Chapter 11 : The Trial of 1871

Chapter 11. The Trial of 1871

This chapter consists of an account of the trial as reported in the Gazette des Tribunaux that Louise Michel included as an appendix to her memoirs.

Sixth Court-Martial Board (Versailles) President of the Court: Delaporte, Colonel, Twelfth Cavalry

Session of 16 December 1871

The Background of the Case against Louise Michel

The Commune had an insufficient number of men for protection against the loyal members of the National Guard, so it established companies of children known as Wards of the Commune. It also tried to organize a battalion of amazons. This group was never formed, but women wearing fanciful uniforms and carrying carbines at their shoul¬ ders could be seen preceding the battalions that went to the ramparts. Among those women who seem to have exercised considerable influence in certain quarters was Louise Michel, ex-schoolmistress at Batignolles, who never stopped displaying boundless devotion to the insurrectionary government.

Louise Michel is thirty-six years old, petite, brunet, with a very developed forehead which recedes abruptly. Her nose, mouth, and chin are very prominent, and her features reveal an extreme severity. She dresses entirely in black. Her temperament is as excitable as it was during the first days of her captivity. When she was first brought in front of the court-martial, she suddenly raised her veil and stared at her judges fixedly.

Captain Dailly was the public prosecutor for the Sixth Court-Martial. According to regulations, Maitre Haussman was appointed to assist the accused in her defense, but she declared she would refuse the help of any lawyer.

The clerk of the court-martial, M. Duplan, read the following report:

Statement by the Clerk of the Court-Martial

In 1870, at the occasion of Victor Noir’s death, Louise Michel began to display her revolutionary ideas. Because Michel was an obscure school¬ mistress with almost no pupils, it was not possible for our investigators to find out what her previous revolutionary activity had been or what her part was in the events leading up to the monstrous offense which terrified our unfortunate country.

To retrace the incidents of 18 March 1871 in their entirety would be useless, and this court, as its point of departure in the prosecution of Mile Michel, will limit itself to determining precisely the part she took in the bloody drama whose theater was the Butte of Montmartre and the rue des Rosiers.

Louise Michel was an accomplice in the arrest of the two unfortunate generals, Lecomte and Clement Thomas. She was fearful that the two victims might escape. “Don’t let them go,” she cried out with all her might to the scoundrels who surrounded the generals. Later, when the murder had been committed, she showed her joy at the spilled blood, and dared to exclaim in the presence of the mutilated bodies, “It serves them right.” Then, radiant and satisfied with her good day, she went to Belleville and La Villette to assure herself “that these neighborhoods were still armed.”

On the nineteenth she returned home, after having taken the precau¬ tion of removing the National Guard uniform that could incriminate her. She felt the need to talk a bit about the events with her concierge. “Ah,” she cried. “If Clemenceau had gotten to the rue des Rosiers a few instants sooner, they wouldn’t have shot the generals. He would have been against it because he was on the side of the Versailles government.”

Paris, in the hands of foreigners and rascals who had come from every corner of the world, proclaimed the Commune. Louise Michel, as secretary of the society called Improvement of Working Women through Their Work, organized the famous Central Committee of the Union of Women, as well as the Committees of Vigilance charged with recruiting stretcher-bearers—and, at the height of the struggle, women—to serve on the barricades and perhaps even some to be arsonists.

A copy of a manifesto found in the Town Hall of the Tenth Arron- dissement indicates the role she played in the aforementioned commit¬ tees during the last days of the struggle. The text of that manifesto reads:

In the name of the Social Revolution that we acclaim, in the name of the demand for the right to work and the rights of equality and justice, the Union of Women for the Defense of Paris and the Care of the Wounded challenges with all its strength the shameful proclamation addressed to women which a group of reactionaries posted the day before yesterday.

That proclamation stated that the women of Paris are appealing to the generosity of Versailles and are requesting peace at any price.

No. The women workers of Paris have come to demand not peace but war to the death.

Today, reconciliation would be treason. It would be to deny all the aspirations of women workers who acclaim complete social change, the annihilation of all existing social and legal relations, the suppression of all special privileges, the end of all exploitation, the substitution of the reign of work for the reign of capital. In a word, they demand the emancipation of the worker through his own efforts.

Six months of suffering and treason during the Siege, six weeks of titanic fights against the united exploiters, waves of blood spilled for the cause of liberty—these are our warrant for glory and vengeance.

The present struggle can have only one result—the triumph of the popular cause. Paris will not pull back, for it carries the flag of the future. The final hour has struck! Give way to the workers! Enough of their executioners! Acts! Energy!

The tree of liberty grows tall, watered with the blood of its enemies! . . .

United and resolute, the women of Paris are matured and enlightened by the suffering that social crises bring. The women of Paris are deeply convinced that the Commune, representing the international and revolu¬ tionary principles of peoples, carries in itself the germ of Social Revolu¬ tion. When the moment of greatest danger comes, the women of Paris will prove to France and to the world that they know how, at the barricades and on the ramparts of Paris, if the reactionaries force the gates, to give their blood like their brothers, to give their lives for the defense and triumph of the Commune—for the people.

