BARRICADE. A hastily improvised ob struction intended to defend streets,. bridges and other narrow passages, and to retard the enemy in his movements. Carriages, casks, chests, furniture, beams, chains, and, in short, which is at hand, is used for this purpose, either in defending a town against besiegers, or in suppressing popular tumults.
Barricades have been made use of in street fights since the Middle Ages, but they are best known in connection with the insurrections in the city of Paris. As early as 1358 the streets of Paris were barricaded against the Dauphin, afterward Charles V. A more. note worthy barricade-fight was that in 1588, when 4,000 Swiss soldiers, marched into Paris by Henry III to overawe the Council of Sixteen, would have been utterly destroyed by the populace, firing from behind barricades, had the court not consented to negotiation; and the result was that the King fled next day.
. The next barricade-fight of importance in Paris was that of 1830, which resulted in the exiiufsion of the Bourbons from the throne of France, and the election of the citizen-King, Louis Philippe. During the three days which this revolution lasted, the number of barricades erected across the streets amounted to several thousands. They were formed of the most heterogeneous materials—overturned vehicles, trees, scaffolding-poles, planks, building-mate rials and street paving-stones; men, women and children talcing part in their erection. In February 184.8, the insurrection against Louis Philippe commenced with the erection of barri cades; but the most celebrated and bloody barricade-fight was that between the populace and provisional government, which, conunenc ing on the night of the 23 June 1848, lasted throughout the three following days, when the people had to surrender. The national
losses by this fight were estimated at .30,000,000 francs; 16,000 persons were killed and wounded, and 8,000 taken prisoners. The Emperor Napoleon III so widened and macad amized the principal.streets of Pans after he ascended the throne as to render the success ful erection of barricades next to impossible. There was a remarkable barricade-erection in London in 1821. The ministry desired that the body of Queen Caroline should be conveyed out of the country to Germany, for interment, without the populace having the opportunity of malcing any demonstration. On the matter be coming known, a vast barricade was erected at the point where the Hampstead road joins the new road; and as nothing but the use of artillery could have forced the way, the officer in charge of the funeral cortege deemed it prudent to change his course and pass through a more central part of the metropolis. During the revolutions of 1848, barricades were suc cessfully carried in Paris, Berlin, Vienna and other places, by abandoning the attack in front and breaking through the houses of contiguous streets, taking their defenders in the rear.