Hérault de Séchelles – a revolutionary from the highest ranks of society. Wealthy, handsome and of noble birth, he was born with the proverbial silver spoon in his mouth. By the age of 25, he had already reached the highest ranks of the legal profession. He was successful and enjoyed life. During the Revolution, he joined the Jacobins – an alliance that could not last. His background and dissolute lifestyle made him suspect, and not only in the eyes of the incorruptible Robespierre. Once the committees had gathered sufficient evidence of a conspiracy with foreign powers, they had him arrested. He died on the guillotine alongside Danton.
December 1793 · Hérault resigns from the Committee of Public Safety.
March 15, 1794 · The Committee of Public Safety and the Committee of General Security have Hérault arrested. He is suspected of having conspired with émigrés.
April 5, 1794 · Hérault is sentenced to death by the Revolutionary Tribunal alongside Danton and other defendants. He is executed that same day on the Place de la Révolution in Paris.
Marie-Jean Hérault de Séchelles lived to be 34 years old.
Quotes
Keep your rivals between hope and fear. Hérault de Séchelles, Théorie de l'ambition, 1788
Dark omens threaten me; I want to hasten to live. Hérault to Madame de Morency, early 1794
Hérault, I’ll have a wig made from your lovely hair! A woman’s cry to Hérault on the cart taking him to his execution (Georg Büchner, Danton’s Death, 1835)
Hérault de Séchelles – a revolutionary from the highest ranks of society. Wealthy, handsome and of noble birth, he was born with the proverbial silver spoon in his mouth. By the age of 25, he had already reached the highest ranks of the legal profession. He was successful and enjoyed life. During the Revolution, he joined the Jacobins – an alliance that could not last. His background and dissolute lifestyle made him suspect, and not only in the eyes of the incorruptible Robespierre. Once the committees had gathered sufficient evidence of a conspiracy with foreign powers, they had him arrested. He died on the guillotine alongside Danton.
