Dragonnades

An Episode from the Dragonnades, painting by Jules Girardet
A Protestant political cartoon satirising the Dragonnades

The Dragonnades was a policy implemented by Louis XIV in 1681 to force French Protestants known as Huguenots to convert to Roman Catholicism. It involved the billeting of dragoons of the French Royal Army in Huguenot households, with the soldiers being given implied permission to mistreat the inhabitants and damage or steal their possessions. Soldiers employed as part of this policy were derisively referred to as "missionary dragoons".