WHOSE VIOLENCE? THE COMEBACK OF THE VERSAILLAIS MYTH

UNTIL THE 1980's, THE CONTRAST BETWEEN THE ARMY'S BARBARISM AND LA COMMUNE'S PACIFISM WAS THOUGHT SELF-EVIDENT

Since then, La Commune has been "demystified" by emphasizing its rare executions and downplaying the army's carnage, to imply that the violence was almost the same. 

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Communard violence:

• La Commune did arrest 70 guards and clergymen at the start of the conflict in reprisal for Versailles killings, as bargaining chips and to slow down shootings,* that is, in self-defense.  

The Arrest of Monseigneur Darboy, newspaper illustration / zoom

*During her deportation Louise Michel met 31 Communards whom that halt in killing saved.  

• Except for the shootings of the Archbishop and five other hostages — inexcusable but due to Ferré alone — it ordered only nine executions, for reasons that are considered legitimate in wartime:  

1. A man who sold plans of a fort to Versailles, the only execution before Bloody Week.  

-- Lissagary, Annex XVI 

2. A man who tried to corrupt a Commune member. 

-- Vuillaume, The Shooting on Pont Neuf,  "Mes Cahiers Rouges" ("My red notebooks"), p.355

3.4.5. Three spies.

6.7.8.9. The commander accused of firing on the crowd at City Hall on January 22 and three policemen, also due to Ferré. Vuillaume thinks that Breton fanatics were responsible for that shooting, but since the commander said only that he "did his duty," Ferré's choice is understandable. 

-- Vuillaume, Gustave Chaudey, "My Red Notebooks," pp. 435-484

• The killings by mobs described above were due to panic. Commune members tried to stop them.

• A decree ordering shootings in reprisal was not applied. For the general absence of coercion, please click and scroll down. 

In short, the Communards executed 15 people, 14 during the anguish of Bloody Week. Of those, nine were legitimate 

in the wartime context. 

Current revisionism 

emphasizes those few executions

and downplays army carnage: 

We will come to that.

 

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A page from a 2016 schoolbook