A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V W X Z

Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4

W >> Wolfgang Menzel, Trans. Mrs. George Horrocks >> Germany from the Earliest Period Vol. 4




Turn we now to MacMahon and the movements of himself and his generals.
When the war broke out MacMahon was in the vicinity of Strasburg with
forty-five thousand men; General Douay with twelve thousand men at
Weissenburg. The same confusion prevailed here as at Metz. The orders
given to MacMahon were of the vaguest description: Douay had no
instructions at all. Yet, in front of him, the German hosts had been
gathering. The commander of the left wing of the German army, the
crown prince of Prussia, had, in obedience to the instructions he had
received, crossed the frontier river, the Lauter, on the 4th of
August, with an army composed of the Second Bavarian and Fifth
Prussian army, numbering about forty thousand men, and marched on
Weissenburg. As his advanced guard approached the town, it was met by
a heavy fire from the French garrison. The crown prince resolved at
once to storm the place. Douay had placed his troops in a strong
position, a portion of his men occupying the town defended by a simple
wall; the bulk, formed on the Gaisberg, a hill two miles to the south
of it. Against this position the crown prince directed his chief
attack. The contest which ensued was most severe, the assailants and
the defenders vying with one another in determination and courage. But
the odds in favor of the former were too great to permit Douay to hope
for ultimate success. After a resistance of five hours' duration the
Germans carried the Gaisberg. Douay himself was killed; but his
surviving troops, though beaten, were not discouraged. They
successfully foiled an attempt made by the Germans to cut off their
retreat, and fell back on the corps of MacMahon, which lay about ten
miles to the south of Weissenburg.

The same day on which the crown prince had attacked and carried
Weissenburg, another German army corps, that of Baden-Würtemberg, a
part of the Third Army, under the command of the crown prince, had
advanced on and occupied Lauterburg. That evening the entire Third
Army, consisting of one hundred and thirty thousand men, bivouacked on
French ground. Meanwhile MacMahon, on hearing of Douay's defeat, had
marched to Reichshofen, received there the shattered remnants of
Douay's division, and, with the emperor's orders under no
circumstances to decline a battle, took up a position on the hills of
which Worth, Fröschweiler and Elsasshausen form the central points. He
had with him forty-seven thousand men, but the Fifth Corps, commanded
by De Failly, was at Bitsche, seventeen miles from Reichshofen, and
MacMahon had despatched the most pressing instructions to that officer
to join him. These orders, however, De Failly did not obey.

The ground on which MacMahon had retired offered many capabilities for
defence. The central point was the village of Worth on the rivulet
Sauerbach, which covered the entire front of the position. To the
right rear of Worth, on the road from Gundershofen, was the village of
Elsasshausen, covered on its right by the Niederwald, having the
village of Eberbach on its further side, and the extreme right of the
position, the village of Morsbronn, to its southeast. Behind Wörth,
again, distant a little more than two miles on the road to
Reichshofen, was the key to the position, the village of Fröschweiler.
From this point the French left was thrown back to a mound, covered by
a wood, in front of Reichshofen.

On the 5th of August the crown prince had set his army in motion, and
had rested for the night at Sulz. There information reached him
regarding the position taken by MacMahon. He immediately issued orders
for the concentration of his army, and for its march the following
morning toward the French position, the village of Preuschdorf, on the
direct road to Wörth, to be the central point of the movement. But the
previous evening General von Walther, with the Fifth Prussian Corps,
had reached Görsdorf, a point whence it was easy for him to cross the
Sauerbach, and take Worth in flank. Marching at four o'clock in the
morning Walther tried this manoeuvre, and at seven o'clock succeeded
in driving the French from Wörth. MacMahon then changed his front,
recovered Wörth, and repulsed likewise an attack which had in the
meanwhile been directed against Fröschweiler by the Eleventh Prussian
and Fifth Bavarian Corps.

For a moment it seemed as though he might hold his position. But
between eleven and twelve the enemy renewed his attack. While one
corps again attacked and carried Wörth, the Eleventh Prussian Corps,
aided by sixty guns placed upon the heights of Gunstett, assailed his
right. They met here a most stubborn resistance, the French
cuirassiers charging the advancing infantry with the greatest
resolution. So thoroughly did they devote themselves that they left
three-fourths of their number dead or dying on the field. But all was
in vain. The Prussians steadily advanced, forced their way through the
Niederwald, and threatened Elsasshausen. While the French were thus
progressing badly on their right, they were faring still worse in the
centre.

