by Alan Schom
Meanwhile tension continued to build, even as Bonaparte was en route from Egypt, and on September 14 government troops narrowly prevented hostile mobs on the Left Bank from breaking into the Bourbon Palace, where the Council of Five Hundred was being addressed by another Jacobin general, Jean-Baptiste Jourdan, who harangued the deputies, warning them of the great danger facing the republic. With this as the perfect excuse, Sieyès demanded Bernadotte’s resignation, over that general’s vehement protest, and got it the next day. The Directory was now literally living on a hair-raising day-by-day existence, everyone wondering just how long this could continue. It was against this chaotic background on September 23 that the president of the Council of Five Hundred, Antoine Boulay de la Meurthe, during a celebration of the anniversary of the creation of the first French Republic, praised Director Sieyès as “the first founder of the Republic.” It was a surrealist nightmare.
With the situation continuing to deteriorate, however, by now even Sieyès, like Barras, was wondering how they were to be saved. He had, he felt, most of the answers: overthrow the present constitution and with it the Directory and its outrageous councils, to be replaced by a new constitutional republic of his own design, headed by two consuls, including himself, naturally, aided by a powerful general, without whom he could not act. “I am looking for a sword,” he had told General Joubert during a frank discussion earlier on, “but the shortest one possible.” When Joubert, his first choice, was killed in mid-August, Sieyès was left to resume his desperate, if unsuccessful, search for the one soldier he could count on, reluctantly turning to the ineffectual but manipulate General Moreau. To the abbé’s surprise, Moreau not only declined but instead recommended Bonaparte, who, he said, “will carry out your coup d’état far better than I.” Moreau wanted no part of this volatile situation.
With the unexpected news reaching the Directory on October 13 of Bonaparte’s seemingly miraculous appearance in France, the situation in Paris, still uncontrolled, changed yet again. No man in French politics seemed less likely to be able to bring about a decisive change of government, not to say a coup d’état, than the bald, puny, scruffy-looking Abbé Sieyès, who, Edmund Burke joked, seemed to have a fresh constitution in every cubbyhole of his desk. No man seemed less energetic, less effectual, and so lacking in the unusual leadership qualities required of such a unique moment. Indeed, no man seemed a less likely collaborator and ally of the arrogant, thumping, rude, impatient, egotistical, and demanding Bonaparte. Despite his appearance — later miraculously transformed by David’s magical paintbrush into a fairly handsome man with a full head of hair! — Sieyès, with his impeccable republican credentials, did wield an immense amount of influence in the country and he did badly want the whole present regime and constitution swept aside in order to permit him to seize personal control. It was indeed ironic that this now somewhat jaded and tarnished idealist, frequently weak, indecisive, and lacking the moral courage to stand up when outnumbered, nevertheless remained perhaps the one key who could, in tandem with the right, vigorous, decisive “sword,” strike the death knell of the very republic he had been so instrumental in launching just a decade earlier. No fellow revolutionary could have been more antithetical in character, morality, decision, and action to Sieyès than the sybaritic Viscount Paul François de Barras.
The military was hardly a surprising choice for Barras, born in Fox-Amphous, Provence, in 1755, of an ancient, aristocratic family dating back to the army commanders it provided during the Crusades, and descended from a long line of soldiers ever since.[298] His career began quite normally after serving in the cavalry in France for five years, setting sail from Marseilles for the fabled East and the French enclave of Pondicherry in India, and a few years later on to South Africa. But on returning permanently to France in 1783, instead of delivering a report to Marshal de Castries, Louis XVI’s irascible war minister, he got into a hot dispute with him, failing to observe the normal conventions incumbent on a very junior officer vis-à-vis a superior. Not only was he cashiered as a result, but an order was subsequently issued for his arrest, which the young man managed to evade. Four years later he was permitted to return to the capital, albeit without a career or future, though in his private life he already boasted a formidable list of ardent beauties to his name. In spite of his well-publicized escapades and affairs, in January 1791 his parents, in exchange for a handsome dowry, somehow got him married off to Pélagie Templier, daughter of a rich Provencal merchant. That the marriage proved unhappy was hardly surprising; though it was never dissolved, the couple rarely saw each other again in the course of their lives. Barras, by now an “incurable epicurean and impenitent seducer,” was not about to change.
