1793
The First Coalition and the Terror
The National Convention tries Louis XVI and has him executed in Paris on 21 January 1793. France declares war on Britain and the Dutch Republic on 1 February and soon afterwards on Spain. In the course of the year the Holy Roman Empire, Portugal, Naples and Tuscany also go to war with France. The First Coalition is a loose alliance, and its members fight without much coordination.
The execution of Louis XVI on 21 January 1793, engraving by Isidore Stanislas Helman after Charles Monnet, 1794Wikimedia Commons, Isidore Stanislas Helman after Charles Monnet, Public domain (Execution of Louis XVI.jpg)
In the Austrian Netherlands the Prince of Coburg defeats Dumouriez at Neerwinden on 18 March, and the French lose the country. Dumouriez tries to march on Paris to restore the monarchy, fails and goes over to the Austrians. In March the Vendée in western France rises in a royalist revolt, and after the arrest of the Girondin deputies in June, Lyon, Marseille and Toulon rise against the Convention. On the Rhine, Mainz surrenders to the Prussians on 23 July.
The Battle of Neerwinden, 18 March 1793, by Johann Nepomuk Geiger, 19th centuryWikimedia Commons, Johann Nepomuk Geiger (1805-1880), Public domain (Bataille de Neerwinden (1793).jpg)
The Convention creates the Committee of Public Safety on 6 April, and in August it decrees the levée en masse, which drafts all able-bodied men aged 18 to 25. From September the Committee governs by terror. By the end of the Terror in July 1794, 16,594 death sentences have been passed in France, 2,639 of them in Paris.
The execution of the Girondin deputies in Paris, October 1793, print of the timeWikimedia Commons, unknown author, Public domain (La fournée des Girondins 10-11-1793.jpg)
The new armies turn the war on the northern frontier. Generals Houchard and Jourdan defeat the Anglo-Hanoverian corps of the Duke of York at Hondschoote from 6 to 8 September, and York lifts the siege of Dunkirk. On 15 and 16 October Jourdan defeats Coburg at Wattignies and relieves the fortress of Maubeuge.
Sources
- Georges Lefebvre, The French Revolution: From 1793 to 1799 (1964).
- Steven T. Ross, Quest for Victory: French Military Strategy, 1792–1799 (1973).
- Digby Smith, The Napoleonic Wars Data Book (1998).
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