Bataclan attack in Paris

Witness History

BBC

History, Personal Journals, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 13 November 2025

⏱️ 11 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On 13 November 2015, 90 people were shot dead by gunmen at the Bataclan theatre in France during an Eagles of Death Metal concert.

A further 40 people were killed in co-ordinated terror attacks by jihadists across the city on the same night.

Rachel Naylor speaks to British couple Justine Merton-Scott and Tony Scott, who managed to escape the venue by climbing out of a skylight.

Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Witness History is for those fascinated by the past. We take you to the events that have shaped our world through the eyes of the people who were there. For nine minutes every day, we take you back in time and all over the world, to examine wars, coups, scientific discoveries, cultural moments and much more. Recent episodes explore everything from the death of Adolf Hitler, the first spacewalk and the making of the movie Jaws, to celebrity tortoise Lonesome George, the Kobe earthquake and the invention of superglue. We look at the lives of some of the most famous leaders, artists, scientists and personalities in history, including: Eva Peron – Argentina’s Evita; President Ronald Reagan and his famous ‘tear down this wall’ speech; Thomas Keneally on why he wrote Schindler’s List; and Jacques Derrida, France’s ‘rock star’ philosopher. You can learn all about fascinating and surprising stories, such as the civil rights swimming protest; the disastrous D-Day rehearsal; and the death of one of the world’s oldest languages.

(Photo: A Parisian holds a flower towards the Bataclan on the anniversary of the attack in 2021. Credit: Kiran Ridley / Getty Images)

Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts.
0:07.0	Hello, I'm Emma Barnett. For most of my career, I've been on live radio, and I love it.
0:13.3	But I've always wondered, what if we'd had more time? How much deeper does the story go?
0:19.2	I remember having this very sharp thought
0:21.7	that what you do right now,
0:23.6	this is it, this defines your life.
0:26.0	I'm ready to talk and ready to listen.
0:28.3	I'm insulted by how little the medical community is ever bothered with this.
0:33.9	Ready to talk with me, Emma Barnard, is my new podcast.
0:37.0	Listen on BBC Sounds.
0:43.1	Hi, this is Witness History from the BBC World Service. I'm Rachel Naler. If you're not new to us,
0:48.0	you know the drill. You can skip the next few seconds. If you are, welcome. We're the podcast
0:51.9	that brings history to life by hearing from those who are there. Episodes are just nine minutes long and they come out every weekday. If that appeals, welcome, with a podcast that brings history to life by hearing from those who are there.
0:54.8	Episodes are just nine minutes long and they come out every weekday.
0:57.7	If that appeals to you, why not subscribe and turn your push notifications on?
1:01.7	Today we're going back 10 years to when three gunmen killed 90 people at a music venue in Paris.
1:06.7	A further 40 people were murdered that night in separate terrorist incidents around the city.
1:11.0	It was France's worst peacetime attack.
1:13.6	I've been speaking to a British couple who were there.
1:17.9	It's the 13th of November 2015 and Justine Merton and her fiancée Tony Scott are in Paris for the weekend
1:23.6	to see Eagles of Death Metal and American rock band.
1:26.7	They spend the afternoon at Notre Dame Cathedral and then go out for dinner before arriving at the Batacloor, a theatre in the 11th hour and Dissomal at around 8pm.
	...

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