The Germans, having seized Wörth, stormed the hilly slopes between
that place and Froschweiler, and made a furious assault upon the
latter, now more than ever the key of the French position. For while
Froschweiler was their objective centre, their right was thrown back
toward Elsasshausen and the Niederwald, their left to Reichshofen.
While the Eleventh Prussians were penetrating the Niederwald,
preparatory to attacking Elsasshausen on the further side of it, the
Fifth Prussian Corps with the Second Bavarians were moving against
Froschweiler. It was clear then to MacMahon that further resistance
was impossible. Still holding Froschweiler, he evacuated Elsasshausen,
and drew back his right to Reichshofen. The safety of his army
depended now upon the tenacity with which Froschweiler might be held.
It must be admitted, in justice to the French, that they held it with
a stubborn valor not surpassed during the war. Attacked by
overwhelming numbers, they defended the place, house by house. At
length, however, they were overpowered. Then, for the first time, the
bonds of discipline loosened, and the French, struck by panic, fled,
in wild disorder, in the direction of Saverne. They reached that place
by a march across the hills the following evening. On their way they
fell in with one of the divisions of the corps of de Failly, and this
served to cover the retreat.

Though their defeat, considering the enormous superiority of their
assailants, might be glorious, it was doubly disastrous, inasmuch that
it followed those perturbations of spirit alluded to in a previous
page, which had done so much to discourage the French soldier. A
victory at Worth might have done much to redeem past mistakes. A
defeat emphasized them enormously. It was calculated that, inclusive
of the nine thousand prisoners taken by the Germans, the French lost
twenty-four thousand men. The loss of the victors amounted to ten
thousand. They captured thirty-three guns, two eagles, and six
mitrailleuses.

The emperor was deeply pained by the result of the battle. To keep up,
if possible, the spirits of his partisans, he wired on the evening of
the 7th to Paris, with the news of the defeat, the words, "tout se
peut retablir." He was mistaken. While the crown prince was crushing
MacMahon at Wörth, the imperial troops were being beaten at Spicheren
as well.

Thereafter the German advance was hardly checked for a moment, though
the losses on both sides were heavy. On the 18th of August was fought
the battle of Gravelotte, in which King William commanded in person,
and though his troops suffered immense loss, they were again
victorious, and forced Bazaine to shut himself up in Metz, which he
subsequently surrendered. In this battle, one of the most decisive of
the war, it is worth noting that the Germans outnumbered the French by
more than two to one. The exact figures are uncertain, but we shall
probably be correct in accepting 230,000 as the strength of the
Germans, and in estimating the French outside of Metz at 110,000.

We now come to Sedan. With the army of Bazaine beleaguered, there
remained, in the opinion of the German chiefs--an opinion not
justified by events--only the army of MacMahon. To remove that army
from the path which led to Paris was the task intrusted to the crown
prince. MacMahon, meanwhile, after his defeat at Wörth, had fallen
back with the disordered remnants of his army on Chalons, there to
reorganize and strengthen it. Much progress had been made in both
respects, when, after the result of the battle of Gravelotte had been
known in Paris, he received instructions from the Count of Palikao to
march with the four army corps at his disposal northward toward the
Meuse, and to give a hand to the beleaguered Bazaine.

MacMahon prepared to obey. But circumstances ordered otherwise. On the
night of August 31st, accompanied by the emperor--who, having
transferred his authority to the Empress Eugenie and his command to
Bazaine, followed the army as mere spectator--MacMahon reached Sedan,
and there ranged his troops so as to meet an attack which he foresaw
inevitable, and fatal too. Placing his strongest force to the east,
his right wing was at Bazeilles and the left at Illy. The ground in
front of his main defence was naturally strong, the entire front being
covered by the Givonne rivulet, and the slopes to that rivulet, on the
French side of it.

The possibility that the French marshal would accept battle at Sedan
had been considered at the German headquarters on the night of the
31st, and arrangements had been made to meet his wishes. The army of
the crown prince of Saxony (the Fourth Army) occupied the right of the
German forces, the Bavarian Corps formed the centre, and the Prussians
the left wing. The advanced troops of the army were ranged in the
following order. On the right stood the Twelfth Corps, then the Fourth
Prussian Corps, the Prussian Guards, and finally the Fourth Cavalry
Division, their backs to Remilly. From this point they were linked to
the First and Second Bavarian Corps, opposite Bazeilles; they, in
turn, to the Eleventh and Fifth Corps; and they, at Dom-le-Mesnil, to
the Würtembergers. The Sixth Prussian Corps was placed in reserve
between Attigny and Le Chene.

