Barricades in the streets of Paris, June Revolution of 1848.
CHAPTER 3 – MONARCHY, REPUBLIC AND EMPIRE
11:08 (Paris Time)
Wednesday, February 23, 1848
Hôtel de Brinvilliers, 12 Charles-V Street
District of Le Marais, Paris
France
‘’MADAM! MADAM! THE NATIONAL GUARD HAS JOINED THE BARRICADES IN MONTMARTRE!’’
Jeanne, who was reading the morning newspaper, raised her nose as Leila Benchetrit, her assistant-cook, appeared in the doorway of her private office on the upper floor of her residence. Leila, who had gone to buy fresh bread, entered the office on a sign from Jeanne.
‘’Where did you hear this, Leila?’’
‘’At the market, madam. Spirits are becoming hot in town and some are talking of going to the Prime Minister’s residence to demonstrate.’’
Jeanne/Nancy ‘B’, who already knew in detail what was to come, put down her newspaper and got up from her sofa, her expression somber.
‘’Tell the other employees that I want to see all of them in the ballroom: I will speak to them.’’
‘’Right away, madam.’’
As the Algerian woman walked away quickly, Jeanne pondered the present situation. France was about to live through a revolution that would not only mark the end of the reign of King Louis-Philippe The First and of his so-called ‘July Monarchy’, but would also inflame revolutionary passions across the whole of Europe in the weeks and months to come. While he had tried to reign with moderation, King Louis-Philippe was afflicted with a most unpopular prime minister, Guizot, who was totally opposed to any reform to the unjust current electoral system, on top of showing himself incapable of dealing with the grave economic crisis France was living through, with the poorer citizens suffering the most from the said crisis. The months to come were going to be politically and socially unstable and she was going to have to act cautiously in order not to put at risk her mission, which was to create and make prosper her future charity foundation, on which the welfare of so many people would eventually depend. To intervene herself politically in the various crisis to come, unless to bet on a winning horse, would only put her fortune and maybe even her own freedom at risk.
When she entered the huge, eleven by ten meter ballroom of the upper floor, she found assembled the six women and four men that made up her domestic staff. She first looked around at the anxious expressions of her employees, which she had personally selected with care for their honesty, intelligence and human decency.
‘’My friends, the next few days could become quite agitated and the streets of Paris will be dangerous, especially now that the army is occupying the streets and that the National Guard seems ready to face it in favor of those asking for reforms. I will thus ask you to stay inside the residence and not to go out until further notice, and this for your own safety. I am ready to offer safe lodging and food to your immediate families, for those of you who are married and have children. However, please hurry and come back before darkness if you want to go get your families. Act quickly but cautiously. Go!’’
Her employees dispersed at once, with the exception of Li Mai, her personal assistant, who stood there, unsure what to do. Jeanne walked to her and gave her a reassuring smile.
‘’Don’t worry, Mai: everything will be fine.’’
‘’But, what will we do if rioters, or even soldiers, come and attack the residence, Jeanne?’’
‘’We will not give them any pretexts to attack us, Mai.’’
‘’But, you are a d’Orléans, Jeanne. Some may be hostile to you just because of your apparent family link with the King.’’
Jeanne nodded her head slowly at those words. Mai, on top of being a sensitive and likeable teenager, had also proved many times that she was an intelligent girl.
‘’I will deal with that whenever the problem will show up, Mai. In the meantime, let’s go prepare our spare rooms for the families of our people.’’
The four employees who were married and had children came back to her townhouse just before noon with their loved ones and a few suitcases as the popular agitation increased along the city’s streets. Jeanne received them with a warm smile, showing particular affection to the sixteen children, whose age varied from nine months to fourteen years.
‘’Come, my children! I have prepared a large common room for the boys and another one for the girls. Aisha, Nadine, you are the two oldest of the lot. You will thus sleep in the guest bedroom, which is empty at the moment.’’
