Part 2 — Chapter III. (These four articles abrogated by the four articles following them, 118-122.) Article 118. The Federal Constitution may at any time be amended. (continued 57)

A. W. Kinglake, The Invasion of the Crimea, volume 1, chapter 14.

ALSO IN: E. Tênot, Paris in December, 1851, chapters 1-4.

V. Hugo, Napoleon the Little.

M. de Maupas, The Story of the Coup d'État.

B. Jerrold, Life of Napoleon III., book 8 (volume 3).

FRANCE: A. D. 1851. The bloody Triumph of the Coup d'État. Destruction of the Second Republic.

"The second part of the Coup d'État, which drenched the boulevards with innocent blood, has cast a shade of horror over the whole transaction that time has been unable to efface. Paris is never so reduced in a crisis, whether the cause be just or unjust, that she is bereft of hands to erect and defend barricades in her streets. In the Faubourg St. Antoine an incipient rising on the 2d was suppressed immediately by the troops. The volcanic district from the Hôtel de Ville northward to the boulevards also showed signs of uneasiness, and throughout the morning of the 3d the military were busy pulling down partially completed barricades and dispersing small bodies of insurgents. There seems to be little question that the army was embittered against the populace. If this were so, the proclamation circulated by the president through the ranks on the 2d was not calculated to appease it. He styled the soldiers as the 'flower of the nation.' He pointed out to them that his interests and theirs were the same, and that they had suffered together in the past from the course of the Assembly. He reminded them of the years 1830 and 1848, when the army had fought the people in the streets of Paris, and concluded by an allusion to the military grandeur of the Bonapartes. During the afternoon of the 3d and morning of the 4th the troops remained inactive; pending orders from the minister of war, and in this interval several strong barricades were erected in the restless quarters. On the afternoon of the 4th the boulevards, from the Madeleine to the Rue du Sentier, were occupied by a great body of troops awaiting orders to move east through the Boulevard Bonne Nouvelle upon the barricaded district. The soldiers stood at ease, and the officers lounged about, smoking their cigars. The sidewalks, windows, and balconies were crowded with men, women, and children, thoughtless onlookers of the great military display. Suddenly a single shot was heard. It was fired from a window near the Rue du Sentier. The troops at the head of the column faced sharply to the south, and commenced a deliberate fusillade upon the crowded walks and balconies. The battalions farther west caught the murderous contagion, until the line of fire extended into the Boulevard des Italiens. In a few moments the beautiful boulevards were converted into a bloody pandemonium. The sidewalks were strewn with corpses and stained with blood. The air was rent with shrieks and groans and the breaking of glass, while the steady, incessant rattling of the musketry was intensified by an occasional cannon-shot, that brought down with a crash the masonry from some fine façade. {1378} This continued for nearly twenty minutes, when a lack of people to kill seems to have restrained the mad volleys of the troops. If any attempt was made by officers to check their men, it was wholly unavailing, and in some cases miserable fugitives were followed into buildings and massacred. Later in the day the barricades were attacked, and their defenders easily overcome. By night-fall insurgent Paris was thoroughly cowed. These allegations, though conflicting with sworn statements of Republicans and Imperialists, can hardly be refuted. The efforts of the Napoleonic faction to portray the thoughtless crowd of the boulevards as desperate and bloody-minded rebels have never been successful, while the opposition so brilliantly represented by the author of 'Histoire d'un Crime' have been too fierce and immoderate in their accusations to win public credence. The questions as to who fired the first shot, and whether it was fired as a signal for, or a menace against the military, are points on which Frenchmen of different political parties still debate. It is charitable to accept M. Hugo's insinuation that the soldiery were drunk with the president's wine, even though the fact implies a low state of discipline in the service. To what extent was the president responsible for the boulevard horror? M. Victor Hugo and M. de Maupas do not agree upon this point, and it seems useless to discuss it. Certain facts are indisputable. We know the army bore small love toward the Parisians, and we know it was in the streets by order of the president. We know that the latter was in bad company, and playing a dangerous game. We may discard M. Victor Hugo's statement as to the orders issued by the president from the Elysée on the fatal day, but we cannot disguise the fact that the boulevard horror subdued Paris, and crowned his cause with success. In other words, Louis Napoleon was the gainer by the slaughter of unoffending men, women, and children, and in after-years, when referring to the 4th of December, he found it for his interest to distort facts, and make figures lie. … Louis Napoleon had expressly stated in the proclamation that astonished Paris on the 2d that he made the people judge between him and the Assembly. The citizens of France were called upon to vote on the 20th and 21st of December 'Yes' or 'No' to the question as to whether the president should be sustained in the measures he had taken, should be empowered to draw up a new constitution, and should retain the presidential chair for a period of ten years."

H. Murdock, The Reconstruction of Europe, chapter 2.

ALSO IN: V. Hugo, History of a Crime.

E. Tênot, Paris in December, 1851, chapters 5-6.

M. de Maupas, Story of the Coup d'État, chapters 18-24 (volume 2).

Count H. de Viel Castel, Memoirs, volume 1, chapter 4.

FRANCE: A. D. 1851-1852. Transportation and exile of republicans. The dictator's constitution for France. Rapid progress of despotism. The Second Empire ordained. Elevation of Napoleon III. to the throne.

"The struggle was over: terror of the victors followed. Thirty-two departments were in a state of siege. More than 100,000 citizens were languishing in prison. Trial followed trial in rapid succession, the cases being classed under three heads: 1st, persons found armed, or against whom serious charges existed; 2d, persons charged with minor offences; 3d, dangerous persons. The first class was judged at once by a council of war, the second sent to various tribunals, the third transported without trial. Many prisoners were not even questioned. Numbers were set free; but multitudes were still held. Under these conditions the date of the plebiscite, December 20 and 21, approached. Notices were posted to the effect that 'any person seeking to disturb the polls or to question the result of the ballot would be tried by a council of war.' All liberty of choice was taken from the electors, many of whom were arrested on suspicion of exciting others to vote against the president of the republic. When the lists were published it was found that the 'ayes' had carried the day, although many did not vote at all. Indubitably the figures were notably swelled by violence and fraud. … December 31, ex-Minister Baroche presented the result of the ballots to the prince-president,—a strange title now given to Louis Napoleon, for the time being, in lieu of another. … Next day, January 1, 1852, Archbishop Sibour celebrated a Te Deum in Notre Dame, the prince-president sitting under a canopy. … While the man of December 2 lodged in the palace of kings, the chief representatives of the republic were cast into exile. The executors of the plot treated the captive representatives very differently according as they were conservative or republican. When the prisoners were told that a distinction was to be made among them, they honorably refused to give their names, but they were betrayed by an usher of the Assembly. The republicans were then sent to Mazas, and treated like common thieves, M. Thiers alone being allowed a bed instead of the ordinary hammock. The other party were soon set free, with but few exceptions, and on the 8th of January the generals imprisoned at Ham, with their companion, Questor Baze, were sent to Belgium. Next day a series of proscriptions came out. All persons 'convicted of taking part in the recent insurrections' were to be transported, some to Guiana, some to Algiers. A second decree expelled from France, Algiers, and the French colonies, 'as a measure of public safety,' sixty representatives of the Left, including Victor Hugo and certain others, for whom it was reserved to aid in the foundation of a third republic. A third decree commanded the temporary absence from France and Algiers of eighteen other representatives, including the generals, with Thiers, De Rémusat, and several members of the Left, among them Edgar Quinet and Emile de Girardin. … The next step was to establish the famous 'mixed commissions' in every province. These commissions were to try the numerous prisoners still held captive. … The mixed commissions of 1852, as the historian of the coup d'état (M. Eugène Ténot) declares, 'decided, without legal proceedings, without hearing of witnesses, without public trial, the fate of thousands and thousands of republicans.' They have left the indelible memory of one of the most monstrous events known in history. An act equally extraordinary in another way was the promulgation of the new constitution framed by the dictator alone (January 14, 1852). … The constitution of 1852 began by a 'recognition, confirmation, and guarantee of the great principles proclaimed in 1789, which are the foundation of the public rights and laws of France.' {1379} But it did not say one word about the freedom of the press, nor about freedom of clubs and association. … 'The government of the French republic is intrusted to Prince Louis Napoleon Bonaparte for the term of ten years.' In the preface Louis Napoleon threw aside the fiction of irresponsibility 'which deceives public sentiment'; the constitution therefore declares the leader of the state responsible to the French people, but omits to say how this responsibility may be realized; the French people have no resource save revolution. … The legislative body was to consist of 262 members (one for each 3,500 electors), chosen for five years by universal suffrage. This body would vote upon the laws and taxes. Louis Napoleon, having profited so largely by the repeal of the law of May 31, could scarcely refuse to retain direct universal suffrage, but he essentially altered its character by various modifications. He also so reduced the importance of the only great body still elective, that he had little or nothing to fear from it. Another assembly, the Senate, was to be composed of eighty members, which number might be increased to 150. The senators were irremovable, and were to be chosen by the president of the republic, with the exception of cardinals, marshals, and admirals, who were senators by right. The president might give each senator an income of 80,000 francs. The Senate was the guardian of the constitution and of 'the public liberty.' … The executive power chose all mayors, and was at liberty to select them outside the town council. In fact, the constitution of 1852 surpassed the constitution of the year VIII. as a piece of monarchic reaction. It entailed no consulate, but an empire,—dictatorship and total confiscation of public liberty. … Despotism spread daily in every direction. On the 17th of February the liberty of the press was notably reduced, and severe penalties were affixed to any infraction. In fact, the press was made dependent on the good-will of the president. Education was next attacked, a decree of March 9, 1852, stripping the professors of the University of all the pledges and principles granted by the First Empire. … The new power, in 1852, labored to turn all the forces of the country to material interests, while it stifled all moral interests. It suppressed education and the press, and constantly stimulated the financial and industrial movement. … Numberless railroad companies now sprang to life, and roads were rapidly built upon a grand scale. The government adopted the system of grants on a long term of years,—say ninety-nine,—plus the guarantee of a small rate of interest. In everything the cry was for instant success, at any cost. Great financial operations followed on the heels of the first grants to railroad companies. … This year's budget, like the constitution, was the work of a single man. The dictator settled it by a decree; then, having ordered the elections for his Chamber of Deputies, just before his constitution went into operation, he raised the universal state of siege (March 28). This was only a feint, for his government was a permanent state of siege. … The official candidates presented, or rather imposed, were generally elected; the republicans failed to vote throughout a great part of the country. … March 29, the prince-president proceeded to install the great state bodies at the Tuileries. It was thought that he would hint in his speech that he expected the title of Emperor, but he left that point vague, and still talked of preserving the republic. … During the session a rumor was current that Louis Napoleon was to be proclaimed emperor on the 10th of May, after the distribution of eagles to the army; but this was not carried out. The dictator had no desire to be made emperor in this fashion. He meant to do it more artfully, and to make it seem that the nation forced the accomplishment of his wishes upon him. He therefore undertook a fresh journey through the provinces. … The watchword was everywhere given by the authorities and influential persons, whose example was imitated by the crowd, irreconcilable opponents keeping silent. … He returned to Paris, October 16, and was received in state at the Orleans station. The official bodies greeted him with shouts of 'Long live the Emperor!' … Next day, the following paragraph appeared in the 'Moniteur': 'The tremendous desire for the restoration of the empire manifested throughout France, makes it incumbent upon the president to consult the Senate upon the subject.' The Senate and Legislature were convened November 4; the latter was to verify the votes, should the Senate decide that the people must be consulted in regard to a change in the form of government, which no one doubted would be the case. … The Senate … passed a decree for the submission of the restoration of the hereditary empire for popular acceptance (November 7); the senators then went in a body to St. Cloud to inform the prince-president of this decision. … The people were then called upon to vote for the plebiscite decreed by the Senate (November 20 and 21). Republican and legitimist protests were circulated in despite of the police, the government publishing them in the official organ, the 'Moniteur,' as if in defiance, thinking that the excessive violence of the republican proscripts of London and Guernsey would alarm the peace-loving public. The result of the vote was even greater than that of December 20, 1851; the authenticity of the figures may indeed be doubted, but there is not a doubt that there was really a large majority in favor of the plebiscite. France abandoned the struggle! On the evening of December 1, the three great state bodies, the two Chambers and the State Council, went to St. Cloud, and the president of the Legislature presented the result of the ballot to the new emperor, who sat enthroned, between his uncle Jerome and his cousin Napoleon."

