1. Seventeenth century estimates of the number of Huguenots who stayed in France after 1685 range from Vauban's figure of 600,000 (pour le rappel des Huguenots [1689]) to the unrealistie 1,900,000 families, claimed by the protestant pastors of Montpellier (‘Les chiffres de M. I'Abbé Roquette,” Bulletin Historique et Litteraire de la Société de içais, LX, 1911, [hereafter cited as Bulletin], pp. 225–38Google Scholar). Throughout the eighteenth century references were made by responsible men of letters and of state to two and three million Protestants in France. It is significant that the official count made in the census of 1802 revealed that there were 479,312 Protestants of the Reformed faith in the territory of old France (not counting those of the Lutheran faith). See Aulard, A., Le christianisme et la révolution francaise (Paris, 1925)Google Scholar. A discussion of the conflicting statistics on this subject is given in Poland, B. C., French Protestants and the French Revolution, Appendix 1, pp. 283–286 (Princeton, 1957).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2. Examples of this approach: Baird, Henry M., The Huguenots and the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (New York, 1896), II, book VIGoogle Scholar; de Felice, G., Histoire des Protestants de france (6th ed.; Toulonse, 1874)Google Scholar; Benoit, Daniel, L'Église sous la croix (Toulouse, 1882)Google Scholar; Puaux, F., Histoire de la réformation (Paris, 1863), books XLIV to LIVGoogle Scholar; Janze, Charles Alfred, Les Huguenotes cent ans de persécution 1685–1789. (Paris, 1886).Google Scholar

3. The somewhat barren region of the Massif Central was the geographic center of rural French Protestantism. This region reached east into Dauphiné, and west along the Lot and the Garonne to Bordeaux. The remainder of Protestant France was widely scattered, adherents being numerous only in certain cities, such as Paris, Bordeaux, La Roehelle, htontauban, Montpellier, Nimes, Caen, Rouen and Sedan, and in a few rural areas such as the Pays de Caux and the Bocage in Normandy.

4. A term used to designate the eighteenth century clandestine French Reformed Church organization. The origin of the term is obsecure but it has biblical significance: “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God,” Isaiah 40:3. It served a useful purpose in the pastors, for it was used to hide the actual places from which they wrote.

5. The record of this achievement may be found in Coquerel, Charles, Histoire des églises du désert (Paris, 1841)Google Scholar; Edmond Hugues, Antoine Court. Histoire de la restauration du protestantisme en France au XVIIIe siěcle. Many contemporary records of the “Desert” Church have been published in the Bulletin, 1853 to date; see also the collectded documents in Hugues, Edmond, ed., Les synodes du désert (Paris, 1885)Google Scholar; Mémoires d' Antoine court (Tolouse, 1885)Google Scholar; Picheral, A. and Dardier, Charles, eds., Paul Rabaut, ses lettres à Antoine Court (Paris, 1884)Google Scholar; Dardier, Charkes, ed., Paul Rabaut ses lettres à divers (Paris,1891).Google Scholar

6. The revocation edict nullified all previous laws in regard to the Protestants; forbade Protestant worship and schools throughout the realm; outlawed Protestant pastors; provided for the baptism of Protestant children in the Catholic Church; recalled Protestants who had left the country, and prohibited further emigration under penalty of confiscation of property. Text of the edict in Isambert, Deerusy, Taillandier Recueil général des anciennes lois françaises… rev. ed., Paris, 1829), XIX, pp. 530–534.Google Scholar

7. Nineteenth century Protestant historians, basing their conclusions on the recitals of horror in Benoist's, ElieHistoire de i'édit de Nantes (Delft, 1693)Google Scholar, maintained that Article XI was never honored, but it must be remembered that Benoist's treatise was written in the years immediately following revocation, when fanaticism was rife. There is every indication that conditions soon changed. Expmples of statements by intendants and magistrated which show that in the eighteenth century French officials were loath to disturb peaceful productive citizens are not difficult to find: See those of de Pomereu, M., Intendant of Champagne in Stephen Leroy “Les Protestants de Sedan au XVIIIe siècle,” Bulletin, XLV (1896), 337–61Google Scholar; the Intendant of Caen in Léonard, Emile-G., “Le problème du culte public et de I'élise dans le Protestantisme Français du XVIIIe siècle,” Foi et Vie (1937), pp. 431–57Google Scholar; the procureur général of Rouen in Waddington, Francis M., La Protestantisme en Normandie(Paris 1862), p. 53Google Scholar; and those of numerous officals quoted in Mercier, Gston, “Les nouveaux convertis dans le midi,” La nouvelle revue, XLV (1907), # 181, 494–510.Google Scholar

