History of the storming of the Bastille. Taking of the Bastille. How it really happened The storming of the Bastille 1789

The historical element "revolutionary situation" is very unstable and naturally turns into the next historical element - dual power. In Russian, this element could be called "Kerenschina".
In France, the day of the onset of this era - July 14, 1789, Bastille Day - has been the main national holiday since 1880. Day in the USSR February Revolution 1917 was also an official holiday for the entire first decade after 1917, and even then it was celebrated on the calendar, although it was no longer a day off.
The main thing that happens on this day is that after watching for some time a growing and widening crack in the former monolith of those in power, the people begin to move. And there is a second center of power, opposing the "old regime". Here it should be noted that the "motor" of the revolutionary dual power of the era of 1789-1993 did not operate in the assembly of deputies, not in the Ball Game Hall, but in the quarters and crowds of the Parisian common people, ready to defend the revolution with weapons in their hands.
Similarly, in Russia in 1917 the center of revolutionary power was not at all in the Tauride Palace, where The State Duma, and not even in the cabinets of ministers of the Provisional Government. No, he was in the street, in an armed crowd of soldiers and workers, in trucks filled with revolutionary people, perhaps in the Petrograd Soviet, which could directly lean on this crowd and on these trucks bristling with bayonets and red flags.
Of course, in the English Revolution, it was by no means the MPs themselves who were its motor, this "motor" was in the midst of the people, then - in the midst of the revolutionary "army of a new model."
In France, the object for the revolutionary attack on July 14, 1789 was unmistakably chosen by the people. The fortress-prison Bastille had a sinister reputation in the eyes of all classes, the nobles hated it no less, and perhaps more ordinary people, as a symbol of royal omnipotence and oppression. After all, any aristocrat could also be imprisoned indefinitely within the walls of the Bastille with a simple Lettre de cachet (royal order for arrest and detention without explanation). By the way, according to Lettre de cachet, one of its last prisoners, the aristocrat Marquis de Sade, ended up in the Bastille, who, according to legend, provoked the assault by shouting through the window to the crowd that the jailers were beating prisoners. (True, he himself was transferred from prison for this trick, so that among the last seven prisoners of the Bastille, released by the insurgent people on July 14, his name is not). As a result, the fortress-prison fell under the onslaught of a motley revolutionary crowd, the commandant Marquis de Launay, who ordered to shoot at the attackers and tried to blow up the powder magazine of the fortress along with himself and all of its garrison, was executed by the insurgent people. (It is amusing to note that the well-known Soviet dissident Vadim Delaunay descended from this very commandant and was even proud of such kinship: “My distant ancestor was the commandant of the Bastille. For loyalty to the oath to the king, they cut off his head in a fit of “people’s anger” and solemnly wore it on the peaks of the rebels through the streets of Paris ... And Why, then, was it necessary to mount his head on a peak and carry it all over Paris! Well, you see, this is rudeness and meanness!").

Marquis Bernard-René Jordan de Launay (1740–1789), last commandant of the Bastille
Vadim Nikolaevich Delaunay (1947–1983), Soviet dissident, participant in the 1968 demonstration on Red Square, a distant descendant of the Marquis de Launay. Both died in Paris...

Unknown artist. Arrest de Launay

Jean-Baptiste Lallemand (Jean-Baptiste Lallemand, 1716-1803). Arrest of the commandant of the Bastille. 1790

Jean Pierre Louis Laurent Hoüel (1735-1813). The storming of the Bastille on July 14, 1789. 1789

Jean-Baptiste Lallemand (Jean-Baptiste Lallemand, 1716-1803). The storming of the Bastille on July 14, 1789. (Musee Carnavalet)

Charles Thevenin (1764-1838). Taking of the Bastille. 1789
Thévenin was one of the first to address the theme of the storming of the Bastille in his painting.

Jean-Francois Janinet (1752-1814). Storming of the Bastille July 14, 1789

Unknown artist. Storming of the Bastille July 14, 1789

Unknown artist. Storming of the Bastille July 14, 1789. About 1789-1791

Jean Pierre Louis Laurent Hoüel (1735-1813). The beginning of the destruction of the Bastille. July 16, 1789

The beginning of the destruction of the Bastille As you know, on the site of the former fortress they wrote: "From now on, they dance here"

The beginning of the destruction of the Bastille. 1790

In Russia, the offensive of dual power in February 1917 is closely connected with the now forgotten phrase "armed trucks". We read about the days of February in the monarchist Shulgin: “For minutes, the crowd was cut through by nightmarish huge animals, bristling and deafeningly growling ... They were trucks packed to capacity with revolutionary fighters ... Bayonets stuck out in all directions, huge red flags curled over them. What a disgust ... "
And here is a revolutionary postcard from February 1917, on the contrary, glorifying these very trucks (“An armed truck is ready at any moment to come to the aid of the freedom fighters,” the caption reads):

Artistic image of the same "February" truck:


Louis de Robin. Petrograd, 1917

And a dispassionate photograph that captures his appearance:

In the painting by Ivan Vladimirov, the tsarist generals arrested by the revolution are put on such a February truck:


