As we concluded the first installment of this series, we left the Tuileries on the eve of the French Revolution as a sleepy building abandoned by the royal family for decades.
The King and Court still resided at Versailles during the spring and summer of 1789, when Louis XVI summoned the Estates General, an elected Assembly of representatives of the Nation, to deal with the budget crisis. Paris had been briefly considered as the seat of the Estates General, but it was soon decided that they needed to meet close to the King and his ministers, in the Palace of Versailles.
Things were not going smoothly in the spring and summer of 1789, and many began talking of a “Revolution.” Bread was lacking, the King has massed foreign mercenaries around the capital. The people of Paris were restless and the Bastille, the hated symbol of the absolute monarchy, was stormed on July 14, 1789.
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