Pierre-Gaspard Chaumette

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Pierre Gaspard Chaumette
graphic by François Bonneville

Pierre-Gaspard Chaumette (born May 24, 1763 in Nevers , France , † April 13, 1794 in Paris ) was an influential politician during the French Revolution .

Life

Pierre-Gaspard Chaumette was the son of a shoemaker, with whom he also worked first; then he went to sea for several years. In 1789 he studied medicine in Paris, after the outbreak of the revolution he worked as an editor for the newspaper Révolutions de Paris and as a writer for the political Club des Cordeliers . Chaumette rose to be the spokesman for the impoverished suburbs and developed radical-revolutionary positions , especially after the failed escape of the king to Varennes and the massacre on the Marsfeld . In 1792 he prepared with others the Tuileries storm and became procureur (secretary) of the insurgent commune (municipal administration) of Paris. During the September massacres he was absent as government commissioner in the Calvados. He agitated against moderate parties like the Girondists in the Parisian sans-culottes . The establishment of the revolutionary tribunal to pursue counter-revolutionary activities is essentially due to him.

As a sign of breaking with the past, he adopted the name Anaxagoras . His fundamental egalitarianism was expressed, for example, in the proposal that everyone, like the common people, should only wear wooden shoes and eat potatoes. Chaumette regarded the church as a symbol of the old order he rejected, so that he was particularly committed to de-Christianization and promoted the cult of reason . As Procurator General of Paris in 1794 he demanded that there should be no differences between rich and poor at funerals in future.

He was close to the Hébertist group , but was somewhat more moderate. As one of the leaders of the Paris Commune, he opposed the Hebertist calls in the spring of 1794 to overthrow 'the new tyranny' (des Robespierre). However, Chaumette was later executed himself, as Maximilien de Robespierre saw his popularity and atheist and radical social revolutionary policies as a domestic and foreign policy threat to France. Because of his friendship with the German-Dutch immigrant Anacharsis Cloots , Chaumette was also suspected of being a foreign agent.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Barbara Happe: Order and Hygiene. Cemeteries in the Enlightenment and the Communalization of the Cemetery System. In: Arbeitsgemeinschaft Friedhof und Denkmal, Museum for Sepulchral Culture: Space for the Dead. Braunschweig 2003, p. 97 ISBN 3-87815-174-8