras promoted him general, 'transferred' his mistress Josephine de Beauharnais to Napoleon, placed him in charge of the troops on the Italian frontier. These troops had not been paid for months, were hungry. Upon arrival, Napoleon told him he did neither bring money nor food, but knew where the soldiers could find both - on the other side of the Alps, in the Austrian camp. Napoleon decided the war in Italy (1797, Treaty of Campo Formio) and returned to France.
A man of his ambition and charisma was dangerous and had to be kept busy. The war with the United Kingdom was an opportunity; England could be harmed by a French army moving via Egypt to India. Napoleon reached Egypt, but the British fleet under Lord Nelson destroyed the French fleet off Alexandria, cutting off Napoleon's communication line; he got stuck in Egypt. Upset about Barras not concluding peace with the English, which would have allowed him to take his army home, he returned to France without his army in 1799. A coup d'etat staged before his arrival in Paris ended the Directotate.
The Directorate was focussing on France holding its ground in the War of the First Coalition. In 1795, peace treaties were concluded with Spain and Prussia; Spain became a French ally. Satellite Republics were established in the Northern Netherlands (the Batavian Republic), later in Italy (Ligurian Republic etc.) and Switzerland (Helvetian Republic, 1798); France annexed territory, the Rhineland in 1795 etc.
The period of reform legislation had practically ended. Among the accomplishments of the Directory was ending the civil war with the Royalists by negotiation.
The Coalitions actually had their opportunities to change Europe in their favour. In 1798-1799 Russian general Suvorov was victorious on thev Italian/Swiss front. A Russo-British dispute over Malta (the Maltese knights had elected Russian Czar Paul I. as Grand Master; when the British expelled the French in 1800, they refused to recognize Russian claims. Angered, Czar Paul I. ordered the Russian troops to withdraw.


E.) THE CONSULATE, 1799-1804

In effect, since 1799, Napoleon ruled alone, the other two consuls being figureheads. Napoleon was much identified as the personification of reform in France, not so much because he passed reforms, but because he defended many, and decreed these reforms to be implemented in countries outside of France he controlled.
In a treaty with the pope, the Concordat, Napoleon restored the Catholic Church in France (a non-Gallican church), returned the church buildings, abolished the Cult of Reason, in return for the pope recognizing the confiscation of church lands in France. Napoleon also abolished the revolutionary calender, reintroduced the Gregorian calendar. The Catholic Church in France was a private institution; the state was responsible for education and family matters (civil registry).
Napoleon terminated other reforms he regarded failures, such as the metric system, and reintroduced slavery (the abolition of slavery had resulted in disaster in Haiti).
Napoleon granted full emancipation to France's Jews. Under him in 1804 the Code Civile or Code Napoleon was published, a compilation of laws based on the principles of liberte, egalite and fraternite.

Napoleon, an exceptional military leader, extended his influence far beyond the borders of France. He controlled much of Italy, the Netherlands (Batavian Republic), Switzerland (Helvetian Republic) and Germany; within the moribund Holy Roman Empire he had the ecclesiastic statelets partitioned/absorbed by their neighbours (1803).
Napoleon, a native Corsican, apart from being a military genius with political instinct, was also a gourmet, womanizer and nepotist. In 1804 he crowned himself Emperor of the French, and Josephine Empress (in a ceremony which supposedly was conducted by the pope, who hesitated, causing Napoleon to conduct the symbolic act himself).
This change of policy, from the protagonist of reform to the creation of a Napoleon-centered new nobility, cost him the sympathies of many, notably that of German composer Ludwig van Beethoven; he crossed out an earlier dedication of the Eroica to Bonaparte.


