French Emigration (1789–1815)

French emigration from the years 1789 to 1815 refers to the mass movement of citizens from France to neighboring countries in reaction to the bloodshed and upheaval caused by the French Revolution and Napoleonic rule. Although the Revolution began in 1789 as a peaceful, bourgeois-led effort for increased political equality for the Third Estate (the non-elite, unprivileged masses of France), it soon turned into a violent, popular rebellion. To escape political tensions and save their lives, a number of individuals emigrated from France and settled in the neighboring countries (chiefly Great Britain, Germany, Austria, and Prussia), however quite a few also went to the United States.

When the Estates General convened in 1789 and aired out their political grievances, many members of each estate found themselves in agreement with the idea that the bulk of France, the Third Estate, was carrying the tax burden without equitable political representation. They even took an oath, the Tennis Court Oath, swearing to pursue their political goals and committing to drafting a constitution which codified equality. Soon, the ideologies of fair and equal treatment by the government and liberation from the old regime diffused throughout France.

While the "Father of the Revolution", Abbé Sièyes, and several other men of the first and second estates supported the Third Estate's desire for equality, several members of the clergy and nobility were averse to it. Under the old regime, they were accustomed with a certain quality of living and with the right to pass this life to their children. The Revolution was looking to remove all privilege in an effort to make everyone politically equal, so the first émigrés, or emigrants, were proponents of the old order and chose to leave France although emigration abroad was not prohibited.

Notable émigrés include Madames Adélaïde and Victoire, aunts of King Louis XVI, who on 19 February 1791 started their journey to Rome to live nearer to the Pope. However, their journey was stopped by and largely debated by the National Assembly who feared that their emigration implied that King Louis and his family would soon follow suit. While this fear eventually resulted in the Day of Daggers and later the King's attempt to escape Paris, the Madames were permitted to continue their journey after statesman Jacques-François de Menou joking about the Assembly's preoccupation with the actions of "two old women".

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