Ivan Vladimirov (1869–1947). Arrest of generals. 1918

February bayonets. The revolutionary army is the pillar of the revolution (1917 postcard). However, we note that along with red bows and a flag, the soldiers are holding the completely old-fashioned slogan "War until complete victory." Very characteristic of the historical element is "dual power" (Kerenschina, Gironde) - a combination of old and new slogans and symbols:

Another postcard from 1917, reflecting the exercise of revolutionary power (as well as "Arrest of the Generals"):

Sometimes in an era of dual power, the revolutionary and anti-revolutionary centers of power clash, so to speak, face to face, as in this picture depicting the invasion of the Tuileries Palace by a revolutionary mob in 1792. On the right is Queen Marie Antoinette and her children. It is also very characteristic that the headdresses of both the queen and the "troublemakers" are decorated with the same revolutionary emblem. Both the defenders of the revolution and its enemies in the era of dual power assume or disguise themselves as the same "revolutionary" color.


Marie Antoinette with her children, when the crowd broke into the Tuileries on June 20, 1792

By the way, this picture also has a "continuation" - the same two social and class forces, again face to face with each other, only in the Jacobin era (here we have gone a little beyond the historical element under consideration). It is not difficult to guess the historical preferences of the artist:


George Hamilton. Marie Antoinette before her execution

We see similar scenes of confrontation between the representatives of the old regime and the new revolutionary government in other revolutions. For example:


Cromwell's soldiers break into a royalist's house (by J.Williamson for the book "More Pictures of British History by E.L.Hoskyn", London, 1914)

Or here:


William Frederick Yeames (1835–1918). "When did you last see your father?", 1878.
It is believed that the painting depicts the interrogation of a junior member of the royalist family by supporters of Parliament during the era of the English Revolution. How monarchists and opponents of revolutions in general love to portray representatives of the counter-revolution in the form of innocent suffering babies ...

Of course, this characterization of the historical element "Dual Power" is far from over, but rather just begun. Continuation - in

There is a turning point in the history of the Great Bourgeois French Revolution - the taking of the Bastille. It was this event that marked the beginning of a new era in the history of France and the fall of the monarchy, the fall of the centuries-old way of life and stability.

Initially, the Bastille was built as a fortified fortress that guarded the approaches to Paris in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine. Later, the fortress turned into a prison for prisoners. As you may have guessed, today we will talk about the history of the Bastille and its capture during the revolution.

Le nom de la Bastille

The word "Bastille" means "strengthening". The name of the fortress speaks for itself. The Bastille was built by order of King Charles V the Wise of the Valois dynasty and under the leadership of the Parisian prevost (police chief) Hugues Aubrey. At that time, the building received the status of a fortified castle, in which kings took refuge during popular uprisings and civil strife. Since the Bastille guarded the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, its full name is la Bastille Saint-Antoine or St. Anthony's Tower. Fortress Bastille

In addition, this is the territory of a rich monastery. In 1471, King Louis XI of Valois granted great privileges to the monastery lands and issued a decree that the artisans who settled here would not be subject to guild laws. This is the beginning of the flourishing and intensive development of the Saint-Antoine suburb in Paris. Craftsmen and craftsmen flock here from all over France, attracted by favorable and convenient working conditions.

What did this fortified fortress look like? It was a long massive quadrangular building, which faced the city on one side and the suburbs on the other. The building had eight towers, a vast courtyard, the fortress was surrounded by a wide and deep moat, through which a suspension bridge was thrown. The whole structure was still surrounded by a wall, which had only one gate from the Faubourg Saint-Antoine. In each tower there were three types of rooms: at the very bottom - a dark and gloomy cellar, where restless prisoners or those who were caught trying to escape were kept; the length of stay here depended on the commandant of the fortress. The next floor consisted of one room with a triple door and a window with three bars. In addition to the bed, the room had a table and two chairs. These conditions for keeping prisoners were not as harsh as at the very bottom. At the very top of the tower there was another room under the roof ( calotte), which also served as a place of punishment for prisoners. The commandant's house and the barracks of the soldiers were located in the second, outer courtyard.

La prison de la Bastille

Of course, the Bastille is better known as a place of detention than as a fortified royal fortress. It should be noted that many famous Frenchmen of the Middle Ages and Modern times were its prisoners.

A strange irony of fate, but the first prisoner of the Bastille was its architect - South Aubrey. He was accused of vicious communication and desecration of religious shrines. After serving four years, he was released during the riots.

Famous people of France of different centuries who managed to serve time in the Bastille were: philosopher-educator Voltaire, Marquis de Sade, philosopher-essayist Michel de Montaigne, finance quartermaster under Louis XIV Nicolas Fouquet, Cardinal de Rogan and Countess de Lamotte, who participated in the scam with a necklace for Queen Marie Antoinette, playwright Pierre Augustin Beaumarchais.

Even the famous "Encyclopedia" of d'Alembert and Diderot was awarded the conclusion to the Bastille.

L'homme au masque de fer

There are many secrets and legends in the history of the Bastille. One of these stories is the legend of a man in an iron mask, a prisoner who served his sentence in this prison.

