Daily Life During the French Revolution (34 page)

An execution in the Place de la Grève was an occasion for
fellow workers, as well as the women, to go in their groups to watch the
gruesome public act. Even the back streets served as places of outdoor
entertainment; men played skittles while the women watched. Children ran wild
in the streets chasing each other or engaged in mock fights using sticks as
muskets or swords or amused themselves with spinning tops or playing quoits,
skittles, or ball games.

On feast days and Sundays, everyone disgorged from their
dingy, crowded apartments and took to the streets, hailing friends and acquaintances
as they passed. Most of the people in rundown quarters of the city were
laborers—just above the beggars on the social ladder.

The people might be ground down by poverty and have their
petty quarrels and lives exposed to the intrusive scrutiny of neighbors, but
such closeness could be beneficial. A master craftsman and his wife who lived
on the ground floor in comparative luxury, a journeyman on the next floor with
his small family, a laborer on the third level with his working wife, and a
penniless widow in the attic who made a few sous mending shirts— all were
polite to one another and exchanged greetings. If the widow had not been seen
on her daily walk to the grocer’s, someone would check to make sure she was all
right. If a violent quarrel seemed to put a woman in danger from a brutal husband,
it would not be uncommon for the neighbors to knock on the door to inquire
about her and even break it down if the situation seemed desperate for the
woman. Bailiffs coming to seize goods or apprehend someone who could not pay
his debts often encountered resistance from the neighbors who drove them off,
forcing them to try another day. What appeared to be an unjust arrest in some
quarters might well degenerate into a local riot in support of the victim.
People also kept an eye on one another’s property: a stranger in the building
was cause for alarm and was watched closely.

The inhabitants of a poor quarter worked 14 or 15 hour
days; a single shop girl might rise at four in the morning, spend all day in
the shop, and come home about seven to prepare a little food and eat alone; but
everyone put a high value on integrity and self-respect and generally addressed
others using the esteemed terms
Monsieu
r and
Madame.

WORK AND LEISURE

To create a trade corporation, the king had to ratify the
corporation’s statutes by
lettres patentes
. With the king’s sanction, it
became a
métier juré,
or sworn trade, and anyone who became a master of
the trade was required to sign an oath of loyalty to the corporation. To learn
the trade, a young man or woman began as an apprentice; the ambition of most
apprentices was to become a master of the craft. The apprenticeship usually
began when the boys or girls were teenagers and lasted from three to six years.
Apprentices were required to undertake a test of their skills by producing an
original work judged acceptable by a jury of masters. For example, an
apprentice seamstress had to create a pleasing dress or gown to fulfill the
requirement.

In addition, candidates also needed sufficient money to buy
the mastership from the corporate community. During the apprenticeship, filial
subordination to the master was part of the process sanctioned by a legal
contract.

Journeymen, skilled workmen who had already served an
apprenticeship, were hired for wages without long-term contracts to bind them
to the master. Many were married and had families, and they retained their
position in society as journeymen, usually for life, for, while they were hired
to help the master, they seldom reached mastership themselves. Excluded from
the confraternities of the masters, they formed parallel associations that had
no standing in law but had elaborate rituals that were often kept secret. For
itinerant young journeymen, the organization kept rooming houses in various
cities and offered aid in times of sickness and when a member died.

It was expensive to set up in business. In Paris, a little
before the revolution, the cost of a mastership ranged from 175 livres for a
seamstress to as much as 3,240 livres for a draper. Most corporations charged
between 500 and 1,500 livres, but often this was more than a journeyman could
earn in a year. Becoming a master offered many advantages, however. The master
was assured of a place in the market and protection for his goods, which no one
else was allowed to produce. His living standard was comparatively good, and in
hard times he could draw on the charity of his trade’s confraternity. Overall,
a mastership meant prestige and security for one’s family, and one’s children
had access to mastership at half the usual price. The master’s position and
privileges could be inherited by his widow until such time as she remarried or
turned them over to a son. Because of his status, the master was able to get credit,
and enhanced income often allowed him to buy property, which raised him even
higher in his social milieu.