H. Martin, Popular History of France, 1789-1878, volume 3, chapter 15.

ALSO IN: H. C. Lockwood, Constitutional History of France, chapter 6, and appendix 9.

FRANCE: A. D. 1853-1856. The Crimean war.

See RUSSIA: A. D. 1853-1854, to 1854-1856.

FRANCE: A. D. 1857-1860. Allied operations with England in China.

See CHINA: A. D. 1856-1860.

FRANCE: A. D. 1858. The Orsini attempt to assassinate Napoleon III. Complaints against England.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 1858-1859.

FRANCE: A. D. 1859. Alliance with Sardinia and war with Austria. Victories of Magenta and Solferino. Liberation of Lombardy. Peace of Villafranca. Acquisition of Savoy and Nice.

See ITALY: A. D. 1856-1859, and 1859-1861.

{1380}

FRANCE: A. D. 1860. The Chevalier-Cobden commercial treaty with England.

See TARIFF LEGISLATION (FRANCE): A. D. 1858-1860.

FRANCE: A. D.1860-1870. Modifications of the imperial constitution.

"Originally … the power of the Legislative Body was limited to voting and rejecting as a whole the laws submitted to it by the Executive; there was no such thing as criticism or control of the general policy of the reign: but the year 1860 opened a period of development in the direction of liberty; by a decree of the November of that year the Emperor permitted the Deputies to draw up an address in answer to his speech, giving them thereby the opportunity to criticise his policy; by that of December 1861 he allowed them to vote the budget by sections, that is to say, to discuss and, if desirable, reject its items; by that of January 1867 he substituted for the Address the right of questioning the Ministers, who might be delegated to the Chamber by the Emperor to take part in certain definite discussions; lastly, by that of September 1869 he gave to the Legislative Body the right of initiating laws, removed the restrictions hitherto retained on the right of amendment and of questions, and made the Ministers responsible to the Chamber. Thus the Constitution was deliberately modified, by the initiative of the Emperor himself, from the form of imperial despotism to that of parliamentary monarchy: this modified Constitution was submitted to a plebiscite in May 1870, and once more the people ratified the Empire by over seven million votes against a million and a half."

G. L. Dickinson, Revolution and Reaction in Modern France, chapter 7, section 8.

FRANCE: A. D.1861-1867. Intervention in Mexico and its humiliating failure.

See MEXICO: A. D. 1861-1867.

FRANCE: A. D. 1862. Commercial treaty with Germany.

See TARIFF LEGISLATION (GERMANY): A. D. 1853-1892.

FRANCE: A. D. 1866. Withdrawal of troops from Rome.

See ITALY: A. D. 1862-1866.

FRANCE: A. D. 1866-1870. Territorial concessions demanded from Germany. The Luxemburg question. War temporarily averted.

See GERMANY. A.D. 1866-1870.

FRANCE: A. D. 1867. Last defense of Papal sovereignty at Rome. Defeat of Garibaldi at Mentana.

See ITALY: A.D. 1867-1870.

FRANCE: A. D. 1870 (June-July). "The Hohenzollern incident." Unjustifiable declaration of war against Prussia.

"Towards the last of June, 1870, there arose what is known as the 'Hohenzollern incident,' which assumed so much importance, as it led up to the Franco-German War. In June, 1868, Queen Isabella had been chased from Spain, and had sought refuge in France. The Spanish Cortes, maintaining the monarchical form, offered the Crown of Spain to Prince Hohenzollern, a relation of the King of Prussia.

See SPAIN: A. D. 1866-1878.

The French Minister at Madrid telegraphed that Prince Leopold Hohenzollern had been nominated to the throne of Spain, and had accepted. This produced the utmost excitement and indignation among the French people. The Paris press teemed with articles more or less violent, calling on the government to prevent this outrage, even at the cost of war. The journals of all shades were unanimous in the matter, contending that it was an insult and a peril to France, and could not be tolerated. The Opposition in the Chamber made the incident an occasion for attacking the government, alleging that it was owing to its weak and vacillating policy that France was indebted to her fresh humiliation. The government journals, however, laid the whole blame upon the ambition of Count Bismarck, who had become to them a bête noire. … Both parties vied with each other in showing the extent of their dislike to the great Prussian Chancellor. Much pressure was soon brought to bear in the proper quarters; the result of this was the withdrawal of the Hohenzollern candidacy. Explanations were made, better counsels seemed to prevail, and all immediate trouble appeared averted. It seemed quite certain that all danger of a war between France and Germany was at an end, and all being quiet on the banks of the Seine, on the 3d of July I left Paris in pursuit of health and recreation at the healing waters of Carlsbad, of far-off Bohemia. I was in excellent relations with the Duke de Gramont, and everything appeared to be serene. I had hardly reached Carlsbad, when scanty news was received of a somewhat threatening character. I could hardly believe that anything very serious was likely to result; yet I was somewhat uneasy. Going to drink the water at one of the health-giving springs, early in the morning of July 15th, my Alsatian valet brought me the startling news, that a private telegram, received at midnight, gave the intelligence that France had declared war against Germany. The news fell upon the thousands of visitors and the people of Carlsbad, like a clap of thunder in a cloudless sky, and the most intense excitement prevailed. The nearest railroad station to Carlsbad, at that time, was Eger. … I rode all night from Carlsbad to Eger. Taking the railroad from Eger to Paris, and passing through Bavaria, Baden, Darmstadt and the valley of the Rhine, the excitement was something prodigious, recalling to me the days at home of the firing upon Sumter, in 1861. The troops were rushing to the depots; the trains were all blocked, and confusion everywhere reigned supreme. After great delays, and much discomfort, and a journey of fifty-two hours, I reached Paris at ten o'clock at night, July 18th. The great masses of people, naturally so excitable and turbulent, had been maddened by the false news so skilfully disseminated, that King William, at Ems, had insulted the French nation through its Ambassador. … It soon turned out that all the reports which had been spread over Paris, that King William had insulted the French Ambassador were utterly false, and had not the slightest foundation. The French Ambassador, M. Benedetti, denied that he had received the least indignity from the Emperor. The plain truth seemed to be that the French Ambassador courteously approached the Emperor, while walking in the garden of the Kursaal, and spoke to him in relation to the pending difficulties then existing between the two countries. The good old king was kind and polite, as he always is to every one with whom he comes in contact, and when M. Benedetti commenced talking in relation to matters of such a grave character, he politely stated that he would have to talk upon such questions with the German Foreign Office. All that was very proper, and nobody thought of it, or supposed that there was any indignity, as there was not the slightest intended. … {1381} The exaggerations in Paris and France of this simple incident surpassed all bounds, and they were apparently made to inflame the people still more. It really appeared that the Government of France had determined to have war with Germany, coûte que coûte [at all costs]. The alleged causes growing out of the talk that Germany was to put a German prince on the throne of Spain were but a mere pretext. The Hohenzollern candidature had been withdrawn, and there was no necessity or sense in any further trouble. But the truth was that, after eighteen years of peace, the courtiers and adventurers who surrounded the Emperor seemed to think that it was about time to have a war, to awaken the martial spirit of the French people, to plant the French eagles in triumph in the capital of some foreign country, and, as a consequence, to fix firmly on the throne the son of Napoleon the Third, and restore to the Imperial crown the lustre it had lost."

