13 Vendémiaire
13 Vendémiaire names a single day in the Year 4 of the French Republican Calendar. It fell on the 5th of October 1795, when Republican troops and Royalist insurgents fought in the streets of Paris. By the time the guns fell silent, close to three hundred Royalists lay dead in the streets. The Republican defenders had held their ground despite being outnumbered roughly six to one. A young, largely unproven general took command of the artillery that day and refused to give ground. Why was the government of Revolutionary France so exposed that a single afternoon of street fighting could nearly topple it? How did the young officer who saved that government change the direction of his own career? And what did a Scottish historian mean when he later claimed this day marked the true end of the French Revolution? This documentary follows the collapse of a Catholic rebellion in western France and the march of Royalist exiles on the capital. It ends with the two hours of gunfire that decided the outcome.
In March 1793, Catholic anger at the Revolution's anti-clerical policies erupted into armed rebellion across the Vendée region of western France. The rebels called their force the Armée catholique et royale. It quickly became a serious problem for the Revolutionary government, led by figures such as François de Charette de la Contrie and Maurice d'Elbée. Their fighters became known as Chouans, a name drawn from early Royalist leader Jean Cottereau's nickname, Jean Chouan. With British support behind it, the Armée catholique et royale won a string of early victories against several Revolutionary armies. The Committee of Public Safety ordered General Jean-Baptiste Carrier to pacify the region. Over several months, his troops crushed the uprising so ruthlessly that locals nicknamed them the infernal columns. The rebellion collapsed after a major defeat at the Battle of Savenay on the 22nd of December 1793.
Following the 9th of Thermidor, the National Convention offered amnesty to any Chouans willing to lay down their arms. Instead, they attacked the Republican-held town of Guémené-sur-Scorff on the 28th of January 1795. The Convention sent General Louis Lazare Hoche to force a cessation of hostilities, and he quickly defeated the Chouan army. On the 17th of February, Charette de la Contrie signed a generous peace settlement. General Jean-Nicolas Stofflet and the fanatical Etienne-Alexandre Bernier refused to accept it and kept fighting. They were backed by 4,000 British-supplied émigrés under Générals Joseph de Puisaye and Hermilly. Hearing of this new force, Charette de la Contrie broke the peace and reopened hostilities. On the 26th of June, the émigré force landed at Carnac. Hermilly advanced on Auray, but Hoche defeated him at Vannes and pushed him out of Auray, trapping him under siege at the Fortress of Penthièvre. The entire insurgent army was now cornered on the Quiberon peninsula. A further émigré division under Général Charles François de Virot de Sombreuil arrived to reinforce the defense on the 15th of July. Hermilly was killed in action the next day. By the 20th, the fortress had fallen, and Hoche swept down the peninsula to crush the trapped émigré army. Only Général Puisaye and a small band escaped with the British fleet; the rest were killed, captured, or executed.
Despite the destruction of his émigré allies, Charette de la Contrie was not finished with his campaign against the Republic.
In early September 1795, a popular revolt broke out near the town of Dreux, only to be crushed in battle at Nonancourt. Charette de la Contrie suffered his own major defeat at Saint-Cyr on the 25th of September. Despite this, the Comte d'Artois landed at Île d'Yeu with 1,000 émigrés and 2,000 British troops. Bolstered by this force, Royalist troops began marching on Paris in early October 1795.
News of the Comte d'Artois's arrival excited the jeunesse dorée, Royalist supporters based in the Le Peletier section of Paris. The section took its name from the Rue Le Peletier, in what is now the Second Arrondissement. They began demonstrations that included felling Liberty Trees and trampling the cockades of France. Rumours soon spread that the entire Paris National Guard might defect to the Royalist side.
The Convention would soon discover just how little it could count on that Guard for its own protection.
The National Convention refused to abandon its meeting rooms until the crisis passed. It called for three battalions of Patriots, raised from Jacobin military staff who had been dismissed after the 9th of Thermidor. Général Jean-François, baron de Menou, was given command of the capital's defense. He had only 5,000 troops to face a Royalist force of 25,000 men.
On 12 Vendémiaire, the 4th of October 1795, the National Guard arrived in Le Peletier in an attempt to put down the unrest. The Military Committee of the Sections of the Capital, under Jean-Thomas-Élisabeth Richer de Sérizy, announced that the Convention's decrees were no longer recognised. Général Louis Michel Auguste Thévenet, known as Danican, took command of the National Guard within the Le Peletier section. The Convention ordered Menou to advance into Le Peletier, disarm the area, and shut down Danican's headquarters. Generals Despierres and Verdière were sent to assist him.
Menou divided his force into three columns and planned to advance into Le Peletier on the evening of 12 Vendémiaire. When the moment came, Despierres reported that he was unwell and unable to proceed, and Verdière refused to advance at all. Menou himself advanced only timidly, inviting the rebels to discuss terms of dispersal, then withdrew after they promised to disarm. Seeing this as weakness, the Le Peletier section called on the rest of Paris to rise up. Menou realised his error and launched a cavalry charge down the Rue du Faubourg-Montmartre, temporarily clearing the area of Royalists. The Convention dismissed him from command and put Paul François Jean Nicolas Barras in charge of its defense.
