Sedan 1870- The Eclipse of France Read online

  For Leoni

  First published in Great Britain in 2008 by

  Pen & Sword Military

  an imprint of

  Pen & Sword Books Ltd

  47 Church Street

  Barnsley

  South Yorkshire

  S70 2AS

  Copyright © Douglas Fermer 2008

  ISBN 978-1-84415-731-0

  eISBN 9781844685684

  The right of Douglas Fermer to be identified as Author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

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  Contents

  List of Maps

  List of Illustrations

  Preface

  Acknowledgements

  1. Hereditary Enemies?

  The Pendulum of Conquest

  The Peace Settlement of 1815

  The Ferment of Nationalism

  Napoleon III Takes Power

  Broken Dreams of German Unity

  A Franco-German Crisis, 1859

  2. Prussia Conquers North Germany

  Prussian Army Reform

  Bismarck Comes to Power

  Bismarck Confronts Austria

  Napoleon III Watches the Rhine

  A Battle in Bohemia

  Germany Reshaped

  3. Dark Clouds on the Horizon

  The French Search for ‘Compensation’

  The Luxembourg Affair

  French Army Reform

  Moltke is Ready

  France Lives on her Military Heritage

  The South German Question

  4. The Crisis

  The Liberal Empire

  Spanish Complications

  ‘The Devil is Loose at Paris’

  The Declaration of War

  5. The Armies Mobilize

  German Mobilization

  French Mobilization

  6. The Invasion of Alsace

  Wissembourg

  Frœschwiller

  The Retreat

  7. The Empire Totters

  Power Changes Hands

  The Châlons Conference

  The Beleaguered Army

  8. The Army of Châlons

  An Improvised Army

  The Die is Cast

  The March to the East

  9. The Path of the Invader

  The Conflict Deepens

  The Germans Wheel North

  10. Hunter and Hunted

  Nouart

  Beaumont

  The Retreat to Sedan

  The Pursuit

  11. Battle

  Fighting Begins at Bazeilles

  French Changes in Command

  The End in Bazeilles

  The Battle Spreads Northwards

  The Trap Closes

  The Ring of Fire

  The Cavalry Charges

  The French Collapse

  Death Throes

  Ceasefire

  12. Aftermath

  Capitulation

  Death, Wounds and Imprisonment

  Departures

  Recrimination and Memory in France

  Conclusion

  Appendix: Order of Battle

  Notes

  Bibliography

  List of Maps

  Prussia 1815–1870

  The Concentration of the Armies, 31 July 1870

  Northern Alsace, 5 August 1870

  Battle of Frœschwiller, 6 August 1870

  The French Retreat after the Defeats of 6 August 1870

  The Germans Encircle Metz, 14–19 August 1870

  The Sedan Campaign, 20–29 August 1870

  Beaumont, 30 August 1870

  Battle of Sedan at 9 a.m., 1 September 1870

  Battle of Sedan at noon, 1 September 1870

  List of Illustrations

  Wilhelm I (1797–1888).

  Otto von Bismarck (1815–98).

  Albrecht von Roon (1803–79).

  Helmuth von Moltke (1800–91).

  Napoleon III (1808–73).

  Agénor de Gramont (1819–80).

  Prussian Troops by Richard Knötel.

  South German Troops by Richard Knötel.

  French Troops by Richard Knötel.

  The Bavarian Assault on Wissembourg, 4 August 1870. Engraving after Ludwig Braun.

  Friedrich Wilhelm, Crown Prince of Prussia (1831–88).

  Maurice de MacMahon (1808–93).

  French Cuirassier taken prisoner at Frœschwiller, 6 August 1870. Painting by Édouard Detaille.

  The Crown Prince acclaimed by his men as he enters Frœschwiller, evening of 6 August 1870. Painting by Ludwig Braun.

  Charles Cousin de Montauban, Comte de Palikao (1796–1878).

  Emmanuel Félix de Wimpffen (1811–84).

