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When they had travelled a few hours, they fell into an ambuscade of militia, and were marched back to the archpriest's quarters at Pont-de-Montvert. The women were sent to Mende to be immured in convents, and the men were imprisoned in the archpriest's dungeons. The parents of some of the captives ran to throw themselves at his feet, and implored mercy for their sons; but Chayla was inexorable.
After this event persecution was redoubled throughout the Cevennes. The militia ran night and day after the meetings in the Desert. All persons found attending them, who could be captured, were either killed on the spot or hanged. Two companies of militia were quartered in Pont-de-Montvert at the expense of the inhabitants; and they acted under the direction of the archpriest Du Chayla.
Germain to assist at the obsequies of the archpriest Chayla, whose body had been brought thither from Pont-de-Montvert on the morning after his murder. When Seguier was informed that the town and country militia were in force in the place, he turned aside and went in another direction.
The village of Pont-de-Montvert is situated in the hollow of a deep valley formed by the mountain of Lozère on the north, and of Bougès on the south, at the point at which two streams, descending from their respective summits, flow into the Tarn. The village is separated by these streams into three little hamlets, which are joined together by the bridge which gives its name to the place.
Pont-de-Montvert is the centre of a series of hamlets, the inhabitants of which were in former times almost exclusively Protestant, as they are now; and where meetings in the Desert were of the most frequent occurrence. Strong detachments of troops were accordingly stationed there and at Florac for the purpose of preventing the meetings and overawing the population.
The Royalists, having received considerable reinforcements, hastened from different directions to intercept him, but he slipped through their fingers, and descended to Pont-de-Montvert, from whence he threw himself upon the villages situated near the sources of the western Gardon.
Other reverses followed in quick succession. Salomon was attacked near Pont-de-Montvert, the birthplace of the insurrection, and lost some eight hundred of his men. His magazines at Magistavols were also discovered and ransacked, containing, amongst other stores, twenty oxen and a hundred sheep.
Besides soldiers, the authorities also established missions throughout the Cevennes, and the principal inspector of these missions was the archpriest Chayla. The house in which he resided at Pont-de-Montvert is still pointed out.
This terrible man had resolved upon a general massacre of the priests, and he now threw himself upon Frugères for the purpose of carrying out the enterprise begun by him at Pont-de-Montvert. The curé of the hamlet, who had already heard of Chayla's murder, fled from his house at sound of the approaching psalm-singers, and took refuge in an adjoining rye-field.
And thus Pont-de-Montvert, which had seen the beginning, also saw the end of the insurrection. After the death of the last of the Camisard leaders, there was no further effort at revolt. The Huguenots seemed to be entirely put down, and Protestantism completely destroyed. There was no longer any resistance nor protest. If there were any Huguenots who had not become Catholics, they remained mute.
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