Talk:September Massacres

mediocre
This is pretty mediocre as it stands, and the last paragraph -- "Some historians cite this outbreak of violence in the name of defending an imperiled Revolution as evidence of an inherent tendency toward bloodshed on the part of the Jacobins" -- is pure weasel: "Some historians" cite it as an "inherent tendency toward bloodshed on the part of" people they don't like.

Currently, I believe the material is covered in more detail at The Legislative Assembly and the fall of the French monarchy. Merge? Refactor? I'm at least adding a "see also". -- Jmabel 05:57, Jun 30, 2004 (UTC)

problems
A recent edit added "The September Massacres marked a period of violence against the Roman Catholic Church that spread throughout France and lasted for nearly a decade." I have two problems with that: (1) it tends to suggest that most of the victims were attacked for their connections to the Church. I am unaware of any reputable source that makes that claim. (2) As far as I know, violence against the Church and its institutions was, at most, intermittent after the fall of Robespierre: there was a flare-up at the time Rome was occupied by the French in 1799, but other than that just a smattering of incidents. No? -- Jmabel | Talk 04:41, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)


 * I was only quoting J. McManners, The French Revolution and the Church (1969) and Gwynne Lewis, Life in Revolutionary France (1972). However, I did not mean it to say continual and massive like 1792, only sporadic but that acts of violence, plus demonstrations against the church that turned violent, continued until the Concordat. 17:07, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

"However this popular account of her being raped, dismembered or mutilated is disputed." Quite possibly; can someone please cite: disputed by whom? - Jmabel | Talk 03:49, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Justification
Recently added, recently cut: "They justified their actions by claiming that they were preserving the republic." The place this was placed in the article, it is not clear who "they" are, though presumably the perpetrators of the massacres. I don't think this is necessarily false, but I don't think it is exactly true either: as I understand it, they justified their actions as an effort to destroy what would now be called a potential Fifth Column before heading off to war. Does someone have a citation for this? - Jmabel | Talk 05:38, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Pcesse de Lamballe
moved here: 'However this popular account of her being raped, dismembered or mutilated is disputed." If this well-attested incident is "disputed", some details are required and the symptomatic "passive of non-attribution" corrected. --Wetman 04:04, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

Paris Commune
I think a description of the Paris Commune's actions just prior to the massacres is needed. Just days prior they sealed off the city and went door-to-door rounding up prisoners, and also they moved de Lamballe from the Temple (which wasn't targeted) to a nearby prison (which, of course, was). And it was just a few weeks earliers that the Commune became insurrectionary and orchestrated the assault on the Tuilleries. "They" is the Paris Commune.

Additions to the background
I've just writted down some more text in order to better this article, including some information about the background of the Paris Commune. I also added some aditional numbers of casualties. Besides, I made some changes in the way this articles was organized, in order to better its presentation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Thaelman (talk • contribs) 08:35, 4 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Is Bergeron's universal history the very best source we can muster. What does Simon Schama's Citizens report of these days?--Wetman (talk) 00:32, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Last line
Do you think this is the most blatant violation of POV in Wiki history? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.96.106.130 (talk) 19:27, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Vague reference
"sans-culottes, the vast majority of Paris' fairly poor population"

To what or to whom does the phrase "fairly poor population" refer, to the vast majority who also happened to be fairly poor? to those who were fairly poor but not to those who were abjectly poor or only moderately poor? And was it a majority of this subset that formed the sans culottes? Remember when you write for public consumption you should take care to express a whole thought not a half; the reader can't read your mind (at least I can't).154.5.32.113 (talk) 11:06, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree, clarification is needed, or else the statement should be removed. The sans culottes were made up of mostly working class tradesmen---butchers, bakers, printers etc. By the time of the massacres, they did compose a majority of the Parisian populace, by default, in that anyone who could afford to leave the city, had already done so by that time, leaving the sans culottes with a literal run of the city.Lorzu (talk) 00:36, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Democratising (POV)
text says: The Commune took major steps towards democratizing the Revolution: the adoption of universal suffrage, the arming of the civilian population, absolute abolition of all remnants of noble privileges, the selling of the properties of the émigrés. I do not believe that an armed insurrection by a manipulated crowd, destituting the constitutional monarch, forcing the Assembly to dissolve itself, killing prisoners, intimidating voters (the suffrage was not secret), arming civilians, and confiscating properties is to be called "democratising" on the merit that it called for universal suffrage. The author (from North Korea :) should explain. Note that the noble privileges were already abolished in 1789 (August 4). The writer is clearly tendentious in trying to assign the merit to the Commune, by inventing a new "absolute" abolition. The short-lived universal suffrage (it was abolished again in 1795) increased the number of voters from an unrepresentative 10.2% in 1791 to and unrepresentative 11.9% in 1792. This was no step towards democracy. None of the revolutionary elections were democratic or representative for the French people in a modern democratic sense. Riyadi (talk) 14:40, 5 January 2012 (UTC)
 * All other objections aside (where I concede you have a point), I do believe that "democratising" is an apt description. As compared to most other political systems in the world at that time (including the U.S.) it certainly was one of the more democratic in regards to voting access. You can't judge it by modern day democratic standards, since systems which we today percieve as actual full universal suffrage wasn't introduced anywhere until late 19th early 20th century. --Saddhiyama (talk) 14:30, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