  French Soldiers sketched from life between Stonne and Mouzon, 29 August 1870, by Auguste Lançon.

  Bandaging Wounded from Beaumont, 3 p.m., 30 August 1870, by Lançon.

  Street in the Faubourg de Mouzon, evening of 30 August 1870, by Lançon.

  The Road between Mouzon and Remilly, 31 August 1870, by Lançon.

  ‘The Last Cartridges’. Engraving after Alphonse de Neuville, 1873.

  Fighting in a courtyard near Bazeilles, 1 September 1870, by Lançon.

  Street Scene in Bazeilles, evening of 1 September 1870, by Lançon.

  Main street of Bazeilles after the battle.

  Panic at the gates of Sedan.

  Charge of the Chasseurs d’Afrique at Floing. Engraving after Anton von Werner, 1884–5.

  General Reille delivers Napoleon’s letter to King Wilhelm. Engraving after Anton von Werner, 1884.

  Negotiations for capitulation at the Mayor’s house in Donchery on the night of the battle. Painting by Anton von Werner, 1885. From left to right: French; Captain d’Orcet (with bandaged head), Chief of Staff General Faure (seated with back to viewer), General Castelnau, General de Wimpffen (standing with hand on table): German; General Podbielski (seated behind table), Moltke (standing at table), and Bismarck. German staff officers: Captain Winterfeld, Count Nostitz (with notebook), Major Krause, Lt. Col. Bronsart von Schellendorff, Lt. Col. Verdy du Vernois, Major Blume and Major de Claer.

  Napoleon III, escorted by Bismarck, goes to meet King Wilhelm on 2 September. Painting by Wilhelm Camphausen, 1876.

  French Prisoners of War.

  Picture sources: Nos. 1–5, 7–11 and 25–29 from J. F. Maurice, The Franco-German War (1900); Nos. 13, 14, 16 and 24 from L. Rousset, Histoire Générale de la Guerre Franco-Allemande (illustrated edition, 1912); No. 15 from J. Claretie, Histoire de la Révolution de 1870–71 (1872); Nos. 17–23 from E. Véron, La Troisième Invasion (1876–7); Nos. 6, 12 and 30 from A. Le Faure, Histoire de la Guerre Franco-Allemande 18
70–71 (1875). Photography by Tony Weller.

  Wilhelm I (1797–1888).

  Otto von Bismarck (1815–98).

  Albrecht von Roon (1803–79).

  Helmuth von Moltke (1800–91).

  Napoleon III (1808–73).

  Agénor de Gramont (1819–80).

  Prussian Troops by Richard Knötel.

  South German Troops by Richard Knötel.

  French Troops by Richard Knötel.

  The Bavarian Assault on Wissembourg, 4 August 1870. Engraving after Ludwig Braun.

  Friedrich Wilhelm, Crown Prince of Prussia (1831–88).

  Maurice de MacMahon (1808–93).

  French Cuirassier taken prisoner at Frœschwiller, 6 August 1870. Painting by Édouard Detaille.

  The Crown Prince acclaimed by his men as he enters Frœschwiller, evening of 6 August 1870. Painting by Ludwig Braun.

  Charles Cousin de Montauban, Comte de Palikao (1796–1878).

  Emmanuel Félix de Wimpffen (1811–84).

  French Soldiers sketched from life between Stonne and Mouzon, 29 August 1870, by Auguste Lançon.

  Bandaging Wounded from Beaumont, 3 p.m., 30 August 1870, by Lançon.

  Street in the Faubourg de Mouzon, evening of 30 August 1870, by Lançon.

  The Road between Mouzon and Remilly, 31 August 1870, by Lançon.

  ‘The Last Cartridges’. Engraving after Alphonse de Neuville, 1873.

  Main street of Bazeilles after the battle.

  Street Scene in Bazeilles, evening of 1 September 1870, by Lançon.

  Main street of Bazeilles after the battle.

  Panic at the gates of Sedan.

