Of course the greater
number of these persons were not actually wounded, but crushed, or
stunned, or thrown down. There was no respect of persons in the use made
of their swords by the police. Three French officers of the 40th, who
were in plain clothes amongst the crowd, were cut down and severely
wounded. An Irish gentleman, the brother of the member for Fermanagh,
narrowly escaped a sabre-cut by dodging behind a pillar. The son of
Prince Piombino was pursued by a gendarme beneath the gateway of his own
palace, and only got off with his hat slit right in two. Persons were
hunted down by the soldiery even out of the Corso. One gentleman, an
Italian, was chased up the Via Condotti by a dragoon with his sword
drawn, and saved himself from a sabre-cut by taking refuge in a passage.
Some of the dragoons rode down the Via Ripetta, when they had come to the
top of the Corso, and cut down a woman who was passing by. As soon as
the Corso was cleared, the gendarmes went into the different cafes along
the street, and ordered all persons, who were found in them, to go home
at once. In one case an infirm old man, who could not make off fast
enough, had his face cut open by a sabre-blow; while the backs of the
gendarmes' swords were used plentifully to expedite the departure of the
cafe frequenters. The exact number of wounded it is of course impossible
to ascertain.
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