The French Revolution is an oft heard about but little known period to most wargamers. We hear of the storming of the Bastille, the Reign of Terror, and the rise of Napoleon. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." The Scarlet Pimpernel rescuing Aristocrats from the Guillotine, and last but not least the execution of the King. Lord! There is so much more to it than that! This years PBM will hopefully interest you in reading more about it. To start off with though, is a chronology of what happened.
CHRONOLOGY OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION:
1788
The Kingdom of France is in grave financial crisis.
1789
The King calls for the Estates General to meet.
The Estates meet but do not give Louis new taxes.
The King locks them out of the hall, they reconvene in
the royal tennis court and swear an oath to not disband
until they have created a constitutional monarchy.
The Parisian mob storms the Bastille.
The mob marches to Versailles and takes the King back
to Paris with them.
General Lafayette moves the Estates General, now the
National Assembly into Paris as well.
The Declaration of the Rights of Man is written.
The peasants are freed of their feudal duties.
Aristocrats start to leave the country.
1790
Bishop Tallyrand sponsors laws which confiscate to the
State all the lands of the church.
The National Assembly begins to issue paper money based
on the sale of church land to pay the national debt.
Run away inflation begins.
The King celebrates the first Bastille Day.
More Aristocrats leave the country and start to form an
"army" in Germany.
1791
The King tries to flee from Paris, and France, but is
captured and returned to the capital.
Danton and Marat call for a petition to depose the King.
Lafayette has the National Guard fire on a crowd in the
Champs de Mars, waiting to sign the petition.
Danton flees to England; Marat hides in the sewers of
Paris and catches a skin disease.
The Constitution of 1791 is passed, which establishes a
Constitutional Monarchy.
New elections are held. The Girondists win and take over
the government from the liberal aristocrats.
The Austria's Declaration of Pillaitz threatens France.
The Girondist government threatens Emigres with
confiscation of their lands If they do not return by December.
1792
Emigre lands are confiscated.
The Girondist government plans war with Austria and
Prussia to take care of the Emigres (and divert
attention away from the financial crisis).
The King feeds military secrets to the enemy.
War Is declared on Austria and Prussia.
Lafayette and other American Revolutionary war heroes
botch the war up.
Distrust of Aristocratic officers soars.
The King dismisses the Girondist government.
Lafayette comes to Paris to rescue the King but
accomplishes nothing. He then flees to Germany.
The San Coulette sections of Paris stage a coup which
overthrows the constitutional monarchy.
The
Revolutionary Tribunal is started.
Angry mobs
massacre pro royalist priests.
General Dumouriez
defeats the invading Prussian army at Valmy, and goes
on to capture Belgium.
The Revolutionary
government charges the King with treason.
1793
The King is executed.
The Girondists and Cordeliers vie to control the
government.
Dumouriez tries to get the army to march on Paris to
take stage a second coup. They refuse and Dumouriez
flees to Germany.
Cordellers and Jacobins team up on the Committee of
Public Safety and start the Reign of Terror.
Girondists are the first killed in the Terror.
Marat is assassinated by a Girondist sympanthiser.
Counter Revolutions break out all over France.
The Levee en Masse saves France from threats both
internal and external.
Napoleon Bounaparte first appears at the siege of
Toulon.
1794
The Terror in the provinces is brutal in crushing
counter revolutionaries and any other "enemies of
the state" that the locals cared to kill.
The army becomes the institution that first brings
revolutionary ideas to the peasants at large.
Having killed all other opposition the Committee of
Public safety executes Danton, due to his wanting to
make peace.
The Terror finally catches up with Robespierre. After
he is dead the Terror ends.
The Directorate is founded.
The Revolution effectively
ends when this body turns Napoleon on the mob of Paris
to tame them with a "Whiff of Grapeshot."
The French Revolution
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© Copyright 1991 by Chris Engle
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