Events of 18 Brumaire, Year VIII
On the morning of 18 Brumaire, members of the Council of Ancients sympathetic to the coup warned their colleagues of a Jacobin conspiracy and persuaded them to remove to the Château de Saint-Cloud, west of Paris. General Bonaparte was charged with the safety of the two Councils. Later that morning Sieyès and Roger Ducos resigned as Directors. Talleyrand persuaded Barras to do the same (the troops in the garden outside were persuasive).
The resignation of three of the five Directors prevented a quorum and thus practically abolished the Directory, but the two Jacobin Directors, Gohier and Moulin, continued to protest furiously. Both men were arrested by Napoleon's ally, General Moreau, and by the following day they were compelled to give up their resistance.
In contrast to the Directory, the two Councils were not yet intimidated and continued meeting.
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