A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Gouges, Marie Olympe de
GOUGES, MARIE OLYMPE DE,
A native of Montauban. During the revolution she espoused the cause of the people, and made Mirabeau the hero of her writings. But the enormities of the Jacobins disgusted her; and when Louis the Sixteenth was dragged before the tribunal, she had the courage to demand the privilege of defending him. This heroic conduct, and her attacks on Marat and Robespierre, marked her out for death. She was guillotined November 3rd., 1792, aged thirty-eight. She wrote several dramas. Her character as a woman was by no means irreproachable.