Then, on March 2, 1791, the revolutionary government
dissolved the guild corporations. The corporate body and its regulations were
no longer relevant. Former masters, who were now called entrepreneurs, could
arrange contracts individually without corporate authority. There were also now
no legal barriers preventing a journeyman from becoming a master and
establishing a business for himself. If the business did badly, he faced the
prospect of falling into the ranks of the wage earner, since there was no
longer a corporate body to ensure him a place in the market or to lend
financial assistance. Masters had to take their chances as employers in an unregulated
open market.

For the working man or woman, the monotony of life on the
job was regularly alleviated by local events. Besides religious holidays,
secular festivities and celebrations took place in the quarters throughout the
year, and one of the most elaborate and colorful was Carnival, when streets
were replete with people wearing costumes and masks. Bonfires were not unusual,
although the police discouraged them as a fire risk. Children marched around
beating drums, and there was dancing, drinking, and socializing, with few
settling into bed before the early hours of the morning. Itinerant actors
presented bawdy plays and burlesque on makeshift stages, while magicians,
acrobats, ballad singers, and puppet shows vied for the crowd’s attention and
its money.

Young country girls often found life on the family farm
tedious and longed to go to the city to find jobs as clerks or apprentice
seamstresses. This could, in fact, relieve the large family of the extra mouth
to feed, and the girl also might be able to send a little money home once in a
while. Paris was generally the preferred destination for such young people. The
working life of a single girl in the city was not an easy one. Girls who became
apprentices worked hard for meager pay, slept in dormitories, and had little to
eat. On Sundays, about half a dozen pounds of meat were stewed in a large pot;
this had to feed everybody in the workshop for a week. The woman in charge sent
the girls out on occasion to the local markets to purchase bread at a price
much cheaper than in the bakeries, and it, too, had to last the week.

Walking through the streets of Paris during the time of the
Terror could be a traumatic experience, especially for young girls or boys
straight from the country. Cattle carts passing by on their way to the river
were sometimes piled high with the bodies of men and women recently butchered.
As the wagons bounced over the cobblestones, arms and legs dangled from the
sides like puppets on a string, trickles of fresh blood falling on the roadway.
At the river, the bodies and their separated heads were thrown into the water
to drift downstream toward the ocean. Only a short time before, the victims had
made the journey in the same tumbrels down the rue St. Honoré to the
guillotine. Working in their shops as the carts passed, Parisians often didn’t
even look up, according to eyewitness reports, or turned their backs on the
gruesome spectacle.

When people went into the streets of Paris, they made sure
they were wearing the tricolor cockade on their hats, which identified them as
patriots, whether they were or not. It was not wise to reveal any subversive
characteristics or thoughts to anyone at any time. To be denounced as a traitor
could mean a place in the tumbrels.

THE PARIS QUARTERS

Not unlike many other large European cities, Paris was
composed of many districts or quarters, each with its distinct people and
atmosphere. The wealthy middle class and the nobility occupied the faubourg St.
Germain, as well as the Marais, the Temple, and the Arsenal districts.

The working-class areas had their special occupations: the
masons lived in St. Paul; the furniture and construction industries were
situated in Croix-Rouge; and milliners, haberdashers, and producers of other
fashionable goods inhabited the rue St. Denis and the rue St. Martin.

To the north of the city, the residents of the suburbs of
Montmartre, St. Lazare, and St. Laurent were engaged mainly in the sale of
cloth. In Chaillot, to the west, were ironworks and cotton mills, while the suburb
of Roule, known as Pologne (Poland, as it was the home of many Polish
immigrants) was one of the poorest neighborhoods in Paris. East of the city on
both banks of the Seine lay the suburbs of St. Antoine and St. Marcel, where
furniture workshops were situated, along with the Gobelins tapestry works, dye
works, and Réveillon’s wallpaper factory.