E. B. Washburne, Recollections of a Minister to France, volume 1, chapter 2.

ALSO IN: W. Müller, Political History of Recent Times, section 25.

G. B. Malleson, The Refounding of the German Empire, chapter 11;

W. Rüstow, The War for the Rhine Frontier, 1870, chapter 6 (volume 1).

FRANCE: A. D. 1870 (July-August). Disastrous opening of the war. Defeats at Wörth, Spichern and Gravelotte. Bazaine's army shut up in Metz.

"July 23d Napoleon intrusted the regency to the empress for the period of his absence from Paris. … On the 28th, … accompanied by his son, [he] left for Metz, to assume command of the army. … The army consisted of eight corps. Of these, the 1st, under Marshal MacMahon, was stationed at Strasburg; the 2d, under General Frossard, at St. Avold; the 3d, under Marshal Bazaine, at Metz; the 4th, under General Ladmirault, at Diedenhofen (Thionville); the 5th, under General Failly, at Bitsch; the 6th, under Marshal Canrobert, in the camp at Châlons; the 7th, under General Felix Douay, at Belfort; the 8th,—the Imperial Guard—under General Bourbaki, at Nancy. Accordingly, the French forces were divided into two groups, the larger stationed on the Moselle, and the smaller in Alsace. To the latter belonged the 1st and 7th corps, both of which were placed under the command of Marshal MacMahon, with orders to prevent the crown prince's army from entering Alsace. The larger group comprised the 2d, 3d, and 4th corps. … The 6th and 8th were to have formed the reserve; but the greatly superior numbers of Prince Frederic Charles and Steinmetz, who were advancing against this larger group, necessitated the immediate bringing of those corps to the front. The connection between the two groups was to be maintained by the 5th corps, stationed at Bitsch. Skirmishing of the advanced posts and collisions between reconnoitering parties began on the 19th of July. The most important of these minor engagements was that at Saarbrücken, on the 2d of August [the French claiming a victory]. … August 4th the crown prince crossed the French frontier and attacked the town of Weissenburg, on the little river Lauter. … Weissenburg was successfully carried by Prussian and Bavarian battalions combined, and the Geisberg by sixteen battalions of Prussians alone. … August 5th MacMahon with his corps took up his position at Wörth, fortifying the heights westward from Sauerbach, together with the villages of Froschweiler and Elsasshausen, in the intention of meeting at that place the advancing columns of the crown prince, whose attack he expected on the 7th. To strengthen his army sufficiently for the task required of it he endeavored to bring up General Felix Douay's corps from Belfort and Mühlhausen, and that of General Failly from Bitsch; but only one division of the former arrived in time, and a division of the latter which was sent to his support did not reach the neighborhood of the battle-field until the evening of the 6th, in time to afford a partial protection on the retreat. Consequently, MacMahon was left with not more than 45,000 men to face the crown prince's whole army. … On the morning of the 6th the advance guard of the 5th corps became involved in a sharp action with the enemy," and "from a mere skirmish of the advance guard resulted the decisive battle of Wörth. … After Wörth itself had been carried, the fighting was most severe around the fortified village of Froschweiler. This was finally taken, and a desperate charge of the French cuirassiers repulsed. Thereupon MacMahon's army broke and fled in wild confusion, some toward the passes of the Vosges, others to Strasburg or Bitsch. … The trophies of victory were numerous and valuable: 200 officers and 9,000 men prisoners. … The French lost 6,000 dead and wounded; the German loss was 489 officers and 10,153 men—a loss greater than that of Sadowa. … MacMahon, with about 15,000 of his defeated troops, reached Zabern on the morning of the 7th, and set out thence for Châlons, whither Generals Douay and Failly were also directed to lead their forces. A new army was to be formed at that point, and northern Alsace was abandoned to the crown prince's victorious troops. The Badish division received orders to march against Strasburg, and by the 9th the whole corps was assembled before that city, Hagenau having been taken by the cavalry on the way. … Preparations for a siege were made, a regular siege corps being formed … and placed under the command of General Werder. With the remainder of the third army the crown prince left Wörth on the 8th of August, marched through the unguarded passes of the Vosges, and entered Nancy on the 16th. … Detachments were left behind to blockade Bitsch and Pfalzburg. At Nancy the prince rested for a few days and waited for decisive news from the Saar and Moselle. A second victory was won on the 6th of August at Spichern [or Forbach]. Like the battle of Wörth, this action was not the result of a strategical combination, but rather of a misunderstanding. … Frossard [whose corps was encountered at Spichern] fell back on Metz by way of Saargemünd. Bazaine, who, although not more than seven or eight miles from the field of battle, had made no attempt to come to Frossard's assistance, led his corps to the same place. In this battle, owing to the unfavorable nature of the ground, the losses of the conquerors were heavier than those of the conquered. The Germans had 223 officers and 4,648 men dead, wounded, and missing; while the French, according to their own reports, lost 249 officers and 3,829 men, 2,000 of whom were taken prisoners. August 7th the victors continued their forward march, capturing great stores of provisions in Forbach. On the 9th St. Avold was taken, and foraging parties advanced almost to Metz. {1382} Marching through the Rhenish Palatinate, part of Prince Frederic Charles's army directed its course toward Metz by way of Saarbrücken, and part through Saargemünd. … In the imperial head-quarters at Metz the greatest consternation prevailed. … It was [finally] decided to concentrate five army corps on the right bank of the Moselle, at Metz, and to form a second army, consisting of four corps, under MacMahon's command, in the camp at Châlons. The first line of defence on the Rhine and Saar had been abandoned, and France was to be defended on the Moselle. By this decision Alsace and Lorraine were surrendered to the foe at the very outset." On the 9th of August the French emperor transferred the chief command from himself to Marshal Bazaine, while Lebœuf at the same time withdrew from the direction of the staff. Simultaneously, at Paris, the Grammont-Ollivier ministry resigned, and was succeeded by a cabinet formed under the presidency of Count Palikao (General Montauban). "New levies were called into the field, comprising all unmarried men between the ages of 25 and 30 not already enrolled in the 'garde mobile.' … In the German head-quarters … it was resolved in some way to make Bazaine's army harmless, either by shutting him up in Metz or by pushing him northward to the Belgian frontier. … The task was a difficult one. … All depended upon what course Bazaine might conclude to pursue, and the energy with which he executed his plans. It was his purpose to leave Metz with the field army and join MacMahon at Châlons. There would then be 300,000 French at that place to block the German march to Paris. In that event the Germans would have to leave 60,000 men before Metz … and Diedenhofen, and would not have enough left to venture an attack on the united and well-intrenched armies at Châlons. Accordingly, the union of those two armies must be prevented at any price, and Bazaine be attacked before Metz. The execution of this plan led to the severe fighting near that city—the battle of Colombey-Nouilly (Borny), on the 14th, Vionville on the 16th, and Gravelotte on the 18th." The battle of Gravelotte was "the first battle in the war in which a pre-arranged plan [Moltke's] was actually carried out. … It was a brilliant victory, and followed by important results. Bazaine's army was shut up in the fortress and among the outlying forts, and rendered unavailable for further service in the field. The losses of the French amounted to about 13,000 men, including 600 officers; the German loss was 899 officers and 19,260 men, of whom 328 officers and 4,909 men were killed outright. The number of combatants on the side of the French was about 140,000, on the side of the Germans 178,818, the former having 550, and the latter 822 cannon. It must be remembered, however, that the French occupied a position very much of the nature of a fortress, which had to be carried by storm."

W. Müller, Political History of Recent Times, section 25.

ALSO IN: Count H. von Moltke, The Franro-German War of 1870-71, section 1.

Colonel A. Borbstaedt and Major F. Dwyer, The Franco-German War, chapters 10-29.

FRANCE: A. D. 1870 (August-September). Investment of Metz by the Germans. Disastrous attempt of MacMahon to rescue Bazaine. The catastrophe at Sedan.

"The huge, stubborn, vehement and bloody conflict waged in the rural tract between the northern edges of the Bois de Vaux and the Forest of Jaumont, which the French Marshal called the 'Defence of the Lines of Amanvillers,' the French Army, 'the Battle of St. Privat,' and the Germans the battle of 'Gravelotte—St. Privat,' established the mastery of the latter over 'the Army of the Rhine.' Marshal Bazaine had not proved strong enough to extricate the Army he was suddenly appointed to command from the false position in which it had been placed by the errors and hesitations of the Emperor and Marshal Lebœuf. … The German leaders forthwith resolved, and acted on the resolve, to take the largest advantage of success. When the broadening day showed that the French were encamped under the guns of the fort, and that they did not betray the faintest symptom of fighting for egress on any side, the place was deliberately invested. … Soon the blockade was so far completed that only adventurous scouts were able at rare intervals to work their way through the German lines. As early as the forenoon of the 19th, the King had decided to form what came to be called the 'Army of the Meuse' out of the Corps which were not needed to uphold the investment of Metz, and thus place himself in a condition to assail the French Army collecting at Chalons. … This formidable force was put under the command of the Crown Prince of Saxony, who had shown himself to be an able soldier. Consequently, there remained behind to invest Bazaine, seven Corps d'Armée and a Division of Reserve under General von Kummer. … One Army had been literally imprisoned, another remained at large, and behind it were the vast resources of France. Three Marshals were cooped up in the cage on the Moselle; one, MacMahon, and the Emperor were still in the field; and upon the forces with them it was resolved to advance at once, because prudence required that they should be shattered before they could be completely organized, and while the moral effect of the resounding blows struck in Alsace and Lorraine had lost none of its terrible power. Therefore the King and General von Moltke started on the morrow of victory to march on Paris through the plains of Champagne."

