#10 aout

[grandboute]

30 years ago...

København

[fanfeline]

Vive la République! Vive la Nation!

[needsmoreresearch]

How many tears I have shed, my dear mother, since midnight yesterday when the tocsin began to ring without stopping until one o'clock this afternoon.  We are victors.  The palace is burning, the blood of the swiss is flowing.

Suleau's head was cut off, they paraded it around Paris. Yesterday C[amille] said to him "My dear, you want to fight for the king, tomorrow you will hang."  He spoke only too truly.  The monsters set cannons all over the palace dome and the unfortunate Marseillais took the first round of fire.  The king is at the National Assembly, everyone was shouting abuse at him.  We're waiting for the Assembly to announce his abdication. Lafayette is in Paris, they're going to demolish his house, people are carrying scraps of the Swiss Guards' clothing around on the points of their pikes, there are quite a few people wounded but thank God none of our Paris patriots.  C is not leaving the commune or the section.

I believe right now the people and the patriots are going to camp at the Tuileries.  Mme Danton [illegible] we haven't left each other, when I might have wanted to leave it would have been impossible, they are keeping the women from going out, it is impossible for C to leave and events come one after another too quickly for me to be able to leave myself. I'm writing you from Danton's home.  I can scarcely breathe, I don't dare to believe we have carried off the victory.  As we have every reason to believe the danger has passed, at least the greatest danger, try to come but find out before you pass the barriers whether you will be able to go back, they are still killing each other and the people have no mercy. When I see you you will know more about it, o my dear mother, it has been so long since I have held you, it seems like I haven't seen you in ten years, make p[apa?] come, give him my love, everything will surely be settled here in eight days.  They are breaking the windows in the palace, someone brought us some sponges and brushes from the queen's toilet, they are trampling the silverware underfoot, no one will touch it.  goodbye, goodbye, the [illegible] are returning triumphant crying Vive la nation, they're carrying rags covered with the blood of those villains. O what fermentation.  C and all the patriots are going to embrace all those generous Marseillais. It would take me a volume to tell you everything.

Letter from Lucile Desmoulins to her mother Annette Duplessis immediately following the events of 10 August, 1792.  Mémoirs secrets du dix-neuvième siècle, Vicomte de Beaumont-Vassy, 1874.  Letter given to the author by M. Matton, who inherited the papers preserved by Annette Duplessis (and was very generous about giving them away to pals, ugh.)  I've put in some punctuation to make it more legible.

[needsmoreresearch]

louis suleau though

i still kind of have emotions about louis suleau despite myself

[needsmoreresearch]

Actually, yes, let's give a minute to the Marseille volunteers of the spring and summer of 1792.  In early August they were freshly arrived in Paris, bringing with them Rouget de Lisle's brand-new anthem; on 10 August they figured heavily in the taking of the Tuileries palace and removal of the king.

THANK YOU MIDSHIPMANKENNEDY FOR THIS FINE MORNING SUGGESTION!