Bibliography

Formation of National Assembly Picture:
http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/46/

Attack on Bastille Picture:
http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/45/

Great Fear Picture:
http://www.historywiz.com/greatfear.htm

Declartaion of the Rights of Man and Citizen Picture:
http://www.dipity.com/kaylag_1993/World_History/

Execution of the King Picture:
http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/180/

The Reign of Terror Picture:
http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/11/

All other information came from the textbook and class notes.

Before and After the Revolution

Before the Revolution I was sure that my place in society was to be at the bottom of the chain, in the Third Estate. I belonged there because my parents and my parent’s parents were born into the class, with no chance of moving up to either the Second or First Estates. But now, I feel that I have much more freedom than I did back 10 years ago. At the start of the Revolution I was being heavily taxed. Although I am still being taxed now, everybody, not just the Third Estate is being taxed, which shows more equality among the people. Also, prior to the revolution, the Third Estate really did not have that much power when voting. A vote from the First and Second Estate would count for more than a vote from the Third Estate, even though the Third Estate included almost all of France’s population. After, voting would be done by head which would, again, give the Third Estate more power and equality while voting. Another idea before the Revolution I did not like was that members of the Third Estate could not hold political positions. I didn’t like that at all because my dream one day is to hold some political position. After the revolution, members of the Third Estate were granted more freedom and they were allowed to hold a political position, which means that maybe one day my dream will come true. Before the revolution there was not much freedom of religion and press, but those were promoted more throughout the revolution. Overall, I liked the results from the French Revolution, although I didn’t like some of the ways in which points were made during it. After, I feel like I have so much more freedom in society and there is much more equality between the classes. Honestly, I hope it stays this way for a while because I like who I am and what I have to offer to society, even though I am not the richest man in town. I believe that the French Revolution was very beneficial to France. I think that almost everybody took something, whether it was positive or negative, away from the revolution. I feel like there are not going to be problems with the government for a while because many people like the person who rose to power after the French Revolution, Napoleon Bonaparte. I hope that he will do great things for the county of France and I am looking forward for what he has to offer.

The Reign of Terror

I feel there is much chaos that has gone on in the country after King Louis was beheaded. The Jacobins, a group of radicals, were the ones to have Louis killed, and, therefore, were happy about it, but one Jacobin, Maximilien Robespierre, slowly took power. I, as well as many other people in the city, were not fans of the Jacobins, and were not pleased when he came into power.
Robespierre and his followers tried to create republic which would wipe out every trace of France’s past. In order to do this, they changed many things, including creating a new calendar. But with the new calendar, the local church began to close, so when one of my daughters became ill, I couldn’t pray for her. Soon after Robespierre came into rule, he started to rule the country as a dictator. People called this period the Reign of Terror, which I feel is a perfect name for it. During this time, Robespierre and his committee tried to protect the Revolution from enemies that might try to slow it down. In order to do that, he imprisoned the so called “enemies” and, eventually they were sentenced to death by guillotine. Thousands of people were sentenced to death during the Reign of Terror, some of which I know personally and will dearly miss. Plus, most of the people who were killed belonged to the Third Estate, but that doesn’t make sense to me because the revolution was started since they wanted change, but Robespierre wanted to protect the Revolution. I don’t know what he was thinking by doing all this. I feel that the violence that was used was unnecessary, unlike the storming of Bastille and the Great Fear, because I don’t see what good putting thousands of people to death is. By doing that, you are not making a point, but rather you are just scaring the population. Finally, Robespierre was sent to the guillotine and the Reign of Terror ended. I don’t know a single person who supported the rule under Robespierre. Again, I wonder what rule will come next. I hope it doesn’t end as badly as this one did.
(The picture above represents the execution of Robespierre)

Execution of the King 1793

I have never been sure about what I think of the king. I realize that by now I should have some idea about whether I like him or not, but my opinion keeps changing. I know he has good intentions sometimes, but I feel he doesn’t know how to do everything right. I feel that the king has not done enough to help the Third Estate, especially when they needed it the most. He and his wife just continued to spend money and not control the economy well, so us people in the Third Estate have had to suffer. The taxes have been increasingly hard for some people to pay and my business has not benefited from that as I have had to raise the price of bread in my store often, losing customers. Throughout the beginning of the revolution, I feel that Louis was too scared to do anything so he just sat back and watched it unfold. I once heard, prior to his execution that he tried to escape with his family. This showed many people, including myself, that he was no longer fit to rule and that his time was over. This was why I was neither surprised when he was put to death nor was I upset about it. Personally, I thought Louis had his chances to step in and do some big changes, even before the revolution, but he never did. I feel that most people of the Third Estate would be happy about his death because he never did anything good for them, so why should they support him. The one thing I wonder is who will take leadership of the country and what he will do in the future. I also wonder if the treatment of the Estates will change because of this.

Declaration of Rights of Man and Citizen 1789

“Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,” what else is there to say. When the National Assembly wrote the Declaration of Rights of Man and the Citizen, I strongly supported the revolutionary ideas that it put forward. This document had influence from the Declaration of Independence, which I heard was strongly supported in the Americas. The ideas in this document covered various ideas including, individual rights and the purpose of the government, defining a “nation”, a lot about law, laying out the responsibilities of public servants, taxation, and finally property rights. This document guaranteed people of the Third Estate many things which they did not have in the past, most of which allowed them to be somewhat more equal with the people of higher classes. Although I have not read the document myself, I have heard a lot of good talk about it from a lot of people about the content of it. I like and strongly support all that I have heard thus far as the ideas in the document support equality among the different social classes which was not present before. I have no objection to any of them, but the only thing I wonder is what the people of the First and Second Estates will think about the ideas. I don’t think they would support all of them, but they hopefully would like some of them. I wonder how they are going to respond to the ideas that were quickly put out in the document made by the National Assembly.