G. Hooper, The Campaign of Sedan, chapter 10.

"While the German invasion had thus been rolling from Lorraine into the flats of Champagne, the shattered right wing of the army of the Rhine, with reinforcements sent off from Paris, had been drawn together in the well-known plains made memorable by the defeat of Attila. By 20 August the first and fifth French corps marched rapidly from the Upper Moselle to the Marne, had been joined by the seventh corps from Belfort and by the twelfth formed in and despatched from Paris; and this force, numbering perhaps 130,000 men, with from 400 to 500 guns, had been concentrated round the great camp of Châlons. Macmahon was given the supreme command, and the first operations of the experienced chief showed that he understood the present state of affairs, and were in accord with the rules of strategy. Bazaine, he knew, was in peril near Metz, and certainly had not attained the Meuse; and he was at the head of the last army which France could assemble for the defence of her capital. {1383} In these circumstances, impressed perhaps by the grand memories of the campaign of 1814, he most properly resolved to fall back towards Paris; but as Bazaine was possibly not far distant, and a position on the flank of the German advance might afford a favourable opportunity to strike, he withdrew northwards on the 21st to Rheims, in the double hope that he would approach his colleague and threaten the communications of the advancing enemy. This, we repeat, was following the art of war, and had Macmahon firmly adhered to his purpose, there would have been no Sedan and no treaty of Frankfort. Unhappily the marshal, a hero in the field, was deficient in real strength of character, and at this critical moment evil counsels and false information shook, and at last changed, a resolve that ought to have never faltered. A new administration had been formed in Paris, and Palikao, the minister of war, devoted to the Empire, and especially bent on satisfying the demands of the excited capital, which passionately insisted on the relief of Bazaine, had conceived a project by which he hoped that this great object would be effected and the 'dynasty' be restored in popular opinion. The army of the Meuse, he argued, was near that stream, round Verdun; the third army was far away to the south; there was a considerable interval between the two masses; and the army of Châlons, then at Rheims, was not far from the Upper Meuse. In those circumstances it was quite practicable, should Macmahon rapidly advance to the Meuse, to overpower with his largely superior force the army of the Meuse before support could be sent from the distant third army; and the enemy in his path being swept aside, the marshal could then descend on Metz, fall with the collected strength of the army of Châlons on the divided fragments of the investing force, and triumphantly effect his junction with Bazaine, having routed, perhaps, the first and second armies before the third could appear on the scene. The defiles and woods of the Argonne and the Ardennes, stretching between the French and the German armies, Palikao insisted, would form a screen to conceal the advance of the army of Chãlons, and would greatly facilitate the proposed movement. This project reached Macmahon on 21 August, and may be pronounced one of the most reckless ever designed by a desperate gambler in war. … Macmahon at first refused to listen to what he condemned as a hopeless project; but bad advisers found their way to him, and his resolution was already yielding when a calamitous event fixed his shifting purpose. A despatch from Bazaine, obscure and untrue, announced that he was on his way northward. Macmahon inferred that his beleaguered colleague had left Metz and eluded his foes, and, thinking that he would reach Bazaine before long, in an evil hour for France and for himself, he consented to attempt the march to the Meuse."

W. O'C. Morris, The Campaign of Sedan (English Historical Review., April, 1888).

"It was not until the afternoon of August 23 that MacMahon's army passed through Rheims. Anxious, and knowing that everything depended on speed, he addressed some columns as they toiled onwards, reminding them that French soldiers had marched thirty miles a day under the sun of Africa. The difference, however, was great between raids made by a few light regiments and the advance of a raw unwieldy mass; and though the marshal endeavoured to hurry them forward, he was confronted with almost insurmountable obstacles. Scarcely had the army made a march towards establishing itself at Bethniville, on the Suippe, when commissariat difficulties obliged him to re-approach the line of the railway. He made a movement on his left, and reached Rethel on the 24th, in order to obtain for his troops several days' subsistence. This distribution occupied the whole of the 25th. … As the direction of the French movement could not now be concealed, at this point MacMahon made arrangements for marching with all possible rapidity. It may be doubted, however, whether Napoleon himself, at the head of the grand army could have made the haste which the marshal designed with his raw and partly demoralized troops. … His army was altogether unequal to forced marches, and moved at this critical moment with the sluggishness inherent in its defective organization. Encumbered with stragglers, badly pioneered, and checked by hindrances of every kind, it made hardly ten miles a day; and it was the 27th of August before its right column, still far from the Meuse, passed through Vouziers, and the left reached Le Chêne. … On the 27th it was openly boasted of in Paris that MacMahon had gained at least forty-eight hours' start of the Crown Prince, and his coming success was firmly counted on by the imperialist cabinet, whereas, in reality, the whole scheme was foiled beforehand by Von Moltke's and General Blumenthal's prompt combination. … If in fighting, in the boldness of their cavalry, the activity of their staff, the cool firing of their infantry, and the skilful tactical use of their guns, the superiority of the Germans to their antagonists had been already proved; it only required the contrast now presented between the movements of the two armies to show, that in no point had the difference of training and moral feeling told more in favour of the invaders than in that of the marching, on which the elder Napoleon so often relied for his advantage over these very Germans. … Between the 27th and the morning of the 29th, the right column of the French army had only its outposts at Buzancy, while the left, though its outposts touched Stenay, was only at Stonne and Beaumont, both columns spreading a long way backward; in other words, they were still a march from the Meuse, which they ought to have passed three days before, and their rearward divisions were yet distant. The German armies, from the 26th to the 29th, made astonishing exertions to close on MacMahon as he crossed towards the Meuse, and success was already within their grasp. The force of the Crown Prince of Saxony, in two columns, had reached the Meuse at Dun on the 27th, and was thus in a position to arrest and retard the vanguard of the French whenever it attempted to cross the river. Meanwhile the army of the Crown Prince of Prussia, hastening forward by Varennes and Grand Prè, and to the left by Senuc and Suippe, had arrived close to the line of march of MacMahon's right column, and by the evening of the 28th had occupied it about Vouziers. A step farther, and this immense army would be upon the positions of the luckless French, who, assailed in flank and rear by superior numbers, could not fail to be involved in terrible disaster. … MacMahon [on the 27th], observing that the enemy so completely surrounded him, felt more than ever satisfied that it would be impossible to carry out the plan which had been prescribed to him at Paris; and to save, if possible, the sole army which France had at her disposal, he accordingly resolved to turn back in a westerly direction. … {1384} The same evening he sent … [a] telegram to the Count Palikao, at Paris. … In reply to this, the government sent a telegram to the emperor at eleven o'clock the same night, telling him that if they abandoned Bazaine there would certainly be a revolution in Paris, and they would themselves be attacked by all the enemy's forces. … The emperor admits that he could unquestionably have set this order aside, but 'he was resolved not to oppose the decision of the regency, and had resigned himself to submit to the consequences of the fatality which attached itself to all the resolutions of the government.' 'As for MacMahon, he again bowed to the decision intimated to him from Paris, and once more turned towards Metz. These orders and counter-orders naturally occasioned further delay, and the French headquarters had reached no farther than Stonne on the 28th. … On Monday, August 29, De Failly occupied the country between Beaumont and Stonne, on the left bank of the Meuse; while the main body of the French army, under MacMahon in person, had crossed the river, and were encamped on the right bank at Vaux, between Mouzon and Carignan, and on the morning of the 30th the emperor telegraphed to Paris that a brilliant victory might be expected. MacMahon's position was in a sharp wedge of country formed by the confluence of the rivers Meuse and Chiers, and it was his intention to advance towards Montmèdy. The other part of his army was close to the river on its left bank. … The battle—or rather series of battles, for the fighting extended over three days—which was to decide whether or not he would reach Metz and liberate Bazaine, began in earnest a little before noon on Tuesday, August 30."

H. M. Hozier, The Franco-Prussian War, volume 1, chapter 13.

"The retreating French were concentrated, or rather massed, under the walls of Sedan, in a valley commonly called the Sink of Givonne. The army consisted of twenty-nine brigades, fifteen divisions, and four corps d'armée, numbering ninety thousand men. 'It was there,' says Victor Hugo, 'no one could guess what for, without order, without discipline, a mere crowd of men, waiting, as it seemed, to be seized by an immensely powerful hand. It seemed to be under no particular anxiety. The men who composed it knew, or thought they knew, that the enemy was far away. Calculating four leagues as a day's march, they believed the Germans to be at three days' distance. The commanders, however, towards nightfall, made some preparations for safety. The whole army formed a sort of horse-shoe, its point turning towards Sedan. This disposition proved that its chiefs believed themselves in safety. The valley was one of those which the Emperor Napoleon used to call a "bowl," and which Admiral Van Tromp designated by a less polite name. No place could have been better calculated to shut in an army. Its very numbers were against it. Once in, if the way out were blocked, it could never leave it again. Some of the generals,—General Wimpfen among them—saw this, and were uneasy; but the little court around the emperor was confident of safety. "At worst," they said, "we can always reach the Belgian frontier." The commonest military precautions were neglected. The army slept soundly on the night of August 31. At the worst they believed themselves to have a line of retreat open to Mézières, a town on the frontier of Belgium. No cavalry reconnoissance was made that night; the guards were not doubled. The French believed themselves more than forty miles from the German army. They behaved as if they thought that army unconcentrated and ill-informed, attempting vaguely several things at once, and incapable of converging on one point, namely, Sedan. They thought they knew that the column under the Prince of Saxony was marching upon Châlons, and that the Crown Prince of Prussia was marching upon Metz. But that night, while the French army, in fancied security, was sleeping at Sedan, this is what was passing among the enemy. By a quarter to two A. M. the army of the Prince of Saxony was on its march eastward with orders not to fire a shot till five o'clock, and to make as little noise as possible. They marched without baggage of any kind. At the same hour another division of the Prussian army marched, with equal noiselessness, from another direction on Sedan, while the Würtemburgers secured the road to Mézières, thereby cutting off the possibility of a retreat into Belgium. At the same moment, namely, five o'clock,—on all the hills around Sedan, at all points of the compass, appeared a dense dark mass of German troops, with their commanders and artillery. Not one sound had been heard by the French army, not even an order. Two hundred and fifty thousand men were in a Circle on the heights round the Sink of Givonne. They had come as stealthily and as silently as serpents. They were there when the sun rose, and the French army were prisoners.'

