Hotties from History

Hotty from History #10 - Charlotte Corday

(27 July 1768 – 17 July 1793) Born Marie-Anne Charlotte de Corday d’Armont, Charlotte was a member of a minor aristocratic family. Everything wasn’t right in the Corday house however; her mum and older sister died within a few months of each other. To cope with his grief, Mr Corday sent little Charlie off to live in an Abbey. Not being one to sit about and do nothing, Charlotte spent all her time reading the somewhat racy philosophies of Voltaire and Rousseau, educating those ‘little grey cells’.

Entrez the French Revolution.

Jean-Paul Marat was a member of the Jacobin faction who led the Reign of Terror following the revolution. He was powerful and influential, a link between the ruling politicians and the people because of his newspaper smarmily called “the Friend of the People”. In August and September 1792, mob violence broke out throughout Paris, championed and encouraged by Mr Marat. By the end of it, over 1000 of the jailed aristocracy and clergy had been horribly killed by mobs of ordinary French citizens, egged on all the time by Marat’s paper.

Well, that really pissed off Charlotte.

She arrived at Marat’s home, claiming to know essential info about an up-coming uprising and was shown into Mr Marat’s bathroom, where he liked to hang out because he whinged all the time about having a terrible skin desease (which was actually an intolerance to wheat, the whiney bastard). She then pulled a 6-inch kitchen knife from her considerable petticoats and stabbed him in the heart.

At her trial, the Fantastic Mademoiselle Corday made a kick-ass speech about “killing one man to save 100,000” and four days later was guillotined for the murder. The story doesn’t end there though: some dick called Legros picked up her newly lopped-off head and gave it a slap. Reports say her expression changed to “unequivocal indignation”.

Soph.