Great Fear 1789

Being a baker and owning my own store in the city, I don’t get out of town much because I need the money. But, regardless of that, I still have some friends who grew up in the city and went out into the countryside, despite the warnings from their parents, as they got older to see what jobs were available. Most of them I had not seen for a couple of years, until one day one came into the city with more news of rebellion. At this time, I was really getting into the idea that change was possible, so I listened to what he told me and I liked it a lot. He told me that after people in the countryside heard about what happened to the Bastille, they too felt like they should do something. My friend took part in what was called the Great Fear. He said it was a time when peasants broke into nobles’ houses and destroyed documents which tied the peasants to their duties. Sometimes, the peasants just burned down houses. After the peasants did this, they gained more freedom from their masters. He said that it was a very chaotic time in which they felt like they were doing the right thing. At first I was a little shocked when he told he, because of all the violence, but then, after it sank in, I was happy and this excited me even more. Again, I feel that violence was used for the rights reasons in this case in order for the peasants to make their point, just like the storming of Bastille. I was not sorry for what happened to the nobles and I thought they mostly deserved what they had got. I hoped this event made the nobles nervous and scared of the Third Estate. Also, this made he be more supportive of the revolution than ever before because of the measures people took for change. I was eager what was to come next and I strongly wanted to support and be a part of it.

Attack on Bastille 1789

About a month after the National Assembly was created by members of the Third Estate, rumors somehow traveled to the city I lived in about Louis, the king at the time, possibly using a military to end the National Assembly. I was scared, I didn’t want the National Assembly to be over, I fully supported it and wanted it to stay intact as long as possible. Because of the threat, the next day, my dad, who lived with me, and the bunch of other men in the city said they were going to travel to Paris. At the time, I didn’t know why he went, but I hoped that he had good intentions. At the same time I was scared for him, I hoped he would be safe and return home. All I knew about his journey to the city was that along the way he gathered more and more people and when they made it to Paris; they joined with even more people. I don’t remember the exact date, but sometime in the July of 1789, a mob stormed Bastille, a Paris prison. My dad, being a part of the mob said that they easily overtook the guards and eventually the group gained control of the prison. He also said that some people killed several guards and the prison commander. In the end, the mob of the Third Estate was victorious and this showed another sign of revolution. Although I don’t always support violence, I realized, through the Attack on Bastille, that when you want something, you may have to use forces you may not think are right in order to make a point. I will definitely remember the day this happened because I think this may have proved to a lot of people, including myself, that the Third Estate isn’t afraid anymore and that they were going to do whatever was necessary to get what they wanted. It gave me the courage and hope that even bigger and better things were to come. If I was a nobleman or part of the clergy, I would have been scared on that day about what was to come next. But, being part of the Third Estate, I was excited about what was to come in the future. The storming of the Bastille, I felt, was a good turning point in the revolution for us.

Formation of National Assembly 1789

In 1789, I could tell that there was a lot of unrest among the different people of France. I would always hear my parents and other adults in the community talk badly about the Second and Third Estates, but I, being 25 years old and having to run a business, didn’t have time to understand it all. Being a little more knowledgeable now, I would assume it had something to do with the Third Estate not having enough power when voting as well as not enough equality in other areas. One day, I went with my wife to see a clergyman speak about Third Estate rights. His name was Emmanuel-Joseph Sieyès and he talked about the Third Estate forming something called a National Assembly which would pass laws and reforms in the name of the French people. Sieyès also started my passion for the government and me wanting to learn more about it. A couple days after I heard Sieyès talk, the National Assembly was formed. It was formed in an effort to promote the end of absolute monarchy and the beginning of a representative government. The day after it was formed, the city I lived in, at least the street I lived on, went crazy, everybody seemed ecstatic about it. I went out on to the street and celebrated with them. This was one of the only days I have ever closed my bread shop. While on the street, I heard a lot of talk about the start of a revolution and how the formation of the assembly was just the first act of it. As learned more about the background of why people were unhappy and why there were so happy about the formation of the National Assembly, I too rejoiced because the assembly would give the people of the Third Estate more power when voting and more freedom of speech. After realizing how long the list of the reasons why the people of the Third Estate were unhappy was (some of my dislikes included), I knew then that this was just one event out of the many that would soon follow. I had a feeling that the France was about to change for the better.
(The picture above represents the Third Estate with the peasant behind the chariot, the worker in the back of the chariot, and the merchant leading the chariot)

Who am I?

My name is Robert Custeau and I am a member of the Third Estate. I was a 25 year old man at the start of the French Revolution with a wife and two kids, both of which were very young then. We live in a pretty large city which is not too far from Paris. I am a baker and in my opinion, I make the best bread in the city, but the income I make is not large enough to support my wife and kids all the time. I also feel that the taxes are way too high, and sometimes people can’t buy my bread because they spend most of their money on the taxes and then there is none left for bread and then I don’t get any money. Plus, I feel I have to raise the price of bread often, too. Along the lines of taxes, I feel that everybody, not just the Third Estate should be taxed because I believe all people should be treated more equally. My dream, one day, is to hold some political position (even though I am uneducated) because I am interested in government, but that is not possible with the current policies. I feel that there is change in the air and that people are going to do something big and I want to be a part of it.