In the 17th century, around 1660-70, there was a prisoner in the Bastille wearing a silk mask who never took it off. He was granted some privileges, unlike other prisoners, such as walking in the courtyards of the fortress, under the condition of complete silence. The conditions of his detention in prison were relatively mild. Indeed, no one has ever seen the face or heard the voice of this prisoner.

Voltaire suggests that this could be the illegitimate son of Queen Anne of Austria, and therefore the brother of Louis XIV. The king was afraid of his claims to the throne, so he hid him in the Bastille.

Alexandre Dumas in the novel "Viscount de Bragelon or ten years later" describes everything much more romantically. The Man in the Iron Mask was the king's twin brother, whom the latter did not even know about. He was taken to the Bastille at an early age to avoid problems. Musketeers are trying to free the prisoner and still put him on the throne. They don't succeed. But the novel is full of adventure and historical romanticism, which is so inherent in the beloved Dumas, which is why it is read in one breath.

La prize de la Bastille et la revolution

Plans to demolish the fortress appeared as early as 1784, as over the centuries the Bastille had fallen into disrepair and lost its original formidable appearance. Place Louis XVI was planned to be built in its place. So the revolutionaries simply stole the idea from royalty.

The revolutionaries decided to take the Bastille because they considered it a stronghold and a symbol of absolutism, cruelty, arbitrariness, etc.

The Bastille was taken on July 14, 1789 (it is still a national holiday in France). The rebels were mainly interested in the arsenal of the Bastille, with which it was possible to arm the revolutionaries. It is curious that there were only seven prisoners in the Bastille at that time: four counterfeiters, two mentally ill and one murderer. The Bastille contained the royal archive, which was looted, only a small part of it survived.

Work on the destruction and demolition of the Bastille was carried out until 1791. Most of its blocks served building material for the Concorde Bridge. Models of the Bastille were made from the rest of its stones and sold as souvenirs.

The Marquis de Lafayette sent one key to the Bastille to George Washington, the first President of the United States of America. Today, this key is kept in the former presidential residence, Mount Vernon, which has been turned into a museum.

After the July Revolution of 1830, it was decided to build the July Column on the site of the Bastille. This column is made of bronze, almost 80 meters high, has at the top of the genius of freedom the work of the master Dunon, and at the base - the bas-reliefs of Bari.

La Place de la Bastille aujourd'hui

Today there is no Bastille in Paris, but the memory of its taking has remained, because France has been celebrating July 14, Bastille Day, since 1880.
Place de la Bastille

Currently, Place de la Bastille is located on the site of the fortress - this is the intersection of dozens of boulevards, there is an underground node of the Paris metro of three lines and the new Paris Opera.

The outline of the fortress, laid out with paving stones of a different color on the pavement, reminds of its past existence.

So, friends, this was our little journey into the historical past of France. See you soon!

Subsequence

On July 12, 1789, Camille Desmoulins delivered his speech at the Palais Royal, on July 13 the Arsenal, Les Invalides and the city hall were looted, and on the 14th a large armed crowd approached the Bastille. Gülen and Eli, both officers of the royal troops, were chosen as the commanders of the offensive. The garrison of the fortress consisted of 82 invalids and 32 Swiss with thirteen guns, but its main defense was drawbridges and thick walls. There were only seven prisoners in the fortress - four counterfeiters, two mentally ill and one murderer. After the negative response of the commandant of the Bastille, the Marquis de Launay, to the offer made to him of voluntary surrender, the people, at about one in the afternoon, moved forward. Easily penetrating into the first outer courtyard and cutting the chains of the drawbridge with axes, he rushed into the second courtyard, where the commandant's apartments and services were located. Fierce firing began on both sides; to protect themselves from shots from above, the people dragged three huge carts of straw and set them on fire; thick smoke hid them.

Lone, knowing perfectly well that there was nothing to count on for help from Versailles, and that he could not resist this siege for a long time, decided to blow up the Bastille. But at the very time when he, with a lit wick in his hands, wanted to go down into the powder magazine, two non-commissioned officers Bekkar and Ferrand rushed at him, and, taking away the wick, forced him to convene a council of war. Almost unanimously, it was decided to surrender. A white flag was hoisted, and a few minutes later, Gülen and Eli, followed by a huge crowd, crossed the lowered drawbridge into the courtyard of the Bastille.

Several officers and soldiers were hanged; as for Lone, Gulen and Eli wanted to save him, but on the way to the city hall, the crowd beat him off from them and, decapitating, stuck the head of the unfortunate man on a pike, with which he then went around the whole city.

Contrary to popular belief, the Marquis de Sade was not kept in the Bastille during the assault, on July 2 he was transferred to an insane asylum near Paris. Immediately after his release, he made a speech. The extremely interesting archive of the Bastille was plundered, and only a part of it has survived to our times.

After July 14, the Parisian municipality decided to demolish the Bastille, and a sign was placed on the wasteland with the inscription "Désormais ici dansent", which means "From now on, they dance here." Within two months, the fortress was destroyed by the joint efforts of the townspeople. In 1790, the bridge of Louis XVI (later the bridge of the Revolution, and now the bridge of Concord) was completed from its stones. At present, in its place and to the east of it is Place de la Bastille, in the center of which rises the July Column, erected in 1840.

