Flight to Varennes

The Flight to Varennes (June 20-21, 1791) was a significant episode in the French Revolution during which the French royal family, faced with a decrease in royal authority, attempted unsuccessfully to escape abroad disguised as a Russian aristocratic family. This represented a turning point after which popular hostility towards the monarchy as an institution, as well as towards Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette as individuals became more pronounced.

Background

Deprived of authority and in fact made virtually a prisoner by the initial events of the revolution from 1789, Louis XVI had for many months acquiesced in the decrees of the National Constituent Assembly. However, the Civil Constitution of the Clergy wounded both his conscience and his pride. From the autumn of 1790 onwards he began to scheme for his liberation. Himself incapable of strenuous effort, the King was spurred on by his queen Marie Antoinette, who keenly felt her own degradation and the curtailment of that royal prerogative which her son would one day expect to inherit.

The king and queen failed to measure the forces which had caused the Revolution. They ascribed all their misfortunes to the work of a malignant faction, and believed that, if they could escape from Paris, a display of force by Bourbon-friendly powers would enable them to restore the supremacy of the crown. The National Guards of Paris treated the royal family well, and protected them on several occasions from tumultuous crowds, but were determined to prevent their escape. When Louis tried to leave the Tuileries for Saint-Cloud at Easter 1791, in order to enjoy the ministrations of a nonjuring priest (one who had not taken the oath required by the Civil Constitution), they would not let him budge. Mirabeau, who had always dissuaded the king from seeking foreign help, died on April 2, 1791.

Encouraged by the émigrés to believe that revolutionary France was without effective military means of defense, representatives of Austria (represented in the discussions by the emperor Leopold II himself), Switzerland, Sardinia, and Spain, met at Mantua and on May 20, 1791 reached a secret agreement to go to war against France, supposedly on behalf of Louis. The British monarch George III also was part of the coalition in his role as Elector of Hannover. Prussia, while not an active participant, was well disposed. However, when the plan was conveyed to Louis XVI, he rejected this potentially treacherous source of aid, casting his lot instead with general Bouillé, who condemned both the emigration and the Assembly, and promised him refuge and support in his camp with the army of the East at Montmedy, where his loyal troops were ready to shelter the royal family and either await foreign help or to begin a counter-revolution.

Planning the King's Flight

The flight was planned and organised by the Swedish count Axel von Fersen, who is believed to have been the queen's lover and the eyes, ears and mouth of Gustav III of Sweden by the royal family.

Although the plan was well-organized, it faced many difficulties in the days leading up to the flight. Originially Louis was supposed to make his departure in a small coach. However, Louis believed that he should ride in a carriage which was fit for a king. This carriage would have drawn suspicion and attention to whoever was in it. The last thing the royal family needed was to draw attention from themselves. Secondly, the family felt that it was necessary to take two nurses and Marie Antoinette's hair dresser Leonard. The family had to delay the flight so that they would have everyone they wanted with them. Also, by taking more people than necessary, the family made themselves more noticable. Lastly, on the night of the flight, the royal family, in disguise, walked right past the Marquise de Lafayette. If Lafayette would have realized who he was passing, he would have figured out that they were trying to escape and would have quickly arrested the royal family. Regardless of all of these events which could have ruined the plan, the king and his family were able to escape and make it to their carriage.

The King's Flight

Maintaining seemingly innocuous conduct to the last, and trusting very few with their secret plans, on the evening of June 20, 1791 the royal family left the Tuileries, one by one, in disguise. A carriage awaited them on the Boulevard to take them on the road to Châlons and Montmedy. Louis left behind him a declaration complaining of the treatment which he had received and revoking his assent to all measures which had been laid before him while under restraint.

In the morning, their disappearance was discovered. An angry crowd, reasonably fearing either an invasion of France or a civil war, accused both mayor Jean-Sylvain Bailly and the Marquis de Lafayette (head of the National Guard) of collusion. However, the Assembly soon established their control of the situation: it seized executive power, commissioned Montmorin, the minister of foreign affairs, to inform the European powers of its pacific intentions; sent commissioners to secure an oath of the troops to the Assembly (rather than to the King), and ordered the arrest of anyone attempting to leave the kingdom.

The King's Capture

The king had the bad luck to be sighted, recognised, and arrested at Varennes late on the 21st. National Guards seized him; other troops on the scene did not oppose them; by the time Bouillé reached Varennes, the issue was decided and the royal family was on their way back toward Paris under guard.

Bouillé left the army and managed to get out of France. The king's eldest brother, the Count of Provence, who had laid his plans more thoroughly, made his escape to Brussels and joined the émigrés.

Pétion, Latour-Maubourg, and Barnave, representing the Assembly, met the royal family at Epernay and returned with them. From this time, Barnave became a counsellor and supporter of the royal family.

The Results

When they reached Paris, the crowd was silent. The Assembly provisionally suspended the king and kept the royal couple under guard. From this point forward, the possibility not only of the deposition or forced abdication of this particular king but of the establishment of a republic entered the political discourse.

It was now no longer possible to pretend that the Revolution had been made with the free consent of the king. Some Republicans called for his deposition, others for his trial for alleged treason and intended defection to the enemies of the French people. Mutual distrust between the Royalists and the revolutionaries deteriorated from this point, ultimately resulting in the guillotining of Louis (January 21, 1793) and of Marie Antoinette (October 16, 1793).

References

The article also draws material from the out-of-copyright History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814, by François Mignet (1824), as made available by Project Gutenberg.

Lindqvist, Herman (1991). Axel von Fersen. Stockholm: Fischer & Co
Loomis, Stnaley (1972). The Fatal Friendship. Avon Books - ISBN 0931933331
Timothy Tackett, When the King Took Flight (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003)

French Revolution