A word now as to the nature of the ground on which the impending
battle was to be fought. Sedan lies in the most beautiful part of the
valley of the Meuse, amid terraced heights, covered with trees, and,
within close distance, the villages of Donchery, Iges, Villette,
Glaire, Daigny, Bazeilles, and others. Along the Meuse, on the left
bank, ran the main road from Donchery through Frenois, crossing the
river at the suburb Torcy, and there traversing Sedan. The character
of the locality may best be described as a ground covered with fruit
gardens and vineyards, narrow streets shut in by stone walls, the
roads overhung by forests, the egress from which was in many places
steep and abrupt. Such was the ground. One word now as to the troops.

The German army before Sedan counted, all told, 240,000 men; the
French 180,000. But the disparity in numbers was the least of the
differences between the two armies. The one was flushed with victory,
the other dispirited by defeat. The one had absolute confidence in
their generals and their officers, the other had the most supreme
contempt for theirs. The one had marched from Metz on a settled plan,
to be modified according to circumstances, the drift of which was
apparent to the meanest soldier; the other had been marched hither and
thither, now toward Montmedy, now toward Paris, then again back toward
Montmedy, losing much time; the men eager for a pitched battle, then
suddenly surprised through the carelessness of their commanders, and
compelled at last to take refuge in a town from which there was no
issue. There was hardly an officer of rank who knew aught about the
country in which he found himself. The men were longing to fight to
the death, but they, one and all, distrusted their leaders. It did not
tend, moreover, to the encouragement of the army to see the now
phantom emperor, without authority to command even a corporal's guard,
dragged about the country, more as a pageant than a sovereign. He,
poor man, was much to be pitied. He keenly felt his position, and
longed for the day when he might, in a great battle, meet the glorious
death which France might accept as an atonement for his misfortunes.

The battle began at daybreak on the morning of the 1st of September.
Under cover of a brisk artillery fire, the Bavarians advanced, and
opened, at six o'clock, a very heavy musketry fire on Bazeilles. The
masonry buildings of this village were all armed and occupied, and
they were defended very valiantly. The defenders drove back the enemy
as they advanced and kept them at bay for two hours. Then the Saxons
came up to the aid of the Bavarians, and forced the first position.
Still the defence continued, and the clocks were striking ten when the
Bavarians succeeded in entering the place. Even then a house-to-house
defence prolonged the battle, and it was not until every house but
one[2] had been either stormed or burned that the Germans could call
the village, or the ruins which remained of it, their own. Meanwhile,
on the other points of their defensive position; at Floing, St.
Menges, Fleigneux, Illy, and, on the extreme left, at Iges, where a
sharp bend of the Meuse forms a peninsula of the ground round which it
slowly rolls; the French had been making a gallant struggle. In their
ranks, even in advance of them, attended finally by a single
aide-de-camp, all the others having been killed, was the emperor,
cool, calm, and full of sorrow, earnestly longing for the shell or the
bullet which should give a soldier's finish to his career. MacMahon,
too, was there, doing all that a general could do to encourage his
men. The enemy were, however, gradually but surely making way. To
hedge the French within the narrowest compass, the Fifth and Eleventh
Corps of the Third Army had crossed the Meuse to the left of Sedan,
and were marching now to roll up the French left. But before their
attack had been felt, an event had occurred full of significance for
the French army.

Early in the day, while yet the Bavarians were fighting to get
possession of Bazeilles, Marshal MacMahon was so severely wounded that
he had to be carried from the field into Sedan. He made over the
command of the army to General Ducrot. That general had even before
recognized the impossibility of maintaining the position before Sedan
against the superior numbers of the German army, and had seen that the
one chance of saving his army was to fall back on Mezieres. He at
once, then, on assuming command, issued orders to that effect. But it
was already too late. The march by the defile of St. Albert had been
indeed possible at any time during the night or in the very early
morning. But it was now no longer so. The German troops swarmed in the
plains of Donchery, and the route by Carignan could only be gained by
passing over the bodies of a more numerous and still living foe. Still
Ducrot had given the order, and the staff officers did their utmost to
cause it to be obeyed. The crowded streets of Sedan were being
vacated, when suddenly the orders were countermanded. General Wimpffen
had arrived from Paris the previous day to replace the incapable De
Failly in command of the Fifth Corps, carrying in his pocket an order
from the Minister of War to assume the command-in-chief in the event
of any accident to MacMahon. The emperor had no voice in the matter,
for, while the regency of the empress existed, he no longer
represented the government. The two generals met, and, after a
somewhat lively discussion, Ducrot was forced to acknowledge the
authority of the minister. Wimpffen then assumed command. His first
act was to countermand the order to retreat on Mezieres, and to direct
the troops to reassume the positions they had occupied when MacMahon
had been wounded. This order was carried out as far as was possible.