8. Waddington, Op. cit., p. 70, describes one Roger La Fontaine, a peddler, who made his rounds in Normandy and also preached, blessed marriages and baptized children, but had no ecclesiastical connection nor training. See also Galland, A.“Les pasteurs du désert en Basse-Normandie de 1743 à 1781, Bulletin, LXXI (1922), 69–87.Google Scholar Not until around 1730, after arrangements were made for the “Desert” churches to send a quote of student pastors each vear to the Protestant Seminary at Lausanne, did French Protestantism again begin to have trained pastors. However, even those who admire them most, frequently apologize for the lack of even the best of the eighteenth century French Protestant pastors.

9. It is significant that there was no public Protestant worship in Paris outside the embassies of Protestant countries until 1789.

10. For a discussion and documents of the controversy which arose over baptism of Protestant children in Roman Catholic churches among the Protestants of Bordeaux, see Leroux, Alfred, Les religionnaires de Bordeaux de 1685 à1802 (Bordeaux, 1920), 175–184Google Scholar. Leroux's conclusion is that many Protestants of Bordeaux continued to haptize their children in the Catholic Church until the Edict of Toleration in 1787.

11. The revocatory edict was such a poorly drawn law that the ink was searcely dry before supplementary legislation began to be issued to clarify and extend it. According to Joly de Fleury (Excerpts from his Mémoire[1752] apper in Mémoire sur le mariage des protestans [1785], attributed édits, déclarations and arrêts had been issued—all of them, he added, being ignored. This unwieldy mass of legislation was codified in the Déclaration of May 14, 1724, which laid special emphasis on deprivation of civil rights of Protestants, and stated specifically that professional and official training and em. ployment were open only to Roman Catholies (articles XII and XIII). Isamber, , Decursy, , Taillandier, , Reoveil généra; des anciennes lois françaises… (rev. ed., Paris, 1829), XXI, 261–76.Google Scholar

12. From the time of Henry IV, who had brought many of his ex-coreligiouists to the capital with him to serve the state, Protestant functionaries had been numerous. A drastic change in policy became manifest during the reign of Louis XIV a number of years before the revocation of the Edict of Nantes.

13. Religionnaires, a colloquial term frequently used to deisgnate the French Protestants in the eighteenth century.

14. Mazoyer, Louis, “Eassai critique sur I'histoire du Protestantisme à la fin du XVIIIe siécle,” Bulletin, LXXXIX (1930), pp. 35–56.Google Scholar

15. For a description of the organization of the Protestant “Committee” at Bordeaux, see Leroux, 103–106, and 251. For some indication of the work of the Protesstant “committees” of several French cities in opposing Court de Gébelin, son of the “Desert” pastor, Antoine Court, and representative of the “Desert” churches in Paris from 1763 until his death see Schmidt, Paul, Court de Gébelin à paris 1763–1784 (Paris, 1908)Google Scholar and Arnaud, Eug. “Court de Gébelin, ses tribulatious comme agent général des églises réformées d'après la correspondence inédite des deux Chiron,” Bulletin, XXXXII (1883), 267–280, 311–323.Google Scholar

16. Under Louis XIV proof of apostasy and other infractions of the laws was left in the hands of the magistrates who were empowered to establish the facts through investigation and interrogation of the accused. See the Déclarations of April 29, 1686, and March 8, 1715, Pilatte, Leon, ed., Edits, déclarations et arreasts conceranans la réligion P. [rétendue] Réformée (Paris, 1885, p. 282–284, 482–484Google Scholar. However, according to the Délaration of May 14, 1724, the only proof necessary was the word of the local pries. Pilatte, 534–550.

17. It is sometimes held that the rational approach to religion generated by the philosophes had all but demolished religious intolerance in France by the second half of the eighteenth century. It is well to remeber that violent anti-Protestant outbursts occurred in Toulouse in 1762 and in the Midi in 1790, that there were few requests for religious tolerance in the cahiers in 1789, and that opposed to the treatises written in the spirit of the Enlightenment was a very large literature which upheld the traditional views in regard to religious uniformity. See Monond, Albert, De Pascal à Chateaubriand les défenseurs du Christianisme de 1760 à 1802 (Paris, 1916)Google Scholar.

