– October 1st, during a banquet in Versailles, the Parisian people have been insulted; royalists resist and set up a famine in Paris; the Revolution is in danger.
– On the eve of October 5, a delegation of female workers from the Halle, mixed with female Revolution activists heads for the Town Hall, entirely dressed in white.
– Some male Parisian patriots dressed up as women join the delegation.
– On their way, other Parisian women join them.
– Once at the Town Hall, the rebels demand arms and bread, and move into the offices.
– Some of them, for lack of bread, take money from the coffers of Town Hall.
– While the abbot in charge of the magazine is threatened with hanging, a woman cuts the rope and lets him flee.
– From every neighbourhood, Parisian women run up; the crowd grows.
– The Parisian women decide to go to Versailles to demand punishment for the King’s guards who insulted the people of Paris, and the speedy acknowledgement of the National Assembly.
– The first wave of people leaving Paris amounts to 5-6000 rebels.
– There appears an actress named Rose Lacombe, an agitator well known to the women from the suburbs.
– Louison Chabry, a young sculptor and a gifted orator, is chosen as spokesperson of the movement.
– Théroigne de Méricourt, heroine of the storming of the Bastille, climbs up on a cannon and encourages her comrades.
– On their way to Versailles, the Parisian women attack bread bakeries in order to feed those who are starving and miserable.
– Before reaching Versailles, the female Parisians lay down a part of their arms in order not to seem threatening to the National Assembly.
– In the meantime, the regiments of patriots and other Parisian women arrive at the Town Hall.
– This new procession decides to go to Versailles to support the first one.
– 15,000 people set off, and are joined by thousands of Parisians.
– In Versailles, the National Assembly is upset by the King’s refusal to ratify the Constitution and the Declaration of Human Rights.
– The most progressive deputies await the Parisians’ arrival, counting on their decisive force of pressure.
– The news of a crowd of Parisians arriving at the castle doesn’t worry the King: “To give you orders? Against women? You’re joking!”, replies the King to the captain who came to ask for the precautions to take.
– Night falls as the women reach Versailles.
– The rain has covered them with mud and the walk has tired them out, but nothing seems to damage their determination.
– Once informed of the Parisians’ number and resolution, the King’s Counsel deploys the guards and two people’s regiments in the Place d’Armes, in front of the castle.
– The Parisian women lay siege to the National Assembly at the Hôtel des Menus.
– A delegation of Parisian women is heard and speaks to the Assembly, blaming the Parisian royalists and ecclesiastics for refusing to submit to the people. The accusations: they insult Paris, they refuse to acknowledge the laws voted by the Revolution, they plot a famine…
– The Parisian women send a delegation leaded by Louison Chabry to the castle in order to speak to the King.
– As they feel that only the progressive deputies support their claims, the Parisian women remaining outside move into the National Assembly in order to debate.
– When Louison Chabry arrives in front of the King, carried by the movement but exhausted, she falls down, unconscious.
– The King, impressed, agrees to the claims and promises to supply Paris.
– The King’s written undertaking is brought back to Paris by Rose Lacombe and forty of her comrades.
– Théroigne de Méricourt and most of the female Parisians, gathered at the Place d’Armes, asks the King’s people’s regiments to side with them.
– The people’s soldiers, moved by Théroigne de Méricourt’s speeches, turn against the King’s guards.
– A fight breaks out between the King’s guards and the armed women supported by the people’s regiments.
– Injured people are counted on each side.
– The commanding officer of the King’s Guard puts a stop to the fight and orders the Parisians and the people’s soldiers to withdraw from the Place d’Armes.
– The Parisians and the people’s soldiers refuse to withdraw.
– Five conveyances of the King try to escape the castle to check whether fleeing is possible.
– The Parisians stop the conveyances.
– The Parisian women refuse to disperse and lay siege to the Castle from the Place d’Armes.
– While the King worries about the women’ fighting spirit and their refusal to leave the Place d’Armes, the delegation forces him to ratify the Constitution and the Declaration of Human Rights.
– The President and the Parisian delegates bring the news back to the Assembly.
– In the Assembly, a tall woman with a loud voice chairs, while on the benches Parisian women have joined the deputies and have impassioned the debates.
– At 11 a.m., the second procession composed of Parisian women and regiments of patriots – 25,000 men – arrive at the Assembly.
– The King’s guards are given the order to stay inside the Castle.
– The people’s regiments settle down outside the railings.
– The Parisian women spend the night wherever they can, round a fire lit on the Place d’Armes (where the food they found is cooking), in public places, taken in by the inhabitants, and in the cafés of the town.
– At 5 a.m., they don’t sleep very much or not at all, and gathered again on the Place d’Armes.
– At 6 a.m., one of the King’s guards fires on a worker who was trying to enter the Castle’s courtyard.
– The rebels force open the railings and move into the Castle.
– The King’s guards fire into the crowd where Parisians and patriots dressed as women are gathered.
– The rebels enter the Palace, head for the Queen’s apartments and fight against the King’s guards who barricade themselves room after room.
– The rebels reach the bull’s-eye room, where the Queen and the King are sheltered.
– The battle is won and the patriot’s commanding officer persuades the King to show up at the window to face the crowd which clamors for his return to Paris.
– The crowd demands to see the Queen.
– The Queen appears at the balcony and many rebels insult and threaten her.
– The King is forced to return to Paris.
– At 1 p.m., the Parisian women escort the royal family back to Paris.
– Sometime after 7 p.m., the procession reaches Paris and comes to a halt at the Town Hall.
– On their way to and at the Town Hall, inhabitants rush up to acclaim the Parisian women while the patriots remain dressed up during the festivities.
– At ten o’clock, the royal family is summoned to dwell in the Tuileries Palace.
– As the Queen goes upstairs on the King’s arm, a woman from the Halle exclaims: “Hold onto him tight; he’s your saviour!”.
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