During the September Massacres, the prisons were attacked by mobs, and the prisoners were placed before hastily assembled people's tribunals, who judged and executed them summarily. Each prisoner was asked a handful of questions, after which the prisoner was either freed with the words 'Vive la nation', and permitted to leave, or sentenced to death with the words 'Conduct him to the Abbaye' or 'Let him go', after which the condemned was taken to a yard where they were immediately killed by a mob consisting of men, women and children.