This article also seems to remove the context of elections, and the massacres relationship with them. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.72.133.15 (talk) 05:10, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

Changes
Dear User:Str1977, please don't complain so loud. This topic is too difficult for most Wikipedians. In five years time nobody added something on the talkpage. I spent weeks/months on this article to find out what happened and the article grew considerably since I started to work on it one year ago. You should cooperate not attack the other contributor. Nobody knows the truth. Taksen (talk) 09:07, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
 * I did not attack anyone nor did I shout. If so, please tell me where. I even stopped myself short of calling the article "a mess" a few times.
 * I disagree that "nobody knows the truth". While not all details might be clear, there has to be quite a few of historical research on this important topic. We should use that research for this article. To achieve this it is vital that every information is cited to a book where it can be looked up. "According to ..." should only be used if there is disagreement either between historians (e.g. J. Israel blames it all on Robespierre and Marat, while Professor X also includes Girondists among the culprits. Dr. Left thinks it was all okay) or between sources, as reported by historians, if the point of disagreement is important enough.
 * We are not helped by citing the works of Robespierre or pamphlets about " the king's Louis Capet's betrayal".
 * What I was trying to do right now is to bring the material that was already there into some coherent sequence, both chronologically and thematically. But I have to stumble over sentences likes:

"The first massacre began in quartier Latin around 2.30 in the afternoon when 24 non-juring priests were being transported to the prison de l'Abbaye near the Abbey of Saint-Germain-des-Prés, after being interrogated by Billaud-Varenne in the townhall. One of the carriages, escorted by Fédérés, was attacked after an incident. [ref] The Fédérés quickly killed three men in the middle of the street, before they could enter the prison. Eighteen arrested were taken inside. They then mutilated the bodies, "with circumstances of barbarity too shocking to describe" according to the British diplomatic dispatch."


 * So it began in the quartier Latin but the victims were transported from the townhall to the prison L'Abbaye after they were interrogated at the town hall. But the "federes" entered the prison. What about the "incident"? I have to admit that right now I do not know whether L'Abbaye is in the Latin Quarter. If so, this could be written in a much less confusing manner.
 * I have absolutely no objection against cooperation. Str1977 (talk) 09:56, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
 * I looked the locations up. L'Abbaye is not in the Latin Quarter but the transport from the town hall back to the abbey could have gone through the Latin Quarter. Is it correct that the first attack of the massacres was on the carriage taking the prisoners back, and that the federes then entered the prison to do more killing. Or was the incident/attack merely an interruption? Who were the three men "quickly killed". Prisoners? The attackers? Would such a street attack actually be part of the massacres? Str1977 (talk) 10:32, 31 December 2019 (UTC)
 * I don't know which site you used but the Abbaye prison was next to the Quartier Latin, which is according to the French Wikipedia in translation: Saint-Germain-des-Prés district, bounded to the west by Dauphine, de Buci, du Four and de Seine streets, to the north by the Seine, the Pont Royal and Ile des Cygnes, and to the south by the end of the Faubourg Saint-Germain from de Seine street to de Sèvres street. The incident happened when the carriages were in the bend of the Rue de Buci, in front of the prison. The prison or the abbey you can find on the map under number 40 between Rue de Colombier and Rue Marguerite. It is easy to find more details on the incident when you look for Abbé Sicard on internet. I suggest not to repeat it. It is easy and quite possible to loose track as each author tells the story a bit differently. Taksen (talk) 10:02, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

Page numbers
I don't understand why someone left the pagenumbers out. Could you explain for which reason? I think it is bad behavior.Taksen (talk) 19:11, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

Onward and upward
I've noticed a tendency for minor academics to publish University material on a subject and then splice in pages of florid, amateur prose into Wikipedia. Ultimately, they are trying to "flesh out" history, and add other perspectives than "history is written by the winners", but I see it as my ethical duty to pare this material down to the facts, and "re-balance" the viewpoint, not to some unrecognised Centrism, but to a reasonable inclusion. I'll whack this lead down and remove the notice, then cruise through the text for weasel words. Probably this merits an article, I'll leave that to others. Billyshiverstick (talk) 12:49, 2 September 2021 (UTC) cheers


 * Your prose is difficult to understand. Are you saying I am not going to do anything here? We don't need headmasters, but people who check and improve. If nothing happens I will revert your contribution one day. It looks as if you want to have everything presented on a silver tea tray, so you can lay back and see others struggling. Taksen (talk) 08:01, 3 September 2021 (UTC)


 * It was Bumbubookworm. He is an expert on swimmers and Vietnam. I am sorry, even the history of the article was difficult to understand. Taksen (talk) 13:31, 4 September 2021 (UTC) Only now I understand what happened. The article was used on the main page. In the old days the moderators would tell or warn you, but they skipped that. As a contributor to the article I am shocked each time. Did it help to ask in such a short time before the publication for more references and page numbers? I would say no.Taksen (talk) 14:18, 4 September 2021 (UTC)