French Revolution execution records go online

Records providing a harrowing insight into the executions carried out during the French Revolution have been put online by Ancestry.co.uk.

The genealogy website said the French Deaths by Guillotine, 1792-1796 will be of particular interest to the British descendants of the 32,000 French citizens who fled to Britain during that period; colloquially known as The Reign of Terror.

The list of more than 13,000 people not only includes the names of individuals sent to the guillotine but also those condemned to be executed by hanging, firing squad and even drowning; including their occupation, age, residence of the victim and the date of the execution.

Olivier Van Caster, Ancestry.co.uk’s managing director said: “The French Revolution was a brutal and gruesome period of history, with repercussions that were felt both in France and across the world socially, culturally and politically.

“The collection will be of huge interest to the six million Brits with French ancestry, who may be able to trace a severed link to an aristocrat or a revolutionary.”

Although between 20,000 and 40,000 ‘enemies of the revolution’ were executed between 1793 and 1794 alone, Ancestry’s details have been taken from a six-volume work – the ‘Dictionary of individuals condemned to die during the Revolution’.

This detailed record was compiled in 1796 by French journalist and newspaper publisher Louis-Marie Prudhomme; who, despite his outspoken views and imprisonment, managed to avoid the guillotine.

Included in the records are key characters from this period of violence that occurred for 50 months from the start of the French Revolution, such as King Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette and Maximilien Robespierre.