Then, victorious, able to unite and agree on their common interests, working men and working women, interdependent and made one for a final effort . . . [The last phrase is incomplete.]

Long live the Republic of all persons! Long live the Commune!

Holding the positions cited above, Louise Michel directed a school at 24, rue Oudot. There, from her lectern in her rare spare moments, she professed the doctrines of free thought and made her young pupils sing poems she had written, among which was the song entitled “The Avengers.”

As President of the Club of the Revolution which met in the church of Saint-Bernard, Louise Michel is responsible for the vote at the session on May 18 (21 Floreal, year 79). That vote was for:

The suppression of magistrates and the annihilation of the legal Codes, with their replacement by a commission of justice;

The suppression of religions, the immediate arrest of priests, and the sale of their goods and the goods of those fugitives and traitors who supported the scoundrels of Versailles;

The execution of an important hostage every twenty-four hours until Citizen Blanqui, an appointed member of the Commune, is freed and arrives in Paris.

It was not enough for this “passionate spirit,” as the author of an imaginative account included in her dossier calls her, to stir up the people, to applaud assassination, to corrupt children, to preach fratri¬ cide, and to encourage crime; she still had to set an example and commit crimes herself.

Thus we find her at Issy, Clamart, and Montmartre fighting in the front line, shooting at government forces or rallying retreating rebels. The April 14 issue of the Cri dupeuple proves this charge. “Citizen Louise Michel, who fought so valiantly at Moulineaux, was wounded at the fort of Issy.” Fortunately for her, we add, the heroine of Jules Vall&s came out of that notorious action with a simple sprain.

What was the motive that pushed Louise Michel down this irrevocable path of politics and revolution?

Clearly, it was arrogance.

Louise Michel was an illegitimate child reared by charity. Instead of thanking Providence for giving her the means to live happily with her mother, she surrendered to her heated imagination and excitable char¬ acter. Breaking with her benefactors, she ran to Paris for adventure.

The wind of revolution began to blow. Victor Noir died. It was the moment for Louise Michel to enter on stage, but an anonymous role was repugnant to her. Her name had to draw public attention and be in the headlines of false proclamations and posters.

In conclusion, we must give a legal classification to the acts this devil-ridden fanatic committed during the period from the beginning of the frightful crisis that France has just undergone to the end of the blasphemous struggle in which the accused took part amid the tombs of the Montmartre cemetery.

She assisted, knowingly, the persons who apprehended the generals Lecomte and Clement Thomas. She assisted, knowingly, in the deeds that followed their apprehension: the torture and death of those two unlucky individuals.

Intimately linked with the members of the Commune, she knew all their plans in advance. She helped them with all her might and will. Moreover, she assisted them and even surpassed them when she volun¬ teered to go to Versailles and assassinate the President of the Republic with the intention of terrifying the Assembly and, according to her, ending the fighting.

She is as guilty as “Ferre, the proud republican,” whom she defended in such a strange fashion and whose head, to use her own words, “is a challenge thrown at your consciences—the answer to which is revolu¬ tion.”

She excited the passions of the crowd and preached war without mercy or truce. A she-wolf eager for blood, she brought about the death of hostages through her hellish plots.

Therefore, it is our opinion that there is sufficient cause to bring Louise Michel to trial for:

1. A crime, having the overthrow of the government as its goal.

2. A crime, having for its purpose the instigation of civil war through encouraging citizens to arm themselves against each other.

3. For having, during an insurrection, carried visible weapons and worn a military uniform and for having made use of those weapons.

4. Forgery of documents.

5. Use of a false document.

6. Complicity through provocation and planning in the assassination of persons held as hostages by the Commune.

7. Complicity in illegal arrests, followed by torture and death, and knowingly assisting the perpetrators of those deeds in the acts they committed.

These crimes are provided for in articles 87, 91, 150, 151, 59, 60, 302, 341, and 344 of the Penal Code, and article 5 of the Law of 24 May 1834.

The Testimony of Louise Michel

President of the Court: You have heard the acts you are accused of. What do you have to say in your defense?

The Accused: I don’t want to defend myself, nor do I want to be defended. I belong completely to the Social Revolution, and I declare that I accept responsibility for all my actions. I accept it entirely and without reservations.

You accuse me of having participated in the assassination of Generals Clement Thomas and Lecomte. To that charge, I would answer yes—if I had been at Montmartre when those generals wanted to fire on the people. I would have had no hesitation about shooting people who gave orders like those. But once they were prisoners, I do not understand why they were shot, and I look at that act as a villainous one.

As for the burning of Paris, yes, I participated in it. I wanted to block the Versailles invaders with a barrier of flames. I had no accomplices in that. I acted on my own.