  Charge of the Chasseurs d’Afrique at Floing. Engraving after Anton von Werner, 1884–5.

  General Reille delivers Napoleon’s letter to King Wilhelm. Engraving after Anton von Werner, 1884.

  Negotiations for capitulation at the Mayor’s house in Donchery on the night of the battle. Painting by Anton von Werner, 1885. From left to right: French; Captain d’Orcet (with bandaged head), Chief of Staff General Faure (seated with back to viewer), General Castelnau, General de Wimpffen (standing with hand on table): German; General Podbielski (seated behind table), Moltke (standing at table), and Bismarck. German staff officers: Captain Winterfeld, Count Nostitz (with notebook), Major Krause, Lt. Col. Bronsart von Schellendorff, Lt. Col. Verdy du Vernois, Major Blume and Major de Claer.

  Napoleon III, escorted by Bismarck, goes to meet King Wilhelm on 2 September. Painting by Wilhelm Camphausen, 1876.

  French Prisoners of War.

  Preface

  The Franco-Prussian War was a turning point in the history of nineteenth-century Europe, and the Battle of Sedan, fought on Thursday, 1 September 1870, was the pivotal event of that war. A generation of Germans celebrated 2 September, the day of the formal French surrender, as ‘Sedan Day’, which, even more than the acclamation of King Wilhelm I of Prussia as the German Emperor at Versailles in January 1871, symbolized the birth of their nation, forged in steel and tempered in the blood of the common enemy. For the Germans it was a dazzling victory, fought out in a suitably spectacular natural setting overlooking the Meuse valley on a halcyon September day. Anton von Werner’s painting of a bareheaded Count Reille, aide-de-camp to the French Emperor Napoleon III, bowing before the King of Prussia as he delivered Napoleon’s note of submission on the evening of the battle, became one of the most celebrated images of the founding legend of the German Second Reich. It was one moment of high drama on a day that saw many.

  Yet the German triumphal dream was a French nightmare. ‘I never imagined the catastrophe would be so terrible,’1 confessed Napoleon III, and to suffer a Sedan remains a byword in French for catastrophic failure in any endeavour. A whole army was surrounded, bombarded into submission and captured. Sedan was a more complete and humiliating defeat than Waterloo, ending the reign of an Emperor who had ruled France for two decades and who had once seemed the most powerful man in Europe. If his fall had elements of tragedy, many Frenchmen found it hard to comprehend or forgive the disaster he had brought upon their country. In trying to revive the imagined glories of his uncle Napoleon I, he had ended by presiding over the end of France’s claims to be the foremost military power of the Continent and had opened the country to all the sufferings of invasion. When news of the defeat and his surrender reached Paris it sparked a revolution that deposed his dynasty. His enemies would celebrate that revolution which ushered in a Republic that, in the event, outlived the German Empire. Yet it was Sedan that made the Republic possible, and therefore had as great an impact on the political future of France as it did upon that of Germany; even if it was hardly an event that any Frenchman would wish to remember.

  Thus the story of Sedan is that of the fall of one empire and the rise of another. It was on one side a milestone in the achievement of German unity, and on the other the culmination of a series of French errors that brought national calamity and the exile of the Bonapartes. It is a story of mutual fear and insecurity that tempted both governments to seek a solution to domestic tensions by a war against the other; as well as the military story of how that war was fought and how Sedan came about. Above all, of course, it is the story of the men who fought and, if they were lucky, survived; but if they were unlucky were wounded, perished from sickness in captivity, or died violent, often agonizing deaths, not knowing whether the battle they fought in was won or lost.

