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My Days of Adventure

E >> Ernest Alfred Vizetelly >> My Days of Adventure




Even nowadays, in spite of innumerable revelations, many writers continue
to cast all the responsibility of the Franco-German War on Germany, or, to
be more precise, on Prussia as represented by Bismarck. That, however, is
a great error. A trial of strength was regarded on both sides as
inevitable, and both sides contributed to bring it about. Bismarck's share
in the conflict was to precipitate hostilities, selecting for them what he
judged to be an opportune moment for his country, and thereby preventing
the Emperor Napoleon from maturing his designs. The latter did not intend
to declare war until early in 1871; the Prussian statesman brought it
about in July, 1870.

The Emperor really took to the war-path soon after 1866. A great military
council was assembled, and various measures were devised to strengthen the
army. The principal step was the creation of a territorial force called
the Garde Mobile, which was expected to yield more than half a million
men. Marshal Niel, who was then Minister of War, attempted to carry out
this scheme, but was hampered by an insufficiency of money. Nowadays, I
often think of Niel and the Garde Mobile when I read of Lord Haldane,
Colonel Seely, and our own "terriers." It seems to me, at times, as if the
clock had gone back more than forty years.

Niel died in August, 1869, leaving his task in an extremely unfinished
state, and Marshal Le Boeuf, who succeeded him, persevered with it in a
very faint-hearted way. The regular army, however, was kept in fair
condition, though it was never so strong as it appeared to be on paper.
There was a system in vogue by which a conscript of means could avoid
service by supplying a _remplaçant_. Originally, he was expected to
provide his _remplaçant_ himself; but, ultimately, he only had to pay a
sum of money to the military authorities, who undertook to find a man to
take his place. Unfortunately, in thousands of instances, over a term of
some years, the _remplaçants_ were never provided at all. I do not suggest
that the money was absolutely misappropriated, but it was diverted to
other military purposes, and, in the result, there was always a
considerable shortage in the annual contingent.

The creature comforts of the men were certainly well looked after. My
particular chum at Bonaparte was the son of a general-officer, and I
visited more than one barracks or encampment. Without doubt, there was
always an abundance of good sound food. Further, the men were well-armed.
All military authorities are agreed, I believe, that the Chassepot
rifle--invented in or about 1866--was superior to the Dreyse needle-gun,
which was in use in the Prussian army. Then, too, there was Colonel de
Reffye's machine-gun or _mitrailleuse_, in a sense the forerunner of the
Gatling and the Maxim. It was first devised, I think, in 1863, and,
according to official statements, some three or four years later there
were more than a score of _mitrailleuse_ batteries. With regard to other
ordnance, however, that of the French was inferior to that of the Germans,
as was conclusively proved at Sedan and elsewhere. In many respects the
work of army reform, publicly advised by General Trochu in a famous
pamphlet, and by other officers in reports to the Emperor and the Ministry
of War, proceeded at a very slow pace, being impeded by a variety of
considerations. The young men of the large towns did not take kindly to
the idea of serving in the new Garde Mobile. Having escaped service in the
regular army, by drawing exempting "numbers" or by paying for
_remplaçants_, they regarded it as very unfair that they should be called
upon to serve at all, and there were serious riots in various parts of
France at the time of their first enrolment in 1868. Many of them failed
to realize the necessities of the case. There was no great wave of
patriotism sweeping through the country. The German danger was not yet
generally apparent. Further, many upholders of the Imperial authority
shook their heads in deprecation of this scheme of enrolling and arming so
many young men, who might suddenly blossom into revolutionaries and turn
their weapons against the powers of the day.

There was great unrest in Paris in 1868, the year of Henri Rochefort's
famous journal _La Lanterne_. Issue after issue of that bitterly-penned
effusion was seized and confiscated, and more than once did I see vigilant
detectives snatch copies from people in the streets. In June, 1869, we had
general elections, accompanied by rioting on the Boulevards. It was then
that the "White Blouse" legend arose, it being alleged that many of the
rioters were _agents provocateurs_ in the pay of the Prefecture of Police,
and wore white blouses expressly in order that they might be known to the
sergents-de-ville and the Gardes de Paris who were called upon to quell
the disturbances. At first thought, it might seem ridiculous that any
Government should stir up rioting for the mere sake of putting it down,
but it was generally held that the authorities wished some disturbances to
occur in order, first, that the middle-classes might be frightened by the
prospect of a violent revolution, and thereby induced to vote for
Government candidates at the elections; and, secondly, that some of the
many real Revolutionaries might be led to participate in the rioting in
such wise as to supply a pretext for arresting them.