Barras would need help holding that command, and it arrived in the form of a general who happened to be inside the building that day.
Napoleon Bonaparte was aware of the commotion and arrived at the Convention to find out what was happening. He was quickly ordered to join Barras's forces, and he accepted only on the condition that he be given complete freedom of movement. At one in the morning on 13 Vendémiaire, the 5th of October, Bonaparte overrode Barras, who was content to let him do as he wished.
Bonaparte ordered Joachim Murat, a sous-lieutenant in the 12ème Régiment de Chasseurs à Cheval, to ride to the plain of Sablons. His task was to bring back the 40 cannon that Menou had said were stationed there. Murat's squadron retrieved the guns before the Royalists could reach them. Bonaparte then arranged the cannon in commanding positions with clear fields of fire.
At five in the morning, a Royalist probing attack was repulsed. Five hours later, the main Royalist assault began, involving roughly 7,000 men. The Republican line held, its cannons firing grapeshot into the massed Royalist ranks while Patriot infantry cut down the advancing rebels. Bonaparte commanded throughout the two-hour engagement and came through unhurt, though his horse was shot from under him. As the grapeshot and volleys took their toll, the Royalist attack began to falter, and Bonaparte ordered a counterattack led by Murat's squadron of chasseurs.
Historians would later reach for a memorable phrase to capture exactly what those forty cannon had done to the Revolution.
Scottish philosopher and historian Thomas Carlyle later described what happened that morning in a single memorable phrase. Bonaparte, Carlyle wrote, had given his opponents a "Whiff of Grapeshot." He added that "the thing we specifically call French Revolution is blown into space by it." In Carlyle's reading, 13 Vendémiaire marks the true end of the French Revolution itself. The phrase is often credited to Bonaparte directly, but the words were probably Carlyle's own invention.
Within weeks, the very Convention that Bonaparte had just saved would dissolve itself and hand power to a new form of government.
On the 19th of October 1795, every officer in the army had to account for their whereabouts around 13 Vendémiaire. This applied even to those previously dismissed, and the reports went to the Committee of Public Safety. On Sunday, the 25th of October, the National Convention declared itself dissolved. It voted a general amnesty for what it called "deeds exclusively connected with the Revolution."
Soon after, the Directoire and the Council of Five Hundred were installed, and the Committee of Public Safety disappeared entirely. Napoleon was appointed General in Chief of the Army of the Interior. He became a national hero almost overnight and was quickly promoted to Général de Division. Within five months, he was given command of the French army conducting operations in Italy. The defeated Royalists tried to portray the Republican defense as a massacre, and nicknamed him Général Vendémiaire. He later said it would be his first title of glory.
That nickname, meant as an insult, would outlive the Revolution itself and follow Bonaparte onto movie and television screens for generations to come.
Director Abel Gance staged 13 Vendémiaire in the third act of his silent film Napoléon. The first episode of the 2002 miniseries Napoléon also portrays the battle. The 2023 film Napoleon depicts the same events as well.
The 2023 film Napoleon still opens its story with the same fight that once decided whether the Republic would survive its own capital.
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Common questions
What was the battle of 13 Vendémiaire?
13 Vendémiaire was a battle fought on the 5th of October 1795 between French Revolutionary troops and Royalist forces in the streets of Paris. It was part of establishing the Directory as France's new government, and it was a major factor in the rapid advancement of Republican General Napoleon Bonaparte's career.
When did the 13 Vendémiaire uprising take place?
The battle took place on 13 Vendémiaire, Year 4 of the French Republican Calendar, which corresponds to the 5th of October 1795.
Who commanded the Republican defense at 13 Vendémiaire?
Napoleon Bonaparte directed the Republican artillery after joining Paul François Jean Nicolas Barras's forces on condition of complete freedom of movement. He ordered Joachim Murat to retrieve 40 cannon from the plain of Sablons and positioned them in commanding areas to defend the Convention.
How many Royalists died during the 13 Vendémiaire battle?
Around three hundred Royalists were killed during the two-hour engagement in the streets of Paris. The Republican defenders had been outnumbered approximately six to one before the major Royalist assault of 7,000 men was repulsed.
What does the phrase whiff of grapeshot mean in relation to 13 Vendémiaire?
The phrase comes from Scottish historian Thomas Carlyle, who wrote that Bonaparte gave his opponents a Whiff of Grapeshot and that this is what blew the French Revolution into space. The words are often mistakenly credited to Bonaparte himself, but they were probably Carlyle's own.
What happened to Napoleon Bonaparte after 13 Vendémiaire?
Bonaparte was appointed General in Chief of the Army of the Interior and quickly promoted to Général de Division. Within five months he was given command of the French army operating in Italy, and the defeated Royalists nicknamed him Général Vendémiaire, a title he later called his first title of glory.
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