VENDEE, WARS OF THE, a counter-revolutionary insur rection which took place during the French Revolution (q.v.), not only in Vendee proper but also in Lower Poitou, Anjou, Lower Maine and Brittany. The district was mainly inhabited by peasants; it contained few important towns, and the bourgeois were but a feeble minority. The ideas of the Revolution were slow in penetrating to this ignorant peasant population, which had always been less civilized than the majority of Frenchmen, and in 1789 the events which roused enthusiasm throughout the rest of France left the Vendeans indifferent. Presently, too, signs of discontent appeared. The priests who had refused to submit to the Civil Constitution of the Clergy perambulated these retired districts, and stigmatized the revolutionists as heretics. In 1791 two "representatives on mission" informed the Convention of the disquieting condition of Vendee, and this news was quickly fol lowed by the exposure of a royalist plot organized by the mar quis de La Rouerie.
The signal for a widespread rising was the introduction of conscription acts for the recruiting of the depleted armies on the eastern frontiers. In February 1793 the Convention decreed a levy on the whole of France, and on the eve of the ballot the Vendee, rather than comply with this requisition, broke out in insurrection. In the month of March 1793 the officer com manding at Cholet was killed, and republicans were massacred at Machecoul and St. Florent. Giving rein to their ancient antip athy, the revolted peasantry attacked the towns, which were liberal in ideas and republican in sympathies.
These first successes of the Vendeans coincided with grave republican reverses on the frontier—war with England, Holland and Spain, the defeat of Neerwinden and the defection of Dumouriez. The emigrés then began to throw in their lot with the Vendeans. Royalist nobles like the marquis de Bonchamp, Char ette de la Contrie, Gigot d'Elbee, Henri de la Rochejaquelein and the marquis de Lescure placed themselves at the head of the peas ants. Although several of these leaders were Voltairians, they held
up Louis XVI., who had been executed in Jan. 1793, as a martyr to Catholicism, and the Vendeans, who had hitherto styled them selves the Christian Army, now adopted the name of the Catholic and Royal Army.
The Convention took measures against the emigrés and the refractory priests. By a decree of March 19, 1793, every person accused of taking part in the counter-revolutionary revolts, or of wearing the white cockade (the royalist emblem), was declared an outlaw. The prisoners were to be tried by military commissions, and the sole penalty was death with confiscation of property. The Convention also sent representatives on mission into Vendee to effect the purging of the municipalities, the reorganization of the national guards in the republican towns and the active prosecu tion of the revolutionary propaganda. These measures proving in sufficient, a decree was promulgated on April 3o, 1793, for the despatch of regular troops; but, in spite of their failure to capture Nantes, the successes of the Vendeans continued.
At the end of Aug. i793, the republicans had three armies in the Vendee—the army of Rochelle, the army of Brest and the Mayen pis; but their generals were either ciphers, like Ronsin, or divided among themselves, like Rossignol and Canclaux. They were un certain whether to cut off the Vendeans from the sea or to drive them westwards ; and moreover, their men were undisciplined.
Although the peasants had to leave their chiefs and work on the land, the Vendeans still remained formidable opponents. They were equipped partly with arms supplied by England, and partly with fowling-pieces, which at that period were superior to the small-arms used by the troops, and their intimate knowl edge of the country gave them an immense advantage.
The dissensions of the republican leaders and the demoralizing tactics of the Vendeans resulted in republican defeats at Chan tonnay, Torfou, Coron, St. Lambert, Montaigu and St. Fulgent.