F.) THE EMPIRE, 1804-1813

Napoleon assumed the title of King of Italy in 1805, had his brothers Joseph crowned King of Naples in 1806, Louis King of Holland in 1807, Jerome ing of Westphalia in 1807. Either, existing republics were converted into monarchies (Italy, Holland), a conquered country turned into a monarchy (Naples) or a new kingdom created by merging a number of smaller states; Napo0leon provided his closest relatives with titlesw he regarded appropriate. In 1808 Napoleon met King Ferdinand of Spain, suggested the latter to abdicate in his own name and that of his son, so that Napoleon's brother Joseph could become King of Spain. This 'suggestion' was executed and would start the Popular War in Spain, would enter the word guerilla in Englash language dictionaries.
Among Europe's traditional noble families, the Bonapartes were treated as parvenus, temporarily on the throne because of power, but not legitimate. In order to overcome this stigma, Napoleon divorced Josephine, and in 1809 married Marie Louise of Habsburg, of Europe's most prestigious noble family. They were to have a son, the King of Rome.
In 1804 Napoleon failed in the execution of a plan to invade England. 1805 saw Napoleon's victory in the Battle of Austerlitz. In 1806 Napoleon decreed the Continental Blockade, in order to deprive the British industries and merchant houses of their European market. He dissolved the Holy Roman Empire, and created the Confederation of the Rhine (without Prussia and Austria). He recreated a Polish state, in form of the Duchy of Warsaw. Russia turned from a French enemy into an ally (Tilsit 1807).
The British attempted to take control of Copenhagen and the Sound in 1808, and thus drove Denmark into the arms of Napoleon. Sweden in 1808 feared itself becoming the victim of partition be France's allies Denmark and Russia; Sweden lost Finland to Russia in 1808. When the Swedish crown priince died, Swedish reform politicians decided to offer the position of (adopted) crown prince to Napoleon himself. Otto Mörner was charged with presenting the offer to Napoleon; the latter declined. Mörner then offered it to one of Napoleon's officers, Jean Baptiste Bernadotte, who accepted.
The Continental Blockade had an impact on both Britain and the continent. The Caribbean sugar plantations went through a crisis, the slave trade was unprofitable, the British parliament abolished it in 1807. Smuggling was big business on the coasts of Europe. In Wallonia (the French-speaking parts of modern Belgium) the metal industry flourished, producing arms and ammunition for Napoleon's armies (Belgium was the first country on the European continent to industrialize). Protection from the import of superior British machinery/weaponry, offered by the Continental Blockade, was instrumental in this development.
France could not win the Popular War in Spain; the guerilleros were supported by the British. They did not fight battles, did not play by the rules; Spain was 'Napoleon's ulcer'. In 1812 Napoleon, dissatisfied with Russia's lukewarm attitude toward the Continental Blockade, invaded Russia with the Grand Armee (600,000 men, for a large part Germans and Italians pressed into service). The Russian commander Kutusov was convinced he could not defeat the French on the battlefield; he ordered retreat, pursued the scorched earth policy. He wanted to order the evacuation of Moscow, this could not be done without a battle being lost. So Kutusov made a stand at Borodino, knowing the Russians would lose the battle. After the defeat, the order to evacuate Moscow was given. Napoleon entered a deserted Mocow, at the head of 130,000 men (losses mainly because of desertions). Napoleon expected emissaries to come. He waited for two months, while his army fought fire (Russians setting their capital afire again and again). Finally realizing that he was traped, he ordered retreat. By now it was November, the roads muddy, then icy. The French abandoned most of their cannon, pursuit and pressed by Russian cavallery. By the time Napoleon reached the Beresina River, he had 30,000 men left. When the French crossed the river, Russian artillery opened fire at the bridge. 5,000 men had managed to cross the bridge before it was destroyed; Napoleon had not lost a battle, but an army.
Prussia, hitherto a reluctant French ally, switched sides; Sweden had done so at the outset of Napoleon's campaign. Austria switched sides later in 1813. Napoleon, at the head of a newly raised army, still had to be defeated in the field. This was done by a joint Austro-Prusso-Russian etc. army under the command of Swedish crown prince Jean Baptiste Bernadotte, in the Battle of Leipzig 1813.


G.) ELBA AND THE 100 DAYS

The power, in the Vienna Congress, negotiated Europe's post-Napoleonic order. Napoleon, brother-in-law of the Austrian Emperor, was given the island of lba to rule as his principality. He was bored, returned to France, where soldiers and officers were flocking to him; by the time he reached Paris, he was at the head of an army (the 100 Days). Anothr campaign had to be fought, in Belgium. Napoleon's French army against the Prussians under Blücher and the English under Wellington. Napoleon divided his forces, ordering one part to drive off the Prussians, while he intended to annihilate the English. It worked according to plan, at Waterloo, until Blücher's Prussians arrived on the scene, attacked the French in the flank and decided the battle.
This time Napoleon was sent to Saint Helena, a prisoner without chains, too far from civilization for him to escape. He died there in 1821.


H.) THE LEGACY

While Napoleon ultimately was defeated, he had achieved lasting change in Europe. French reforms, the code civile, had been introduced in areas he temporarily controlled. Prussia, a state the raison d'etre of which had always been its army, had been compelled to implement drastic reforms, the introduction of mandatory military service, the abilition of serfdom, the emancipation of the Jews being among them. These reforms were not taken back.
The French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars had resulted in the rise of nationalism elsewhere. Polish nationalism was pro-French, as the Poles invested their hopes in regaining independence in Napoleon. Spanish and German nationalism, and to a certain extent Russian nationalism, were explicitly anti-French. In the Italian case there were patriots supporting Napoleon and those opposing him.
Nationalism was a political stream affectring mainly the bourgeoisie. Hitherto excluded from political affairs, bourgeois patriots identified with their respective nations (often these were little more than utopian political concepts) volunteering to fight the French. From victory they hoped for gratitude of the monarchs - in form of a written constitution, respecting civil rights - the achievements of the French Revolution. The world had changed.