18. The size of these “Desert” assemblies is controversial. According to Galabert, Franeois (“Les assemblées de Protestants dans le Montalbanais en 1744 et 1745” Bulletin, XLIX, 1900, 7–31, 76–86, 132–151Google Scholar) some of them drew as many as 40,000 worshippers. The diary of a member of the “Desert” Church (Bulletin, XXXII, 1833, 361–367Google Scholar) notes that at the gathering place near Nimes the weekly open air services were attended by as many as 18,000 and never less than 4,000 people. See also Léonard, Emile-G., “Les assembleées du désert,” Bulletin, LXXXVII (1938), 471–486Google Scholar. The “Desert” pastors used of Protestant strength, hence the published records of attendance may have been exaggerated.

19. For examples of such supplications see the following, reprinted in the Bulletin, “Requête des Protestants de Cleriac, tonniens… au r o i” 1755, XXXI (1882) 541–547Google Scholar; “Requê des Protestants du Bas-Languedoc au roy” 1754, XXVII (1878) 469–475Google Scholar; “Memoire” 1771 to the Count of Perigord, XXXVII (1888) 478–482.Google Scholar

20. Hugues, Edmond, Antoine Court. Histoire de la restauration du protestantisme en France au XVIIIe siècle (4th ed., Paris, 1875), II, 257–258.Google Scholar

21. Allamand has been identified as the Count of Wied, or Neu-Wied, near Coblentz. For a discussion of this pamphlentz. For a discussion of this pamphlet see Hungues, Edmond, Antoine Court…II, 245Google Scholar; Dedieu, Joseph, Histoire politique des protestants français (Paris, 1925), II, 30.Google Scholar For two responses to Allamand see Bulletin, favouable, XXVII (1878), 225–231Google Scholar; unfavorable, XXXVI (1887), 479–484.

22. In 1719 when France and Spain were at war, the Spanish Court sent emisaries to the Protestant regions of southern France in an endeavor to stir up revolt. Hearing this news, the Regent, the Duke of Orleans, immediately got in touch with refugee French Protestant pastors in Holland and else-where, to ask them to use their influence to discourage their coreligionists in France from participation in such intrigue. The response of Jacques Basnage was the pamphlet mentioned above. There is no indication that the French Protestants cooperated with Spain during this war.

23. These works inelude the following: Répons des protestants de France à i'auteur de cette lettre (au desért, 1745), attributed to Professor Polier, Lausanne Seminary, member of a French refugee family. Mémoire apologétique n faveur des pnotestants sujets de sa majestéschrétienne… (1745), attributed to Armand de la Chapelle, a theologian, born in France but taken to England while still a child; he later settled in Holland. This pamphlet was condemned to be burned by the Parlements of Toulouse and Dauphié. Apologie des protestants du royaume de France sur leurs assemblées relisgieuses (eésert, 1745). La nécesite due culte public parmi les chrétiens (The Hangue, 1746; Frankfort, 1747)Google Scholar, attributed to Aramand de la Chapelle. Réponse des protestants de Frace à i'auteur d'une lettre imprimées des religionnaires en Languedoc… (Rotterdam, 1745)Google Scholar, attributed to Antoine Court.

24. Salomon, Mlle, “Le pasteur Alsacien C. F. Baser,” Bulletin, LXXIV (1925), 423–448Google Scholar. An intersting episode occurred in 1755 when a Protestant army officer Jean Louis Lecointe de Marcillac, a captain of cavalry in the regiment of the Prince de Conti, persuaded the Prince, who was at the time estranged from the Court, to take an interest in th Protestatnt cause. It became evident that the Prince de conti was thinking of forcing concessions for insurrection, or threatened insurrection, as part of a plot fo further his own ambitions. In 1755 the Conti plan was considered by Protestant leaders of southern France at a “National” synod, but it failed to win approval. One of those who participated in this plot was one Herrenschevan, a Protestant member of the King's Swiss Guard, in the pay of Madame Pompadour, acting as a spy of the Court. See Hugues, Edmond “Un épisode de l'histoire du Protestantisme au XVIIIe siècle,” Bulletin, XXXVI (1887), 289–303, 337–350.Google Scholar

25. Belle Isle (Charles Louis Auguste Fouquct) the Minister of the Marine.

26. Coquerel, , Histoire des églises du dèsert, … II, 344–351Google Scholar; Hugues, Antoine Court … II, 347–353Google Scholar; Dardier, , Paul Rabaut. … I, 254.Google Scholar

27. Hugues, , Antoine Court. … II, 253–254Google Scholar; Dardier, , Paul Rabaut. … I, 254.Google Scholar

28. Schmidt, , Court de Gébelin a Paris, 45.Google Scholar

29. These commissions were usually given to foreigners, thus the King of Sweden intervened in behalf of the Protestant prisoners of Aigues Mortes in 1745, and the Duke of Bedford performed a similar task in 1762.

