Directory

Directory

https://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/1085/

1085

This five-member group functioned as the executive for the governmental system created by the Constitution of 1795. As its most visible component, the Directory gave its name to the entire government. It existed from October 1795 to November 1799, when it was overthrown by Napoléon Bonaparte with the assistance of one of the directors, Emmanuel-Joseph Sieyès. The directors staged a series of coups in Fructidor Year V (August-September 1797) and Floréal Year VI (April-May 1798) to overturn electoral results that they did not like, and the legislature purged the directors in Prairial Year VII. The Directory consolidated many of the gains of the first years of the Revolution and prosecuted the war successfully with the help of its brilliant young general Napoléon Bonaparte, but proved incapable of protecting the republic.