  This account of that climactic clash between two great continental rivals has no pretension other than to offer a narrative introduction to events. Its justification may be that, although in the English-speaking world there is still a great appetite for books on the First and Second World Wars, there is apparently far less curiosity about a war that founded the modern German state, dominated European consciousness for a generation, and in some senses lay at the root of what happened in 1914. Of course, the origins of the Great War reach well beyond the Franco-German quarrel, but equally its outbreak is incomprehensible without reference to Sedan and its legacy. For no Balkan or colonial quarrel could have ignited a general European and world war had it not been for the rivalries of highly militarized alliances, central to which were political and military tensions between France and Germany resulting from the conflict of 1870. Besides, whether as a case study, a human drama, a terrible warning, or simply an exploration of the past on its own terms, the story of that violent, fateful summer of 1870 is one that should invite retelling and reflection for as long as Europeans are concerned with their past.

  Douglas Fermer

  2007

  Acknowledgements

  My principal debt is to Rupert Harding, Commissioning Editor of Pen & Sword Books, who suggested that a new survey of the Sedan campaign, of manageable length, might be of interest to readers for whom the Franco-Prussian War remains a relatively unfamiliar subject. It is also a pleasure to record my thanks to the librarians of King’s College, London, the Institute of Historical Research, the British Library, and the Wellcome Library; and to those of Croydon Central Library for obtaining photocopies of rare items. I am immensely grateful to Tony Weller for photography and to Nick Stansfeld for checking some of my translations from German sources, and for several fascinating discussions of them. I owe a special debt to John Cook for the skill and patience with which he has drawn the maps from my sketches, and to his son Matthew Cook for processing them digitally. My happy experience has been that, when it comes to producing maps, one simply cannot have too many Cooks. Susan Milligan cast an expert editorial eye over the text. Finally, the bibliography is but a pale hint of the immeasurable debt any researcher in this field owes to the distinguished company of German, French, British and American scholars, living and dead, who have explored it before him. Though the standards set by the giants of the subject – Rousset, Palat (‘Pierre Lehautcourt’), La Gorce, Picard and Howard – are humbling, they are in equal measure inspiring. Needless to say, however, any errors of fact or interpretation are mine alone.


  D. F.

  Chapter 1

  Hereditary Enemies?

  The Pendulum of Conquest

  It was a catastrophic defeat. Fear of the growing power of the old enemy beyond the Rhine had come to a head over a diplomatic insult. Urged on by patriotic crowds demonstrating in the capital, an overconfident government had gone to war over a point of honour. Yet the country was without firm allies, its generals were hidebound and, for all his wife’s bellicosity, the head of state had inherited no spark of his illustrious forebear’s military ability. The army that had amazed Europe half a century ago was living on its past reputation and proved no match for a modern enemy intelligently commanded. Pursuing a hesitant strategy, it had been outmanoeuvred then crushed after a brief campaign culminating in a day of battle. Now the state lay at the mercy of the conqueror, and the ruling dynasty fled the capital.

  Such was the plight of the Kingdom of Prussia in October 1806, following her defeat by Napoleon I at the Battle of Jena. The French Emperor entered Berlin in triumph, visited the tomb of Frederick the Great and symbolically confiscated the sword of the king who had routed a French army in 1757. French occupation brought partial dismemberment of the state and imposition of a crushing war indemnity. These humiliations, and the ruin of her trade by enforced obedience to Napoleon’s continental blockade of Great Britain, were long remembered in Prussia. Widespread economic misery was compounded by conscription, forced labour, requisitioning and predations committed by French troops and deserters. Stories of shootings and hangings by French soldiers entered Prussian folklore. Eventually, after Napoleon had overreached himself and ruined his Grand Army in Russia in 1812, Prussia threw off her forced allegiance to him and made common cause with the Russians. In March 1813 King Friedrich Wilhelm III summoned his subjects to arms against the French. The stakes were high, for had Napoleon regained the upper hand in the fighting in Germany that year he would have eliminated the Prussian state. Only by combining forces did Russia, Prussia and Austria finally bring Napoleon to bay and defeat him in a huge battle at Leipzig in October 1813. The allied invasion of France followed and, despite defeats at the hands of the resourceful French Emperor, numbers and determination eventually prevailed. In March 1814 allied armies entered Paris. Napoleon abdicated and went into exile on Elba.