I was with my mentor Brossard and my brother Edward one night in June when
a "Madeleine-Bastille" omnibus was overturned on the Boulevard Montmartre
and two or three newspaper kiosks were added to it by way of forming a
barricade, the purpose of which was by no means clear. The great crowd of
promenaders seemed to regard the affair as capital fun until the police
suddenly came up, followed by some mounted men of the Garde de Paris,
whereupon the laughing spectators became terrified and suddenly fled for
their lives. With my companions I gazed on the scene from the _entresol_
of the Café Mazarin. It was the first affair of the kind I had ever
witnessed, and for that reason impressed itself more vividly on my mind
than several subsequent and more serious ones. In the twinkling of an eye
all the little tables set out in front of the cafés were deserted, and
tragi-comical was the sight of the many women with golden chignons
scurrying away with their alarmed companions, and tripping now and again
over some fallen chair whilst the pursuing cavalry clattered noisily along
the foot-pavements. A Londoner might form some idea of the scene by
picturing a charge from Leicester Square to Piccadilly Circus at the hour
when Coventry Street is most thronged with undesirables of both sexes.

The majority of the White Blouses and their friends escaped unhurt, and
the police and the guards chiefly expended their vigour on the spectators
of the original disturbance. Whether this had been secretly engineered by
the authorities for one of the purposes I previously indicated, must
always remain a moot point. In any case it did not incline the Parisians
to vote for the Government candidates. Every deputy returned for the city
on that occasion was an opponent of the Empire, and in later years I was
told by an ex-Court official that when Napoleon became acquainted with the
result of the pollings he said, in reference to the nominees whom he had
favoured, "Not one! not a single one!" The ingratitude of the Parisians,
as the Emperor styled it, was always a thorn in his side; yet he should
have remembered that in the past the bulk of the Parisians had seldom, if
ever, been on the side of constituted authority.

Later that year came the famous affair of the Pantin crimes, and I was
present with my father when Troppmann, the brutish murderer of the Kinck
family, stood his trial at the Assizes. But, quite properly, my father
would not let me accompany him when he attended the miscreant's execution
outside the prison of La Roquette. Some years later, however, I witnessed
the execution of Prévost on the same spot; and at a subsequent date I
attended both the trial and the execution of Caserio--the assassin of
President Carnot--at Lyons. Following Troppmann's case, in the early days
of 1870 came the crime of the so-called Wild Boar of Corsica, Prince
Pierre Bonaparte (grandfather of the present Princess George of Greece),
who shot the young journalist Victor Noir, when the latter went with
Ulrich de Fonvielle, aeronaut as well as journalist, to call him out on
behalf of the irrepressible Henri Rochefort. I remember accompanying one
of our artists, Gaildrau, when a sketch was made of the scene of the
crime, the Prince's drawing-room at Auteuil, a peculiar semi-circular,
panelled and white-painted apartment furnished in what we should call in
England a tawdry mid-Victorian style. On the occasion of Noir's funeral my
father and myself were in the Champs Elysées when the tumultuous
revolutionary procession, in which Rochefort figured conspicuously, swept
down the famous avenue along which the victorious Germans were to march
little more than a year afterwards. Near the Rond-point the _cortège_ was
broken up and scattered by the police, whose violence was extreme.
Rochefort, brave enough on the duelling-ground, fainted away, and was
carried off in a vehicle, his position as a member of the Legislative Body
momentarily rendering him immune from arrest. Within a month, however, he
was under lock and key, and some fierce rioting ensued in the north of
Paris.

During the spring, my father went to Ireland as special commissioner of
the _Illustrated London News_ and the _Pall Mall Gazette_, in order to
investigate the condition of the tenantry and the agrarian crimes which
were then so prevalent there. Meantime, I was left in Paris, virtually "on
my own," though I was often with my elder brother Edward. About this time,
moreover, a friend of my father's began to take a good deal of interest in
me. This was Captain the Hon. Dennis Bingham, a member of the Clanmorris
family, and the regular correspondent of the _Pall Mall Gazette_ in Paris.
He subsequently became known as the author of various works on the
Bonapartes and the Bourbons, and of a volume of recollections of Paris
life, in which I am once or twice mentioned. Bingham was married to a very
charming lady of the Laoretelle family, which gave a couple of historians
to France, and I was always received most kindly at their home near the
Arc de Triomphe. Moreover, Bingham often took me about with him in my
spare time, and introduced me to several prominent people. Later, during
the street fighting at the close of the Commune in 1871, we had some
dramatic adventures together, and on one occasion Bingham saved my life.