The thirteen year-old Algerian and the fourteen year-old Haitian thanked her before being guided to their room by Mai, each carrying a bag containing a few spare clothes. Jeanne took care herself of installing the other children, as well as the four spouses of her employees. Once everyone had been accommodated, Jeanne locked herself up in her private office and, taking out a key she always wore on herself, opened a large, solid oak cabinet, revealing her personal arsenal. Taking out of the cabinet two Colt-Paterson Model 1839 caliber .52 revolving carbines and two Colt DRAGOON caliber .44 revolvers, plus gunpowder, bullets and loading accessories, she took fifteen minutes to carefully load the four weapons. Those would give her a total of 26 ready-to-fire shots, a nearly unthinkable amount of firepower for the time period, all with perfectly contemporary weapons. Then hiding in various places her loaded weapons, Jeanne next went to the dining room, where she ate lunch with her assembled employees and their families.
The afternoon and early evening were tense, with seditious shouts being heard at intervals from the street and with mixed groups of workers, students and small merchants starting to patrol the streets, armed with improvised weapons and a few rare firearms. Thankfully for Jeanne, nobody seemed to pay particular attention to her residence then. She probably owed that to the fact that she was well known in this district for her generosity and for her respect for the lower social classes, a respect that was most atypical of other French aristocrats. However, at around ten at night, a short but intense firefight could be heard from the direction of the district of Des Capucines. Less than half a hour later, rioters started running up and down the streets, shouting out indignant cries.
‘’THE SOLDIERS OF THE KING FIRED ON THE PEOPLE AND KILLED 52 MARTYRS! DOWN WITH GUIZOT!’’
Those outraged cries rekindled at once the revolutionary fervor, which had quieted down somewhat during the evening. Jeanne, imitated by the other adults in her residence, watched from the upper floor windows of her townhouse as a small crowd of rioters started building a barricade at the corner of their street, while the bells of churches rang all across Paris.
‘’My god! This is going to end in a bloodbath.’’ said Rosette Sans-Soucis, Jeanne’s Haitian maid. Jeanne gave her a sober look.
‘’I truly hope that it won’t happen, Rosette. While Prime Minister Guizot has no consideration for the lower classes, King Louis-Philippe is not the kind of man ready to stay in power through massacres.’’
Jeanne, who had discreetly sent robotic spy probes to various strategic points of Paris to film those historical events for the benefit of the Time Patrol, also filmed the scenes down her street with the help of a pair of micro-cameras hidden in her earrings. She was thus able to film the passage of a funeral procession that passed under her windows around one o’clock in the morning. A huge crowd carrying lit lanterns escorted a cart full of dead people covered with blood. From the clothes worn by the dead, who were mostly men, it was evident that the bodies were those of people of modest condition, something that made Pierre Brunelle, Jeanne’s gardener and handyman, grind his teeth.
‘’The bastards! To shoot at the people like this. I hope that this Guizot bastard will pay for that.’’
‘’I believe that his position of power will not survive long after this, Pierre. The King will have no choice now but to disassociate himself from him. Let’s go to bed: tomorrow may be a long day.’’
The day of February 24 in fact proved to be full of news that brought joy to Jeanne’s employees and to the insurgents of Paris. With his palace besieged by a huge crowd of rioters, and not wanting to be responsible for another massacre, King Louis-Philippe officially fired his hated prime minister and abdicated before fleeing his palace under a disguise, on his way to exile in England. The King’s daughter, the Duchess of Orléans, whom he had named as regent for the benefit of his nine year-old grandson, then went to the Palais-Bourbon, the seat of the National Assembly, to proclaim her regency and thus save the monarchy. However, the republican representatives were not ready to play her game and colluded with the rioters to let the crowd invade the Palais-Bourbon. It was not supper time yet when the news of the proclamation of a provisional republican government circulated around Paris.
Jeanne greeted that news with an obvious satisfaction that surprised her employees. As she was opening a bottle of Champagne to celebrate the republican victory with them and their families, the young Michel d’Angelo, her stable boy, hesitantly asked her what all the others were secretly wondering about.
‘’You are really happy to see the monarchy fall, madam? But, you are a d’Orléans.’’
Jeanne answered him with a big smile as she made the bottle cork pop out.