Victor Hugo, Choses Vues.

The battle was one of artillery. The German guns commanded every part of the crowded valley. Indeed the fight was simply a massacre. There was no hope for the French, though they fought bravely. Their best troops, the Garde Impériale, were with Bazaine at Metz. Marshal MacMahon was wounded very early in the day. The command passed first to General Ducrot, who was also disabled, and afterwards to Wimpfen, a brave African general who had hurried from Algeria just in time to take part in this disastrous day. He told the emperor that the only hope was for the troops to cut their way out of the valley; but the army was too closely crowded, too disorganized, to make this practicable. One Zouave regiment accomplished this feat, and reached Belgium. That night—the night of September 1—an aide-de-camp of the Emperor Napoleon carried this note to the camp of the king of Prussia:—Monsieur Mon Frère,—Not having been able to die in midst of my troops, it only remains for me to place my sword in the hands of your Majesty. I am your Majesty's good brother, Napoleon. … With Napoleon III. fell not only his own reputation as a ruler, but the glory of his uncle and the prestige of his name. The fallen emperor and Bismarck met in a little house upon the banks of the Meuse. Chairs were brought out, and they talked in the open air. It was a glorious autumn morning. The emperor looked care-worn, as well he might. He wished to see the king of Prussia before the articles of capitulation were drawn up: but King William declined the interview. When the capitulation was signed, however, he drove over to visit the captive emperor at a château where the latter had taken refuge. {1385} Their interview was private; only the two sovereigns were present. The French emperor afterwards expressed to the Crown Prince of Prussia his deep sense of the courtesy shown him. He was desirous of passing as unnoticed as possible through French territory, where, indeed, exasperation against him, as the first cause of the misfortunes of France, was so great that his life would have been in peril. The next day he proceeded to the beautiful palace at Cassel called Wilhelmshöhe, or William's Rest. It had been built at ruinous expense by Jerome Bonaparte while king of Westphalia, and was then called Napoleon's Rest. … Thus eighty thousand men capitulated at Sedan, and were marched as prisoners into Germany; one hundred and seventy-five thousand French soldiers remained shut up in Metz, besides a few thousand more in Strasburg, Phalsbourg, Toul, and Belfort. But the road was open to Paris, and thither the various German armies marched, leaving the Landwehr, which could not be ordered to serve beyond the limits of Germany, to hold Alsace and Lorraine, already considered a part of the Fatherland."

E. W. Latimer, France in the Nineteenth Century, chapter 12.

"The German army had lost in the battle of Sedan about 460 officers and 8,500 men killed and wounded. On the French side the loss sustained in the battle and at the capitulation amounted according to their returns to the following: Killed 3,000 men; wounded 14,000; prisoners (in the battle) 21,000; prisoners (at the capitulation) 83,000; disarmed in Belgium 3,000; total 124,000."

The Franco-German War: German Official Account, part 1, volume 2, page 408.

ALSO IN: Capt. G. Fitz-George, Plan of the battle of Sedan, with Memoir.

A. Forbes, My Experiences of the War between France and Germany, part 1, chapter 4 (volume l).

Colonel. A. Borbstaedt and Major F. Dwyer, The Franco-German War, chapters 30-40.

G. B. Malleson, The Refounding of the German Empire, chapter 14.

FRANCE: A. D. 1870 (September). Revolution at Paris. Collapse of the empire. Self-constitution of the Government of National Defense.

At Paris, the whole truth of the tremendous disaster at Sedan was but slowly learned. On the afternoon of Saturday, September 3, Count de Palikao intimated a little part of it, only, "in a statement to the Corps Législatif, announcing that Marshal Bazaine, after a vigorous sally, had been obliged to retire again under the walls of Metz, and that Macmahon, after a series of combats, attended by reverses and successes— having at the outset driven a part of the enemy's army into the Meuse—had been compelled to retreat to Sedan and Mézières, a portion of his army having taken refuge in Belgium. The junction of the two armies had therefore not been made. The situation was serious, calmly observed the Minister of War, but not hopeless. Not hopeless! when the truth was that one army was blockaded and the other prisoner, and that there were no reserves. … At a midnight sitting Count de Palikao, still determined to conceal a portion of the truth, intimated that part of Marshal Macmahon's army had been driven back into Sedan, that the remainder had capitulated, and that the Emperor had been made prisoner. M. Jules Favre met this announcement of fresh disasters by a motion, declaring the Emperor and his dynasty to have forfeited all rights conferred by the Constitution, demanding the appointment of a Parliamentary Committee invested with the governing power, and having for its special mission the expulsion of the enemy from French territory, and further maintaining General Trochu in his post as Governor of Paris. The Chamber then adjourned till the morrow. But Paris had touched one of those crises when, as Pascal says, a grain of sand will give a turn to history and change the life of nations, and the morrow brought with it the downfall of the Ministry, of the dynasty, of the Empire, and of that bizarre constitutional edifice which had been kept waiting so long for its complemental crown. … It had been intimated that the Corps Législatif would reassemble at noon, before which time numerous groups collected on the Place de la Concorde, and eventually swelled to a considerable crowd. The bridge leading to the Palais Bourbon was guarded by a detachment of mounted gendarmes, and numerous sergents-de-ville. … Battalions of National Guards having, however, arrived, the gendarmes, after flourishing their swords, opened their ranks and allowed them to pass, followed by a considerable portion of the crowd, shouting 'Vive la République!' and singing the 'Chant du Départ.' The iron gates of the Palais Bourbon having been opened to admit a deputation of National Guards, the crowd precipitated itself forward, and in a few minutes the steps and courtyard were alike invaded. Cries of 'Vive la Garde Nationale!' 'Vive la Ligne!' 'Vive la République!' resounded on all sides, and the soldiers who occupied the court of the Palais Bourbon, after making a show of resistance, ended by hoisting the butt ends of their rifles in the air in sign of sympathy, joining at the same time in the shouts of the crowd, while the latter, encountering no further opposition, proceeded to invade the passages of the Chamber, at the moment Count de Kératry was attacking the Ministry for surrounding the Corps Législatif with troops and sergents-de-ville, contrary to the orders of General Trochu. Count de Palikao, having explained the relative positions of the Governor of Paris and the Minister of War, introduced a bill instituting a Council of Government and National Defence, composed of five members elected by the Legislative Body, the ministers to be appointed with the approval of the members of this Council, and he, Count de Palikao, to occupy the post of Lieutenant-General. M. Jules Favre having claimed priority for the motion which he had introduced the day before, M. Thiers, pleading the necessity for union, next moved that:—'In view of existing circumstances, the Chamber appoints a Commission of Government and National Defence. A Constituent Assembly will be convoked as soon as circumstances permit.' The Chamber having declared in favour of their urgency, these several propositions were eventually referred to the Bureau, and the sitting was suspended. It was during this period that the crowd penetrated into the Salles des Quatre Colonnes and de la Paix. … At half-past two, when the sitting was resumed, the galleries were crowded and very noisy. The members of the Left only were in their places. It was in vain the President attempted to obtain silence, in vain the solemn huissiers commanded it. MM. Gambetta and Crémieux appeared together at the tribune, and the former begged of the people to remain quiet. … {1386} A partial silence having been secured, Count de Palikao, followed by a few members of the majority, entered the Chamber, but did not essay to speak. … A minute or two afterwards, the clamour arose again, and a noisy multitude commenced invading the floor of the hall. … Nothing was left to the President but to put on his hat and retire, which he did, together with Count de Palikao and the members by whom the latter had been accompanied. By this time the Chamber was completely invaded by National and Mobile Guards, in company with an excited crowd, whose advance it was in vain now to attempt to repel. M. Jules Favre, having mounted the tribune, obtained a moment's silence. 'No scenes of violence,' cried he; 'let us reserve our arms for our enemies.' Finding it utterly impossible to obtain any further hearing inside the Chamber, M. Gambetta, accompanied by the members of the Left, proceeded to the steps of the peristyle, and there announced the dethronement of the Emperor to the people assembled outside. Accompanied by one section of the crowd, they now hurried to the Hôtel de Ville, and there installed themselves as a Provisional Government, whilst another section took possession of the Tuileries—whence the Empress had that morning taken flight—as national property. A select band of Republicans, mindful of what Count—now Citoyen—Henri Rochefort had done to bring Imperialism into disrepute, proceeded to the prison of Sainte Pélagie and conducted the author of the Lanterne, and other political prisoners, in triumph to the Hôtel de Ville. The deputies who quitted the Chamber when it was invaded by the mob, met that same afternoon at the President's residence, and sent a deputation to the Hôtel de Ville, with a proposal to act in common with the new Government. This proposition was, however, declined, on the score of the Republic having been already proclaimed and accepted by the population of Paris. At an evening meeting of nearly two hundred deputies, held under the presidency of M. Thiers, MM. Jules Favre and Simon attended on the part of the Provisional Government to explain that they were anxious to secure the support of the deputies, whom they hinted, however, could best serve their country in the departments. After this unequivocal rebuff, the deputies, who had in the meantime been apprised that seals had been placed on the doors of the Corps Législatif, saw that nothing remained to them but to protest, and protest they accordingly did against the events of the afternoon. … Not one of the two hundred deputies present so much as dared suggest the breaking of the seals and the assembling in the Legislative Chamber. … The Government which grasped the reins of power on the utter collapse of Imperial institutions was a mob-named one in the fullest sense of the term, the names having been chalked by the populace on the pillars of the portico of the Palais Bourbon during that invasion of the Chamber on the Sunday afternoon which resulted in the overthrow of the Imperial regime. The list appears to have been accepted by the principal members of the Left, who, although they would have preferred disassociating themselves from M. Rochefort, nevertheless felt that it was impossible to leave him out of the combination, and therefore adroitly—and not inappropriately, as the safety of Paris was especially in their keeping—made it embrace all the deputies for Paris, save, as M. Jules Simon observed, the most illustrious —meaning M. Thiers, who refused to join it. … The Government of National Defence, as it elected to style itself, on M. Rochefort's suggestion, was composed of the following members:—General Trochu, president; Jules Favre, Vice President and Minister for Foreign Affairs; Emanuel Arago; Crémieux, Minister of Justice; Jules Ferry, Secretary; Leon Gambetta, Minister of the Interior; Garnier-Pagès; Glais-Bizoin; Eugene Pelletan; Ernest Picard, Minister of Finance; Henri Rochefort; and Jules Simon, Minister of Public Instruction. Subsequently it associated with it General Le Flô, Minister of War; Admiral Fourichon, Minister of Marine; M. Dorian, Minister of Public Works; and M. Magnin, Minister of Agriculture and Commerce. These, with Count de Kératry, charged with the Prefecture of Police, M. Etienne Arago, appointed Mayor of Paris, composed altogether no less than eighteen members, upwards of two-thirds of whom were Bretons, advocates, or journalists. … For some days the new Government was prodigal of proclamations and decrees. Its first acts were to close the doors of the Palais Bourbon and the Palais du Luxembourg, and dissolve the Corps Législatif and abolish the Senate as bouches inutiles politiques, to issue proclamations to the army, or rather the debris of one, justifying the Revolution and appealing to the troops to continue their heroic efforts for the defence of the country, and to the National Guard, thanking them for their past, and asking for their future patriotism. It released all functionaries from their oaths, dismissed the ambassadors at foreign courts, appointed prefects in all the departments, and new mayors in the twenty arrondissements of the capital, proclaimed the complete liberty of the press, ordered all Germans not provided with special permission to remain, to quit the departments of the Seine and Seine-et-Oise within four-and-twenty hours. … It pressed forward the provisioning of the city and its works of defence, increased the herds of sheep and oxen and the stores of corn and flour, provisionally abolished all local customs and octroi dues, and fixed the price of butcher's meat, armed the outer forts and the enceinte, blew up or mined all the bridges and fired all the woods in the environs, razed thousands of houses to the ground, felled roadside trees, and constructed huge barricades with them; laid in fact all the beautiful suburbs in waste; listened to the thousand and one wild schemes put forth by patriotic madmen for exterminating the invaders, and launched a huge captive balloon, which hovered daily over Paris to give timely notice of their dreaded arrival."

