Everywhere, in every province, in every city, the blood-red standard of the revolution was lifted up; might had become law; death was the rule, and in lieu of the boasted liberty of conscience was tyranny.  Who dared think otherwise than the terrorists, who presumed to doubt the measures of the Convention, was a criminal who, in the name of the one and indivisible republic, was to be punished with death; whose head must fall, for he had cherished thoughts which agreed not with the schemes of the revolutionists.

How in these days of agitation and anguish Josephine rejoiced at her good fortune, that she had not to tremble for her husband’s life; that she was away from the crater of the revolution which raged in Paris, and daily claimed so many victims!

Alexandre de Beauharnais was still with the army.  He had risen from rank to rank; and when, in May, General Custine was deposed by the Committee of Public Safety from the command of the Northern army, Alexandre de Beauharnais, who was then chief of the general’s staff of this army, was appointed in his place as commanding general of the Army of the Rhine; and the important work now to be achieved was to debar the besieging Prussians and Austrians from recapturing Mayence.  The Committee of Public Safety had dismissed General Custine from his post, because he had not pressed on with sufficient speed to the rescue of Mayence, according to the judgment of these new rulers of France, who wanted from Paris to decide all military matters, and who demanded victories whilst too often refusing the means necessary for victory.

General de Beauharnais was to turn to good what General Custine, according to the opinion of these gentlemen of the Convention, had failed to do.  This was an important and highly significant order, and to leave it unfulfilled was to excite the anger of the Committee of Safety; it was simply to deserve death.

General de Beauharnais knew this well, but he shrank not back from the weighty and dangerous situation in which he was placed.  To his country belonged his life, all his energies; and it was to him of equal importance whether his head fell on the battle-field or on the scaffold; in either case it would fall for his country; he would do his duty, and his country might be satisfied with him.

In this enthusiastic love for country, De Beauharnais accepted cheerfully the offered command of the Army of the Rhine as general-in-chief, and he prepared himself to march to the rescue of besieged Mayence.

Whilst General de Beauharnais was on the French frontier, Josephine trembled with anxious misgivings.  The new dignity of her husband filled her with fear, for she multiplied the dangers which surrounded him and his family, for now the eyes of the terrorists were fixed on him.  An unfortunate move, an unsuccessful war operation, could excite the wrath of these men of power, and send Beauharnais to the guillotine.  It was well known that he belonged not to the Mountain party, but to the moderate republicans, to the Girondists; and as the Girondists were now incarcerated, as the Committee of Safety had brought accusations against them, and declared them guilty of treason toward France, it was also easy, if it pleased the terrorists, to find a flaw in the character of General Beauharnais, and to bring accusations against him as had been done against the Girondists.