30. This was the last “National” synod. The fact that no more were held is testimony to the divergence of opinion among the religioanaires on political and religious matters.

31. Cabribère, Justin, Court de Gébelin défenseur des églises réformées de France (Paris, 1899), 19.Google Scholar

32. Hugues, , ed., Les Synodes du Désert, II. The National Synod of 1763, art. 37.Google Scholar

33. Dardier, Charles (Paul Babaut … 1, 339)Google Scholar states that when Gébelin left Lausaane he was in the bad graces of the Protestant committees of Geneva and Berne because he had published in the form of letters a work called Les Toulousaines (Edinburgh [actnally Lausanne] 1763)Google Scholar which denounced several incidents that had occurred in 1762 in Toulouse: the hanging of Pastor Rochette, the beheading of three men who tried to help him, the breaking on the wheel of Jean Cams, etc. Accused by the Swiss Protestant Committees of sedition, asked to have all copies of Les Toulousaines destroyed, and to retract what he had said, Gébelin apparently became discouraged and left, never to return.

34. Gébelin is often referred to as the official representative of the Protestant churches from 1764–1784. Actually, although several provincial synods gave their assent, he was never authorized by the churches of all the provinces of southern France. He was able to remain in Paris by using up his inheritance, supplemented from time to time by contributions from “Desert” pastors and churches sympathetic with what he was trying to do. For details see Schmidt, Court de Gébelin a Paris: Carbribère, Court de Gébelin défenseur …, and Eug. Araaud loc. cit. 267–280, 311–323.

35. Schmidt, chapter VI; also “Le premier journal Protestant Franqais projet dc Court de Gébelin,” Bulletin, I (1853), 383–399.Google Scholar The project of a Protestant periodical did not materialize until the nineteenth century. Schmidt (chapter VII) thinks it was Gébelin's cultivation of contacts in the best circles of French society and the Court which enabled him to bring pressure to bear that stopped the sporadic instances of persecution which occurred in France after 1764. Whenever an incident occurred, Gébelin was immediately to be found knocking at the doors of ministers of state, memoirs in hand, demanding justice for his coreligionists.

37. Arnaud, loc. cit. 267–280, 311–323. The Paris Committee was for a time headed by LeCointe de Mercifiac, who became too active to suit his fellow members, and in 1788, through use of a lettre de cachet was forced to leave Paris.

38. The lack of cooperation of his coreliglonists enabled Gébein to spend a great deal of time on his ambitious and erudite treatise, Le monde primitif, of which nine volumes appeared before he died. The work was not a financial success, but the volumes were subscribed to by such prominent persons as Diderot, Turgot, Franklin and by several members of the royal family, and the appearance of each one brought forth the eulogies of savants. The Academic Franaise awarded him two prizes, and he was invited to become a candidate for the Académic des Inscriptions. He reminded this group that he was a Protestant, but was assured that made no difference. However, two members opposed his admission. The affair became public, and popular opinion was sympathetic to Gébelin. The outcome of this incident was the appointment of Court de Gébelin. as ernseur royal in 1781, by the director of the Librairie, Miromesnil, apparently as compensation for the public humiliation of a recognized scholar. He was received in Court circles, and presented his Le monde primitif to the King and Queen in person.

39. For a discussion of this work see Leroy, Stephen, “Les Protestants do Sedan au XVII1e siècle,” Bulletin, XLV (1896), 337–361.Google Scholar

40. Dardier, , ed., Paul Rabaut … I, 371–376.Google Scholar

41. In places where Caivinists had no churches iii Alsace, they were permitted to register their marriages with the curé of the parish. See Anquez, L., De l'état civil des réformés de France (Paris, 1868), 148–149Google Scholar. LeCointe's ideas appear in his Coinmentaires sur la retraite des dix mille (1766) and Mémoire instructif pour servir au projet d'édit en faveur des Protestants de France (1768). The latter was turned over to Gilbert do Voisins, Counselor of State, who was at the time working on a project for a law giving civil status to Protestants.