Storm

One of the central episodes of the French Revolution, the storming of the fortress-prison Bastille on July 14, 1789.

The fortress was built in 1382. It was supposed to serve as a fortification on the outskirts of the capital. Soon she began to serve as a prison, mainly for political prisoners. For 400 years, there were many famous personalities among the prisoners of the Bastille. For many generations of the French, the fortress was a symbol of the omnipotence of kings. By the 1780s, the prison had practically ceased to be used.

The French Revolution

In France, since the spring-summer of 1789, the largest transformation of social and political systems state, which led to the destruction of the old order and the monarchy in the country, and the proclamation of a de jure republic (September 1792) of free and equal citizens under the motto "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity".

The beginning of the revolutionary actions was the capture of the Bastille on July 14, 1789, and historians consider the end to be November 9, 1799 (coup of 18 Brumaire).

Bastille

Originally a fortress built in 1370-1381, and a place of detention for state criminals in Paris. At the beginning of the French Revolution on July 14, 1789, the fortress was taken by the revolutionary-minded population and destroyed a year later, and in its place, Pierre-Francois Palloy (demolition contractor) installed a sign with the inscription "They dance here and everything will be fine." At present, on the site of the demolished fortress, there is Place de la Bastille - the intersection of a dozen streets and boulevards with an underground node of the Paris metro of three lines and the new Paris Opera.

For the living and the fighting, a new morning dawns on July 14th. Under all the roofs of the seething city, the denouement of a drama not without tragedy is brewing. How much fuss and preparations, fears and threats, how many tears are shed from aging eyes! On this day, my sons, be men. In memory of the suffering of your fathers, for the sake of hope for the rights of your children! Tyranny threatens with violent malice, and nothing will help you but your own hands. Today you must die or win. At dawn, the Standing Committee, without a wink of a wink, heard a familiar cry that grew to furious, indignant: “Arms! armed with at least a lance! Weapons are the only thing we need: with weapons we are an invincible, formidable National Guard, without weapons we are a mob that will be swept away by a volley of buckshot.

Fortunately, a rumor is spreading - for there is nothing secret that would not be revealed - that muskets are in the Les Invalides. Rather go there! Monsieur Etiy de Corny, the Crown Prosecutor, and every person in authority whom the Standing Committee may release, will come with us. Besanval is stationed there, perhaps he will not shoot at us, but if he kills us, we will die. Alas, poor Besenval's troops are thinning and there is not the slightest desire to shoot! At five o'clock in the morning, when he is still dreaming in oblivion, military school at its head grows a figure "with a rather beautiful face, burning eyes, quick and short speech, impudent air"; such a figure drew back the veils from Priam's couch! The figure warned that resistance is useless, and if blood is shed, woe to the one who will be guilty of this. So said the figure and disappeared. "There was a kind of eloquence in everything that was said, which was amazing." Besenval admits that he should have been arrested, but this was not done. Who could be this figure with burning eyes, quick and short speech? Besenval knows this, but does not reveal the secret. Camille Desmoulins? The Pythagorean Marquis Valady, inspired by "the violent movement in the Palais-Royal that lasted all night"? Rumor calls him "young Monsieur Maillard", but never mentions him again.

Be that as it may, at about nine o'clock in the morning our national militia rolls southwest in a wide stream to the Les Invalides in search of the only necessities. The Crown Prosecutor, Monsieur Ety de Corny, and other officials are already there; the curate of the parish of Saint-Étienne Dumont is by no means peacefully at the head of his militant Paris. We see judges marching in red camisoles, who have now become judges' militia; volunteers from the Palais-Royal, united in spirit and thought, who became national volunteers, whose number is in the tens of thousands. The royal guns must become the guns of the nation; think, Monsieur de Sombray, how in these circumstances you will refuse them!

Old Monsieur de Sombray is ready to start negotiations, to send representatives, but it's useless: several people climb over the walls to open the gates, and not a single invalid fires a bullet. Patriots noisily rush inside, spreading through all the rooms and corridors from the basement to the roof in search of weapons. Not a single cellar, not a single attic will escape a search. The weapon was found - all intact, packed in straw - not in order to burn it! The crowd rushes at him more violently than hungry lions at dead prey, with clanging and cursing; pushing, dumping, fighting up to the point that they crush, trample - perhaps even to death - the weakest patriots. And now, under this deafening roar and the roar of an orchestra that has not yet been played, the stage changes, and 28 thousand good guns are raised on the shoulders of the same number of national guards, taken out of the darkness into a dazzling light.

Let Besenval look at the flash of these guns as they sail past him! It is said that the French guards aimed cannons at him from the other side of the river, in order to open fire if necessary. He is indecisive, "amazed," as they flatter themselves, "by the intrepid appearance (fiere contenance) of the Parisians." And now to the Bastille, undaunted Parisians! There is still the threat of canister shots, the thoughts and steps of all people rush there.

