Note 56 — Chapter IV

Bazaine gives the details from his point of view in his Episodes de la Guerre de 1870 et le Blocus de Metz (Madrid, 1883). One of the go-betweens was a man Regnier, who pretended to come from the Empress Eugénie, then at Hastings; but Bismarck seems to have distrusted him and to have dismissed him curtly. The adventuress, Mme. Humbert, recently claimed that she had her "millions" from this Regnier. A sharp criticism on Bazaine's conduct at Metz is given in a pamphlet, Réponse au Rapport sommaire sur les Opérations de l'Armée du Rhin, by one of his Staff Officers. See, too, M. Samuel Denis in his recent work, Histoire Contemporaine (de France).