National Guard (France)
The National Guard is a French military, gendarmerie, and police reserve force, active in its current form since 2016 but originally founded in 1789 during the French Revolution.
It was founded as separate from the French Army and existed both for policing and as a military reserve. However, in its original stages from 1792 to 1795, the National Guard was perceived as revolutionary and the lower ranks were identified with sans-culottes. It experienced a period of official dissolution from 1827 to 1830 but was reestablished. Soon after the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71, the National Guard in Paris again became viewed as dangerously revolutionary, which contributed to its dissolution in 1871.
In 2016, France announced the reestablishment of the National Guard for the second time, in response to a series of terrorist attacks in the country.
Creation
The raising of a "bourgeois guard" for Paris was discussed by the National Assembly on 11 July 1789 in response to the King's sudden and alarming replacement of minister for finance and state, Jacques Necker, with the Baron de Breteuil on that day. The replacement caused rapidly spread anger and violence throughout Paris.The National Assembly declared the formation of a "bourgeois militia" on 13 July. In the early morning of the next day, the search for weapons for this new militia led to the storming of the town hall, the Hotel des Invalides and then the storming of the Bastille.
Marquis de Lafayette was elected to the post of commander in chief of the Bourgeois Militia on 14 July, and it was renamed the "National Guard of Paris".
When the French Guards mutinied and were disbanded during the same month, the majority of this former royal regiment's rank and file became the full-time cadre of the Paris National Guard.
Similar bodies of National Guards were spontaneously created in the towns and rural districts of France in response to widespread fears of chaos or counter-revolution. "Bourgeois militia" changed its name to National Guard, like in Limoges in November 1789, where no other military bodies were allowed.
Initially, each city, town and village maintained National Guard units operated by their respective local governments in the districts for not more than a year. They were united on 14 July 1790 under Lafayette, who was appointed "Commandant General of all the National Guards of the Kingdom" and was responsible to the King as commander-in-chief of the armed forces.
Organization
On 5 December 1790, Robespierre held a speech on the urgent topic of the National Guard; envisaging an evolution from semi-organised militia to citizen-soldiers independent from the regular army. He repeated his ideas in the following year. On 18 December it was decreed to supply the National Guard with 50,000 fusils. In January 1791 Robespierre promoted the idea not only the National Guard but also the people had to be armed if necessary with pikes.On 27 April 1791, Robespierre again opposed the plans for reorganizing the National Guard and restricting its membership to active citizens.
On 22 April and 15 June 1791, the Parliament recruited 400,000 National volunteers from the entire French National Guard. On 17 July 1791 Champ de Mars massacre took place. At the end of September a law passed to reorganize the National Guard formations in cantons and districts; each year officers and non-commissioned officers could be elected on 14 July.
Under the law of 14 October 1791, all active citizens and their children over 18 years were obliged to enlist in the National Guard. Their role was the maintenance of law and order and, if necessary, territorial defense in wartime.
Following a nationwide scheme decided on in September 1791, the National Guard was organised on the basis of district or canton companies. Five of these neighbourhood units made up a National Guard infantry battalion. Eight to ten battalions comprised a legion. Districts might also provide companies of veterans and young citizens, respectively drawn from volunteers over 60 or under 18. Where possible, there was provision for mounted detachments and artillery batteries under the Guard.
- The 23-years-old Napoleon Bonaparte began his "political career" as lieutenant-colonel of a Battalion of Corsican Volunteers in the National Guards in February 1792.
- Chevalier de Saint-Georges was one of the first in Lille to join its Garde Nationale.
On 11 July, the Jacobins won an emergency vote in the wavering Assembly, declaring the nation in danger and drafting all Parisians with pikes or pistols into the National Guard. On 17 July the municipality of Paris accepted all citizens armed with a pike for enlistment as part of the capital's own National Guard unit.
