Jacques-Louis David and the Last Journey of Marie Antoinette

Jacques-Louis David (Paris, France, 30th August 1748 - Brussels, Belgium 29th December 1825)

On this day in 1748, famed artist Jacques-Louis David was born. Initially renowned for his history paintings, David eventually began to develop strong Revolutionary sensibilities and became closely allied to Marat, producing a famed painting depicting his death. He later grew close to Robespierre and enjoyed immense influence over French arts and culture during the Revolution and then the rule of Napoleon. Although known for his grand works and portraits, I have chosen instead to concentrate on a more simple sketch he produced, that of Marie Antoinette on her way to the guillotine.

Marie Antoinette on the Way to the Guillotine by Jacques-Louis David, 1793

When David sketched the doomed queen on 16th October 1793, she was a world away from the grand, glamorous figure memorialised in innumerable works of art. In her thirty seventh year, Marie Antoinette had been incarcerated for some time and David depicts her with an unflinching eye, showing an unremarkable woman, face haggard and toothless, hair shorn and her hands bound as she sits in the tumbrel on its way to the scaffold. One cannot help but notice how straight she sits, though the expression on her face is one of grim sadness.

In this simplest of sketches David shows not a queen, nor the hated figure so vilified by her persecutors, but a simple human in her final minutes. There was nothing remotely Royalist in David's work and yet his honest depiction carries with it a dignity of its own. He might have produced far finer works and laboured long hours over great canvasses but for me, this simple, human sketch is one of David's greatest works; it captures a singular moment in time and one that, as the tumbrel rolled on past the artist's window, was soon gone forever.

Life in the Georgian Court, true tales of 18th century royalty, is available at the links below.

Pen and Sword
Amazon UK
Amazon US
Book Depository (free worldwide shipping)

"I killed one man to save 100,000": Charlotte Corday

Marie-Anne Charlotte de Corday d'Armont (Normandy, France, 27th July 1768 – Paris, France, 17th July 1793)

Charlotte Corday painted in the condemned cell by Jean-Jacques Hauer

My not so happy ever after tale of the death of Marat has proven one of the most popular stories here at the Guide and the little ones of Gin Lane never tire of hearing it. Funny thing is, they're not so fussed about the man in the bath, it's the girl on the guillotine who grabs their fancy so, on the anniversary of her birth, I thought the time had come to tell a little more of Charlotte Corday.

Charlotte was born in the tiny Normandy hamlet of Saint-Saturnin-des-Ligneries to a minor line of aristocrats. Following the death of her mother and sister, Charlotte and her surviving sibling were raised in the Abbaye-aux-Dames convent at Caen. Here she studied the work of philosophers including Rousseau and Voltaire, proving herself to be a bright and serious-minded girl. When she reached adulthood Charlotte did not take holy orders but instead left the convent. She remained in Caen and set up home with her cousin and good friend, Madame Le Coustellier de Bretteville-Gouville. 

Charlotte's childhood home

Charlotte met a number Girondins in Caen and came to sympathise with their political ideals. Already unsure about the direction in which the revolutionaries were steering her country, she admired the moderate approach of the Girondin leaders and shared their distrust and dislike of the Montagnards. As she grew more politicised and her opinions more firm, Charlotte watched in horror as violence swept through France. After the September Massacres, she began to fear that the country was teetering on the brink of civil war.

Fired by fear for the future, Corday began to conceive of a plan to remove one of the most outspoken and radical Jacobins, Jean-Paul Marat. She was, of course, not Marat's only enemy and he had spent time in hiding before due to threats on his life but he could hardly have conceived of the threat posed by the seemingly harmless young woman who would finally bring him down.

On 9th July 1793, Charlotte travelled from Caen to Paris, where she took lodgings at the Hôtel de Providence and wrote a document explaining her forthcoming violent actions, Addresse aux Français Amis des Lois et de la Paix ("Address to the French People, Friends of Law and Peace"). Four days later she concealed a kitchen knife in her clothing and went to visit Marat, supposedly to share intelligence with him.

Despite his wife's reservations, Charlotte was admitted to Marat's home, the revolutionary forced to conduct his business from a bathtub due to an agonising skin condition. As the short meeting concluded, Charlotte rose to her feet, drew the concealed blade, and plunged it deep into the revolutionary's chest. 