The earlier months of 1870 went by very swiftly amidst a multiplicity of
interesting events. Emile Ollivier had now become chief Minister, and an
era of liberal reforms appeared to have begun. It seemed, moreover, as if
the Minister's charming wife were for her part intent on reforming the
practices of her sex in regard to dress, for she resolutely set her face
against the extravagant toilettes of the ladies of the Court, repeatedly
appearing at the Tuileries in the most unassuming attire, which, however,
by sheer force of contrast, rendered her very conspicuous there. The
patronesses of the great _couturiers_ were quite irate at receiving such a
lesson from a _petite bourgeoise_; but all who shared the views expressed
by President Dupin a few years previously respecting the "unbridled luxury
of women," were naturally delighted.

Her husband's attempts at political reform were certainly well meant, but
the Republicans regarded him as a renegade and the older Imperialists as
an intruder, and nothing that he did gave satisfaction. The concession of
the right of public meeting led to frequent disorders at Belleville and
Montmartre, and the increased freedom of the Press only acted as an
incentive to violence of language. Nevertheless, when there came a
Plebiscitum--the last of the reign--to ascertain the country's opinion
respecting the reforms devised by the Emperor and Ollivier, a huge
majority signified approval of them, and thus the "liberal Empire" seemed
to be firmly established. If, however, the nation at large had known what
was going on behind the scenes, both in diplomatic and in military
spheres, the result of the Plebiscitum would probably have been very
different.

Already on the morrow of the war between Prussia and Austria (1866) the
Emperor, as I previously indicated, had begun to devise a plan of campaign
in regard to the former Power, taking as his particular _confidants_ in
the matter General Lebrun, his _aide-de-camp_, and General Frossard, the
governor of the young Imperial Prince. Marshal Niel, as War Minister, was
cognizant of the Emperor's conferences with Lebrun and Frossard, but does
not appear to have taken any direct part in the plans which were devised.
They were originally purely defensive plans, intended to provide for any
invasion of French territory from across the Rhine. Colonel Baron Stoffel,
the French military _attaché_ at Berlin, had frequently warned the War
Office in Paris respecting the possibility of a Prussian attack and the
strength of the Prussian armaments, which, he wrote, would enable King
William (with the assistance of the other German rulers) to throw a force
of nearly a million men into Alsace-Lorraine. Further, General Ducrot, who
commanded the garrison at Strasburg, became acquainted with many things
which he communicated to his relative, Baron de Bourgoing, one of the
Emperor's equerries.

There is no doubt that these various communications reached Napoleon III;
and though he may have regarded both the statements of Stoffel and those
of Ducrot as exaggerated, he was certainly sufficiently impressed by them
to order the preparation of certain plans. Frossard, basing himself on the
operations of the Austrians in December, 1793, and keeping in mind the
methods by which Hoche, with the Moselle army, and Pichegru, with the
Rhine army, forced them back from the French frontier, drafted a scheme of
defence in which he foresaw the battle of Wörth, but, through following
erroneous information, greatly miscalculated the probable number of
combatants. He set forth in his scheme that the Imperial Government could
not possibly allow Alsace-Lorraine and Champagne to be invaded without a
trial of strength at the very outset; and Marshal Bazaine, who, at some
period or other, annotated a copy of Frossard's scheme, signified his
approval of that dictum, but added significantly that good tactical
measures should be adopted. He himself demurred to Frossard's plans,
saying that he was no partisan of a frontal defence, but believed in
falling on the enemy's flanks and rear. Yet, as we know, MacMahon fought
the battle of Wörth under conditions in many respects similar to those
which Frossard had foreseen.

