Consider this a small part of my response to the people who complain about there being women at the barricade in the musical (specifically about how anachronistic it supposedly is).
Porte Saint-Martin, eight o’clock. They seized the two gates, Saint-Denis and Saint-Martin, which they kept despite the arrival of a regiment of lancers, one of the infantry and some companies of the National Guard. The insurgents abandoned the first and made false resistance at the second until ten o’clock to give time for brave friends to meet again at the cloister of Saint-Méry. They saw a platoon fire at inoffensive people after having told them: “Messieurs, go past quickly, there’s no danger;” and immediately a discharge from their side, which was the one opposite to where they were themselves being harassed by some skirmishing shots. The route from Porte Saint-Martin to the Cloister was for many of the brave men such an extraordinary thing that it’s inconceivable that they would have made it there. A woman, rue…….. took a shot herself to avenge a man killed in front of her by bayonet strikes, joining a handful of brave men who forced the post to let them pass. [x]
So if you ever need a primary source to point to which mentions a woman not only participating but actually fighting in the June Uprising, here you go, here’s your quote.
I swear I’m gonna make a post about the women of Saint-Merry at some point… If it seems like I’ve forgotten, remind me. It’s not even gonna be a huge post or anything because I didn’t find that much material (part of why I haven’t done it yet: waiting to see if I can find more) but yeah, that’s a thing I want to do.
