BILLAUD-VARENNE Signed autograph letter Thermidorian Reaction 1795

  
BILLAUD-VARENNE - Autograph letter signed - Thermidorian Reaction - 1795. If Robespierre was the great theorist of the Revolution, Billaud was its great executor and played an essential role in the government of France during the Terror.

His efficiency and severity were formidable. Despite his friendship and ideological closeness to Robespierre, he was a central figure in his downfall on 9 Thermidor. He was arrested during the Thermidorian Reaction. Deported to Cayenne without trial, he refused Napoleon’s pardon there.

Autograph letter signed to his father, “Citadelle de l'isle d'Olérons,” 16 Floréal, Year 3 (5 May 1795), 2 pp. Some defects and a few words missing.

Seized at his home on 2 April 1795 during the Thermidorian Reaction, Billaud-Varenne was deported to La Rochelle and then, on 6 July, to French Guiana. A very interesting letter from Billaud-Varenne, written just after his arrest and shortly before his deportation to French Guiana. He worries about his wife, reflects on all the difficulties of the Revolution, and speaks of the peace of his conscience. Later he would regret the excesses of anger on 9 Thermidor that brought down Robespierre, and he accepts his fate and the trials ahead. “[…] I have not yet received a letter from my wife, but what has reassured me on her behalf is the one she addressed to the Convention, asking to be allowed to share my fate.

This devotion does credit to her heart, and must have given you as much pleasure as it did me. It is not that I wish her to share the full extent of my misfortune, and I count on your affection to keep her from it. When I speak of misfortune, do not think, however, that my situation is not dreadful. For a long time I had prepared myself for all events, and my character will still know how to triumph over the harshness of fate, whatever it may be. Accustomed for six years to living amid storms, there is none that I do not know how to face.

Besides, I have the peace of my conscience on my side, and if it pains me to see the bonds that were dear to me broken, I still find consolation in the signs of attachment you show me, as well as my beloved wife. My only sorrow is to cause you pain, when my sweetest satisfaction had been to contribute to your happiness.

Heaven did not will it so. Let us have the philosophy and courage necessary in such circumstances […]”. For countries outside the European Union, an additional export licence from the Ministry of Culture may take up to 2 months.