The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1895-12-23

Paris. She is almost IS years of age.
Her father was marquis and her moth
er a peasant woman. She was of illegit-
innate birth, but her noble father gave
her an excellent education. When her
father died and she was left to shift for
herself, she supported herself as teach
er in public school in Burgundy for
awhile, but she taught her scholars that
the coup 'etat of 1851 was crime and
led them in singing the "Marseillaise. :"
Paris and opened school of her own,
where she taught the children Of the
poor still more radical doctrines.
At that time she believed that the sal
walton Of France lay in the establish
ment of a republic. She tried to assassi-
nate Napoleon when he was emperor. It
had been the dream of her life for years,
but Sedan occurred before she carried
out her plan. She firmly believed in the
usefulness of political assassination.
When the Germans marched into Paris,
Louise Michel led the rabble that har-
assed them. She divided her time be-
tween the hospital tents, where she
helped the wounded, and the front,
where she carried a musket and urged
her comrades to rush on the enemy.
They called her the "Red Num- then.
When the republic was established
and she saw that there were still those
who were poor and suffered, she turned
the batteries of her fiery oratory on the
bourgeois. 1t was then that she gained
the title of "the Mother of the Com
mune.' During the bloody week when
Do1.iu xz7oc OF tho Of no ho
was in the thiclest of the fighting.
Dressed in a ragged uniform of the ma
tional guard, she mounted the street bar
ricades, gun in hand, and defied the
Versailles troops amid a shower of
bullets. She was also seen leading a
rabble that spread petroleum fed flames
and almost burned up the city. In an
impassioned speech to the communists
one night she exclaimed:
''Thiers is in the way. will go and
kill himl''
She did not kill Theirs, but it was be-
cause the president was too closely
guarded.
When the commune was crushed,
Louise Michel surrendered, defied the
judges to do their worst and was sent to
New Caledonia. She was set free by the
amnesty act few years later and re-
turned to Paris only to throw herself
heart and soul into the anarchistic
movement. She carried the black flag
in the bread riots of 1888 and went to
jail for it. She has been jailed several
times since, always for offenses against
tie government. A few years ago she
was exiled, but went to London and
carried on her work of spreading the
propaganda just the same. Recently she
was allowed to return to her beloved
Paris. She was received by a great
crowd of workingmen, who cheered her
all the way to her humble quarters.
els it some foreign prince that has ar
riVed?" asked stranger.
'tPrince!' contemptuously exclaimed
a man in a blouse. ''No. it is Louise
Michel that comes.
The ''Red Virgin, although possess
ing the intelligence to earn enough to
purchase all comforts and many Injuries,
lives in almost absolute poverty. She in
habits wretched garnet on the outskirts
of Paris. There she writes her books
and keeps her cats. She receives a good
income from her publishers, but spends
it all in relieving the distress of those
around her.
Her friends have almost given up the
attempt to keep her decently dressed,
because she has a habit of taking off her
skirt, jacket or even her shoes and pre-
senting them to the first needy woman
she meets
Tbs thousands of persons in this coun-
try who have read of her romantic ca
reer will want TO see Louise Michel and
hear her speak, and her lecturing tour
will probably prove big success.