H. Vizetelly, editor, Paris in Peril, chapter 1.

ALSO IN: J. Favre, The Government of the National Defence, June-October.

W. Rüstow, The War for the Rhine Frontier, chapter 22 (volume 2).

{1387}

FRANCE: A. D. 1870 (September-October). Futile striving for allies and for peace without territorial sacrifices. Investment of Paris. Gambetta's organization of defense in the provinces. Bazaine's surrender at Metz.

"The Government of National Defence … imagined that the fall of the Empire would simplify the cruel position of France towards the enemy. The Dynasty which had declared war being reversed, and the men now in power having been throughout opposed to war and in favour of German unity, and now demanding nothing but peace, what motive could the King of Prussia have to continue the invasion of France? It was further to be considered that free France would defend her integrity to the last drop of her blood; that she would voluntarily give up neither an inch of her territory nor a stone of her fortresses. Such were the ideas which the new Minister of Foreign Affairs, M. Jules Favre, expressed on the 6th of September, in a circular addressed to the French agents in foreign countries. The Cabinet of Berlin was not slow in disabusing him of these convictions. Far from accepting the view that the Emperor Napoleon was the sole promoter of war, Count Bismarck, in two despatches of the 13th and of the 16th of September, threw the responsibility of the conflict on the French nation. He stated that the vast majority of the Chambers had voted for war, and that the Emperor was justified in assuring the King that he had been forced into a war to which he was personally averse. … In order to be secure against future aggression, Germany would ask for guarantees from the French nation itself, and not from a transitory Government. … In any case, Germany would require Strasburg and Metz. Thus the accession to power of the Republican Government did not modify the reciprocal positions of the two belligerents. Nevertheless, hope was entertained in Paris that the friendly intervention of the great powers might induce the victor to soften his rigour;" but intervention was declined by the Berlin Cabinet and not undertaken. "On the 19th of September the investment of Paris was completed. At the desire of the French Government, the English Cabinet applied to the German head-quarters, with the object of obtaining for M. Jules Favre an interview with Count Bismarck. This request having been granted, the two statesmen held conferences, on the 19th and 20th of September, at Ferrières, a castle of Baron Rothschild near Meaux. During these interviews the French Minister was sentimental and the German Minister coldly logical. They could not come to an agreement on any single point. … The Government of Paris … again proclaimed that France would not cede an inch of her territory. Meanwhile, in consequence of the investment of Paris, the Government of National Defence was divided into two parts; some of its Delegates withdrew to Tours, forming a delegation of the central Government which remained in Paris. The German armies had continued their onward march, as well as their operations against the fortresses. Toul capitulated on the 23rd and Strasburg on the 28th of September. On the 5th of October, King William had established his headquarters at Versailles." Meantime "the Government of National Defence made a last attempt to secure allies, or at least the help of powerful mediators. With this object M. Thiers, who had placed himself at the disposal of the Administration of the 4th of September, was sent on a mission to the European Courts. From the 12th of September till the 20th of October, the old statesman visited in succession London, Vienna, St. Petersburg, and Florence. In none of these cities were his measures attended with happy results." At St. Petersburg and at London he was told—and he was himself convinced—"that the King of Prussia was compelled to consider the public opinion of Germany, and that France would have to resign herself to territorial sacrifices." He returned to France to advise, and to procure authority for, a conference with the German Chancellor. But events had already occurred which aggravated the forlorn condition of France. "The youngest and most enterprising member of the Government of Paris, M. Gambetta, had left the Capital on the 8th of October in a balloon for Tours. It was his intention to organise national defence in the Provinces. The day after his arrival at Tours, he issued a fiery Proclamation to the French people. … With an energy that called forth universal admiration, the Government of Tours, over which Gambetta presided as Dictator, organised resistance, formed a new army, and gathered together every possible resource for defence both in men and in materials. All these efforts could not arrest the progress of the invasion. From the 11th to the 31st of October, the Germans took successively Orleans, Soissons, Schlestadt and Dijon. Round Paris they repulsed the sallies of Malmaison, Champigny, and le Bourget. But all these defeats of heroic soldiers waned when compared to the appalling and decisive catastrophe of Metz. After the battle of Gravelotte, Marshal Bazaine had unsuccessfully attempted several sallies. … On the 7th of October, after an unfortunate battle at Woippy, lasting nine hours, Bazaine considered the situation desperate. His only thought was to obtain the most favourable conditions he could, and with this object he sent General Boyer to the headquarters at Versailles." After two weeks of negotiation, "on the 21st of October, the army encamped within the walls of Metz found itself without provisions. … Negotiations with Prince Frederick Charles, nephew of the King and Commander-in-chief of the besieging Army, were opened on the 25th, and terminated on the 27th of October. The conditions were identical with those of Sedan: capitulation of the town and its forts with all the material of war, all the army of the Rhine to be prisoners and the officers to be liberated on parole."

E. Simon, The Emperor William and his Reign, chapter 13 (volume 2).

"The French Army of the Rhine at the time of the surrender still numbered 173,000 men, inclusive of 6,000 officers and 20,000 men remaining temporarily in Metz as sick or convalescent."

The Franco-German War: German Official Account, part 2, volume 1, page 201.

ALSO IN: A. Forbes, My Experiences of the War between France and Germany, part 2 (volume 1).

FRANCE: A. D. 1870-1871. The war in the provinces. Unsuccessful attempts to relieve the capital. Distress in Paris. Capitulation and armistice.

