forty convoys carrying wheat to be sold at our market. The laborers & their valets protested in vain that the wheat was no longer theirs; that it belonged to the Subsistence Committee of Orléans, that they were promised a portion of the current price at the market; they were beaten, a portion of the wheat was pillaged, & the rest bought at a price well below that of the market. However, volunteers, some on foot and others on horseback, totaling two hundred, together with equal numbers in military infantry & with a detachment of military cavalry, arrived to the site of the dispute at the first signal. As a result, the quarrel intensified; eight of the assailants were killed: the doors of the storehouses where the stolen wheat was kept, were knocked down; more than a dozen insurgents were arrested and led to prisons, & almost of the convoys of wheat were recaptured, on which the market so dearly depended.

Only two marshal cavalries were injured by the assailants’ rifles, & one of them perished when one of his broken arms was amputated.

The alarm was sounded, not only to assemble all the volunteers, but also to compel all good citizens to take up arms. A number of stakes were distributed in all areas of the town, guards were doubled, & the surplus of militia, both civilian and military, formed a battalion that held fast throughout the entire day. All of these precautions seemed to have restored tranquility in the town & market; but at 3 o’clock in the afternoon, a man called Jean Desboefs, former soldier from Touraine & currently porter and a sergeant in the S. Marceau troop, left the post he had held since noon—the fifth one to do so--under the pretense of having to eat lunch. He left to go join more than two

thousand men armed with rifles, axes, & pistols, at the end of the bridge on rue Dauphine. These two thousand men were attempting to penetrate the town in order to join ten thousand artisans, who had been thrown to idleness & great misery as a result of the stagnation of commerce. Thus the guards of the Royal-Comtois² infantry, mixed with volunteers outside of the bridge’s gate, retreated to the top of the bridge crying out: to arms! The assailants sounded the tocsin at Saint Marceau, which despite being a parish of the town, was located outside of the city walls. The charge was sounded: the volunteers –around 400, including myself– mixed & packed into the ranks of the Royal-Comtois, a detachment of three hundred cavalrymen following suite, assembled quickly at the bridge. Jean Desboeufs, named as such³ because of his strength & for fighting six of his fellowmen, asked to approach alone without a fight in order to surrender. It was granted to him. He moved his hat in a

2. Infantry regiment of the French Kingdom established in 1674.
3. The name, “Desboeufs” literally means “Of Oxen”, implying that Jean Desboeufs was a very strong man.

downward direction, like an army general, & said that as leader of more than three thousand men supporting the right cause, he was asking: first, to join the body of volunteers with his new troop in order to protect the town; secondly, to allow brown bread to be taxed at nine pounds & eighteen sous⁴; & thirdly, for salt to be taxed at six sous the pound.

Since they did not accept any of his proposals, having rejected them for sound reasons that were explained to him, & that incidentally, they knew of the true intention of his troop, he replied so: Allow me, Gentlemen, to retreat peacefully and go to the courageous men I have the honor of commanding in order to make my mission & your response known to them. I dearly wish that it satisfies them. Having returned to his group, within shooting range of the gate, he lectured them & ordered them to march in tight ranks toward us. When he was more or less near

4. From 781 to 1794, the Kingdom of France used the livre as their form of currency.

the path or promenade in front of the gate, he ordered that six hundred gunshots be fired, which fortunately flew past our ears without injuring anyone. Only an officer from France-Comté had his hat shot off of his head. When the gunfire ceased, we shot back at them, & the first shot fired flew through Jean Desboeufs’s mouth, who then fell dead as he cursed horrendously. Right away, his troop disbanded & was shot at, pursued, & stabbed by the cavalry until they reached beyond the Olivet bridge. It is claimed, & I believe it, that there were eighty brigands involved in this matter who were either killed or injured, without a single loss of life or injury on our part.

As the cavalry rode on, we investigated the river banks to push back those who had taken part in this troop. We found there only one man who had

dared to defy us for he had barricaded himself in his house, from where he shot at us. We knocked down the doors & arrested this seditious man who had the audacity to say to us (I heard it) that he had failed, that for two months he had paid inhabitants of other districts to riot as well as the vine-growers who had broken their word of honor.

This man, named Rimbert, sold vinegar & was a cooper & a commissioner. He was in possession of more than fifty thousand crowns & had no children. He was hanged one hour after midnight by provostorial judgment.

The rebellious men from the district of Bannier would have faced the same fate if the inhabitants of this district –shocked by this example– had not come & begged that their carelessness be forgiven.

All of their sentences were suspended except for twelve men who were held as hostages in case there was the slightest sign of rioting.

During this small war, the volunteers of the Royal-Comtois, who guarded the prison that the men wanted to enter, were first attacked & then stoned & shot at by rifles & pistols, to which they counteracted with a simple firing of twenty-four rifle shots, which brought seven men to the ground.

Among the volunteers was an actor named Granger, brother of Granger in the Comédie Italienne, who was injured, though lightly; he still goes out, & it is said that the injury was nothing.

Signed D’ARTIC, Orléans inhabitant.

Printed by the MOMORO Printing Press, the first Printing Press of the Liberté Nationale, located on Harpe street.

N. 160 1789.

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