Old Delaunay, as we have already said, retired "to his chambers" after midnight on Sunday and has remained there ever since, like all old military men, because of the uncertainty of the situation. The Hotel de Ville "offers" him to let in the soldiers of the nation, which in a mild form means the surrender of the fortress. But on the other hand, he has firm orders from His Majesty. Of course, its garrison is only 92 disabled veterans and 32 young Swiss, but the walls are 9 feet thick; of course, he has guns and gunpowder, but, alas, only a day's supply of food. In addition, the city is inhabited by the French, and the garrison consists mainly of the French. Stern, old Delaunay, think about what you should do!

Starting at nine o'clock all morning shouts are heard everywhere: "To the Bastille!" Several "deputations of citizens" visited here, looking for weapons, from which Delaunay got off with soft speeches delivered through the loopholes. Toward noon, the elector Thurio de la Rosier receives permission to enter and finds that Delaunay does not intend to surrender and is ready to blow up the fortress as soon as possible. Thurio climbs with him to the bastions: heaps of cobblestones, old pieces of iron and shells are piled up, cannons are aimed at the crowd, in each embrasure there is a cannon, only slightly pushed back! But outside, look, O Thurio, the crowds are pouring down every street, the tocsins are beating furiously, all the drums are beating out the general gathering; The Saint-Antoine Faubourg, all, as one man, is heading here! This vision (illusory and yet real) you contemplate, O Thurio, at this moment from your mountain of Visions: it prophesies other phantasmagoria and bright, but indistinct, ghostly realities, which you are not yet aware of, but will soon see! "Que voulez vous?" (What do you want?) - Delaunay asks, turning pale at the sight of this spectacle, but with reproach, almost with a threat.

"Dear sir," answers Thurio, rising to the heights of courage, "what are you going to do? Think about it, because I can throw myself down with you from this height" - only a hundred feet, not counting the ditch under the wall! In response, Delaunay falls silent. Thurio appears from some tower to calm the crowd, which is agitated and suspicious, then he descends and retires, protesting and warning, addressed also to the disabled, on whom, however, this makes a vague, indefinite impression: after all, old heads are not easy perceive the new, and, they say, Delaunay was generous with drinks (prodigua des boissons). They think they won't shoot if they don't get shot at, or if they can manage without it, but on the whole they will be guided by the circumstances.

Woe to you, Delaunay, if at this hour you cannot, having made some firm decision, manage circumstances! Soft speeches are useless, hard shot shots are doubtful, but throwing between the one and the other is impossible. The waves of men roll in harder and harder, their endless rumble louder and louder, in it curses and the crackle of single shots are distinguishable, which are harmless to walls nine feet thick. The outer drawbridge was lowered for Thurio, and this way was used by the third and loudest deputation, who entered the outer court; since soft speeches do not impress, Delaunay fires a volley and raises the bridge. A weak spark, but it ignites combustible chaos and turns it into a roaring chaos of fire! At the sight of their own blood, the rebels rush forward (because this spark caused several deaths), rifle volleys roll endlessly, outbursts of hatred and curses. At this time, a volley of buckshot from guns fires out with a roar from the fortress above our heads and shows what we must do. The siege of the Bastille has begun!

Arise, every Frenchman who has a soul! Sons of freedom, let your tinned throats scream, strain with all your might all the faculties of your souls, bodies and minds, because the hour has come! Hit, Louis Tournay, coachman of the Marais, veteran of the Dauphine regiment, hit the chain of the outer drawbridge amid the hail of fire whistling around you! Never has your ax dealt such a blow to either the rims or the wheel hubs. Demolish the Bastille, demolish it into the realm of the Orc, let the whole accursed structure fall into it and swallow up tyranny forever! Standing, as some say, on the roof of the guardhouse or, as others say, on bayonets stuck in the cracks in the wall, Louis Tournay beats the chain, and the brave Aubin Bonnemer, also a veteran, helps him, and the chain gives way, breaks, a huge outer bridge with a roar (avec fracas) falls. Fabulous! And yet, alas, these are only external fortifications. Eight gloomy towers with armed invalids, cobblestones and cannon muzzles still rise intact; paved with stone, the yawning ditch is impenetrable, the inner drawbridge turned its back side towards us; The Bastille has yet to be taken!

I think that to describe the siege of the Bastille - one of the most important events in history, is probably beyond the power of any mortal. Can anyone, even one who is endlessly read, even imagine inner plan building! At the end of the rue Saint-Antoine is an open esplanade, a series of outer courts, vaulted gates (where Louis Tournai now fights), then new drawbridges, permanent bridges, fortified bastions, and the ominous eight towers: a labyrinth of gloomy rooms, the first of which was built 420 years ago, and the last - only 20. And as we have already said, it is besieged in its last hour by the revived chaos! Artillery guns of all calibers, heart-rending cries of people with a variety of plans for the future, and each of them is his own head; never since the war of the pygmies with the cranes had such an unnatural situation been seen. Half-paid Eli goes home to put on his uniform: no one wants to obey him, dressed in civilian clothes. Julin, also on half pay, delivers a speech to the French guards in the Place de Greve. The fanatical patriots pick up the bullets and carry them, still hot (or appearing to be), to the Hôtel de Ville: you see, they want to burn down Paris! Flessel's "lips turn pale" because the roar of the crowd becomes menacing. All of Paris has reached the height of its fury, a panicky frenzy tossing it from side to side. At each street barricade, a boiling local whirlpool swirls, strengthening the barricade, for God knows what is coming, and all these local whirlpools merge into a huge fiery Maelstrom that rages around the Bastille.