However, the purely defensive plans on which Napoleon III at first worked,
were replaced in 1868 by offensive ones, in which General Lebrun took a
prominent part, both from the military and from the diplomatic
standpoints. It was not, however, until March, 1870, that the Archduke
Albert of Austria came to Paris to confer with the French Emperor.
Lebrun's plan of campaign was discussed by them, and Marshal Le Boeuf and
Generals Frossard and Jarras were privy to the negotiations. It was
proposed that France, Austria, and Italy should invade Germany conjointly;
and, according to Le Boeuf, the first-named Power could place 400,000 men
on the frontier in a fortnight's time. Both Austria and Italy, however,
required forty-two days to mobilize their forces, though the former
offered to provide two army corps during the interval. When Lebrun
subsequently went to Vienna to come to a positive decision and arrange
details, the Archduke Albert pointed out that the war ought to begin in
the spring season, for, said he, the North Germans would be able to
support the cold and dampness of a winter campaign far better than the
allies. That was an absolutely correct forecast, fully confirmed by all
that took place in France during the winter of 1870-1871.

But Prussia heard of what was brewing. Austria was betrayed to her by
Hungary; and Italy and France could not come to an understanding on the
question of Rome. At the outset Prince Napoleon (Jérome) was concerned in
the latter negotiations, which were eventually conducted by Count
Vimercati, the Italian military _attaché_ in Paris. Napoleon, however,
steadily refused to withdraw his forces from the States of the Church and
to allow Victor Emmanuel to occupy Rome. Had he yielded on those points
Italy would certainly have joined him, and Austria--however much Hungarian
statesmen might have disliked it--would, in all probability, have followed
suit. By the policy he pursued in this matter, the French Emperor lost
everything, and prevented nothing. On the one hand, France was defeated
and the Empire of the Bonapartes collapsed; whilst, on the other, Rome
became Italy's true capital.

Bismarck was in no way inclined to allow the negotiations for an
anti-Prussian alliance to mature. They dragged on for a considerable time,
but the Government of Napoleon III was not particularly disturbed thereat,
as it felt certain that victory would attend the French arms at the
outset, and that Italy and Austria would eventually give support.
Bismarck, however, precipitated events. Already in the previous year
Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen had been a candidate for the
throne of Spain. That candidature had been withdrawn in order to avert a
conflict between France and Germany; but now it was revived at Bismarck's
instigation in order to bring about one.

I have said, I think, enough to show--in fairness to Germany--that the war
of 1870 was not an unprovoked attack on France. The incidents--such as the
Ems affair--which directly led up to it were after all only of secondary
importance, although they bulked so largely at the time of their
occurrence. I well remember the great excitement which prevailed in Paris
during the few anxious days when to the man in the street the question of
peace or war seemed to be trembling in the balance, though in reality that
question was already virtually decided upon both sides. Judging by all
that has been revealed to us during the last forty years, I do not think
that M. Emile Ollivier, the Prime Minister, would have been able to modify
the decision of the fateful council held at Saint Cloud even if he had
attended it. Possessed by many delusions, the bulk of the imperial
councillors were too confident of success to draw back, and, besides,
Bismarck and Moltke were not disposed to let France draw back. They were
ready, and they knew right well that opportunity is a fine thing.

It was on July 15 that the Duc de Gramont, the Imperial Minister of
Foreign Affairs, read his memorable statement to the Legislative Body, and
two days later a formal declaration of war was signed. Paris at once
became delirious with enthusiasm, though, as we know by all the telegrams
from the Prefects of the departments, the provinces generally desired that
peace might be preserved.

Resident in Paris, and knowing at that time very little about the rest of
France--for I had merely stayed during my summer holidays at such seaside
resorts as Trouville, Deauville, Beuzeval, St. Malo, and St. Servan--I
undoubtedly caught the Parisian fever, and I dare say that I sometimes
joined in the universal chorus of "À Berlin!" Mere lad as I was, in spite
of my precocity, I shared also the universal confidence in the French
army. In that confidence many English military men participated. Only
those who, like Captain Hozier of _The Times_, had closely watched
Prussian methods during the Seven Weeks' War in 1866, clearly realized
that the North German kingdom possessed a thoroughly well organized
fighting machine, led by officers of the greatest ability, and capable of
effecting something like a revolution in the art of war.