Doing the same jobs, frequenting the same taverns, and
marrying local girls, the workers seldom ventured beyond their districts.
Events happening in one section of the city were not even known about in
others, as people were generally indifferent to what was going on elsewhere.
Difficulties of transportation and traffic compartmentalized the city, and
reactions to political events were different in the various sections.

Housewives shopping at the local market might be totally
unaware that people were being massacred nearby. News, spread by word of mouth,
could take several days to reach all parts of the city, and everything was
extremely susceptible to exaggeration and rumor.

For those curious people willing to travel further afield
to hear the most recent news, there were meeting places where discussions took
place. The Jardin des Tuileries, earlier a fashionable parade ground, became
the open-air anteroom of the Assembly, and the Place de la Grève was used for
executions, mass gatherings, and parades of the National Guard. The most
popular meeting place was the gardens of the Palais Royal. Here was the center
of cafe life, restaurants, entertainment, and the favorite haunt of agitators,
soapbox orators, rabble-rousers, scandalmongers, prostitutes, and demagogues.
The galleries along the arcaded sidewalks had been rented out to tradesmen by
the duke of Orléans some years before and had become the noisiest and, for the
future of the royal crown, the most dangerous place in the city.

The marquis de Ferrières, a provincial nobleman, having
visited the Palais Royal, stated:

You
simply cannot imagine all the different kinds of people who gather there. It is
a truly astonishing spectacle. I saw the circus; I visited five or six cafés,
and no Molière comedy could have done justice to the variety of scenes I
witnessed. Here a man is drafting a reform of the Constitution; another is
reading his pamphlet aloud; at another table, someone is taking the ministers
to task; everybody is talking; each person has his own little audience that
listens very attentively to him. I spent almost ten hours there. The paths are
swarming with girls and young men. The book shops are packed with people
browsing through books and pamphlets and not buying anything. In the cafés, one
is half-suffocated by the press of people.

Most visitors never ventured into the old quarters but
stayed in the hotels in the more affluent areas. However, that the capital was
lively, noisy, and vivacious is evident from reports of foreigners who visited
the city. A German bookseller and writer named Campe, who visited Paris in
1789, noted that not only were the people polite and animated in conversation
but also that everybody was

talking,
singing, shouting or whistling, instead of proceeding in silence, as is the
custom in our parts. And the multitude of street vendors and small merchants
trying to make their voices heard above the tumult of the streets only serves to
make the general uproar all the greater and more deafening.

Campe, a refined gentleman from a sedate and somewhat dull
country compared to France, went one evening to watch the sunset from the Place
Louis XV and suddenly found himself assailed by three old harpies who tried to
kiss him and at the same time snatch his purse. Fortunately, he got away
unscathed. Some witnesses found life in Paris harrowing, with the crowds,
noise, smells, dirt, and abundance of people from the provinces looking for
work, some of whom were desperate for a handout of a few sous. A lot of these
wound up working in the quarries of the Butte Montmartre.

Some 4,000 of the nobility lived in Paris. The revolution
brought about the first exodus of aristocrats from the city on July 15, 1789;
the second and larger one took place after October. Those who remained found
life rather boring, since there were no more grand balls and even concerts had
been eliminated. Night patrols kept the streets peaceful and aristocrats
indoors. As people left the richer districts for exile, trade slowed down and
money became scarcer.

