Remembering France's Heritage: Saint Bartholomew's Day Massacre

August 24, 1572 (436 years ago) is a day that has lived in infamy in the annals of the French Reformed (Protestant) Church. The date is remembered for what is commonly called “The St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre” (Massacre de la Saint-Barthélemy in French).

Though Charles IX was enthroned as king, his mother, Catherine de Médici, still played a dominant role in the kingdom. In an effort to escape dominance by the House of Guise (Catholic) while at the same avoiding dependence on Admiral Coligny, leader of the Huguenot forces, Catherine desired to wed her daughter Marguerite (sister to Charles IX) to the young Protestant Henry of Navarre. The wedding took place on August 18, 1572.

The Huguenot nobility and followers of the young King of Navarre had flocked into a zealously Catholic Paris, heightening the tension already existing in the city. Four days following the wedding, Admiral Coligny’s life was almost taken when shots were fired at him from a window. The perpetrators were unknown but panic ensued. In the brouhaha of secret meetings, negotiations, etc., Catherine determined to capitalize on the presence of so many Huguenot leaders. Early on August 24 (a feast day in honor of Bartholomew, one of the twelve apostles), Catherine gave the word and the blood bath began. The wounded Coligny was killed in his bed, his body thrown out the window and dragged through the streets. The blood-thirsty mobs and Guise-controlled gangs continued the butchery, atrociously slaughtering the unsuspecting Huguenots and committing crimes on their victims that are repulsive even to the most perverted of minds. The exact number of fatalities is not known, but it has been estimated that more than 2,000 innocent Huguenots were killed in Paris and more than 3,000 in the French provinces.

(Painting by François Dubois, 1529–84)