The capture of the Bastille

Every year on July 14 the French celebrate the Day of the Bastille. The holiday is very original and quite unexpected. And to understand what it is connected with, a little digression into history is necessary.

A powerful fortress, with high walls and eight towers, the Bastille was built for more than 10 years, 1370-1381. And almost from the very beginning the fortress served as a prison. First it contained the most dangerous criminals, eventually it became a political prison. And in the same eighteenth century, many famous people visited her prisoners, including Voltaire, the great philosopher of that time, as well as Count Cagliostro, the Countess of Lamotte, the Marquis de Sade, Nicolas Fouquet, and so on. The list can be continued, but the purpose of the article is not this.

We were imprisoned in this prison on the personal order of the king, without trial and effect, so to speak. And the orders in the Bastille were much stricter than in any other prison. It is only natural that this particular fortress was associated with the Parisians, and also with a part of the French, with despotism and political arbitrariness. And this, together with the fact that ammunition was stored in the basement of the fortress, made the taking of the Bastille almost inevitable.

The revolutionary spirit among the people in 1789 grew rapidly. By mid-July of that year, the feudal-estate General States, convened in May of the same year, spontaneously transformed themselves into an unconscious institution that positioned itself as the bearer of the people's will and, on this basis, claimed the supreme power. In the wake of this, the National Assembly, created by the deputies of the "third estate", declared itself to be the National Constituent Assembly.

In order to stop the beginning of the revolution, troops consisting of foreign mercenaries in the amount of more than 20,000 were stolen to Paris. Then one of the popular ministers, Jacques Neckar, was dismissed. His place was taken by Baron Breteuil. This news alarmed the inhabitants of Paris, who feared the defeat of the National Assembly, because they had such hopes. Each of these events gradually increased the people's anger and thereby brought about the capture of the Bastille.

The revolutionaries began to call on the people for an uprising, the most famous of the agitators was Kamil Demulen. As a consequence, riots begin in Paris on July 13, in particular, the Saint-Lazare monastery was looted. To be precise, its granary. The Parisian master, Jacques de Flessell, sought to end the unrest and created the city police, which included about 48,000 people. However, the police did not become armed.

And then there was the capture of the Bastille. On July 14, an armed crowd of Parisians, numbering about 50,000 people, looted weapons warehouses at the House of Disabled People (this word in France was then called for veterans who had already retired). Thus, in the hands of the rebels there were about 40,000 rifles. The next point in their route was the Bastille, because in its basements, as already mentioned, gunpowder and bullets were stored.

The Marquis de Lone sent a rebellious delegation to issue ammunition to arm the city police. De Launay received the delegation in the highest degree of friendliness, but refused to give ammunition. One by one the delegations left with nothing.

Meanwhile, the people all stayed on the square. Thus the garrison of the Bastille consisted of only 114 people, 32 of them were Swiss guardsmen, and the remaining 82 were invalids. In addition, 13 guns were installed on the fortress walls. In the middle of the day, namely at half past one, these guns opened fire on the crowd gathered near the fortress. The result of this action was the death of 89 people, and 73 were wounded. After that, several more delegations were sent to the Marquis, and then the cannons captured at the House of Disabled were brought up to the lift bridge.

Seeing such a demonstration of forces and intentions, de Lone did not hope for reinforcements from Versailles and therefore decided to blow up the fortress. To do this, he went down to the basement, where the powder was kept with the lighted wick. However, they did not give him the chance to do it. The Bastille garrison called a military council, on which almost unanimously voted for surrender.

In exchange for a promise to save the lives of defenders of the fortress, they handed over the Bastille by 17:00. Thus ended the storming of the Bastille. Almost all defenders of the fortress, as well as the Master de Flessell, were killed by an outraged crowd. This event was the first victory of the people's revolution. Despite the fact that taking the Bastille was not a great victory, it still played an important role in the history of France. Over time, this event became a symbol of the inevitable victory over despotism.

Since 1880, the Bastille Day is celebrated as a national holiday.