Jacques-Nicolas Billaud-Varenne
French revolutionary lawyer and architect of the Reign of Terror.
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Jacques-Nicolas Billaud-Varenne was a French lawyer and a major figure in the French Revolution. A close associate of Georges Danton and Maximilien Robespierre, he was one of the most militant members of the Committee of Public Safety and is often considered a key architect of the Reign of Terror. He later broke with Robespierre, played a major role in his downfall on 9 Thermidor, and was deported to Cayenne after the Thermidorian Reaction.
Background
Billaud-Varenne was born in La Rochelle, the son of a lawyer. Educated at Oratorian schools in Niort and Juilly, he became a professor before leaving in 1785 after a comédie strained his relationship with the school. He then moved to Paris, married, and bought a position as a lawyer. In early 1789 he published a three-volume work on the Despotisme des ministres de la France and an anti-clerical text, 'The Last Blow Against Prejudice and Superstition.' He joined the Jacobin Club and became a violent anti-Royalist orator, linked to Jean-Marie Collot d'Herbois.
After the flight to Varennes, he published a pamphlet demanding a federal republic. On the night of 10 August 1792, he met with Danton and others during the attack on the Tuileries Palace, and was later elected a deputy-commissioner of the Paris Commune. He was accused of being an accomplice in the September Massacres.
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Sources
Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.
- Wikipedia: Jacques-Nicolas Billaud-Varenne (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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