Vendée War

The causes

In western France, the Revolution provoked opposition as early as 1790. The Civil Constitution of the Clergy required priests to swear an oath to the state, dividing parishes between constitutional priests and refractory priests, who remained loyal to the pope. Many peasants, attached to their parish priest and to the Catholic religion, rejected these reforms. The execution of Louis XVI, on 21 January 1793, deeply shocked a population that remained loyal to the monarchy. Tensions between republican towns and royalist countryside then grew.

The nobles and former officers of the region, often close to the king, took the lead of the opposition. The Convention, at war with the European monarchies, sought to raise new soldiers to defend the country. The levy of 300,000 men, decided in February 1793, was experienced as a threat by peasant families, who feared sending their sons to fight far from home. Many refused enlistment, while the agents of the Republic tried to enforce the law. It was the implementation of this levy, in March 1793, that triggered the uprising.

The course of the war

In March 1793, at Saint-Florent-le-Vieil, peasants rose up against the agents responsible for recruiting conscripts. The insurgents then gathered around leaders drawn from the peasantry and the local lesser nobility. The movement quickly spread to the Bocage. The insurgents, led by Jacques Cathelineau, a carter who became the first great leader of the insurrection, took Cholet, then Saumur in June 1793. They then tried to seize Nantes, but the attack failed. Cathelineau was mortally wounded there, which durably weakened the Vendéen army.

In autumn 1793, the republican armies regained the upper hand. On 17 October, the Battle of Cholet ended in a Vendéen defeat, and the insurgents, pushed out of their lands, crossed the Loire. Hoping for an English landing at Granville, they headed north: this was the Virée de Galerne. Henri de La Rochejaquelein, one of the main leaders, took part in this march. Exhausted, the Vendéens were defeated one last time at Savenay, in December 1793. Many fighters died or scattered, and the Vendéen army never really reconstituted itself.

In January 1794, General Louis Marie Turreau organized mobile columns, known as the "infernal columns", tasked with destroying villages, farms and harvests. These columns roamed the Vendée for several months. Farms and market towns were set on fire, and civilians were massacred, while prisoners were executed in Nantes. Historians describe this violence in detail, but its legal characterization is debated. These facts are today documented by military archives, testimonies and reports from the period.

After the fall of Robespierre, in July 1794, the repression slowed and negotiations began. On 17 February 1795, the Treaty of La Jaunaye granted freedom of worship and a partial amnesty to the insurgents, who laid down their arms. But the peace remained fragile: leaders such as Charette took up the fight again. In June 1795, a royalist landing at Quiberon, supported by the British, failed, and the prisoners were shot. The failure at Quiberon durably weakened the royalists' hopes of outside support.

The last insurgent leaders, such as Stofflet and Charette, waged guerrilla warfare in the bocage and the Marais. In February 1796, Stofflet was captured and shot. On 29 March, Charette was in turn captured, then shot at Nantes. His death marked the end of Vendéen resistance, although disturbances persisted in the west until the Consulate. The Republic imposed its rule, and the region remained deeply marked. After several years of fighting, the exhausted rural population gradually drew away from the struggle.

The consequences

The war caused very heavy losses among civilians and combatants, and ruined part of the western countryside. Farms and villages were destroyed, and the population experienced hunger and exile. The Vendée remains marked by the memory of the repression. The Chouannerie, a royalist insurrection in Brittany and Normandy, extended part of this fighting until 1800. The Concordat of 1801 restored Catholic worship, which partly calmed the region. Families who lost relatives long remembered this violence.

The memory of the war remained vivid in the west for a long time, with monuments and accounts that celebrated loyalty to the king and to religion. Historians debate its interpretation. Some stress the religious and social motivations of the insurrection, others the crimes of the republican columns. The term "genocide", used in the thesis of Reynald Secher published in 1986, is rejected by most historians, who prefer to speak of massacres and repression.

Timeline

1. 1793Uprising in the Vendée against the levy of 300,000 men
2. 1793Defeat of the Vendéen army at Savenay, end of the Virée de Galerne
3. 1794General Turreau's infernal columns devastate the Vendée
4. 1795Treaty of La Jaunaye, then failure of the royalist landing at Quiberon
5. 1796Charette is captured and shot, end of the war

Key figures

• Jacques Cathelineau, carter who became the first great leader of the insurrection, mortally wounded before Nantes in 1793
• François de Charette, royalist guerrilla leader in the Marais, shot at Nantes in 1796
• Henri de La Rochejaquelein, noble Vendéen leader, a figure of the Virée de Galerne
• Louis Marie Turreau, republican general, responsible for the infernal columns of 1794