In some places, the
inhabitants, without distinction of age or sex, were put indiscriminately
to the sword; in others, they were forced to carry the pillage collected
from their own dwellings, which, after being thus stripped, were
consigned to the flames.*
* "This conflagration accomplished, they had no sooner arrived in
the midst of our army, than the volunteers, in imitation of their
commanders, seized what little they had preserved, and massacred
them.--But this is not all: a whole municipality, in their scarfs of
office, were sacrificed; and at a little village, inhabited by about
fifty good patriots, who had been uniform in their resistance of the
insurgents, news is brought that their brother soldiers are coming
to assist them, and to revenge the wrongs they have suffered. A
friendly repast is provided, the military arrive, embrace their
ill-fated hosts, and devour what they have provided; which is no
sooner done, than they drive all these poor people into the
churchyard, and stab them one after another."
Report of Faure, Vice-President of a Military Commission at
Fontenay.
--The heads of the prisoners served occasionally as marks for the
officers to shoot at for trifling wagers, and the soldiers, who imitated
these heinous examples, used to conduct whole hundreds to the place of
execution, singing _"allons enfans de la patrie.
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