The workers respond with insurrection to the…

The workers respond with insurrection to the closing of national workshops; bloody street fighting takes place from June 23-26, the so called-June Days.

Thousands of workers suddenly cut off the state payroll are joined by sympathizers-students, artisans, employed workers-in a spontaneous protest movement.

Barricades go up in many working-class sections.

On the second day of fighting, Lamartine is thrown out of office.

To suppress the insurrection, the Assembly appoints as temporary dictator General Louis-Eugène Cavaignac, who had made his mark in repressing Algerian rebel tribes, Entrusted with full powers to do the same in Paris, Cavaignac gives the workers time to dig themselves in, then brings up artillery against their barricades.

At least fifteen hundred rebels are killed; twelve thousand are arrested, and many are subsequently exiled to Algeria.

The radical movement is decapitated; the workers withdraw into silent and bitter opposition.

On June 28 the National Assembly names Cavaignac, called by his opponents ”the butcher of June”, chief executive of France.