The Rest Is History
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742 episodes
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‘Still more traitors, still more treason…"It is 1792 and France has been at war since April; it is not going well. In Paris, the Tuileries Palace has been stormed, and the royal family imprisoned. Meanwhile, tensions are rising between the main political factions of the Revolution, the Girondins and the Montagnard, led by the icy Maximilien Robespierre. The streets of Paris teem with armed young men - the Federes and the Sans-Culottes - responsible for the brutal slaughtering of the Swiss Guard earlier that year. They have arrested and imprisoned thousands of people. It is into this progressively febrile atmosphere of paranoia and fear that terrible news arrives: the Prussians, hungry for vengeance, have taken the fortress of Verdin. Rumours swirl of treason and betrayal from deep within Paris itself, and a new, chilling idea is raised to wash the city of counter revolutionaries once and for all: cleanse the prisons. So it is that on the 2nd of September, a group of Prisoners being escorted from one prison to another is stopped, and methodically hacked to death. The survivors face an impromptu tribunal before receiving the same treatment. Over the next few days, all prisoners across Paris are likewise judged, and many similarly damned and mutilated. A tide of bloodshed is rising, which will soon flood the streets of Paris, taking thousands of lives with it. Who will survive the massacre?Join Dominic and Tom for the next series of the French Revolution, as they pick up this epic story - one of the most resounding and complex historical events of all time - with arguably the most horrific episode of the whole revolution: the September massacres…EXCLUSIVE NordVPN Deal ➼ https://nordvpn.com/restishistory Try it risk-free now with a 30-day money-back guarantee!_______Twitter:@TheRestHistory@holland_tom@dcsandbrookProducer: Theo Young-SmithAssistant Producer: Tabby Syrett + Aaliyah AkudeExecutive Producers: Jack Davenport + Tony Pastor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
742 episodes
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549. The Road to 1066: Revenge of the Vikings (Part 2)
Following the bloody St Brice’s Day Massacre, of the 13th of November 1002, which saw King Æthelred brutally exterminating the Danes from England, the Vikings were hungry for revenge. None more so than the terrifying Scandinavian King, Swe…
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The Norman Conquest of 1066, culminating in the legendary Battle of Hastings, is perhaps the greatest turning point in the history of the English nation. It was a year that changed the fate of England forever, forging empires, and settling…
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546. The French Revolution: The Monarchy Falls (Part 3)
“From this place and from this day forth commences a new era in the world’s history, and you can all say you were present at its birth!”By September 1792, the Prussians, under the leadership of the formidable Duke of Brunswick, were closin…
545. The French Revolution: The First Feminist (Part 2)
In the summer and Autumn of 1792 - with the Prussians bearing down on Paris, the streets thronged with the stirring swell of the Marseillaise, but also the rotting bodies of those brutally killed during the September Massacres - the French…
544. The French Revolution: The September Massacres (Part 1)
‘Still more traitors, still more treason…"It is 1792 and France has been at war since April; it is not going well. In Paris, the Tuileries Palace has been stormed, and the royal family imprisoned. Meanwhile, tensions are rising between the…
543. Death in the Amazon: Aguirre, the Wrath of God
“Anyone who even thinks of abandoning this mission will be cut up into a thousand pieces…I am the wrath of God!”At the height of the age of exploration, during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, one story in particular gripped the imag…
542. Elizabeth I’s Sorcerer: Angels and Demons in Renaissance Europe
In Tudor England, during the reign of Elizabeth I, there lived in the very heart of her court a magician, alchemist and polymath, bent upon conversing with the angels of heaven and other supernatural beings. His name was John Dee, and he w…
541. Heart of Darkness: Fear and Loathing in the Congo
“The horror! The horror!”Joseph Conrad’s ‘Heart of Darkness’ - the inspiration for Francis Ford Coppola's ‘Apocalypse Now’ - is one of the most celebrated literary works of all time, though now increasingly contentious. Based on Conrad’s o…