The citizens kept their weapons and their uniforms at home and set forth with them when required. The initially multi-coloured uniforms of the various provincial National Guard units were standardised in 1791, using as a model the dark blue coats with red collars, white lapels and cuffs worn by the Paris National Guard since its creation. This combination of colours matched those of the then young revolutionary tricolour flag. The uniform headdress was the tricorne.
From French Revolution until 1827
Role during the Revolution
The formation of the National Guard can be seen as a response to public demand for maintaining order, while at the same time reducing or ending its dependence on the monarchy. The former Guet royal had held responsibility for the maintenance of law and order in Paris from 1254 to 1791, when the National Guard took over this role.In fact, the last commander of the Guet royal, de La Rothière, was elected to head the National Guard in 1791. In the summer of 1792, the fundamental character of the guard changed. The fédérés were admitted to the guard and the subsequent takeover of the guard by Antoine Joseph Santerre when Mandat was murdered in the first hours of the insurrection of 10 August placed a radical revolutionary at the head of the Guard.
After the abolition of the monarchy, the National Guard fought for the Revolution and it had an important role in forcing the wishes of the capital on the French National Assembly which was obliged to give way in front of the force of the "patriotic" bayonets. The Insurrection of 31 May started after François Henriot was chosen by the Commune to lead the Paris Guards.
After 9 Thermidor, year II, the new government of the Thermidorian Reaction placed the National Guard under the control of more conservative leadership. Part of the National Guard then attempted to overthrow the Directory during the royalist insurrection on the 13 Vendémiaire, year IV, but was defeated by forces led by Napoleon Bonaparte in the Battle of 13 Vendémiaire. The Paris National Guard thereafter ceased to play a significant political role.
First Empire
Napoleon did not believe that the middle-class National Guard would be able to maintain order and suppress riots. Therefore, he created a Municipal Guard of Paris, a full-time gendarmerie which was strongly militarized. However, he did not abolish the National Guard but was content to partially disarm it. He kept the force in reserve and mobilised it for the defence of French territory in 1809 and 1814.In Paris during this period the National Guard comprised twelve thousand bourgeois property owners, serving part-time and equipped at their own expense, whose prime function was to guard public buildings on a roster basis.
Between 1811 and 1812 the National Guard was organized in "cohorts" to distinguish it from the regular army, and for home defence only. By a skilful appeal to patriotism, and judicious pressure applied through the prefects, it became a useful reservoir of half-trained men for new battalions of the active army.
After the disastrous campaign in Russia in 1812, dozens of National Guard cohorts were called up for field duty the next year; four cohorts being combined to form one line infantry regiment. The 135ème to 156ème Régiments d'Infanterie de Ligne were thus formed. Many of these fought in the campaigns in Germany in 1813 and the invasion of north-east France by Coalition forces in 1814. Existing National Guard units, such as those of Paris, were deployed as defence corps in their areas of recruitment.
Mass conscription was extended to age groups previously exempt from military service, to provide more manpower for the expanded National Guard. Students and volunteers from gamekeepers and other professional groups formed separate units within the National Guard. Clothing and equipment were often in short supply and even the Paris National Guard was obliged to provide pikes as substitute weapons for some of its new recruits. These field and regional units were disbanded in 1814 after the abdication of Napoleon I.
Six thousand national guardsmen took part in the Battle of Paris in 1814. Following the occupation of Paris by the allied armies, the National Guard was expanded to 35,000 men and became the primary force for maintaining order within the city.
The Restoration
Under the Restoration in 1814, the National Guard was maintained by Louis XVIII.Initially, the Guard, purged of its Napoleonic leadership, maintained good relations with the restored monarchy. The future Charles X served as its Colonel-General, reviewed the force regularly and intervened to veto its proposed disbandment on the grounds of economy by the Conseil.
However, by 1827, the middle-class men who still composed the Guard had come to feel a degree of hostility towards the reactionary monarchy. Following hostile cries, at a review on 29 April Charles X dissolved the Guard the following day, on the grounds of offensive behaviour towards the crown. He neglected to disarm the disbanded force, and its muskets resurfaced in 1830 during the July Revolution.