A NOBLEMAN IN THE ESTATES-GENERAL

The marquis de Ferrières, a public figure in Poitou,
divided his time between his chateau in Marsay and his grand house in Poitiers.
A student of the philosophers of the Enlightenment, he published three essays
on the subject. His satire on monastic vows earned him a reputation as an
intellectual and led the nobility of Poitiers to elect him as their
representative to the Estates-General. He kept up regular correspondence with
his wife after his arrival at Versailles. Like the majority of deputies, he
deplored the move to Paris and complained that the streets of the city were
rivers of mud in the constant rain and that he did not go out at night for fear
of being run over by carriages. Instead, he spent the time alone and sad,
seated by the fire. He invited his wife to join him in Paris, but they needed
servants, so he asked if the cook at Poitiers would be able to dress her
mistress? Would she sweep the floors and make the beds? If she was not
agreeable, he would rather have the little chambermaid, who could help with the
washing and manage some cooking. Madame de Ferrières arrived in Paris and
passed two winters there, but in the summers of 1790 and 1791 she returned home
and her husband continued to write to her about domestic affairs. In August
1790, the marquis stated that he was highly satisfied with Toinon, his servant,
who gave him every attention, and wrote about his diet, which consisted of
beans, haricots, cucumbers, and very little meat. He dined with another noble
deputy from Béziers, who shared expenses with him helping to keep costs down.
He declared that in the preceding month, the cost of provisions (butter, coal,
vegetables, fish, and desserts) had amounted to 118 livres, and bread had cost
another 30 livres. This sum did not include meat and wood, or lodging at three
livres a day. Toinon was later replaced by a girl, Marguérite, who was
excellent at making vegetable soup. The staff also included a manservant called
Baptiste, a short, jolly man who liked coffee and sneaked a cup whenever he
could, ate too much meat, and spent his free time entertained by the
marionettes in the Place Louis XV. The marquis said he had only one serious
shortcoming: when he went down to the wine cellar, he always came back reeking.

CAFE SOCIETY

In the summer of 1789, cafe society was in full swing, and
there was more to discuss and argue about than ever before. The tables on the
sidewalks were packed with people sipping everything from English and German
beer to liqueurs from the French West Indies, fruit drinks, wine, Seidlitz
water, and a host of other cathartic and herbal tonics, as well as coffee and
chocolate-flavored drinks. Signboards advertising the cafes were on every
corner, gallery, and arcade. In front of the famous cafe Caveau, great throngs
gathered until two in the morning. Each establishment was well known for some
specialty: the Grottes Flamande for its excellent beer, the Italien for its
beautiful porcelain round stove, and the Café Mécanique for the mocha pumped up
into patrons’ cups through a hollow leg in each table. Of the many and varied
places, the Café de Foy was the most popular of all, with its gilded salons and
a pavilion in the garden. A fine brandy from the provinces was its trademark.

In the rue des Bons-Enfants stood the Café de Valois,
frequented by many of the Feuillants reading the
Journal de Paris
, while
the Jacobins were regular patrons of the Café Corazza, where François Chabot
and Collot d’Herbois often held the floor. In the rue de Tournon was the Café
des Arts, the focal point of the extremists from the Odéon district, while more
moderate types congregated at the Cafe de la Victoire, in the rue de Sèvres.
The differences in clientele could be striking. At the Régence, on the right
bank of the Seine, Lafayette was greatly loved, but at the Cafe de la Monnaie,
on the rue de Roule, the sans-culottes burned him in effigy. The Café de la
Porte St. Martin attracted quiet, respectable people out for an evening stroll.
As varieties of opinion were expressed, a man was judged by the cafe of his
choice. Rarely seen in cafes before, women began to follow the example of the
men and appeared in the evenings at the popular gathering places. They were
welcomed, as it was good for trade—the cafe trade, which was to endure all
upheavals and which persists until the present day.

Paris was not alone in the development of cafe society. All
the major cities and towns of the country began to enjoy the companionship and
the stimulation of discussion in their favorite bistros. Owners were exposed to
certain occupational risks, as, on occasion, heated discussions led to dishes
and cutlery being hurled across the tables. Major topics under discussion in
the news sheets and by sidewalk orators were the revolution, politics, members
of the government, trade, colonies, finances, taxation, and the huge deficit.