Meanwhile the Germans were pressing more and more those positions.
About midday the Guards, having made their way step by step, each one
bravely contested, gave their hand to the left wing of the Third Army.
Then Illy and Floing, which had been defended with extraordinary
tenacity, as the keys of the advanced French position, were stormed.
The conquest of those heights completed the investment of Sedan. There
was now no possible egress for the French. Their soldiers retreated
into the town and the suburbs, while five hundred German guns hurled
their missiles, their round shot and their shells, against the walls
and the crowded masses behind them.

Vainly then did Wimpffen direct an assembly in mass of his men to
break through the serried columns of the enemy. In the disordered
state of the French army the thing was impossible. The emperor, who
had courted death in vain, recognized the truth, and, desirous to
spare the sacrifice of life produced by the continued cannonade,
ordered, on his own responsibility, the hoisting of a white flag on
the highest point of the defences, as a signal of surrender. But the
firing still continued, and Wimpffen, still bent on breaking through,
would not hear of surrender. Then Napoleon despatched his chief
aide-de-camp, General Keille, with a letter to the king of Prussia.

King William early that day had taken his stand on an eminence which
commanded an extensive view and which rises a little south of Frenois.
There, his staff about him, he watched the progress of the fight.
Toward this eminence Reille rode. Walking his horse up the steep, he
dismounted, and raising his cap presented the letter. King William,
breaking the imperial seal, read these phrases, which, if somewhat
dramatic, are striking in their brevity:[3]

"MONSIEUR MON FRÈRE--N'ayant pu mourir au milieu
de mes troupes, il ne me reste qu' à remettre mon epée entre
les mains de Votre Majeste.

"Je suis de Votre Majeste,
"le bon Frere,

"NAPOLÉON.

"Sédan, le 1er Septembre, 1870."

"Only one half hour earlier," writes Mr. George Hooper in his
"Campaign of Sedan," "had the information been brought that the
emperor was in Sedan." Mr. Hooper adds:

"The king conferred with his son, who had been hastily summoned, and
with others of his trusty servants, all deeply moved by complex
emotions at the grandeur of their victory. What should be done? The
emperor spoke for himself only, and his surrender would not settle the
great issue. It was necessary to obtain something definite, and the
result of a short conference was that Count Hatzfeldt, instructed by
the chancellor, retired to draft a reply. 'After some minutes he
brought it,' writes Dr. Busch, 'and the king wrote it out, sitting on
one chair, while the seat of a second was held up by Major von Alten,
who knelt on one knee and supported the chair on the other.' The
king's letter, brief and business-like, began and ended with the
customary royal forms, and ran as follows:

"'Regretting the circumstances in which we meet, I accept your
Majesty's sword, and beg that you will be good enough to name an
officer furnished with full powers to treat for the capitulation of
the army which has fought so bravely under your orders. On my side I
have designated General von Moltke for that purpose.'

"General Reille returned to his master, and as he rode down the hill
the astounding purport of his visit flew from lip to lip through the
exulting army which now hoped that, after this colossal success, the
days of ceaseless marching and fighting would soon end. As a contrast
to this natural outburst of joy and hope we may note the provident
Moltke, who was always resolved to 'mak siker.' His general order,
issued at once, suspending hostilities during the night, declared that
they would begin again in the morning should the negotiations produce
no result. In that case, he said, the signal for battle would be the
reopening of fire by the batteries on the heights east of Frenois.