France was currently thought stronger than she really was. Of the good
physique of her men there could be no doubt. Everybody who witnessed the
great military pageants of those times was impressed by the bearing of the
troops and their efficiency under arms. And nobody anticipated that they
would be so inferior to the Germans in numbers as proved to be the case,
and that the generals would show themselves so inferior in mental calibre
to the commanders of the opposing forces. The Paris garrison, it is true,
was no real criterion of the French army generally, though foreigners were
apt to judge the latter by what they saw of it in the capital. The troops
stationed there were mostly picked men, the garrison being very largely
composed of the Imperial Guard. The latter always made a brilliant
display, not merely by reason of its somewhat showy uniforms, recalling at
times those of the First Empire, but also by the men's fine _physique_ and
their general military proficiency. They certainly fought well in some of
the earlier battles of the war. Their commander was General Bourbaki, a
fine soldierly looking man, the grandson of a Greek pilot who acted as
intermediary between Napoleon I and his brother Joseph, at the time of the
former's expedition to Egypt. It was this original Bourbaki who carried to
Napoleon Joseph's secret letters reporting Josephine's misconduct in her
husband's absence, misconduct which Napoleon condoned at the time, though
it would have entitled him to a divorce nine years before he decided on
one.

With the spectacle of the Imperial Guard constantly before their eyes, the
Parisians of July, 1870, could not believe in the possibility of defeat,
and, moreover, at the first moment it was not believed that the Southern
German States would join North Germany against France. Napoleon III and
his confidential advisers well knew, however, what to think on that point,
and the delusions of the man in the street departed when, on July 20,
Bavaria, Würtemberg, Baden, and Hesse-Darmstadt announced their intention
of supporting Prussia and the North German Confederation. Still, this did
not dismay the Parisians, and the shouts of "To Berlin! To Berlin!" were
as frequent as ever.

It had long been one of my dreams to see and participate in the great
drama of war. All boys, I suppose, come into the world with pugnacious
instincts. There must be few, too, who never "play at soldiers." My own
interest in warfare and soldiering had been steadily fanned from my
earliest childhood. In the first place, I had been incessantly confronted
by all the scenes of war depicted in the _Illustrated Times_ and the
_Illustrated London News_, those journals being posted to me regularly
every week whilst I was still only a little chap at Eastbourne. Further,
the career of my uncle, Frank Vizetelly, exercised a strange fascination
over me. Born in Fleet Street in September, 1830, he was the youngest of
my father's three brothers. Educated with Gustave Doré, he became an
artist for the illustrated Press, and, in 1850, represented the
_Illustrated Times_ as war-artist in Italy, being a part of the time with
the French and at other moments with the Sardinian forces. That was the
first of his many campaigns. His services being afterwards secured by the
_Illustrated London News_, he next accompanied Garibaldi from Palermo to
Naples. Then, at the outbreak of the Civil War in the United States, he
repaired thither with Howard Russell, and, on finding obstacles placed in
his way on the Federal side, travelled "underground" to Richmond and
joined the Confederates. The late Duke of Devonshire, the late Lord
Wolseley, and Francis Lawley were among his successive companions. At one
time he and the first-named shared the same tent and lent socks and shirts
to one another.

Now and again, however, Frank Vizetelly came to England after running the
blockade, stayed a few weeks in London, and then departed for America once
more, yet again running the blockade on his way. This he did on at least
three occasions. His next campaign was the war of 1866, when he was with
the Austrian commander Benedek. For a few years afterwards he remained in
London assisting his eldest brother James to run what was probably the
first of the society journals, _Echoes of the Clubs_, to which Mortimer
Collins and the late Sir Edmund Monson largely contributed. However, Frank
Vizetelly went back to America once again, this time with Wolseley on the
Red River Expedition. Later, he was with Don Carlos in Spain and with the
French in Tunis, whence he proceeded to Egypt. He died on the field of
duty, meeting his death when Hicks Pasha's little army was annihilated in
the denies of Kashgil, in the Soudan.

Now, in the earlier years, when Frank Vizetelly returned from Italy or
America, he was often at my father's house at Kensington, and I heard
him talk of Napoleon III, MacMahon, Garibaldi, Victor Emmanuel, Cialdini,
Robert Lee, Longstreet, Stonewall Jackson, and Captain Semmes.
Between-times I saw all the engravings prepared after his sketches, and I
regarded him and them with a kind of childish reverence. I can picture him
still, a hale, bluff, tall, and burly-looking man, with short dark hair,
blue eyes and a big ruddy moustache. He was far away the best known member
of our family in my younger days, when anonymity in journalism was an
almost universal rule. In the same way, however, as everybody had heard of
Howard Russell, the war correspondent of the _Times_, so most people had
heard of Frank Vizetelly, the war-artist of the _Illustrated_. He was,
by-the-by, in the service of the _Graphic_ when he was killed.

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