FREEMASONRY

Imported from England in the early 1700s, Freemasonry had
by the end of the century reached 700 lodges, with 30,000 members, distributed
throughout all the major cities. Many of the revolutionaries were prominent
Freemasons. Louis-Philippe Orléans, cousin of the king, was Grand Master, and
others included Georges-Jacques Danton, Marie-Jean Condorcet, and Jacques-Louis
David. Individual Masons were very active within the new society, some working
through the press and literary societies to make people aware of imminent
political change. They were generally well educated, often drawn from the
wealthier families and an important element, not unlike the salons, in
spreading enlightenment ideas. Men of all shades of opinion were recruited by
the lodges. The “Committee of Thirty,” which contained many prominent men, met
mainly at the house of Adrien du Port and put out pamphlets and models for
petitions or grievances and gave its support to political candidates. How much
Freemasonry influenced the course of the revolution remains to be clarified,
however. The majority of members were bourgeois who approved of the Masonic
abstract symbol of equality; yet the organization’s hierarchical structure
conflicted with the egalitarian principles of the revolution.

In the army, too, Masons were to be found, especially among
the officers. Some claim that the election committees of the Estates-General
consisted mainly of Masons. Freemasons were in general considered suspect by
the Catholic Church, but although they preached a “natural” religion, they did
not necessarily look for the separation of the church from the state. In
general, Freemasonry attracted men who were interested in philanthropy,
fraternity, and friendship (being open to greater social mixing than other
old-regime groups), and in new political ideas.

The number of lodges reflected the strength of the
bourgeoisie and other non-noble groups of the Third Estate. Not all Masons
became revolutionaries, but the lodges were present in many revolutionary
municipalities, and their influence was palpable. Men who aspired to be
politicians thus might have found it advantageous to join and benefit from the
close personal ties available among the “brothers.”

Reception of a Master Mason at a
lodge meeting.

THE SANS-CULOTTES

The term “sans-culotte” referred to the men who did not
wear the short knee trousers (breeches) and silk stockings of the nobility and
the upper bourgeoisie but wore instead the long trousers of workers and
shopkeepers. They were generally from the lower and often impoverished classes,
and “sans-culotte” was originally a derisive appellation. During the
revolution, the sans-culottes became a volatile collection of laborers in Paris
and other cities whose ranks soon included clerks, artisans, shopkeepers,
goldsmiths, bakers, and merchants. They were easily manipulated by popular
leaders such as Marat, Hébert, and Robespierre. The Jacobins used the
sans-culottes to control the streets of Paris and other cities and to intimidate
moderate members of the Assembly. The Committee of Public Safety under
Robespierre was adroit at using the discontented masses, and in September 1793
a decree established a revolutionary sans-culotte army. In October of that
year, this army participated in severe violence and brutality in Lyon against
those it considered enemies of the state. The sans-culottes were associated
with popular politics, especially in the Paris region, and were instrumental in
the September massacres and in the attacks on the Tuileries palace. In January
1794, the sans-culotte army, having served its purpose, was disbanded by the
Terror government.

Militant sans-culottes devoted much of their leisure to
politics, even while holding no official post in their section of the city.
Occasionally they would visit the Jacobin club, but they generally divided
their evenings between the
société sectionnaire
and the General
Assembly. In the section they would be surrounded by friends in their own
social milieu. They wore the red bonnet, the
carmagnole,
and, in
critical situations, carried their pikes in hand. The pike was a powerful
symbol of the people in arms. It was not employed on the front against enemy
armies but was extensively used to quell disturbances at home. When the death
penalty was decreed, on June 25, 1793, for hoarders and speculators, Jacques
Roux said the sans-culottes would execute the decree with their pikes. On
August 1, 1793, the government authorized the municipalities to manufacture
pikes on a grand scale and to provide them to the citizens who lacked firearms.

Besides attending meetings of the
sociétés sectionnaire
s
and the General Assembly, sans-culottes also found time to socialize in
cabarets, cafes, or taverns, where they enjoyed singing patriotic songs.

The life of most sans-culottes was modest. Some bordered on
the fringe of the lower echelons of society and lived in a perpetual state of
desperation. It was not unknown for a family with three or more children to
live in one sparsely furnished room on an upper floor of a building.