So he rages, and so he roars. The vintner Shola has become a makeshift gunner. Look how Georges, who has just returned from Brest, where he served in the navy, controls the cannon of the Siamese king. Strange (if we were not accustomed to such things): last night Georges was resting quietly in his hotel, and the Siamese cannon had been standing for a hundred years, not knowing anything about his existence. And now, at the right moment, they have united and are announcing the neighborhood with eloquent music, because Georges, having heard what is happening here, jumped off the Brest stagecoach and rushed here. The French Guard will also come here with real guns - if the walls weren't so thick! Up from the Esplanade, horizontally from all nearby rooftops and windows, a chaotic shower of gunfire pours - but to no avail. The invalids have prostrated themselves behind the stone coverings and are shooting back from a relatively convenient position, but not even the tip of the nose protrudes from the loopholes. We fall shot, but no one pays attention!

Let the flames rage and devour everything that burns! The guardhouses were burnt, and the canteens of the invalids too. An absent-minded "hairdresser with two lit torches" would have set fire to "saltpeter in the Arsenal", if not for a woman who jumped out with a screech, and more than one patriot, somewhat familiar with natural philosophy, who quickly knocked the breath out of him (with the butt of a gun under the spoon), turned barrels and stopped the destructive element. The young beauty, mistaking her for Delaunay's daughter, was seized in the outer courtyards and almost burned in front of Delaunay; she fell dead on the straw, but again one patriot - this is the brave veteran Aubin Bonnemer - rushes and saves her. Straw burns, three carts dragged here turn into white smoke that threatens to suffocate the patriots themselves, so that Eli has to pull out one cart, singing his eyebrows, and Reol, the "giant petty merchant", another. Smoke like hell, bustle like the Tower of Babel, noise like doomsday!

Blood flows and feeds a new madness. The wounded are taken to the houses on Cerise Street, the dying say their last will: not to yield until the damned fortress falls. And how, alas, will she fall? The walls are so thick! Delegations, three in all, come from the Hôtel de Ville, and the Abbé Fauchet, who is a member of one of them, can attest to the supernatural courage of humanity they acted with. They raise their city flag above the vaulted gates and greet it with drumming, but to no avail. How can Delaunay hear them in this doomsday, let alone believe them? They return in righteous anger with the whistle of bullets still ringing in their ears. What to do? Firefighters use their hoses to spray cannons on disabled people to cool the igniters, but unfortunately they can't shoot that high and only spread clouds of spray. Persons familiar with ancient history suggest making catapults. Santer, a vociferous brewer from the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, advises setting fire to the fortress with "a mixture of phosphorus and turpentine, sprayed by pressure pumps." O Spinola-Santer, do you have this concoction at the ready? Everyone is their own head! And yet the torrent of shooting does not stop: even women and Turks shoot, at least one woman (with her lover) and one Turk. The French guards came - real guns, real gunners. Mayar is very active; Eli and Yulen, who received half the salary, are burning with anger among the thousands of crowds.

The great Bastille clock in the courtyard is ticking inaudibly, counting hour after hour, as if nothing significant is happening either for them or for the world! They struck the hour when the shooting began; now the arrows are moving towards five, but the fire does not subside. Deep below, in the cellars, seven prisoners hear a dull roar, as in an earthquake; the jailers dodge answers.

Woe to you, Delaunay, and your hundred unfortunate invalids! Broglie is far away and his ears are stuffed up; Besenval hears but cannot send help. One miserable detachment of hussars, sent out for reconnaissance, carefully made its way along the embankments up to the New Bridge. "We want to join you," said the captain, seeing that the crowd was vast. A large-headed, dwarf-like entity, pale and smoky, shuffles forward, and through blue lips croaks not without meaning: "If so, dismount and give us your weapons!" The captain of the hussars is happy when he is taken to the outpost and released on parole. Who was this man? They say it was Monsieur Marat, the author of the magnificent and peace-loving Appeal to the People. Truly great for you, O wonderful veterinarian, is this day of your appearance and rebirth, and, however, on the same day in four years... But let the veils of the future be drawn for the time being.

What does Delaunay do? The only thing Delaunay can do and, according to him, wanted to do. Imagine him sitting with a lit candle at arm's length from the powder store, motionless like a Roman senator or a bronze candelabrum, cold, with one movement of his eyes warning Thurio and everyone else what his decision was. In the meantime, he sits there without harming anyone, and he is not harmed. But the royal fortress cannot, has no right, must not and will not be surrendered to anyone except the king's envoy. The life of an old soldier is worth nothing, but it should be lost with honor. But just think, roaring mob, what will happen when the whole Bastille soars into the sky! In this frozen state, like a statue in a church holding a candle, Delaunay would have been better off leaving Thurio, the red judges, the curé of Saint-Stefan and all the rabble of the world to do what they wanted.

