Back in December 2024, I traveled to France for the first time with my wife and, ever the public historian, I worked diligently to prepare myself for the history I would encounter along the way.

One of the surprising things I learned while preparing for our visit to the French capital: much of Paris burned during a vicious civil war that took place in the city in the early months of 1871.

Known as the Paris Commune, a revolutionary government set itself up in the French capital following the dramatic events of 1870, when Prussian armies utterly defeated and crushed French forces in the Franco-Prussian War. This included a bitter and deadly siege of Paris that lingered into 1871 that left thousands of civilians dead due to artillery fire, disease, and starvation.

It ended with total Prussian victory and peace terms that set the stage for the First World War in 1914.

Following French defeat, the Paris Commune occupied Paris and took up arms against a new French government it viewed as illegitimate. From March 1871 to May 1871, Paris was besieged again, this time by French forces facing off against the National Guard that sided with the Communards in Paris.

In late May 1871, French forces under the government based in Versailles, launched an assault into Paris and a bitter week-long struggle resulted. Known as Bloody Week, this brutal little civil war saw street-by-street fighting more reminiscent of 20th century combat.

As the Communard forces retreated, they set fire to many of the best known buildings across Paris, leaving thousands of buildings in the historic core of Paris in utter ruins.

After a week of fighting, French forces snuffed out of the Paris Commune, summarily executed many of its leaders, and set to rebuilding Paris and the French nation as a whole as the “Third Republic.” It’s estimated that as many as 20-25,000 people died in the fighting.

Little remains on the Parisian cityscape today to show that, just over 150 years ago, much of this European capital was in flames in a civil war that foreshadowed political and military battle lines that would shape the 20th century in Europe.

I’ll have more to come on this visit – I was fascinated by how the Paris Commune is deeply engrained in French history, society, and politics, even today.

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What I read to prepare for a trip to Paris

Seven Ages of Paris by Alistair Horne

The Fall of Paris: The Siege and the Commune 1870-71 by Alistair Horne

A New World Begins: The History of the French Revolution by Jeremy Popkin

Hero of Two Worlds: The Marquis de Lafayette in the Age of Revolution by Mike Duncan

The Revolutions Podcast, Season 3 by Mike Duncan (listened to this one – incredible)

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Read more travel stories from Jake Wynn – Public Historian

Exploring the history of “The Blitz” that devastated London in 1940-41 | Travel

In the footsteps of the 1848 Vienna Uprising in Austria | Travel

Memorial to victims of the Irish potato famine of the 1840s | Dublin, Ireland

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