The Fructidor Cup - A Brief History

On september third, 17 97, that is 18 fructidor year five, paris woke up to find itself under military occupation. The directory issued arrest warrants for 53 council deputies and their two directorial colleagues with the full support of the army. Then a carefully chosen quorum of loyal council delegates met under the protection of armed soldiers,. They officially sanction the deployment of troops in paris and approve the subsequent arrests. And then this loyal republican quorum dropped the real bomb - they retroactively annulled the result of the spring elections in forty nine departments immediately purging a hundred and 77 conservative members from the councils. There was no pushback. There wasNo fighting in