"The surrender of Metz and the release of the great army of Prince Frederick Charles by which it was besieged fatally changed the conditions of the French war of national defence. Two hundred thousand of the victorious troops of Germany under some of their ablest generals were set free to attack the still untrained levies on the Loire and in the north of France, which, with more time for organisation, might well have forced the Germans to raise the siege of Paris. The army once commanded by Steinmetz was now reconstituted, and despatched under General Manteuffel towards Amiens; Prince Frederick Charles moved with the remainder of his troops towards the Loire. Aware that his approach could not long be delayed, Gambetta insisted that Aurelle de Paladines should begin the march on Paris. {1388} The general attacked Tann at Coulmiers on the 9th of November, defeated him, and re-occupied Orleans, the first real success that the French had gained in the war. There was great alarm at the German headquarters at Versailles; the possibility of a failure of the siege was discussed; and 40,000 troops were sent southwards in haste to the support of the Bavarian general. Aurelle, however, did not move upon the capital: his troops were still unfit for the enterprise; and he remained stationary on the north of Orleans, in order to improve his organisation, to await reinforcements, and to meet the attack of Frederick Charles in a strong position. In the third week of November the leading divisions of the army of Metz approached, and took post between Orleans and Paris. Gambetta now insisted that the effort should be made to relieve the capital. Aurelle resisted, but was forced to obey. The garrison of Paris had already made several unsuccessful attacks upon the lines of their besiegers, the most vigorous being that of Le Bourget on the 30th of October, in which bayonets were crossed. It was arranged that in the last days of November General Trochu should endeavour to break out on the southern side, and that simultaneously the army of the Loire should fall upon the enemy in front of it and endeavour to force its way to the capital. On the 28th the attack upon the Germans on the north of Orleans began. For several days the struggle was renewed by one division after another of the armies of Aurelle and Prince Frederick Charles. Victory remained at last with the Germans; the centre of the French position was carried; the right and left wings of the army were severed from one another and forced to retreat, the one up the Loire, the other towards the west. Orleans on the 5th of December passed back into the hands of the Germans. The sortie from Paris, which began with a successful attack by General Ducrot upon Champigny beyond the Marne, ended after some days of combat in the recovery by the Germans of the positions which they had lost, and in the retreat of Ducrot into Paris. In the same week Manteuffel, moving against the relieving army of the north, encountered it near Amiens, defeated it after a hard struggle, and gained possession of Amiens itself. After the fall of Amiens, Manteuffel moved upon Rouen. This city fell into his hands without resistance. … But the Republican armies, unlike those which the Germans had first encountered, were not to be crushed at a single blow. Under the energetic command of Faidherbe the army of the north advanced again upon Amiens. Goeben, who was left to defend the line of the Somme, went out to meet him, defeated him on the 23rd of December, and drove him back to Arras. But again, after a week's interval, Faidherbe pushed forward. On the 3rd of January he fell upon Goeben's weak division at Bapaume, and handled it so severely that the Germans would on the following day have abandoned their position, if the French had not themselves been the first to retire. Faidherbe, however, had only fallen back to receive reinforcements. After some days' rest he once more sought to gain the road to Paris, advancing this time by the eastward line through St. Quentin. In front of this town Goeben attacked him. The last battle of the army of the North was fought on the 19th of January. The French general endeavoured to disguise his defeat, but the German commander had won all that he desired. Faidherbe's army was compelled to retreat northwards in disorder; its part in the war was at an end. During the last three weeks of December there was a pause in the operations of the Germans on the Loire. … Gambetta … had … determined to throw the army of Bourbaki, strengthened by reinforcements from the south, upon Germany itself. The design was a daring one, and had the … French armies been capable of performing the work which Gambetta required of them, an inroad into Baden, or even the reconquest of Alsace, would most seriously have affected the position of the Germans before Paris. But Gambetta miscalculated the power of young, untrained troops, imperfectly armed, badly fed, against a veteran army. In a series of hard-fought struggles the army of the Loire under General Chanzy was driven back at the beginning of January from Vendôme to Le Mans. On the 12th, Chanzy took post before this city and fought his last battle. While he was making a vigorous resistance in the centre of the line, the Breton regiments stationed on his right gave way; the Germans pressed round him, and gained possession of the town. Chanzy retreated towards Laval, leaving thousands of prisoners in the hands of the enemy, and saving only the debris of an army. Bourbaki in the meantime, with a numerous but miserably equipped force, had almost reached Belfort. … Werder had evacuated Dijon and fallen back upon Vesoul; part of his army was still occupied in the siege of Belfort. As Bourbaki approached he fell back with the greater part of his troops in order to cover the besieging force, leaving one of his lieutenants to make a flank attack upon Bourbaki at Villersexel. This attack, one of the fiercest in the war, delayed the French for two days, and gave Werder time to occupy the strong positions that he had chosen about Montbéliard. Here, on the 15th of January, began a struggle which lasted for three days. The French, starving and perishing with cold, though far superior in number to their enemy, were led with little effect against the German entrenchments. On the 18th Bourbaki began his retreat. Werder was unable to follow him; Manteuffel with a weak force was still at some distance, and for a moment it seemed possible that Bourbaki, by a rapid movement westwards, might crush this isolated foe. Gambetta ordered Bourbaki to make the attempt: the commander refused to court further disaster with troops who were not fit to face an enemy, and retreated towards Pontarlier in the hope of making his way to Lyons. But Manteuffel now descended in front of him; divisions of Werder's army pressed down from the north; the retreat was cut off; and the unfortunate French general, whom a telegram from Gambetta removed from his command, attempted to take his own life. On the 1st of February, the wreck of his army, still numbering 85,000 men, but reduced to the extremity of weakness and misery, sought refuge beyond the Swiss frontier. The war was now over. Two days after Bourbaki's repulse at Montbéliard the last unsuccessful sortie was made from Paris. There now remained provisions only for another fortnight; above 40,000 of the inhabitants had succumbed to the privations of the siege; all hope of assistance from the relieving armies before actual famine should begin disappeared. {1389} On the 23rd of January Favre sought the German Chancellor at Versailles in order to discuss the conditions of a general armistice and of the capitulation of Paris. The negotiations lasted for several days; on the 28th an armistice was signed with the declared object that elections might at once be freely held for a National Assembly, which should decide whether the war should be continued, or on what conditions peace should be made. The conditions of the armistice were that the forts of Paris and all their material of war should be handed over to the German army; that the artillery of the enceinte should be dismounted; and that the regular troops in Paris should, as prisoners of war, surrender their arms. The National Guard were permitted to retain their weapons and their artillery. Immediately upon the fulfilment of the first two conditions all facilities were to be given for the entry of supplies of food into Paris. The articles of the armistice were duly executed, and on the 30th of January the Prussian flag waved over the forts of the French capital."

C. A. Fyffe, History of Modern Europe, volume 3, chapter 6.

ALSO IN: H. Murdock, The Reconstruction of Europe, chapters 29-30.

Daily News Correspondence of the War chapters 13-21.

Cassell's History of the War, volume 1, chapter 36, volume 2; chapters 1-18.

Comte d'Herrison, Journal of a Staff Officer in Paris.

E. B. Washburne, Recollections of a Minister to France, volume 1, chapters 5-10.

J. A. O'Shea, An Iron-bound City.

F. T. Marzials, Life of Gambetta, chapter 5.

H. von Moltke, The Franco-German War of 1870-71, sections 3-7.

T. G. Bowles, The Defence of Paris.

W. Rüstow, The War for the Rhine Frontier, 1870, volume 3.

FRANCE: A. D. 1871 (January-May). Preliminaries of Peace signed at Versailles. The Treaty of Frankfort. Cession of Alsace and one-fifth of Lorraine. Five milliards of indemnity.

"On the afternoon of January 28 [1871] the capitulation of Paris was signed, and an armistice agreed upon to expire on February 19 at noon. The provinces occupied by the armies of Bourbaki and Munteuffel were alone excluded from this agreement. On January 29 the German troops quietly took possession of the Paris forts. The regulars and mobiles became prisoners of war, with the exception of 12,000 men who were left under arms to preserve order. At the earnest request of Favre the National Guard were allowed to retain their arms. If Favre urged this as a measure to counteract the imperialistic ideas supposed to be still cherished by the prisoners returning from Germany, it was a political crime as well as a military folly. The National Guard became the armed Commune. … While the armies withdrew to the lines stipulated in the armistice, the elections went quietly forward. The assembly convened at Bordeaux, and manifested a spirit that won for it universal respect. On February 17 M. Thiers was appointed chief of the executive power, and having named his ministry, he repaired to Versailles to arrange the preliminaries of peace. The conferences that followed with the German chancellor were perhaps the most trying ordeals to which the Frenchman had ever been subjected. No peace was possible save on the basis of the cession of miles of territory and the strongest of fortresses. France must also pay a war indemnity of no less than five milliards of francs. Bismarck, it is true, thought Thiers 'too sentimental for business, … hardly fit indeed to buy or sell a horse,' but no diplomatist, however astute, could have made better terms for stricken France. So thought the assembly at Bordeaux; and when Thiers announced the result of his mission with a quivering lip, he had its sympathy and support. On the 2d of March the assembly formally ratified the peace preliminaries by a vote of 546 to 107. It had been stipulated in the armistice that the German troops should not occupy Paris. The extension of time granted by the Germans entitled them to some compensation, and the entry of Paris was the compensation claimed. The troops detailed for this purpose were not chosen at random. To the Frenchman who on the 1st day of March beheld them pass along the Avenue de Malakoff or the Champs Elysées it was an ominous pageant. It was a German and not a Prussian army that he beheld. … That night the Hessians smoked their pipes on the Trocadéro, and the Bavarians stacked their arms in the Place de la Concorde, while the lights blazing from the palace of the Elysée announced the German military headquarters. On the third day of the month, the Bordeaux Assembly having ratified the peace preliminaries, the German troops marched out, and Paris was left to herself again. The war was over. Beyond the Rhineland, in Bavaria and Würtemberg as well as in the north, all was joy and enthusiasm over the return of the army that had answered before the world the question, 'What is the German Fatherland?' On the 10th of May the definite treaty of peace was signed at Frankfort by which France ceded Alsace and a portion of Lorraine, including the fortresses of Metz and Strasburg, to her conqueror."

H. Murdock, The Reconstruction of Europe, chapter 30.

The following are the heads of the Preliminary Treaty concluded at Versailles, to which the final Treaty of Frankfort conformed:

"1. France renounces in favour of the German Empire the following rights: the fifth part of Lorraine including Metz and Thionville, and Alsace less Belfort.

2. France will pay the sum of five milliards of francs, of which one milliard is to be paid in 1871 and the remaining four milliards by instalments extending over three years.

