Thirty thousand National Guards advanced, about two p.m., by different streets, to the siege of the palace: but its defence was now in far other hands than those of Louis XVI.
Buonaparte, having planted artillery on all the bridges, had effectually secured the command of the river, and the safety of the Tuileries on one side.

He had placed cannon also at all the crossings of the streets by which the National Guard could advance towards the other front; and having posted his battalions in the garden of the Tuileries and Place du Carousel, he awaited the attack.
The insurgents had no cannon; and they came along the narrow streets of Paris in close and heavy columns.

When one party reached the church of St.Roche, in the Rue St.Honore, they found a body of Buonaparte's troops drawn up there, with two cannons.

It is disputed on which side the firing began; but in an instant the artillery swept the streets and lanes, scattering grape-shot among the National Guards, and producing such confusion that they were compelled to give way.

The first shot was a signal for all the batteries which Buonaparte had established; the quays of the Seine, opposite to the Tuileries, were commanded by his guns below the Palace and on the bridges.