42. Hugues, , ed., Les synodes du désert, III, 47, 55, 269.Google Scholar

43. Born of French Protestant refugee parents in Lausanne, Armand attended the Seminary there, served as pastor in the Palatinate, at Hanau and Frankfort; in 1766 he was called to the Walloon Church in the Hague, and in 1775 became a chaplain at the Dutch Embassy in Paris. Eug. and Em. Haag, La France Protestante (2nd ed. Paris, 1846).Google Scholar

44. Details of this plan are given in Leroux, Alfred “Histoire externe de Ia cornunauté des religionnaires de Bordeaux de 1758 à 1789,” Bulletin, LXVIII (1919), 35–62Google Scholar; also Dardier, , Paul Rabaut … II, 266–67.Google Scholar

45. One of the ministers of state who approved this plan was Vergennes, and his consent to it may be the basis for the statement of his friend P. M. Hennm (a secretary to the Count of Broglie) that Vergennes was convinced of the necessity of granting civil status to Protestants and diligently tried to procure it. Doniol, Henri, ed., Politiques d'autrefois; le Comte de Vergenries et P. M. Hennin 1749–1787 (Paris, 1898), 90–91.Google Scholar

48. Dardier, , ed., Paul Rabaut … II, 281–82.Google Scholar A year later Armand was condemned by the Synod of Languedoc.

49. The “deputies,” besides Gébelin, included Du Tems, sent by the Protestant Committee of La Roeheile; Perrier, sent by a similar body in Montpellier; Le Cointe, serving the Paris Committee; and two representatives sent by the Consistory of Metz.

50. The evidence is to be found in Hugues, , Les synodes du désert, III.Google Scholar

51. The eighth and last national synod was held in 1763.

52. Coquerel, Charles, Histoire des églises cia désert chez les Protestants de France, II, 497.Google Scholar

53. Le Roi doit modifier les lois portées contre lea Protestants. Démonstration: avantages que la France tirent de cette modification. (London, 1784).Google Scholar

54. Réflexions impartial, es d'un philanthrope sur is situation presente de Protestants et sur les moyens de la changer, (N. P. 1787), reprinted in Bulletin, XLIX (1899) (N.P. 1787), 646–650Google Scholar. This pamphlet is usually attributed to Rabaut Saint (N. P. 1787), Etienne (see Dardier, Charles, Bulletin, XXXVI 1887, 254Google Scholar), but Armand Lods maintains it was written by Oliver Desmont, pastor of Bordeaux (Bulletin, XLIV, 1895, 330–332Google Scholar.

55. Reprinted in Nicolas, Michel, Jean-Bon Saint-André sa vie et ses écrites, (Montauban, 1848), pp. 275–310.Google Scholar

56. The plan of Rabaut Saint-Etienne in his Réflenions impartiales d'un philanthrope … called for divided control, with the president and members of the ecclesiastical council being laymen and pastors, elected by the notables and pastors.

57. That his position was one of expediency is indicated in a statement he made in 1780 “It is a long way from the principles on which the laws ought to be made to those which circumstances seem to force to prevail, and unhappily it is a question less of what ought to be done than of what can be done.” Letter to the members of the Committee of Bordeaux in Dardier, Paul Rabaut ses lettres à divers, II, 398.Google Scholar

58. The many pamphlets and their authors are named and discussed in Adams, F. Geoffrey W., “The Struggle by the French Protestants for Civil Rights, 1750–1788,” unpublished Ph.D. Thesis, University of Chicago, 1954) microflim).Google Scholar

59. Isambert, , Decrusy, , Taillandier, , Recueil génêral des anoiennes lois françses (rev. ed., Paris, 1829), XXVIII, 472–482Google Scholar. The edict made provision for validation of non-Catholic marriages without proof of Catholicity, either before Catholic priests or magistrates. Non-Catholics were guaranteed rights of inheritance and the right to engage in commerce, the arts, crafts and professions, but were barred from holding public office (despite the fact they were already doing so unofficially).

60. For Protestant reaction to the edict see Lods, A., “L'édit de tolérance de 1787 et Gal Pomaret d'après une lettre inédite de ce pasteur,” Bulletin, XLVIII (1899), 646–650Google Scholar; Mazoyer, Louis, “L'application de l'édit de 1787 dans le midi de la France,” Bulletin, LXXIV (1925), 149–176Google Scholar; Levy, Edouard “L'application de 1'édit de 1787,” Nouvelle revue historique de droit Franis et étranger (07–08. 1911), 433–459Google Scholar; and by the same author “Mariages entre Protestants,” La révolution Française, LX (02. 1911), 97–105.Google Scholar

61. Mazoyer, Louis, “La question protestante dans les cahiers des êtats généraux,” Bulletin, LXXX (1931), 41–73.Google Scholar