‘’I was born a Brissac, not a d’Orléans, Michel. Furthermore, I believe in democratic values. The people IS France, whatever the aristocrats and big bourgeois may think. Come on, let’s drink together for the people and for France!’’
‘’FOR THE PEOPLE AND FRANCE!’’ Shouted in unison the men and women while raising their glasses of Champagne.
The weeks to follow were turbulent ones, as much in the rest of Europe as in France. Popular insurrections and riots shook in succession Vienna, Venice, Berlin, Milan, Munich and Prague, while the provisional French government publicly proclaimed the abolition of the death penalty and of slavery, the creation of national workshops in order to combat the widespread unemployment and the adoption of universal male suffrage. Jeanne didn’t waste her time during those weeks. Operating anonymously through a Paris stockbroker and using the troubled political situation across France and Europe, she speculated actively on the stock markets while using her historical knowledge from the future, buying stocks from companies which were going through temporary lows and were being dumped by panicked owners. On top of the Paris stock market, she also speculated on the London stock market, not wanting to put all of her precious eggs in the same basket. By May 4, the day of the official proclamation of the Second Republic in France, created after the national elections held on April 23, her initial fortune had ballooned to nearly thirty million francs2, split nearly evenly between her accounts at the Bank of France and at the Midlands Bank of London. The proclamation of the Second Republic did not stop her financial speculations, but Jeanne did slow down her stock market activities in prediction of other important events due in June. Those events were preceded on May 15 by a big popular demonstration meant to support the Polish insurgents fighting to throw off the hold of Imperial Russia’s on their country. The French National Assembly, composed in majority of right-wing conservatives and hidden monarchists, then imposed its views on the more socialist Executive Committee, which supposedly governed France but was in reality too weak to oppose the National Assembly. Many moderate republican officials were then replaced or even accused and imprisoned following the failed demonstration of May 15. The repercussions of this turn to the right by the government did not take long to make themselves felt around Jeanne.
10:18 (Paris Time)
Thursday, June 22, 1848
Hôtel de Brinvilliers
12 Charles-V Street, district of Le Marais
Paris
Jeanne, who was starting to be worried about Mai and her two missing maids, was partly relieved on seeing through the window of her private study her young Chinese personal assistant come back at a quick pace and enter through the carriage gate. Leila Benchetrit and Rosette Sans-Soucis were however still missing. Going quickly down the grand staircase of her residence, Jeanne met Mai as she was about to go up the stairs.
‘’Do you have news about Leila and Rosette, Mai?’’
‘’Yes, Jeanne! Unfortunately, they are not good. Their husbands, who were officially working at the national workshops closed yesterday by the government, will now have to leave for the provinces, like all the other unemployed men over the age of 25. Leila and Rosette are desperate and don’t know what to do anymore. They are asking for your help concerning their husbands.’’
‘’And they will have it!’’ Replied firmly Jeanne. ‘’Let’s take my personal cart to go see them.’’
Going out in the inner courtyard of the townhouse and walking to the stables, Jeanne gave an urgent order to Michel d’Angelo, who was cleaning the stalls of Jeanne’s three horses.
‘’MICHEL, HOOK QUICKLY PEGASUS TO MY PERSONAL CART: I HAVE TO GO OUT AT ONCE.’’
‘’RIGHT AWAY, MADAM!’’
Not staying inactive herself, Jeanne helped Michel by pushing out of its garage the small four-wheeled cart that she used for her informal trips in and around Paris. Six minutes later she was rolling out with Mai, turning on Saint-Paul Street and driving towards Saint-Antoine Street as fast as she could without risking to hit the numerous pedestrians following the narrow streets. Jeanne soon arrived at an old and decrepit apartment building where Rosette Sans-Soucis and her family were living. Telling Mai to stay in the cart, Jeanne ran up the narrow, dirty stairs of the building, finally knocking on a door of the second floor.
‘’ROSETTE, IT’S ME, JEANNE. OPEN UP!’’
The worried face of her Haitian maid appeared a few seconds later as she opened her door.
