They demanded more men, and a committee with three millions of francs could easily command recruits.  They stormed the Hotel des Invalides, where thousands of muskets were kept fit for instant use; one division of regular troops, whose commander, the Baron de Besenval, was a resolute man, determined to do his duty, mutinying against his orders, and refusing to fire on the mob.  They took possession of the city gates, and, thinking themselves now strong enough for any exploit, on the third day of the insurrection, the 14th of July, they marched in overpowering force to attack the Bastile.

In former times the Bastile had been the great fortress of the city; and, as such, it had been fortified with all the resources of the engineer’s art.  Massive well-armed towers rose at numerous points above walls of great height and solidity.  A deep fosse surrounded it, and, when well supplied and garrisoned, it had been regarded with pride by the citizens, as a bulwark capable of defying the utmost efforts of a foreign enemy, and not the less to be admired because they never expected it to be exposed to such a test; but as a warlike fortress it had long been disused.  In recent times it had only been known as the State-prison, identified more than any other with the worst acts of despotism and barbarity.  As such it was now as much detested as it had formerly been respected; and it had nothing but the outward appearance of strength to resist an attack.  Evidently the military authorities had never anticipated the possibility that the mob would rise to such a height of audacity.  But the rioters were now encouraged by two days of unbroken success, and those who spurred them on were well-informed as well as fearless.  They knew that the castle was in such a state that its apparent strength was its real weakness; that its entire garrison consisted of little more than a hundred soldiers, most of whom were superannuated veterans, a force inadequate to man one-tenth of the defenses; and that the governor, De Launay, though personally brave, was a man devoid of presence of mind, and nervous under responsibility.

Led by a brewer, named Santerre, who for the next three years bore a conspicuous part in all the worst deeds of ferocity and horror, they assailed the gates in vast numbers.  While the attention of the scanty garrison was fully occupied by this assault, another party scaled the walls at a point where there was not even a sentinel to give the alarm, and let down one draw-bridge across the fosse, while another was loosened, as is believed, by traitors in the garrison itself.  Swarming across the passage thus opened to them, thousands of the assailants rushed in; murdered the governor, officers, and almost every one of the garrison; and with a savage ferocity, as yet unexampled, though but a faint omen of their future crimes, they cut off the head and hands of De Launay and several of their chief victims, and, sticking them on pikes, bore them as trophies of their victory through the streets of the city.