Annals of a Fortress Part 23

The besieger from this day forwards was but slow in carrying on his approach works; he contented himself with terminating the second parallel and setting up three batteries of six pieces each, which opened fire on the 6th of March upon the faces right and left of bastions II.

and III., and on the left face of demi-lune No. 2, with the evident intention of making a breach at four hundred yards' distance. Three mortar batteries covered the works with bombs. The Germans were evidently intending to keep the garrison occupied, and put it out of heart; waiting the chance of political events to put the place in their hands. Of the four thousand men under General Werther's command, and who had been reduced to three thousand four hundred by the losses sustained, it was necessary to send one thousand to Troyes; only two thousand five hundred men therefore remained before La Roche-Pont. Besides, the general had received orders to run no risks, but limit himself to a surveillance of the pa.s.sages from the Saone to the Marne, and blockading the garrison of La Roche-Pont, keeping it sufficiently employed to prevent its taking the offensive, but without losing men in the capture of so insignificant a place. On the other hand, the royalists of the lower town were constantly predicting the end of hostilities and the return of the Bourbons.

On the 12th of March news was received at headquarters that Napoleon had received a check before Laon, that Marmont's force had been routed, and that the allied troops were in full march on Paris. The royalists thought that the moment had come for another application to General Werther to induce him to complete the capture. They were anxious to be the first in Burgundy to declare for the Bourbons, and the cautious deliberation of the general of the allied troops exasperated them. He, too, would have liked to get possession of the place before the antic.i.p.ated cessation of hostilities. He therefore sent another envoy to Colonel Dubois, to give him the latest news of the armies of the coalition, to inform him that the Allies were just about to enter Paris, which was now without defence, and to summon him to surrender in order to avoid a useless effusion of blood; and to say that if he refused to capitulate he must expect rigorous measures, which he, General Werther, would rather avoid, and of which the governor alone would have to bear the responsibility. Colonel Dubois' answer was exactly the same as before. He said he could not capitulate, as his defences remained entire.

During the night of the 12th of March, two mortar batteries were planted on the hill slopes of the right bank, and opened fire in the evening on the faubourg of the left bank. The _fleche_ which served as a _tete du pont_ was broken down by the sh.e.l.ls. The German general thought he should thus induce the townspeople to insist on the governor's promptly capitulating. Some of the houses in this faubourg caught fire, and the inhabitants took refuge in the upper town. The garrison could not respond to the fire of the mortar batteries, as they had no more guns of large calibre. The six twenty-four pounders were employed to oppose the enemy's batteries on the north, and they could not disarm the bastions on this side. To complete their distress typhus broke out among the wounded in the _cite_.

Provisions, too, were becoming scarce, and the garrison was placed on half rations.

On the plateau the cannonade on both sides was continuing, and the escarpments of the two bastions II. and III. were much damaged. As the enemy found nothing more to destroy or burn in the lower town on the right bank, he began his approaches on the 15th of March, and established a demi-parallel with two fresh batteries during the night (of the 15th and following day), of four guns each. This was, however, not accomplished without difficulty, for these batteries were only three hundred yards from the faces of bastions II. and III., whose cavaliers still preserved three guns of large calibre. But on the 18th and 19th of March twenty-six guns were brought to bear against the works, and succeeded in throwing down the parapets and dismounting the guns of the besieged.

During the night of the 19th of March, the colonel endeavoured to mount the cannon that still remained to him; but these pieces of small calibre could effect nothing against the enemy's works. However, the breaches made in the salients of demi-lune No. 2 and of bastion II., were not practicable; and the colonel, wishing to reserve the little artillery he had left, for the moment of a.s.sault, retrenched the gorge of bastion II., withdrew its cannon within the fortification and waited the issue.

Not to keep his soldiers idle he occupied them at night in trifling sorties which fatigued the besieger. He kept the covered ways in good repair as far as the enemy's fire allowed, and prepared camouflets and _chicanes_ for the moment when the a.s.sailant should try to ascend the counterscarp.

On the 25th of March the third parallel was finished. The place was thenceforth only defended by musketry, and a few stone mortars, and grenades, which small sallying parties threw into the trenches at night.

The approaches to crown the covered way and set up breach batteries were advancing but slowly, thanks to the activity of the garrison, whose courage seemed redoubled in seeing the enemy approaching and which defended its glacis foot by foot.

On the 1st of April came the news of the capitulation of Paris, the abdication of the Emperor, and the order to suspend hostilities. The garrison was allowed to retire to Nevers, through Auxonne, Beaune, Autun and Chateau-Chinon.

On the 5th of April Colonel Dubois quitted La Roche-Pont at the head of seven hundred soldiers of all arms, who were all the able-bodied men left him.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 61: See for the numbers of the enemy's batteries, Fig. 72.]

[Footnote 62: See Fig. 72.]

[Footnote 63: See Fig. 74.]

[Footnote 64: See Fig. 74.]

CHAPTER XVII.

_CONCLUSION._

Notwithstanding its bastioned enclosure and great outwork which was still existing in 1870, exactly as Vauban had planned it, the town of La Roche-Pont could not have held out forty-eight hours before the German artillery. A few batteries to the north, on the plateau, and on the west and east on the sides of the hills placed at nearly two miles distant would have overwhelmed the place with projectiles without a possibility of replying; for in September 1870 the small a.r.s.enal of La Roche-Pont contained only six cast iron guns, and four bronze pieces with smooth bore, two thousand pounds of powder and two or three hundred solid b.a.l.l.s.

It was not attacked, though bodies of the enemy showed themselves not far from its walls.

Its garrison consisted then of a guard of the engineers and a brigade of gendarmes.

The inhabitants of La Roche-Pont are, however, patriotic, and mention with pride the numerous sieges they have experienced.

