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Estates General Meets
King Louis XVI calls the Estates General due to the refusal of nobles and clergy to pay token sum of debt. -
Storming of the Bastille
In the summer of 1789 France was on the verge of revolution due to fury, for on going problems in France, toward the King. On July 13 citizens with muskets started to fire upon the Bastille and the next morning the growing mobs attacked. -
Declaration of The Rights of Man
The National Assembly believed ignorance, neglect or contempt were sole cause of public calamites. It consists of 17 articles stating a man's rights. -
Women March on Versailles
The women marched to Versailles because, while they sit starving and running out of bread, King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette were feasting like proverbial kings and queens. -
Civil Consttution of The Clergy
This constitution was an attempt to reorganize the Roman Catholic Church in France on a national basis. -
Royal Family Flees Attempts to Flee to Austria
Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette flee from France due to the inevadible period when they become figureheads. They are trying to flee to Austria to Marie's family but they are caught and brought back to France. -
King Louis XVI Executed
King Louuis and his wife were arrested in August of 1792. Louis' counterrevolutionary plans were discovered and he was put on trial for treason. He was executed next January 21, 1793. -
Reign of Terror Begins
The on going threat of war caused Jacobins to institute the Reign of Terror; history's first mass purge of people based on their social beginnings or beliefs. -
Maximilien Robespierre
Robespierre rises in the Convention to denounce backsliders and hesitant. Such speeches were followed by a series of arrests. This time, however, they shouted Robespierre down and arrested him. The following day he was executed. -
France Sells The U.S. The Louisiana Territory
The U.S. buys the tract of land and doubles their size because they are still a small republic. France was very slow in taking control of Louisiana. -
Napoleon Crowns Himself Emperor
Napoleon had already suppressed all political opposition and secured his high-standing by carrying out a series of acts. After he crowned himself emperor and created a Bonaparte dynasty. -
Congress of Vienna
The Congress of Vienna began after Napoleon's first abdication and just before the Waterloo campaign and the final defeat of Napoleon. -
Battle of Waterloo/Napoleon's 2nd Abdication and Exile
A disastrous invasion of Russia along with other losses cause Napoleon to abdicate and be exiled in 1814. Napoleon returned briefly in 1815 and resumed power. The Battle of Waterloo was the final defeat of Napoleon and after this lost he was exiled again for the last time.