Unlike most of his family, with the coming of the Revolution, Barras turned not only to politics but to Jacobin politics, joining the extreme left wing in bringing down and destroying his own class and the French monarchy, and like Sieyès, voting for the death of the very king he had earlier (as an officer) sworn to defend. “I neither pretend to justify, nor pretend that I even have to justify to anyone, the conduct which those times required of me, and further which my conscience then also demanded of me,” he wrote decades later.
After a stint in the newly created National Convention, to which he had been elected in 1792, he was named political commissar with the Army of Italy, in charge of maintaining the army’s political loyalty to the Convention and the republic. With the fall of Toulon to the British in August 1793, Barras was given command of the overall military and political situation of that region and in the course of his duties appointed Bonaparte to take charge of the port’s siege artillery. There, for the first time, another aspect of Barras’s character appeared, as he personally ordered the murder and execution of hundreds of innocent French people in retaliation for their alleged support of the British. After stealing a fortune in booty from French citizens, he returned to Paris, where he somehow managed to survive Robespierre’s animosity, while joining in the plot to overthrow him in July 1794.
The year 1795 marked a great rise in Barras’s career, amid the nationwide turbulence and insurrection following the downfall of Robespierre and his cohorts. Now hurriedly reintegrated into the army and promoted to the rank of général de division, or major general, and commander in chief of the armed forces, Barras attempted to cope with the thousands of armed rebels fighting in the capital. The creation of a new constitution — that of the Year III, attended by the revolt of 13 Vendémiaire (October 5), was expeditiously quelled when General Barras called in Brigadier General Bonaparte (promoted by Barras in December 1793) as his second-in-command.[299] Thus, ironically, Barras once again was responsible for launching Bonaparte in his career and catapulting him to national fame. It was to Barras, more than to any other single individual, that the young officer owed his meteoric rise. Subsequently, as commander in chief of the Army of the Interior, Barras named Brigadier General Bonaparte his second-in-command once again. Then, upon Barras’s elevation to the Directory on October 26, he had Bonaparte appointed his successor, raised in rank to divisional general (he had risen from lieutenant in less than three years), and six months later transferred to command the new Army of Italy.[300] And just for good measure, no doubt giving the debauched director much sadistic joy, Barras acted as witness to the wedding of his former mistress, Josephine de Beauharnais, to General Bonaparte. Thanks to Barras’s continued support in the Directory and Bonaparte’s own successes with his army in Italy, his career continued on its course.[301]
Barras’s choice of this soldier had been vindicated. He needed the army behind him to support his own political ambitions and had carefully selected and groomed Bonaparte as his protégé because of his lack of the traditional ties and loyalties found in most other officers: Bonaparte, the Corsican outsider, had not a drop of French blood in his veins and no ties to court or party. Moreover, his military record already indicated more than one black mark against him — being AWOL for months at a time, chiefly in Cor
sica, even leading attacks against French forces there, not to mention having supported Robespierre’s regime and later refusing to take up the command of an army in the West. Without Barras to cover for him, time and again, he probably would have had little chance of a successful military career. Thus Bonaparte literally owed Barras everything, and in return he provided the ideal “sword” to support Barras’s political role. Barras’s biggest mistake, however, was in underestimating the young general, whom he thought he could manipulate to his own advantage, as he had everyone else.
