Appointed U.S. Minister to France in 1785, Thomas Jefferson was in Paris in July 1789 when the French people rose up against their rulers and the first blood was shed in the opening days of the French Revolution. In his letter to Secretary of Foreign Affairs John Jay, Jefferson recounts how a mob stormed the Bastille, took the stash of arms, freed the prisoners, and seized the "Governor" of the Bastille who was then killed and beheaded in the city streets.
Jefferson’s letter and other gripping eyewitness acounts from U.S. History are part of the Eyewitness exhibit–travelling to museums nationwide through 2008.
