Causes
The abandonment of the controlled economy provoked a frightful economic catastrophe. Prices soared and the rate of exchange fell. The Republic was condemned to massive inflation and its currency was ruined. In Thermidor, Year III, ''assignats'' were worth less than 3 percent of their face value. Neither peasants nor merchants would accept anything but coin. The debacle was so swift that economic life seemed to come to standstill. The insurmountable obstacles raised by the premature reestablishment of economic freedom reduced the government to a state of extreme weakness. Lacking resources, it became almost incapable of administration, and the crisis generated troubles that nearly brought its collapse. The ''sans-culottes'', who had unprotestingly permitted the Jacobins to be proscribed, began to regret the regime of the Year II, now that they themselves were without work and without bread.The insurrection
A pamphlet, published in the evening of 30 ''Floreal'' (19 May 1795) and entitled ''Insurrection of the People to obtain bread and reconquer their right'', gave the signal for the movement. This pamphlet, which was known as ''The Plan of Insurrection'', provided the popular agitators with definite objectives, the first of which was expressed in a single word: Bread! Its political aims were expounded at greater length: the putting into practice of the Constitution of 1793, the election of a legislative assembly which should take the place of the Convention, the release of the imprisoned patriots. The people were asked to march in a body to the Convention on 1 Prairial. There can be no doubt about the preparation of the insurrection by the ''sans-culottes'' leaders. As early as 29 Germinal (18 April), had reported a plot to the Convention. As for the deputies of the Left, their attitude on the first of ''Prairial'' showed that they looked favorably on the movement, yet they did nothing to organize or direct it.First round
Early on 1 ''Prairial'' the tocsin was sounded in theSecond day
The armed rebellion continued the next day. From 2 o'clock in the morning, the call to arms had sounded in the ''Quinze Vingts''. The tocsin tolled before 10 o'clock in ''Fidelite (Hotel de Ville)'' and ''Droits de l'Homme''. In these two sections and in ''Arcis, Gravilliers, and Popincourt'' illegal assemblies were held. The three sections of the ''Faubourg Saint-Antoine'' sprang to arms and marched on the Convention, led by Guillaume Delorme, a wheelwright and captain of the gunners of ''Popincourt''. Supported by some sections of the center, they appeared on the ''Place du Carrousel'' at 3:30 in the afternoon, loaded guns and trained them on the Convention. General Dubois, who commanded the Convention forces, had 40,000 men under him; the insurgents may have numbered 20,000. It was the largest display of military force drawn up for battle that had been seen in Paris since the Revolution began. But no shots were fired: when the Convention's gunners and ''gendarmerie'' deserted to the opposing side, the insurgents failed to follow up the advantage. Towards evening negotiations began; petitioners were received at the bar of the Assembly, repeated their demands for bread and the Constitution of 1793 and received the presidential embrace. Lulled by vain hopes of promises to be fulfilled, the insurgents thereupon retired to their various sections.The defeat
But the Convention was determined to make an end of the business. On the morning of 3 Prairial regular army units were mustered, in addition to the ''jeunesse dorée'' and battalions of the western Sections, and preparations were made to enclose the ''Faubourg Saint-Antoine'' within a ring of hostile forces. The ''jeunesse'' made a premature sortie into the ''faubourg'' and was forced to retreat, and ''Saint-Antoine'' workers rescued from the police one of the assassins of ''Féraud'' on his way to execution. But, during the night, the Government overcame the resistance of most of the other insurgent Sections; and, on the 4 Prairial, the ''faubourg'' was called upon to hand over ''Féraud's'' murderers and all arms at its disposal: in the event of refusal it would be declared to be in a state of rebellion and all Sections would be called upon to help to reduce it by force of arms or to starve it into surrender. Meanwhile, an army under General Menou prepared to advance against the rebels. Their situation was hopeless; yet some attempt was made in other Sections to bring them relief. In ''Poissonnière'' Étienne Chefson, a cobbler and old soldier of the ''armée révolutionnaire'', was later arrested for trying to organize building workers of the rues ''d'Hauteville'' and ''de l'Échiquier'' to march to the help of the ''faubourg''; in ''Arcis'' and in ''Finistère'', there were shouts, even after the battle was lost. But no material support was forthcoming; and the ''faubourg'' surrendered, a few hours later, without a shot being fired. The movement was totally crushed.Reaction
This time, the repression was thorough and ruthless. It struck both at the leaders – or presumed leaders – of the insurrection itself and at the potential leaders of similar revolts in the future: to behead the ''sans-culottes'' once and for all as a political force it was thought necessary to strike at the remnants of Jacobins in the Convention and in the Sectional assemblies and National Guard. Twelve deputies were arrested, including six that had supported the demonstrators' demands on 1 Prairial. On 23 May (4 Prairial), a Military Commission was set up for the summary trial and execution of all persons captured with arms in their possession or wearing the insignia of rebellion. The Commission sat for ten weeks and tried 132 persons; nineteen of these, including six deputies of the Mountain, were condemned to death. The murderers of Feraud, the ''gendarmes'' who had gone to over to rioters, and the deputies Romme, Duquesnoy, Goujon, Duroy, :fr:Pierre-Amable de Soubrany and Bourbotte were all lumped together in the same category. The condemned deputies, wishing both to demonstrate their inviolable liberty and to challenge their accusers, attempted to kill themselves before being conducted to the scaffold. The first three were successful. Soubrany died as he reached the ''guillotine''; the others were executed alive. This 'heroic sacrifice' put the 'martyrs of Prairial' in the pantheon of the popular movement. But it highlighted the insoluble contradiction of their position. On 1 Prairial the most lucid of them understood the trap which was set up for them and consciously walked into it. The Sections were invited to hold special meetings on 24 May to denounce and disarm all suspected 'terrorists' and Jacobin sympathizers. The result was a massive toll of proscriptions, in which the settling of old scores played as large a part as the testing of political orthodoxy. By the 28 May the ''Gazette française'' already put their number at 10,000; and the eventual total of arrested and disarmed must have been considerably larger, as, in several Sections, all former members of Revolutionary Committees, all soldiers of the ''armée révolutionnaire'' were arrested or disarmed irrespective of any part they may have played in the events of Germinal or Prairial. The precedent thus established was to be followed on more than one occasion during theReferences
Sources
* * * * * *{{Cite book, last1=Hampson, first1=Norman, title=A Social History of the French Revolution, year=1988, publisher=University of Toronto Press, location=Routledge, isbn=0-710-06525-6, url-access=registration, url=https://archive.org/details/socialhistoryoff0000hamp 1795 events of the French Revolution Military coups in France 18th century in Paris 18th-century coups d'état and coup attempts Insurgencies in Paris