Marie Antoinette must have known that things were going to end badly for her following her husband’s execution. Few newspapers exist that covered contemporary events of revolutionary France. This article written a few days after her execution suggests that she was originally acquitted by the Revolutionary Tribunal before being murdered by ‘the sanguinary mob’. History has since been re-written.
'LONDON Murder of the Queen of France
Tuesday morning an account arrived from Dover, of the melancholy event of the execution of the Queen of France. By subsequent and well-authenticated accounts, this afflicting intelligence is too certainly confirmed. Our advices do not enter into a particular detail ; but they contain enough to freeze every heart with horror, that is not become callous to all emotions of humanity.
On the morning of the 15th, this ill-fated Queen was put upon her trial before the Revolutionary Tribunal. The charges made against her are alike an outrage to decency and common sense ; but notwithstanding the friendless and deserted situation in which she stood, and the acknowledged malice of her judges as well as accusers, our accounts state that SHE WAS ACQUITTED.
Would to Heaven that, in pity to the honest and tender feelings of our countrymen, and from regard to the general character of mankind, we could for ever draw a veil over the dreadful catastrophe !–The just sentence of acquittal was no sooner pronounced, than the sanguinary mob seized on the unhappy Queen, and MURDERED HER without remorse !!!
Another account says, the tribunal pronounced the unfortunate Queen guilty of having been accessary to, and having co-operated in different manoeuvres against the liberty of France ;–of having entertained a correspondence with the enemies of the Republic ; of having participated in a plot tending to kindle civil war in the interior of the Republic by arming citizens against each other.
[The execution of an unjust sentence by regular forms, is as repugnant to humanity as the most savage outrages of a lawless mob.]
When the sentence of the National Convention was read to the widow of Capet, she cast down her eyes, and did not again lift them up. “Have you nothing to reply to the determination of the law?” said the President to her.–“Nothing,” she replied. “And you, officious defenders?” “Our mission is fulfilled with respect to the widow Capet,” said they.
The execution took place at half past eleven o’clock in the forenoon. The whole armed force in Paris was on foot, from the Palace of Justice to the Place de la Revolution. The streets were lined by two very close rows of armed citizens. As soon as the ci-devant Queen left the Conciergerie, to ascend the scaffold, the multitude which was assembled in the courts and the streets, cried out bravo, in the midst of plaudits. Marie Antoinette had on a white loose dress, and her hands were tied behind her back. She looked firmly round her on all sides. She was accompanied by the ci-devant Curate of St. Landry, a constitutional Priest, and on the scaffold preserved her natural dignity of mind.
After the execution, three young persons dipped their handkerchiefs in her blood. They were immediately arrested.’
Stamford Mercury, 25 October 1793.