Battle of Fleurus (1794) 1795, the Dutch Republic was extinguished. After Fleurus, the republican army would keep its momentum in the war, staying on the offensive until its eventual victory against the First Coalition in 1797. Politically, the battle invalidated the argument that continuation of the revolutionary Reign of Terror was necessary because of the military threat to France's very existence. Thus, some would argue, victory at Fleurus was a leading cause of the Thermidorian Reaction a month later. Saint-Just arrived in Paris after such a great victory only to die with Maximilien Robespierre and the other leading Jacobins. Battle of Fleurus (1794) The
Paris in the 18th century The former city government, the Commune, had virtually disappeared; of the one hundred forty members of its General Council before the Terror, eighty-seven had been guillotined, and forty imprisoned. Of the thirty-three senior city administrators, twenty had been executed and ten imprisoned. It was impossible to have a document registered for lack of living city employees. On August 24, 1794, the new government of France, the Directory created a whole new city government. The forty-eight sections, each governed by a revolutionary committee, were replaced by twelve arrondissements, strictly under the control of the Directory. Each arrondissement was governed by a