I've been describing how early in 1793, the fate of the French Revolution was in the balance, that Europe was consumed with the war to the death between revolution and counter-revolution. This was very much an international conflict now that Spain and England had into the war alongside Austria and Prussia. There were foreign troops on French soil, in the south, in the east, in the northeast, and an English naval blockade. The military crisis was exemplified by the decision of a Leading-General Dumouriez in April 1793. But it's also an internal crisis that the New Republic faces, because in March 1793 when rural people in western France, particularly the region of the Vendée, are asked to put their names into a ballot to meet the New Republic's conscription requirements, there is a large scale rebellion, a rejection of the demand coming from Paris. And it means that the whole question of the future of the revolution, the future of the republic, or future of France itself, is put in the balance between counter-revolution, internally and externally, and the revolution. I want to say something more about the seeds of this massive disaffection in the west of France because it has to have tragic consequences and the memories of what happens there with us still in contemporary France. An early sign of what might happen is in the oath that's taken on clerical reform at the start of 1791, when parish priests are required to take an oath if they wish to continue in their role as parish priests. And we saw how in the northwestern west, very few, fewer than 10% in most regions, parish priests were prepared to take that oath which they saw as, in some sense, perjury against the oath they had given to God and to the pope. In the huge region around Paris and down here in the Southeast, it's a very different matter. There are many areas they were virtually all parish priest take the oath and with them give a very clear statement to the parishioners that they support the revolution. So, why the Vendée? Why the insurrection in the Vendée? And it's to be won that is to cost at least a hundred thousand lives on both sides. Like all civil wars, it is to be fought with the degree of anger and even brutality which is shocking. There are a number of reasons for it. And one of the key ones is indicated by this map. The region of the Vendée and much of western France, particularly Brittany, is characterized by this type of settlement pattern, often referred to as the 'bocage,' where small villages hidden between the hedgerows that surround them. This is a cattle raising area but most people live outside the village center, in small hamlets and on scatted farms. In regions like this, the church plays a crucial role, not just as the spiritual heart of the community, but as the communications as the social heart of the community. Because it's set that church on Sunday mornings that well-respected local men and well-paid men, who were the parish priests deliver news, give advice effectively, or at the heart of parish life. These are areas, as well, where most of the farmers are renters of land, rather than the outright owners of land. As rentals of land, they hadn't paid very many feudal dues, the abolition of feudalism or the partial abolition, had not brought them any concrete benefits. They'd hoped that the revolution would recognize the fact that they have very long term leases, up to 99 years, and that they might actually be accorded full ownership of the farms, rather than being treated as renters. But the revolution has refused to touch that rental arrangement. In other words, the revolution has removed the good priests, who've refused to take the oath, and they've got outsider or intruder priest as they call them in their parish churches. The revolution has shut down a lot of the small chapels in the countryside and it hasn't done much for them in terms of their material well-being. In fact, it seems to have increased state taxes that they pay. One of the reasons why the fighting is so bitter and so bloody in this area of France once it erupts in counter-revolution in March 1793, is that much of the countryside is characterized by these hedgerows, narrow paths through the undulating countryside with hedgerows on either side much of them has disappeared today. But as Republican troops move through and try and put down this insurrection, it's very easy for locals to hide in the hedgerows to ambush the Republican troops to engage in a type of guerrilla warfare. Of course, once they're caught, the reprisals can be very bloody indeed. That's the case in much of the west and northwest of France. But there are other areas of France which remain profoundly committed to the revolution. In fact, of crucial importance in explaining the capacity of the New Republic to conscript vast numbers of people into the revolutionary armies, is that for most people, the French Revolution had bought concrete gains. At the other extreme of France, right down here in the foothills of the Pyrenees, the proclamation of the republic is marked by the planting of a tree. It's one of only two or three of the Liberty trees that are planted in 1792 and 1793 which is still standing in France. The plaque that is attached to it explains that it's planted in September 1792 to commemorate the founding of the French Republic and it's planted by the parish priest, by a constitutional priest named Maku. And it's still standing there today, one of only two or three such trees still alive today. A second plaque at the bottom with a quote from Victor Hugo about the importance of the French Revolution is put on that tree at the time of the bicentenary in 1999. Within the national convention as the New Republic has to face this crisis, a crisis of a divided France as well as of an external invasion, the National Convention starts to swing the votes behind the Jacobins, who are the most militant of the Republicans and who increasingly are seen by the non-committed deputies on the plane, they're sometimes called the Swamp. The Jacobin deputies are increasingly seen as those who will take the tough resolute measures necessary if France is to have any hope at all of surviving this crisis. The Girondin politically are becoming more isolated. They've been defeated about the death of the King. They are embarrassed by the fact that the war is going so badly. They are attacking Parisians as being anarchists and they are seen as somehow holding up the necessary measures to try and deal with this extraordinary military crisis that the Republic is facing, externally as well as internally. So, the uncommitted deputies and the center of the convention start backing Jacobin measures to try and deal with this crisis. In March 1793, they supported decree against émigrés. Those people who fled the revolution, who are in league with the enemy outside France and who are effectively told now, you have a couple of weeks to return or your property will be seized and sold. In April 1793, the Convention decides to establish a committee of public safety. Of course, with the overthrow of the monarch, there is no longer an executive head of government in France. They decide to create a committee of public safety of 12 men, chosen by the National Convention to be an emergency wartime government with extraordinary powers. They decide that other deputies inside the National Convention will be dispatched to the armies and to the provinces with other extraordinary powers, powers to requisition supplies for the army, and crucially, powers to supervise the conduct of the offices in the French armies; So that any suggestion that they will retreat in the face of the enemy will result in their immediate destitution and possible trial for treason. This is a war to the death. Then in May 1793, the Convention decides to do something about the subsistence needs of working people in Paris and issues it's law of the maximum. That's to say, it controls the price and availability of bread in Paris and other urban centers as the most basic subsistence requirement of the working people who are being expected to enroll in the French armies and confront the foreign troops and counter-revolutionary forces in the Vendée in what has become a deadly war. As the French war cry keeps putting it in 1793, the issue is victory or death.