Charlotte Corday by Paul-Jacques-Aimé Baudry, 1860 

The assassin asked for no mercy at her trial, declaring that she had "killed one man to save 100,000." During her short imprisonment she wrote a number of letters and even sat for a portrait; her lawyer, Chauveau-Lagarde had previously defended Marie Antoinette but once again his efforts were to be in vain. Happy to lay down her life for her beliefs, Charlotte repeatedly admitted her guilt and the revolutionary tribunal sentenced her to death.

Just four days after Marat breathed his last, Charlotte was taken to the guillotine and executed. Moments after the blade fell, executioner's assistant Legros lifted her head from the basket and slapped her cheek. Charlotte's executioner, Charles-Henri Sanson, echoed the crowd's outrage at this affront and Legros was rewarded with a three month prison sentence for his troubles.

In fact, Charlotte's actions were to have little impact on the path of the revolution and instead Marat was hailed as a martyr whilst Corday's name was left to languish. Now they are forever linked, bound by art, literature and history.

"Short in stature, deformed in person, and hideous in face": Jean-Paul Marat

Jean-Paul Marat (Boudry, Switzerland, 24th May 1743 - Paris, France, 13th July 1793)

 Jean-Paul Marat by Joseph Boze, 1793

"Short in stature, deformed in person, and hideous in face",  physician, scientist, journalist, radical and victim of an audacious assassination, Marat's life was blighted by illness, controversy and thwarted ambition.

Highly ambitious and with a gift for making influential connections, Marat left home at the age of 16 with no formal qualifications and nothing but the desire to succeed. The young man travelled through Europe, teaching in Bordeaux and undertaking medical training in Paris before his travels took him to London and the artistic circle of Angelika Kauffmann. Remaining in England, he began to write on the subject of slavery, eventually producing the highly-acclaimed Chains of Slavery in 1773.

Finally on his way, Marat returned to Paris and established a medical practice, eventually winning the lucrative position as a physician in the household of the comte d'Artois, later to become King Charles X. Not satisfied to rest on his already considerable laurels, Marat embarked on a programme of scientific discovery, extending his intellectual and political circle and continuing to publish increasingly radical works. Just as he abandoned his medical career in favour of science, so too would this new direction eventually be set aside in preference of a career in journalism, Marat's attentions now firmly set on the politics of revolution.

The increasingly radical Marat began publishing his own newspaper, L'Ami du Peuple, in 1789. The paper was highly critical of Girondin leaders and he eventually found himself forced into hiding, fearing their vengeance. Not content with life as a journalist, Marat moved into politics when he was elected to the National Convention in 1792. His criticisms of the Girondins grew in both fury and scale and he began to call for violent action against them, a tactic that swiftly led to his arrest and imprisonment. Brought before the Tribunal, the persuasive, passionate Marat spoke in his own defence and when he was acquitted, his supporters celebrated uproariously.

However, Marat's always poor constitution was further weakened by the stress of his experiences and he began to be plagued by a debilitating skin condition that left him covered in itchy, suppurating blisters. He increasingly took to his bath for the sake of comfort, conducting his business from this somewhat unorthodox office. When the Girodins fell in June 1792 Marat was already virtually housebound and increasingly isolated from his political allies, growing distant from the centre of power.

The Death of Marat by Jacques-Louis David, 1793

On 13th July 1793 Charlotte Corday visited Marat's home, offering confidential information on the remaining, fugitive Girodins. The young woman was admitted to the bathroom which had become his virtually permanent residence and there followed a short conversation, after which she drew a knife from her corset and plunged it into his chest. Within seconds Jean-Paul Marat was dead, the victim of a royalist Girondin who had achieved what his other enemies could not, to finally silence the ambitious radical for good.

Four days later Marie-Anne Charlotte de Corday d'Armont went to the guillotine, telling her trial that she had "killed one man to save 100,000."

In death, Marat briefly achieved the importance he had sought all his life. Immortalised in paint and sculpture, his funeral was attended by the most influential figures in Paris and he was held up as a martyr to the revolutionary cause. Eventually though this flame of adoration dimmed and Marat passed into memory, his name forever linked with that of Charlotte Corday, the woman who took his life on a summer day in 1793.

Charlotte Corday by Jean-Jacques Hauer

It seems that Charlotte really struck a cord with the Gin Laners, earning herself her own entry. Read the story of Charlotte's life here!