Friends of the Rights of Man? Representing the British in a Radicalizing France

Abstract

The fortunes of the British in France reached an acute juncture over late 1792 and early 1793. This stemmed from the failure of radical hopes that a revolution like that in France might take place in Britain too, from the increasing ideological polarization of the Revolution in France itself, and from declining Franco–British diplomatic relations and then outright war. Rather than modelling revolution for Britain and Ireland, expatriates from these countries instead became seen as avatars of the failure of such hopes. Ultimately, they came to be included in, and perhaps to be the leading elements in, a new reading of the British people. The latter were now no longer seen as fellow sans-culottes seeking true liberty, but rather as the worst of counter-revolutionaries—slaves who had come to love the chains of their seeming-freedom.