They had organized their national guard as early as August, including an artillery corps. It is true they had not been able to supply these National Guards with more than a hundred flint guns which were lying in the citadel, and about thirty muzzle-loading guns. These brave people were not less determined to defend themselves, and began to cast bullets and make cartridges. They had not the pain of seeing the Germans there.

In 1871, a French captain of engineers, having been in General Bourbaki's army, had entered Switzerland with the _debris_ of the corps.

Captain Jean had received a bullet in his breast, not far from the frontier, and had been taken up by some peasants in the environs of Pontarlier, and saved by some Swiss custom house officers who had conveyed him to Lausanne, where he had received the most careful attention. We might give a touching account of that sad period of our disasters; and indeed we must write it if it is to be on record at all, for the Swiss are not the people to make a parade of the zealous kindness they displayed on this occasion in saving our hara.s.sed, famished, and frozen soldiers. Peasants and townspeople set out amid the snows of the Jura, to guide and to give shelter to our disbanded and wandering regiments. Some sacrificed their lives in this service of humanity, and emulated each other in offering an asylum and giving a.s.sistance to our exhausted soldiers. The behaviour of these excellent people has excited universal admiration.

Captain Jean was living at Lausanne when Monsieur N.... an officer on half pay happened to be there. His medical attendants thought that the climate would contribute to the cure of the wounded man, who had obtained a conge in the hope of regaining health under the clement skies of this part of the lake of Geneva. His sister had come to join him and was doing all for his cure that the tenderest affection could suggest.

His strength was however not returning and alarming symptoms continued.

Captain Jean was from La Roche-Pont; he was on intimate terms with Monsieur N.... and the conversation often turned on the recent war and the resources which through ignorance or inability had not been employed; and they frequently spoke of this beautiful province of Burgundy, placed on the flank of the invasion, and which was so well adapted to mask and protect an offensive movement, if they had had an army of reserve with its right supported by Besancon and its left by Dijon, and abundantly supplied from the basins of the Rhone and the Saone.

The Captain used to employ his leisure in studying the defence of his dear little town whose history he knew so well and which he deemed a strategic position of some importance.

Monsieur N.... spent nearly a month in the company of this amiable and well-informed man, whose feelings were deeply affected by our disasters; but whose active mind sought in these misfortunes themselves a means of instruction, and an opportunity for developing the resources and advantages peculiar to France. This was an inexhaustible subject of conversation for the two friends, and they would continue talking till the sister interposed her authority as nurse to enjoin silence and rest.

In December 1871, Monsieur N.... received the following letter at Paris, accompanied by a bundle of papers.

"LAUSANNE, _December 10th, 1871_.

"SIR,

"My dearly loved brother died in my arms the day before yesterday, his death being the result of his wound and also perhaps of grief for our late disasters,--deeply affected as he was by the indelible recollection of the sufferings he had witnessed.

"He retained his consciousness to the last, and I am fulfilling one of his most urgent requests in sending you these papers. It is the only souvenir he can bequeath to you--as he said to me the day before his death--of the hours you so kindly devoted to a poor invalid.

"My brother often spoke to me of you; you were able to appreciate his excellencies and n.o.ble character, and will receive his bequest, I doubt not, as a mark of the profound esteem he had for you.

"As for myself I cannot quit a neighbourhood where I have lived with my brother, and where we have met with so much sympathy."

_Extracts from Captain Jean's papers._

Attack implies a shock or onset; defence is a resistance to this onset.

Whether a piece of ordnance discharges a ball against a plate of iron, or a casing of masonry, or an earthwork; or an a.s.saulting column climbs a breach, the problem is substantially the same; in either case we have to oppose to the impulsive force a resistance that will neutralise its effect.

When there were no projectile weapons, or their range was inconsiderable, only a normal resistance had to be opposed to the shock--a man to a man--or if the effect was to be rendered certain, two men to one. But when projectile arms acquired a longer range, the _position_ of the attack and defence became a question of importance.

Thus were evolved for combatants in open ground the elements of tactics, and for fortification, arrangements of a more and more complicated character.

It is evident, for example, that when it came to a close engagement--a hand-to-hand struggle with an adversary; if the latter found himself placed behind a circular enclosure, the obstacle that protected him would give him a considerable advantage--an advantage that could only be compensated for by renewing the attack.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 76.]

To make this very simple principle intelligible at a glance, suppose (Fig. 76) a circular enclosure containing forty defenders separated from each other about a yard apart; a hand-to-hand struggle can only be carried on with a number equal to that of the defenders--or nearly so--and these under cover. It is no use for the a.s.sailants to a.s.semble as at _A_, they can only present a front equal to that of the defence, and if this is energetic, the triangle _a_, _b_, _c_, will be effective only at _c_.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 77.]

But let us suppose the attacking body to possess projectile arms (Fig.

77), and instead of encountering the circular enclosure, the a.s.sailants to set up their engines between _A_ and _B_ within fair range. They will overwhelm the segment _d_, _c_, _e_, of the circle with projectiles, while the defenders will be able to oppose only an inferior number of engines to the convergent fire.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 78.]

To compensate in part for this inferiority the defending party adds appendages to the enclosure (Fig. 78 A), which allow an almost equal front of defence to be opposed to the attacking front, as regards the number of projectile weapons, and very superior in point of elevation and protection. But the attacking force will thus naturally arrange its engines as seen at B. Thus the projectiles sent from _a_, _b_, _c_, _d_, _e_, converge upon the salient C. The defence adds the new appendages D D, and if the engines are well protected, it can make the projectiles _g_, _h_, _i_, converge on the engine K and crush it, secondly the projectiles _l_, _g_, _h_, on engine _m_ and destroy it, and so on.