‘’Thank you from the bottom of my heart for coming, madam. To be frank, I don’t know what to do right now.’’
Jeanne gave a quick look at Thomas, Rosette’s husband, who was sitting in a corner on a rickety chair and who was holding his head in despair.
‘’What is happening exactly, Rosette?’’
‘’It’s that damn governmental decree, madam.’’ exclaimed Rosette on an indignant tone. ‘’Not content with closing the national workshops and thus throwing my husband and tens of thousands of other workers back into unemployment, the government has ordered that all the unemployed men over the age of 25 are to move to worksites in various provinces. If my husband Thomas obey that edict, I will be separated from him, maybe for good.’’
‘’Has he received an official notice about that?’’
‘’Not directly, madam, but the decree published in the newspapers orders the unemployed to show up tomorrow morning at their old workshops, from which chariots will carry them to provincial worksites. The youngest ones will be brought to army barracks to be enrolled there. Can you help us, madam?’’
Rosette’s pleading tone moved Jeanne, who already knew how much misery and even blood that closure of the national workshops would bring. She however had an idea in mind that could save Thomas. She thus looked at the dejected black man and spoke gently to him.
‘’Thomas, when did you show up for the last time at your workshop?’’
‘’The day before yesterday, madam.’’ answered Thomas in his Creole-accented French.
‘’Thus on the twentieth, one day before the publication of the decree announcing the closure of the national workshops. Excellent! Thomas, you will say to anyone asking you that you were hired by me on a permanent basis on the evening of the twentieth, and that you are thus not touched by the decree. As a precaution, I will ask you to come lodge with your whole family in my residence, until I can make all this official. By the way, you will really work for me, at my standard daily salary of three francs per day.’’
‘’You…you would do this for me, madam?’’ asked Thomas, not believing his luck.
‘’I would do it for any decent person in need, Thomas. Rosette, pack quickly a suitcase for your husband: he will leave with me. Then, start packing more bags for the rest of your family, so that I can pick you up in a couple of hours and bring you to my residence for a few days: I anticipate that some difficult days are coming.’’
‘’Thank you, Jeanne! Thank you for everything! You are too good.’’ said Rosette, tears in her eyes, prompting Jeanne in going to her to hug her.
‘’Nobody can be too good, Rosette: you can only be too mean.’’
Ten minutes later, and with Thomas in the back of her cart with an old suitcase, Jeanne took the reins and drove off, this time in the direction of the home of the Benchetrit. There, she found the same situation as that with the Sans-Soucis and applied the same solution, retroactively hiring permanently Omar Benchetrit and telling Leila to start packing her family things. With both Thomas and Omar in the back of her cart, Jeanne then went to see a notary that she knew well and who had socialist views, asking him to produce hiring contracts with retroactive dates for Omar and Thomas. A discreet bonus of 500 francs helped erase the few professional scruples of the notary, who signed the contracts as a witness. On her return trip, Jeanne briefly stopped at the homes of the two men, to start hauling their families’ bags to her residence. Two more return trips were needed to pick up their wives and children and the rest of their limited belongings, with Luc Rémillard accompanying Jeanne’s cart in her heavy haul chariot. By the time that the families of all her employees were safely installed in her residence, the popular agitation had grown to alarming levels.
Supper that night was a somber affair, with all realizing how difficult the next few days could become. Jeanne did her best to calm the nerves of her employees and of their families by singing and playing the piano and the guitar for them. She hid her own anxiety, knowing thanks to historical hindsight how bloody the next few days were going to be in Paris. Helping in late evening the mothers to put their children to bed for the night, Jeanne thought on looking at the sixteen boys and girls that simply doing this made all her efforts expended in this mission worthy. The smiles of gratitude from her employees, which had nothing to do with simple servility, also warmed her heart. Satisfied with herself, Jeanne/Nancy went to take a good hot bath and then slipped in her bed, falling asleep quickly.