But for all that, he couldn't afford it. Have you ever thought how the heart of any person is tremblingly in tune with the hearts of all people? Have you ever noticed how omnipotent is the most powerful voice of the mass of people? How does their indignant cries paralyze a strong soul, how does their angry roar awaken unheard-of horror? Cavalier Gluck confesses that the leitmotif of one of his best passages in one of his best operas was the voice of the mob heard by him in Vienna, when she shouted to her Kaiser: "Bread! Bread!" Great is the united voice of men, the expression of their instincts, which are truer than their thoughts; this is the grandest thing that a person can face among the sounds and shadows that form this world of times. Whoever can resist him stands somewhere above time. Delaunay couldn't do it. Confused, he rushes between two decisions, hope does not leave him in the abyss of despair. His fortress will not surrender - he announces that he will blow it up, grabs torches to blow it up, and... does not blow it up. Poor Delaunay, this is the death agony of your Bastille and your own! Prison, imprisonment, and jailer, all three, whatever they may be, must perish.

For four hours now, the world chaos has been roaring, which can be called a world chimera, spewing fire. The poor invalids have taken refuge under their walls, or rise up with upside down guns: they have made white flags out of handkerchiefs and are sounding the lights out, or it seems that they are sounding the lights out, because nothing can be heard. Even the Swiss at the aisles look weary from the shooting, discouraged by the barrage of fire. At the drawbridge, one loophole is open, as if they want to speak from there. Look at the bailiff Mayar: a clever man! He walks along a board swinging over the abyss of a stone ditch: the board rests on a parapet, held by the weight of the bodies of patriots; he soars dangerously, like a dove striving for such an ark! Beware, clever bailiff! One person has already fallen and crashed far below, on the rocks! But the bailiff Mayar does not fall: he walks carefully, with precise steps, with outstretched arms. The Swiss holds out a piece of paper through the loophole, the dexterous bailiff grabs it and returns. Terms of surrender - forgiveness and safety for all! Are they accepted? "Foi d" officier "(On the word of honor of the officer), - answers Yulen or Eli (people say different things). The conditions are accepted! The drawbridge is slowly lowered, the bailiff Mayar fixes it, a living stream rushes in. The Bastille has fallen! Victory! The Bastille is taken!

Every year, France celebrates a national holiday - Bastille Day. Why did the spontaneous storming of the fortress, which by that time had lost its former significance, in the view of the French become almost major event their revolutions?

The choice of July 14 as the date of the national holiday was made almost a hundred years after the revolution - in 1880. The same thing that actually happened on that day is remembered today, perhaps, only by historians. And why? “The darkness of low truths is dearer to me than the uplifting deception…” Indeed, by and large, the taking of the Bastille itself was nothing more than one of the many excesses that accompanied the phenomenon, which would later be called the French Revolution.

But what really happened in the middle of the summer of 1789?

The short-sighted act of the king

On July 12, Paris learned that the day before, Louis XVI had dismissed Jacques Necker, who headed his government. The king had every reason to be dissatisfied with the minister. The States General, convened on the advice of Necker, in two months of work not only did nothing to overcome the financial crisis, for which, in fact, they were assembled, but also presented unreasonable, from the point of view of the monarch, claims to supreme power, declaring themselves National, and then and the Constituent (i.e. constituting the Constitution) Assembly. However, the decision to dismiss the minister, a rather routine act in itself, was taken far from better situation which led to grave and unforeseen consequences.

Necker had a reputation - not a very well-deserved one, though - of a real financial genius, and therefore the holders of government securities, who were afraid that this act was bringing the bankruptcy of the monarchy closer, did not like his removal from business. The bourgeoisie was agitated. The urban lower classes had their own reason for dissatisfaction: the grain harvested in the previous, not to say auspicious year, was coming to an end and bread prices reached a maximum on the eve of the new harvest. In those days, the young Russian Count Pavel Stroganov wrote to his father from the capital of France: “Now in Paris there is a great number of troops gathered in order to keep the people from indignation, which are terribly poor everywhere.”

However, public opinion in Paris itself associated the concentration of troops in the city and its environs not so much with the threat of a food riot, but with the possible dissolution of the National Assembly. Fantastic rumors circulated about an "aristocratic conspiracy" against the "patriots", as the supporters of the Assembly considered themselves, and about the intention of the court to starve the capital to death. At the Palais Royal, self-proclaimed orators warmed up the audience all day with fiery speeches. A skirmish between the royal cavalry patrolling the city and an aggressive mob that took place in the late afternoon in the Tuileries Garden added fuel to the fire. Although in fact there were no casualties, rumors spread that the commander of the cavalry, Prince de Lambesque, personally hacked to death with a saber a certain venerable old man.

In the absence of Bonaparte

The city boomed. On the night of the 13th, customs gates at the entrances to Paris were burned and the monastery of Saint-Lazare was plundered. The capital was gradually covered by anarchy. Panic moods spread: the Parisians were afraid of the introduction of troops into the city, and the outrages of the marginals. In the morning, electors (voters of the second stage) gathered in the Town Hall, headed by Jacques de Flessel, the merchant provost of Paris (analogous to the post of mayor), and decided to establish a virtually new municipality - the Standing Committee - and the city police, which was supposed to maintain order on the streets, and in if necessary, to protect people from the royal army.

