The provincial militia is a form of Conscription which existed in France of 1688 with 1791, official year of its abolition by the National Assembly. The purpose of its lifting was initial to supplement the usual recruitment of the royal armies with subjects obliged to be useful. If the government wished that the drawing lot designate the militiamans, it often happened that officially trade associations can provide volunteers of which they bought the service or, that in the villages, the chance was not alone to indicate the militiaman.
She is indicated by several names in the documents: royal militia and militia of ground (little used), provincial militia then officially provincial troops as from 1771; these two last being most frequent. “Royal Militia” allows to indicate that which orders the lifting; “ground militia” opposes the Milice coastguard to which the communities close to the littorals are subjected.
History
In 1688, at the beginning of the War of the League of Augsburg, the Secretary of State to the War, the marquis de Louvois, initiates a lifting of provincial militiamans in order to assist the troops regulated in the places of garrison, even with the combat. These militia are returned to it in 1697 after the peace of Ryswick.The provincial militia is recreated of 1701 to 1714 to be useful during the War of succession of Spain, and again in 1719 during the short forwarding of Spain.
The royal decree of February 25th, 1726 prepared by the marquis de Breteuil makes of the provincial militia a permanent troop whose objective is “to have always on foot in the interior of the kingdom a body of militia which, being exerted during peace with the handling of the weapons, without disturbing work which agriculture requires, nor to leave the provinces, could be ready to go on the borders to increase by them the forces in the most pressing needs for the State. ” It is in this form that they were used during the wars of succession as Poland (1733-1738), of Succession of Austria (1741-1748) and Seven Years (1756-1763).
During the long peace which follows (the war of American Independence of 1776-1783 concerning more the coasts and overseas), of many calls to reform the provincial militia are made that try to follow the successive Secretary of State to the War, the marquis de Monteynard, then the count of Saint-Germain. By the ordinance of August 4th, 1771, they are recreated in the shape of formed “provincial troops” “provincial soldiers”.
By a letter of December 27th, 1788, the Office of the movement of the troops announces to the intendants whom the lifting is suspended time that place has a new distribution; the General states of the kingdom are then in preparation and the militia was reproduced on certain registers of grievances of the third-state. March 14th, 1789, a letter of the Minister for the War, Mister de Puységur, specifies that the king wants to thus reduce the campaigns following the damage of the cold and the floods of the winter 1788-1789, but that in 1790, the militiamans of 1789 and 1790 will be raised. This lifting never took place and the National Assembly decides by the decree of March 4th, 1791 to abolish the provincial troops (during the same time, several other military practices of monarchy are also abolished or limited).
But, the revolutionary liftings of the period 1791-1793 to fight against united European monarchies take again the system of the obligation of the militia just abolished; in the provinces, one organizes even drawing lots in July 1792 to designate men. Lastly, the Loi Jourdan of September 5th, 1798, institutes the conscription and joins again with the military obligation that the provincial militia evoked already.
Liftings in practice
The first ordinances of lifting of 1688 to 1690 order with the provinces to provide a number of men. The intendants distribute this number between the parishes which must provide volunteers and ensure the equipment of it. The authorities must note that, often, the militiamans are too old or inapt to make the war; their equipment is of poor quality. Quickly, in 1691, the Secretary of State to the war orders that the militiamans are designated by Drawing lot among the valid men of the parish.
Exemptions exist on the initiative of subdelegated intendants who do not conceive to deprive a family of her chief, to engage of too young men or obviously reached physical infirmities. An official list of the exemptions is drawn up in 1765, with possibility for the intendants of extending it according to the characteristics of the province. This list seeks to preserve agriculture and industry: for example, the wire are free whose fathers cannot work any more, but it is necessary to justify of a certain ease; but also to preserve the comfort of richest since their servants are released from the obligation of the militia. The miliciables present their reasons to subdelegated which accepts or refuses. The simplest means not to have to draw remainder to measure less than 5 feet (approximately 1,62 m).
Two means existed to draw with the fate:
- before the ordinance of 1765, one registers the name of each miliciable good for the service on a paper. One draws names as many as militiamans required by the community,
- as from 1765, the hat contains as many tickets as of miliciables: all are white, except one or some carrying the word “militiaman” according to the number of militiamans to be obtained. Those which draw the “black ticket” must be useful for the milice.
Unpopular, the drawing lot is even more with the eyes of the rural parishes and certain trade associations because in the big cities, certain trade associations obtained the privilege to rather provide volunteers than to see their boys leaving regularly to the drive or the war. In Montpellier, in fact especially trades of craft industry have the nobility and the middle-class for customers: goldsmiths, apothecaries, servants and servants, etc This practice involves disadvantages because these volunteers (sometimes foreign at the city) tend to disappear more easily than the militiamans living their grounds and trades.
To compensate for the fact of seeing one as of his designated militiaman, the miliciables and inhabitants of the parish sometimes took the practice cotiser to give an amount of money to indicated. If the order is not to tolerate them, subdelegated generally the eyes closed provided that they are not informed of it and that does not cause tumult (the joined together sum which can disappear fraudulently…).
The militiaman must then present himself to all the convocations. In times of peace, it must come to be involved a few weeks per annum in a royal camp with the handling of the weapons and the military march. In time of war, it is used for to reduce the labor of the regulated troops: mainly the guard of the place-strong announces the royal decrees. But the militiamans found themselves with the combat to supplement battalions decimated by the war. Certain militiamans thus could become “officer of fortune”, i.e. promoted lieutenant or captain of troops regulated to compensate for officers dead or promoted in time of war.
According to the sources evoking the provincial militia, it seems to have been very unpopular:
- the people did not include/understand why the king needed the people in times of peace,
- why one designated the militiamans with the fate whereas the parishes were ready to buy volunteers.
In an anonymous engraving of 1789 on the four wishes of the third-state (reproduced in the Encyclopedia Universalis ), the militia appears beside the barriers of granting, the quibblers (men of law who made pay all their acts) and of the gamekeepers of the noble ones.
See too
Sources
Files of the historical Service of defense:- correspondence of the ministry for the War with the governors and the intendants of province (A1 series),
- controls of the troops and the officers (series 1M),
- memories on the organization of the provincial militia addressed to the ministry for the War (series Xb and Yb).
- files of the intendance for the departments having accommodated the seat of the intendant of province,
- files of the subdelegations gathered by current departments (often constitute a double of those of the intendance),
- files of the military governor for the department having accommodated the seat of this one,
- some communal records contains information on the liftings of provincial militia carried out.
Municipal files:
- In the cities having files of some importance, the series of the military businesses includes/understands official reports of nomination militiamans. That makes it possible to fill possible gaps of the files of the intendance.
Some testimonys exist apart from the files of the institutions:
- Valentine Jammeray-Duval, Memories , beginning of the XVIIIe century; published by J. - M. Goulemot, Memories. Childhood and education of a peasant at the XVIIIe century , Paris, 1981. This peasant trying to inform itself, traverses France and testifies that, as soon as one announced the lifting of the provincial militia: “To the only noise which was spread some, terrified youth was going to hide in the most isolated tiny rooms and thickest of the forests. ”
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