The first shots, coming from the poor districts on the Left Shore, echoed around ten o’clock the next morning. Those isolated shots quickly became heavy exchanges of gunfire as the workers of Paris built barricades all across the city and as the army went on to brutally dismantle them and disperse the rioters. Contrary to the February Revolution, the government did not bow to the rioters and the National Guard stayed on the government’s side. By the evening of June 23, Paris had turned into a battlefield. The next day, June 24, proved even worst, prompting Jeanne in keeping her guests far from the façade’s windows during the day, fearing lost bullets. On the morning of June 25, the fighting closed in on her district. Jeanne was able to film in that afternoon the brief firefight that opposed a full company of infantry to a group of rioters holding a barricade erected at the corner of Charles-V and Saint-Paul Streets. The rioters, poorly armed, still caused a few casualties to the soldiers before dispersing in disorder. Jeanne ground her teeth together but kept filming discreetly as soldiers rounded up with much use of rifle butt strokes a dozen disarmed rioters and made them stand against a wall before summarily executing them. She suddenly became alarmed when about fifty soldiers started coming slowly down her street, bayonets fixed, while knocking on doors and then entering houses to search them. A poor man who made the mistake of protesting too vigorously the searching of his house was simply shot on his doorstep.
Taking a quick decision, Jeanne left the window and walked out of her private study to make a quick tour of her residence, ordering her staff and their families to assemble in the ballroom and to stay there. She then took with her Luc Rémillard and, after making sure he had no weapons on him, went down with him in the tunnel formed by the carriage gate of her residence. Once in front of the solidly locked double doors of the gate, she looked gravely at the ex-legionnaire, a tough, solid man of 32 who had left the Foreign Legion because of a wound to his left arm.
‘’Listen to me carefully, Luc, and don’t protest. At my signal, you will unlock the pedestrian door and will let me go out, then will immediately close and lock back the door. You will open it again when I will give three widely spaced knocks. If soldiers then follow me inside, do not oppose any resistance and do not object to their presence. The lives of all of our people here are at risk.’’
Rémillard in turn looked at her with worry. Jeanne was presently wearing a splendid aristocrat’s dress, plus a set of jewels that was worth a fortune.
‘’But, you risk being killed by going out like this, madam.’’
‘’I am the least at risk here, Luc. Trust me: I know what I am doing.’’
Then getting close to the pedestrian door embedded into the left carriage door of the gate, she listened for a moment before signaling Rémillard.
‘’Now, Luc!’’
While mortally worried for her, the man obeyed her and quickly pulled the three heavy bolts locking the thick wooden pedestrian door, then pulled the door opened to let Jeanne pass. She quickly stepped outside in the street, letting her coach driver and security guard close and lock the door behind her. A group of soldier walking down the street towards her residence and being less than fifteen paces from Jeanne raised their muskets at once on seeing her.
‘’DON’T MOVE! HANDS IN THE AIR!’’
Her heart beating furiously and hoping to hell that the soldiers would not simply shoot her without questions, Jeanne slowly raised her hands up in the air while speaking in a firm voice.
‘’I am Lady Jeanne d’Orléans. I want to speak with your commanding officer.’’
The soldiers looked at each other in indecision, with one of them finally talking to his NCO.
‘’Shit, she’s an aristocrat! What do we do, Sergeant?’’
‘’Uh, I think that we better let the lieutenant decide. LIEUTENANT!’’
A young officer whose saber was stained with blood approached at a quick step on hearing the call.
‘’What is it, Sergeant? Who is this woman?’’
‘’She says that she is an aristocrat, Lieutenant. She came out of that carriage door.’’
‘’This is my residence, Lieutenant.’’ offered Jeanne, then taking a chance. ‘’I am Lady Jeanne d’Orléans and I came out to ask your soldiers to show restraint if they have to search my residence. I can assure you that I am alone with my servants and their families and that you will find no rioters inside.’’
The lieutenant approached Jeanne and examined her visually from head to toe, noting her rich dress and jewels. Impressed by her appearance and beauty, he finally bowed politely to her.
‘’Searching your residence will not be necessary, Lady Jeanne. You may now return inside. Have a good evening, madam.’’
‘’Thank you and good evening to you too, Lieutenant.’’