Barras and the Directory were not without their own trials, however, as they cracked down on the anarchist Gracchus Babeuf — “The Revolution is not over. The rich still have all the money” — and his fellow communist conspirators, who were finally condemned for treason in February 1797. Royalist pressure in the south continued to develop as well, as Director Barras ordered General Hoche’s Armée de Sambre et Meuse back to France from Austria. Such emergencies required money, of course, and despite the vast booty sent by Bonaparte, more was needed, as Barras informed him. “At one fell blow you can save the Republic, stop the emigres and destroy the base of foreign influence here,” Barras wrote. “If you need force to accomplish this, then call up the armies.”[302]
Although his protégé did not come in person to aid Barras in Paris, he did send General Augereau, but in fact it was General Hoche who provided the first fifty thousand badly needed livres (out of his own pocket) for the director’s emergency expenses.[303] Meanwhile the royalist plot to overthrow the French government continued apace, General Pichegru, one of its leaders (and Napoleon’s former math teacher), ironically warning the government that it was Bonaparte, not he, who was the real threat to the Republic: “Tell them [the government] not to trust your Buonaparte, this little monsieur...The directors believe that they are using him, but one fine morning he is going to gobble them up, without their being able to do anything about it.”[304] Pichegru, it seems, was one of the very few in France who really understood the extent of the Corsican general’s ambitions.
The crisis came at the beginning of September 1797. Barras, on behalf of the Directory, ordered General Augereau to bring up his troops and artillery to protect the major bridges and government buildings of the capital, and then, on the fourth (18 Fructidor), the Directory ordered General Pichegru’s arrest for treason. In addition dozens of leftist conspirators were also sought by the police, and the election of 157 newly returned Jacobin deputies was quashed as well. A total of 163 “conspirators” were in the end deported to the dry guillotine, as French Guiana was called, and thirty-one opposition newspapers were suppressed.
This smashing of Barras’s political opponents, generally referred to as his coup d’état of 18 Fructidor, proved but a temporary reprieve. The immediate threat was over; both royalists and Jacobins were stunned, if not uprooted. And yet, perhaps not surprisingly given his devious character, Barras — with Talleyrand acting as middleman — had also been secretly negotiating with Louis XVIII. The success of 18 Fructidor giving him full independence again, he did not follow up the royal option — all reference to which was carefully hushed up.
Meanwhile Bonaparte had returned to France from Italy as the greatest national hero of his day. This was followed by the general’s demand to become a member of the government and Barras’s rejection of the idea. Rastadt of course had not worked out, nor had the invasion plans for England, Bonaparte instead being dispatched safely across the Mediterranean to capture Egypt. Barras and the other directors could breathe more easily. With a bit of luck the ambitious general would not be seen again for years, perhaps never.
But, as 1798 gave way to 1799, the disintegration of French politics and society continued unabated. “The invasion of [Jacobin] republicans continues to penetrate all levels and classes,” Barras, the former good Jacobin, complained, while whispered tales of his sexual orgies in the Luxembourg and at his nearby estate of Grosbois circulated among the government’s growing number of enemies. Decadence and corruption, not politics, were the order of the day. Even Madame de Chastenay, well informed by Police Minister Fouché, lamented Barras’s leading role in this decline, including the immense fortune he was making through the illicit sale of army horses and supplies — while fresh police reports informed Paris that “all organization [within the country] is deteriorating at an unabated rate, everything is collapsing.”[305] France had been teetering on the edge of internal collapse for several years, and a series of military disasters in the spring of 1799 — beginning with the defeat of General Jourdan’s army at Stockach, Germany, in March — only made matters worse. As already noted, this was followed by the even more incredible news of the double disaster in Italy that April, when first General Moreau was crushed at Cassano, resulting in the loss of Milan, capped by General Schérer’s evacuation of the whole of Lombardy, not to mention the continuing threat of a possible Russian thrust through Switzerland. All that Bonaparte had earlier won in Italy had been lost.
It was under these circumstances that on May 9 Sieyès was recalled from his diplomatic post in Prussia to replace Rewbell in the Directory, much to the dismay of Barras, so fearful of this puritanical theoretician. Barras needed an influential soldier to support him. The once tall, handsome, dashing army officer, was now a tired, jaded politician, prematurely exhausted by his constant political intrigues and dissolute personal life. Thus had he been transformed, pasty unhealthy flesh gathering about his body, so replete with all the excesses Paris had to offer, that he was practically moribund, incapable of acting vigorously in the face of fresh upheavals. Hence his anxiety about the return of the more active and still ambitious Sieyès who, though perhaps a fanatic, could nonetheless become a real determining force if left unchecked.