Meanwhile, the government itself showed no signs of life. The troops stationed on the Champ de Mars did not receive orders from Versailles and felt abandoned. In essence, the entire responsibility for decision-making fell on the shoulders of the military commandant of the capital, Baron de Besenval, who was clearly not ready for such a burden. A military officer in his distant youth, he has long turned into a courtesan weary of life, preoccupied only with seeking the favor of the royal couple. Being Lately in disfavor with the queen, the baron avoided any drastic action that could aggravate the precariousness of his position at court.

The situation in Paris required decisive steps from him - the same ones that General Bonaparte took in similar circumstances six years later, shooting the rebels with grapeshot. But Bezenval was not Bonaparte. On the morning of July 14, when crowds of Parisians, demanding weapons, surrounded the Les Invalides, he led the royal troops out of the capital, leaving to the mercy of fate those who guarded military installations. Upon learning of this, the garrison of the Les Invalides surrendered, handing over tens of thousands of rifles and 20 cannons to the besiegers. However, there was not enough gunpowder, and the crowd went after him to the Bastille.

Storming of the Bastille

Built in the 14th century, the Bastille was once an important part of the fortifications of Paris and later a political prison. But by 1789, she lost both functions. The government even decided to demolish it, but there was no money in the treasury for this. Now there was a small garrison of 82 veterans and 32 Swiss guards guarding military depots and seven convicted criminals. At the head of the garrison was the Marquis de Launay. A purely peaceful man, he held only administrative posts all his life and had no combat experience. Nevertheless, between capitulation and the fulfillment of duty, the marquis chose the latter. Kindly receiving a delegation from the City Hall, he refused to give ammunition, promising, however, not to shoot at the armed crowd surrounding the Bastille. Indeed, if the cannons of the fortress had opened fire, they would have completely swept away not only the discordant ranks of the rebels, but also a good half of the Saint-Antoine Faubourg.

Subsequent delegations of the Standing Committee received an equally polite but firm refusal. Long negotiations exhausted the patience of the besiegers. The most enterprising of them broke the chains that held the drawbridge, it sank - and the crowd poured over it into the outer courtyard of the fortress. The soldiers of the garrison reacted exactly as the charters of all the armies of the world prescribe to react in the event of unauthorized entry of outsiders into the protected object, that is, they gave a warning and opened fire. About a hundred people died, several dozen were injured.

The so-called "assault" of the Bastille began, consisting in the indiscriminate shelling of its stone walls with guns. Only with the arrival of the soldiers of the French Guard and five cannons from Les Invalides did the actions of the insurgents acquire a more or less organized character.

The "storm" in total lasted about six hours. All this time, the commandant waited in vain for reinforcements, or at least an order on what to do next: surrender or offer full resistance. Avoiding more bloodshed, de Launay never used the artillery. Finally, at 5 p.m., he agreed to lay down his arms in exchange for the promise of the besiegers to save the lives of the defenders of the Bastille. However, six veterans were lynched on the spot as soon as the mob broke into the fortress. The commandant was stabbed to death on the way to the Town Hall. His head was put on a pike and carried throughout the city. On the other peak was the head of de Flessel, who was killed, having found a note from the merchant prevost in de Launay asking him to hold out until the evening in the hope of reinforcements coming ...

Symbol of the unity of the nation

There was nothing extraordinary about the taking of the Bastille in itself. The Parisians, who rebelled against the authorities, had a chance to capture it before, when it was still really a fortified castle and a political prison.

But the reaction of the authorities to what happened on July 14, 1789 was unprecedented. Louis XVI not only withdrew troops from the outskirts of the capital and returned Necker to the government, but also visited the Paris City Hall three days later, accepting from the members of the Standing Committee a red and blue cockade - a symbol of rebellious Paris. Thus, he actually sanctioned the murder of people whose only fault was the performance of state and military duty.

From now on, none of the servants of the state could be sure of their safety. Having demonstrated absolute powerlessness in maintaining social order, the monarchy entered a period of steadily accelerating disintegration. So, a rather local event in its significance - the capture by a crowd of an old castle intended for demolition, the garrison of which did not really resist - turned out to be the pebble that led to an unstoppable avalanche. This was the beginning of the end of the Old Order.

Not surprisingly, the revolutionaries immediately mythologised the story of the fall of the Bastille, giving it a symbolic meaning. Everything that happened began to be interpreted as the result of purposeful actions of the “French people”, which, filled with the “idea of ​​freedom”, took by “storm” the hated “political dungeon” and the “stronghold of despotism”.

The symbolic meaning of the events of July 14, 1789 was expanded and consolidated a year later, when the Feast of the Federation was held in Paris to commemorate the storming of the Bastille on the Champ de Mars. Representatives of the national guard from all departments of the country, deputies of the Constituent Assembly and the king himself took a solemn oath of allegiance to the future Constitution, which was later interpreted as an act of creating a single French nation by merging the peoples of many provinces, each of which had its own separate history, traditions and traditions. even your own dialect.

Alexander Chudinov, Doctor of Historical Sciences