Fatal Purity: Robespierre and the French Revolution by Ruth Scurr Page A

August 8
Smashing of royal tombs at Saint-Denis, August 10
Toulon surrenders to the English, August 29
Terror becomes the order of the day, September 5
Law of Suspects, September 17
Law of General Maximum, September 29
Adoption of the Republican calendar (backdated to 22 September 1792), October 5
Year I
Fall of Lyon, Vendémiaire 18 (October 9)
Execution of Marie Antoinette, Vendémiaire 25 (October 16)
Execution of the Girondin deputies, Brumaire 10 (October 31)
Festival of Reason in Notre-Dame, Paris, Brumaire 20 (November 10)
Commune decrees closure of Parisian churches, Frimaire 3 (November 23)
Constitution of Revolutionary Government, Frimaire 14 (December 4)
First issue of Desmoulins’s Le vieux Cordelier , Frimaire 15 (December 5)
French recapture Toulon, Frimaire 29 (December 19)
Rebels in the Vendée crushed, Nivôse 2 (December 22)
Year II
Robespierre ill, Pluviôse 22–Ventôse 22 (February 10–March 12)
Execution of Hébertistes, Germinal 4 (March 24)
Recall of Fouché from Lyon, Germinal 7 (March 27)
Execution of Dantonistes, Germinal 16 (April 5)
Robespierre runs the Police Bureau after Saint-Just leaves on mission to the army, Floréal 9 (April 28)
Cécile Renault attempts to assassinate Robespierre, Prairial 4 (May 27)
Festival of the Supreme Being, Prairial 20 (June 8)
Reorganization of Revolutionary Tribunal, Prairial 22 (June 10)
French victory at Battle of Fleurus, Messidor 8 (June 26)
Fraternal banquets to celebrate the anniversary of the Bastille’s fall, Messidor 26 (July 14)
Robespierre’s last speech to the National Convention, Thermidor 8 (July 26)
Arrest of Robespierre, Thermidor 9 (July 27)
Execution of Robespierristes, Thermidor 10 (July 28)



Preface
    MY DEAR CROKER,
    I wish you would think seriously of the History of the Reign of Terror. I do not mean a pompous, philosophical history, but a mixture of biography, facts and gossip: a diary of what really took place with the best authenticated likenesses of the actors.
    Ever yours,
    ROBERT PEEL 1
    Soon after he received this letter from his friend Sir Robert Peel, the once and future Tory prime minister, John Wilson Croker packed his bags for a seaside holiday. Although he was a prominent literary and political journalist and was hoping to work as he sat on the beach, Croker packed none of his collection of rare and fascinating books about the French Revolution that are now one of the glories of the British Library. He took with him only the list of those condemned to death during the Reign of Terror. 2 He perused it against the rhythmic sound of waves breaking on the shore.
    Twenty-two impoverished women, many of them widows, convicted of forwarding “the designs of the fanatics, aristocrats, priests and other agents of England,” guillotined.
    Nine private soldiers convicted of “pricking their own eyes with pins, and becoming by this cowardly artifice unable to bear arms,” guillotined.
    Jean Baptiste Henry, aged eighteen, journeyman tailor, convicted of sawing down a tree of liberty, guillotined.
    Henrietta Frances de Marbœuf, aged fifty-five, convicted of hoping for the arrival in Paris of the Austrian and Prussian armies and of hoarding provisions for them, guillotined.
    James Duchesne, aged sixty, formerly a servant, since a broker; John Sauvage, aged thirty-four, gunsmith; Frances Loizelier, aged forty-seven, milliner; Mélanie Cunosse, aged twenty-one, milliner; Mary Magdalen Virolle, aged twenty-five, hairdresser: all convicted for writing, guillotined.
    Geneviève Gouvon, aged seventy-seven, seamstress, convicted of “various conspiracies since the beginning of the Revolution,” guillotined.
    Francis Bertrand, aged thirty-seven, convicted of producing “sour wine injurious to the health of citizens,” guillotined.
    Mary Angelica Plaisant, another seamstress, guillotined for exclaiming, “A fig for the nation!”
    Relaxing into his holiday, Croker continued reading through the long list of dubious charges against the