As seen earlier, the crisis broke on June 15 when the Councils of Ancients and Five Hundred, having received no reply to their demand to the Directory of a fresh assessment of the state of French foreign and military affairs, now defiantly declared themselves in permanent session (and beyond the orders of the Directory). Agitation was increased when Treilhard, the newly appointed leftist director, was quickly disqualified, ostensibly because of a minor technical infraction.[306] Having executed this move, on June 18 Barras carried out his next coup, ousting two more opposing leftist directors, Merlin and La Révellière (subjecting the latter to a crude verbal barrage, involving language rarely heard in public). In fact La Révellière, so outraged by the dissolute viscount, had drawn his sword, and the flash of clashing metal was averted only by the timely arrival of some deputies.
Meanwhile the country’s internal disintegration continued unabated as brigands closed public roads everywhere; Jacobins threatened the entire administrative structure of Normandy; and industrial Lyons was shaken by severe unrest; while in the West, royalists supported by English gold and munitions erupted in fighting. France’s worst enemies were always the French.
Celebrating his immediate victory resulting from the June 18 coup, Barras returned to his usual spate of luxurious dinner parties and nightly entertainments, while Sieyès quietly returned to France in June to join the Directory and, like Barras, seek “a sword” to support his own coup. “He continues ceaselessly to plot surreptitiously with the Assembly...he creates factions, eggs them on, one against the other, and then stands aside [innocently] to profit from the outcome...He is more dangerous and guilty so far as our personal liberties are concerned than all those previously brought to justice,” Robespierre (of all people) had complained of Abbé Sieyès years earlier, just prior to his own downfall. These words now perfectly described the situation on October 13, when word reached Paris of Bonaparte’s totally unexpected landing near St.-Raphael.
Chapter Thirteen – 18-19 Brumaire
‘There are those who would like to return to the days of the Convention [and Robespierre], to the revolutionary committees and the scaffold...Just remember that I am marching with the gods of victory and war on my side.’
On
October 8, 1799, Bonaparte’s last dispatch from Egypt had reached Paris, announcing his final victory at Abukir Bay, just prior to his abandoning that country. The Directory immediately ordered celebratory artillery salvos fired throughout the city, joined by the peal of bells from the capital’s hundreds of desecrated churches. The directoral ecstasy gave way, however, to utter consternation when, five days later, they learned that the great hero — whom they had all thought safely stranded on the other side of the Mediterranean — had in fact just returned to France, AWOL, and was even then en route to Paris! In fact Bonaparte’s journey from Fréjus had been greeted by hysterical mobs following his coach for miles, attended by “unanimous applause” and “general euphoria...this inconceivable enthusiasm...this explosion of feeling and admiration...this spontaneous outburst...the like of which will never be seen again,”[307] leaving even Bourrienne quite staggered. Unabashed hero worship, singing, dancing in the streets, torchlit parades, and hastily erected flower-covered triumphal arches complete with tricolor bunting were to be seen from Marseilles to Lyons and all the way to Paris, where a weary, dust-covered General Bonaparte finally reached his small house in the Rue de la Victoire at dawn on October 16, after an exhausting all-night drive from Burgundy. Josephine was still in Lyons, having missed him en route, thus Bonaparte entered an empty house — except for a servant — and went upstairs to his bedroom, collapsing still dressed into a deep sleep.
Nevertheless, after just a few hours, he was up washing and changing his clothes, then setting out across the Seine to report to the Luxembourg Palace. As his carriage pulled into the courtyard, he jumped down and hurried up the long stone staircase to pay his respects to the Directory’s current president, Louis Gohier. But he was anxious rather than triumphant, for — in addition to the humiliating tale he bore of his abandoned army of more than twelve thousand, with its horses, artillery, and stores — he was preoccupied with that whore of a wife, Josephine, news of whose flaunted affair with the young, “pretty” Captain Charles had even crossed the Mediterranean, consuming Bonaparte the cuckold with a fury such as he had never known, all because of a woman he had not only married and truly loved but madly adored. And to his great chagrin his brothers had met him en route to Paris and confirmed everything he had heard and more.