"The signal was not given. Late on the evening of September 1st a
momentous session was held in Donchery, the little town which commands
a bridge over the Meuse below Sedan. On one side of a square table
covered with red baize sat General von Moltke, having on his right
hand the quartermaster-general Von Podbielski, according to one
account, and Von Blumenthal according to another, and behind them
several officers, while Count von Nostitz stood near the hearth to
take notes. Opposite to Von Moltke sat De Wimpffen alone; while in
rear, 'almost in the shade,' were General Faure, Count Castelnau, and
other Frenchmen, among whom was a cuirassier, Captain d'Orcet, who had
observant eyes and a retentive memory. Then there ensued a brief
silence, for Von Moltke looked straight before him and said nothing,
while De Wimpffen, oppressed by the number present, hesitated to
engage in a debate 'with the two men admitted to be the most capable
of our age, each in his kind.' But he soon plucked up courage, and
frankly accepted the conditions of the combat. What terms, he asked,
would the king of Prussia grant to a valiant army which, could he have
had his will, would have continued to fight? 'They are very simple,'
answered Von Moltke. 'The entire army, with arms and baggage, must
surrender as prisoners of war.' 'Very hard,' replied the Frenchman.
'We merit better treatment. Could you not be satisfied with the
fortress and the artillery, and allow the army to retire with arms,
flags and baggage, on condition of serving no more against Germany
during the war?' No. 'Moltke,' said Bismarck, recounting the
interview, 'coldly persisted in his demand,' or as the attentive
d'Orcet puts it, 'Von Moltke was pitiless.' Then De Wimpffen tried to
soften his grim adversary by painting his own position. He had just
come from the depths of the African desert; he had an irreproachable
military reputation; he had taken command in the midst of a battle,
and found himself obliged to set his name to a disastrous
capitulation. 'Can you not,' he said, 'sympathize with an officer in
such a plight, and soften, for me, the bitterness of my situation by
granting more honorable conditions?' He painted in moving terms his
own sad case, and described what he might have done; but seeing that
his personal pleadings were unheeded, he took a tone of defiance, less
likely to prevail. 'If you will not give better terms,' he went on, 'I
shall appeal to the honor of the army, and break out, or, at least,
defend Sedan.' Then the German general struck in with emphasis, 'I
regret that I cannot do what you ask,' he said; 'but as to making a
sortie, that is just as impossible as the defence of Sedan. You have
some excellent troops, but the greater part of your infantry is
demoralized. To-day, during the battle, we captured more than twenty
thousand unwounded prisoners. You have only eighty thousand men left.
My troops and guns around the town would smash yours before they could
make a movement; and as to defending Sedan, you have not provisions
for eight-and-forty hours, nor ammunition which would suffice for that
period.' Then, says De Wimpffen, he entered into details respecting
our situation, which, 'unfortunately, were too true,' and he offered
to permit an officer to verify his statements, an offer which the
Frenchman did not then accept.

"Beaten off the military ground, De Wimpffen sought refuge in
politics. 'It is your interest, from a political standpoint, to grant
us honorable conditions,' he said. 'France is generous and chivalric,
responsive to generosity, and grateful for consideration. A peace,
based on conditions which would flatter the amour-propre of the army,
and diminish the bitterness of defeat, would be durable; whereas
rigorous measures would awaken bad passions, and, perhaps, bring on an
endless war between France and Prussia.' The new ground broken called
up Bismarck, 'because the matter seemed to belong to my province,' he
observed when telling the story; and he was very outspoken as usual.
'I said to him that we might build on the gratitude of a prince, but
certainly not on the gratitude of a people--least of all on the
gratitude of the French. That in France neither institutions nor
circumstances were enduring; that governments and dynasties were
constantly changing, and the one need not carry out what the other had
bound itself to do. That if the emperor had been firm on his throne,
his gratitude for our granting good conditions might have been counted
upon; but as things stood it would be folly if we did not make full
use of our success. That the French were a nation full of envy and
jealousy, that they had been much mortified by our success at
Koniggratz, and could not forgive it, though it in nowise damaged
them. How, then, should any magnanimity on our side move them not to
bear us a grudge for Sedan.' This Wimpffen would not admit. 'France,'
he said, 'had much changed latterly; it had learned under the empire
to think more of the interests of peace than of the glory of war.
France was ready to proclaim the fraternity of nations;' and more of
the same kind. Captain d'Orcet reports that, in addition, Bismarck
denied that France had changed, and that to curb her mania for glory,
to punish her pride, her aggressive and ambitious character, it was
imperative that there should be a glacis between France and Germany.
'We must have territory, fortresses and frontiers which will shelter
us forever from an attack on her part.' Further remonstrances from De
Wimpffen only drew down fresh showers of rough speech very trying to
bear, and when Bismarck said, 'We cannot change our conditions,' De
Wimpffen exclaimed, 'Very well; it is equally impossible for me to
sign such a capitulation, and we shall renew the battle.'

Copyright (c) 2007. famouswriterz.com. All rights reserved.