I am also charged with being an accomplice of the Commune. That is quite true, since above everything else the Commune wanted to bring about the Social Revolution, and Social Revolution is my dearest wish. Moreover, I am honored to be singled out as one of the promoters of the Commune. It had absolutely nothing to do with assassinations or burn¬ ing. I attended all the sessions at the Hotel de Ville, and I affirm that there never was any talk of assassinations or burnings.

Do you want to know who the real guilty parties are? The police. Later, perhaps, the light of truth will fall on all those events. Now people naturally place responsibility on the partisans of Social Revolution.

One day I did propose to Th£ophile Ferre that I go to Versailles. I wanted two victims: M. Thiers and myself, for I had already sacrificed my life, and I had decided to kill him.

Question: Did you say in a proclamation that a hostage should be shot every twenty-four hours?

Answer: No, I only wanted to threaten. But why should I defend myself? I have already told you I refuse to do it. You are the men who are going to judge me. You are in front of me publicly. You are men, and I, I am only a woman. Nevertheless, I am looking you straight in the face. I know quite well that anything I tell you will not change my sentence in the slightest. Thus I have only one last word before I sit down.

We never wanted anything but the triumph of the great principles of Revolution. I swear it by our martyrs who fell on the field of Satory, by our martyrs I still acclaim here, by our martyrs who some day will find their avenger.

I am in your power. Do whatever you please with me. Take my life if you want it. I am not a woman who would dispute your wishes for a moment.

Question: You claim you didn’t approve of the generals’ assassinations. On the contrary, people say that when you were told about it, you cried out: “They shot them. It serves them right.”

Answer: Yes, I said that. I admit it. In fact, I remember that I said it in the presence of Citizens Le Moussu and Ferre.

Question: Then you do approve of the assassinations?

Answer: Let me point out that my statement is not proof. I said those words with the intention of spurring on revolutionary zeal.

Question: You also wrote for newspapers, the Cri du peuple, for example. Answer: Yes, I’ve made no effort to conceal that.

Question: In each issue, those newspapers demanded the confiscation of the clergy’s property and suggested other similar revolutionary mea¬ suers. Were those opinions yours?

Answer: Indeed yes, but note that we never wanted to take those goods for ourselves. We thought only of giving them to the people for their well-being.

Question: You asked for the suppression of the court system?

Answer: Because I had in front of me examples of its errors. I remem¬ bered the Lesurques affair and so many more.

Question: Do you confess to having resolved to assassinate M. Thiers? Answer: Of course. I have already said that, and I claim it now. Question: It seems that you wore various uniforms during the Commune. Answer: I was dressed as usual. I only added a red sash over my clothes. Question: Didn’t you wear a man’s uniform several times?

Answer: Once. On March 18. I dressed as a National Guardsman so I wouldn’t attract attention.

Few witnesses had been subpoenaed, because Louise Michel had not disputed the acts she was charged with. . . .

Summation

Captain Dailly, the prosecutor, spoke. He asked the court-martial to excise the accused from society, because the accused was a continuing danger to it. He withdrew all charges except that of carrying visible or hidden arms in an insurrectionary movement.

Ma!tre Haussman, appointed to defend the accused, spoke. He de¬ clared that because of the formal wish of the accused not to be defended, he would simply put his faith in the wisdom of the court-martial. President of the Court: Accused, do you have anything to say in your defense?

Louise Michel: What I demand from you, you who claim you are a court-martial, you who pass yourselves off as my judges, you who don’t hide the way the Board of Pardons behaves, you who are from the military and who judge me publicly—what I call for is the field of Satory, where our revolutionary brothers have already fallen.

1 must be cut off from society. You have been told that, and the prosecutor is right. Since it seems that any heart which beats for liberty has the right only to a small lump of lead, I demand my share. If you let me live, I will not stop crying for vengeance, and I will denounce the assassins on the Board of Pardons to the vegeance of my brothers. President of the Court: I cannot allow you to continue speaking if you continue in this tone.

Louise Michel: I have finished. ... If you are not cowards, kill me. . . .

The Sentence

After these words, which caused a great stir in the courtroom, the court-martial withdrew to deliberate. After a time, it returned and announced its sentence: that Louise Michel be sentenced to deportation to a fortified place.

Louise Michel was brought back into the courtroom and informed of the verdict. When the clerk told her she had twenty-four hours to petition for reviews, she cried out: “No, there is nothing to appeal. But I would have preferred death.”

[This speech ends the excerpt from the Gazette des tribunaux reprinted in the Memoirs. Louise Michel later appended a short note.]

Observations

I shall limit myself to pointing out a few errors.

1. I was not reared by charity but by my grandparents, who thought it proper to do so. I left Vroncourt only after their deaths, and I left to prepare for my schoolmistress’s diploma. I believed that in this fashion I could be useful to my mother.

2. The number of my pupils in Montmartre was 150. That was stated by the authorities during the Siege.

3. Perhaps there is some use in noting that contrary to the description of my person given at the beginning of the account in the Gazette des tribunaux, I am tall, not short. In the times in which we live, it is proper to pass only for oneself.