Following their forced departure from Versailles in October 1789, Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette were placed under house arrest at Tulieres Palace in Paris. Along with them were their two young children, Marie Therese and the Dauphin, Louis-Charles as well as the king’s sister, Princess Elisabeth.
Louis XVI was forced to sign away most of his power to the new government, the National Assembly. Even though he had always been a mild king, he hated the National Assembly and resented their treatment of him and his family. And so it came that he decided to escape Paris and gather forces in the northeast of France, to reclaim his royal authority.
The escape plan was hatched by several royal supporters, including Axel Von Fersen, who had supposedly once been a lover to Marie Antoinette. The king’s younger brother, Comte de Provence, would leave Tulieres Palace at the same time as the King and Queen, but he would take a different route to Montmedy, 194 miles outside of Paris. Marquis Louis de Bauille would join the king, with an army, Montmedy was close to both the Netherlands and Switzerland should revolutionary forces prevail. Duc de Choiseal would be waiting in the small village of Pont de Sommevelle with forty hussars, to escort the king and his family on the last leg of the journey.
The Berlin Coach
Axel Von Fersen ordered the notorious Berlin coach, that is often blamed for the failed escape. Designed by a fashionable coach builder, Jean-Louis, the vehicle had four wheels and was designed to be pulled by six horses. The Berlin was a luxurious vehicle painted green with yellow trim. Inside it had a white velvet interior, a cooking stove, and even a leather toilet. Fersen, who would act the part of stage driver, even took the coach out, to see how fast it went. Though critics point out it was incredibly slow and cumbersome, it traveled at a top rate of six miles an hour- typical of other carriages of the time.
Capture in Varennes
On Monday morning of June 20, 1791, the day started out quite normal. Marie Therese and Louis Charles knew nothing of the plan until late that evening. To keep up appearances, Marie Antoinette made plans for the following day, requesting bodyguards for an outing into the city. She then took the children through a stroll at Tivoli Gardens around 5 pm, before returning to the palace. At 10 pm that evening, Marie Therese and the Dauphin were awakened and dressed in simple clothes. The dauphin was dressed as a girl, as an extra precaution. They were the first to leave, with their nurse, to Petit Carrousel, where Axel von Fersen waited with the coach. Shortly thereafter the king and queen and Madame Elisabeth joined the children. The coach did not leave Paris until after midnight. They drove at an ambling pace, as to not draw attention. It took two hours until they reached the city gates. It was here that Axel Von Fersen bid adieu to the king and queen.
The party stopped at six in the morning at Meaux, where they changed horses. They stopped again at 10am at Viels-Maisons was due to reach Chalons between 12:30 and 1:30, where they would meet the Duc de Choiseul. However, when they stopped to change horses in Meaux, where the king insisted on relaxing. By this point, word had spread like wildfire that the king and queen were on the run. Scouts from Paris had ridden far into the countryside to sound the alarm. When the party reached the small town of Varennes, six miles from the German border, they were recognized immediately and taken into custody.
Following the capture of the royal family, the government acted swiftly. King Louis XVI was put on trial and sent to the guillotine on January xx, 1793. Marie Antoinette would follow her husband’s fate nine months later. The dauphin, now proclaimed by royalists in France and abroad, to be Louis XVII would die under mysterious consequences on June 8, 1795. Only Marie Therese would survive the royal imprisonment, helping her uncle to reclaim the throne in 1814.
Sources:
Lang, Sean. European History For Dummies. West Sussex: John Wiley & Sons, LTD. 2006.
Mayer, Dorothy Moulton. Marie Antoinette: The Tragic Queen. New York: Coward-
McCann, Inc., 1968.
Nagel, Susan. Marie-Therese, Child of Terror. New York: Bloomsbury USA, 2008.
Lorri Brown - I am a published freelance writer living in the beautiful foothills of Western Maine. Mom to four wonderful children, my passion for ...
Join the Conversation