3. The German troops will begin to evacuate the French territory as soon as the Treaty is ratified. They will then evacuate the interior of Paris and some departments lying in the western region. The evacuation of the other departments will take place gradually after payment of the first milliard, and proportionately to the payment of the other four milliards. Interest at the rate of five per cent. per annum will be paid on the amount remaining due from the date of the ratification of the Treaty.

4. The German troops will not levy any requisitions in the departments occupied by them, but will be maintained at the cost of France. A delay will be granted to the inhabitants of the territories annexed to choose between the two nationalities.

6. Prisoners of war will be immediately set at liberty.

7. Negotiations for a definitive Treaty of Peace will be opened at Brussels after the ratification of this Treaty.

8. The administration of the departments occupied by the German troops will be entrusted to French officials, but under the control of the chiefs of the German Corps of occupation.

9. The present Treaty confers upon the Germans no rights whatever in the portions of territories not occupied.

10. This Treaty will have to be ratified by the

National Assembly of France."

C. Lowe, Prince Bismarck, volume 1, chapter 9.

ALSO IN: E. Hertslet, The Map of Europe by Treaty, volume 3, numbers 438 and 446.

{1390}

FRANCE: A. D. 1871 (March-May). Insurrection of the Communists of Paris. Second siege and reduction of the capital.

"On the 3d of March the German army of occupation—which had been in the assigned part of the city since the 1st—marched off through the Arc de Triomphe, and on the 7th the German headquarters were moved from Versailles. The great Franco-Prussian War was over. … But before … peace could be attained, the country had yet to suffer from the so-called patriots of the Red Republicans worse outrage than it had endured at the hands of the German invaders. When the negotiations for the capitulation of Paris were in progress, Count Bismarck had warned M. Favre of the danger of allowing, as he proposed, the National Guard to retain their arms; and the members of the Government of National Defence might themselves have seen the risk they were incurring, had they calmly considered the various émeutes that had taken place during the siege, and in which the National Guard had always played such a conspicuous part on the side of disaffection. Now, in the full consciousness of their strength—somewhere about 100,000—and in their possession of a powerful artillery,—for during the German occupation they had, on the pretext of keeping them safe, got a large number of cannon into their hands,—they seemed determined to attempt the revival of the Reign of Terror. … The appointment of General d'Aurelle de Paladines as their commander gave great offence, and on the 9th March an attempt to place the tricolor on the column in the Place de la Bastille instead of the red flag of revolution led to an outbreak. A promise in the event of the cannon being given up, of the continuance of pay till 'ordinary work was resumed,' was disregarded, and the dismissal of D'Aurelle and the full recognition of the right of the National Guard to elect its own officers demanded. An effort of the government to seize the cannon in the Place des Vosges failed, and it was now clear enough that more energetic action than negotiations must take place. On the morning of the 18th March a large force of regular troops under Generals Vinoy and Lecomte proceeded to Montmarte and took possession of the guns; but the want of horses for their immediate removal gave time for the Reds to assemble and frustrate the effort, while, worst of all, a large number of the regular troops fraternized with the insurgents. General Lecomte and General Clement Thomas were taken prisoners and almost immediately shot. The outbreak, thus begun, spread rapidly; for, through some unaccountable timidity of the government, the government forces were withdrawn from the city, and the insurgents left free to act as they pleased. They seized General Chanzy at the Orleans railway station, took possession of the Ministry of Justice and the Hôtel de Ville, and threw up barricades round all the revolutionary quarters. The Central Committee of the National Guard, the leading man of which was Assi, … summoned the people of Paris to meet 'in their comitia for the communal elections,' and declared their intention of resigning their power into the hands of the Commune thus chosen. The National Assembly removed from Bordeaux and held its sittings at Versailles: but bitter as was the feeling of the majority of the Deputies against the new turbulence, the position of affairs prevented any action from being taken against the insurgents. The removal of General d'Aurelle and the appointment of Admiral Saisset in his place was of no avail. A number of the inhabitants of Paris, styling themselves 'Men of Order,' attempted to influence affairs by a display of moral force, but they were fired on and dispersed. The Assembly was timid, and apparently quite unable to bring its troops into play. … Through Admiral Saisset concessions were offered, but the demands of the Communists increased with the prospect of obtaining anything. They now modestly demanded that they should supersede the Assembly wherever there was any prospect of collision of power, and be allowed to control the finances; and as a very natural consequence the negotiations were abandoned. This was on the 25th of March, and on the 26th the Commune was elected, the victory of the Reds being very easily gained, as hardly any of those opposed to them voted. Two days afterwards the Commune was proclaimed at the Hôtel de Ville, the members who had been elected being seated on a platform in red arm-chairs. The leading man of the new system was the honest but hot-headed and utopian Deleseluze; Cluseret, a man of considerable military genius, who had led a life of a very wild nature in America, and who was the soul of the resistance when the actual fighting began, was Delegate of War; Grousset, of Foreign Affairs; and Rigault, of Public Safety. The new government applied itself vigorously to changes; conscription was abolished, and the authority of the Versailles government declared 'null and void.' Seeing that a desperate struggle must inevitably ensue, a very large number of the inhabitants of Paris quitted the city, and the German authorities allowed the prisoners from Metz and Sedan to return so as to swell the forces at the disposal of M. Thiers. They also intimated that, in view of the altered circumstances, it might again become necessary for them to occupy the forts they had already evacuated. The first shot in the second siege of Paris, in which Frenchmen were arrayed against Frenchmen, was fired on the 2d April, when a strong division of the Versailles army advanced against the National Guards posted at Courbevoie, and drove them into Paris across the Pont de Neuilly. During the ensuing night a large force of insurgents gathered, and were on the morning of the 3d led in three columns against Versailles. Great hopes had been placed on the sympathy of the regular troops, but they were doomed to disappointment. … The expedition … not only failed, but it … cost the Commune two of its leading men,—Duval, and that Flourens who had already made himself so conspicuous in connection with revolutionary outbreaks under the Empire and the Government of National Defence,—both of whom were taken and promptly shot by the Versailles authorities. The failure and the executions proved so exasperating that the 'Commune of Paris' issued a proclamation denouncing the Versailles soldiers as banditti. … They had ample means of gratifying their passion for revenge, for they had in their hands a number of leading men, including Darboy, Archbishop of Paris, and M. Bonjean, President of the Court of Cassation, and these—two hundred in all—they proclaimed their intention of holding as hostages. {1391} M. Thiers was still hesitating, and waiting for a force sufficiently powerful to crush all opposition; and in this he was no doubt right, for any success of the Communists, even of the most temporary character, would have proved highly dangerous. The Germans had granted permission to the government to increase their original 30,000 troops to 150,000, and prisoners of Metz and Sedan had been pouring steadily back from Germany for this purpose. On the 8th April Marshal MacMahon took command of the forces at Versailles. A premature attack on the forts of Issy, Vanves, and Montrouge on the 11th failed, but on the 17th and 19th several of the insurgent positions were carried; on the 25th the bombardment of Issy and Vanves was begun, and from that time onwards operations against the city were carried on with the greatest activity, the insurgents being on all occasions put to the sword in a most merciless manner. Issy was taken on the 8th May, and Vanves on the 4th, and the enceinte laid bare. Inside Paris all this time there was nothing but jealousy. … First one leader, and then another, was tried, found wanting, and disgraced. … On the 21st May the defenders of the wall at the gate of St. Cloud were driven from their positions by the heavy artillery fire, and the besieging army, having become aware of the fact, pushed forward and secured this entrance to the city; and by the evening of the 22d there were 80,000 Versaillists within the walls. Next day they gained fresh ground, and were ready to re-occupy the Tuileries and the Hôtel de Ville; but before this was possible the Communists, mad with despair, had resolved on that series of outrages against humanity that will make their names detested and their cause distrusted as long as the story of their crimes stands recorded in the annals of history. They had already perpetrated more than one act of vandalism. … On the 12th May, in accordance with a public decree, they had destroyed the private residence of M. Thiers with all its pictures and books; on the 16th the magnificent column erected in the Place Vendome in memory of Napoleon I., and crowned by his statue, was undermined at one side and then pulled to the ground by means of ropes and utterly destroyed; and now on the 24th, in the last efforts of despairing rage, bands of men and women, still more frantic and eager for blood than were those of the Reign of Terror, rushed through the doomed city. Early in the morning the Tuileries, the Hôtel de Ville, the Ministry of Finance, the Palais d'Orsay, and other public and private buildings were seen to be on fire. The Louvre, too, with all its inestimable treasures, was in flames, and was saved with the greatest difficulty. If the Commune was to perish, it had clearly resolved that the city was to perish with it. Men and women marched about in bands with petroleum, and aided the spread of the conflagration by firing the city in different places. Heedless of the flames, the Versailles troops pressed on, eager, if possible, to save the lives of the 200 hostages, but, alas, in vain. A passion for blood had seized on the Commune, and its last expiring effort was to murder in cold blood, not only a large number of the hostages, but also batches of fresh victims, seized indiscriminately about the streets by bands of men and women, and dragged off to instant death. On the 26th Belleville was captured, and on the 27th and 28th the Cemetery of Père la Chaise was the scene of the final struggle,—a struggle of such a desperate nature—for there was no quarter—that, for days after, the air of the district was literally fraught with pestilence. Many of the leaders of the Commune had fallen in the final contest, and all the others who were captured by the Versailles troops during the fighting were at once shot. Of the 30,000 prisoners who had fallen into the hands of the government, a large number, both men and women, were executed without mercy, and the rest distributed in various prisons to await trial, as also were Rossel, Assi, Grousset, and others, who were captured after the resistance was at an end. Cluseret succeeded in making good his escape. … Of the prisoners, about 10,000 were set free without trial, and the others were sentenced by various courts-martial during the following months and on through the coming year, either to death, transportation or imprisonment."