The Franco-German War of 1870-71 Part 6

The losses of the Guard Corps marching forward to attack a front so formidable were simply enormous. In the course of half an hour five battalions lost all, the others the greater part of their officers, especially those of the higher grades. Thousands of dead and wounded marked the track of the battalions pressing valiantly forward in spite of their cruel losses. The ranks as fast as they were thinned constantly closed up again, and their cohesion was not lost even under the leadership of young lieutenants and ensigns. As they drew nearer to the enemy the needle-gun came into full utility. The French were driven from all their foremost positions, in which, for the most part, they did not await the final struggle. By a quarter-past six the battalions had advanced to within 600 to 800 paces of Amanvillers and St. Privat. The troops, weary from the strained exertion, halted under the steeper slopes offering some, though small, protection, and in the shelter trenches abandoned by the enemy. Only four battalions now remained in reserve at Ste. Marie, behind the line which now extended to a length of 4000 paces. Every charge of the French cavalry and of de Cissey's Division had been steadily repelled with the aid of twelve batteries of the Guard Corps which had hastened up; but detachments commingled under stress of untold losses, had to show a resolute front against two French Corps in close proximity for more than half-an-hour, before relief came to them.

It was nearly seven o'clock when on the left of the Guard, two brigades of Saxon infantry reached the scene of strife; the other two were still a.s.sembling in the forest of Auboue; their artillery, however, had for a considerable time been maintaining a lively fire on Roncourt.

When Bazaine received word that the Germans were stretching out in constantly increasing extension with intent to outflank his right, he at three p.m. ordered Picard's Guard Grenadier Division posted at Plappeville, to march towards the threatened flank. Though the distance to be covered was little more than four miles, this all-important reinforcement, having diverged to rightward from the direct road through the woodland, had not yet arrived; and Marshal Canrobert, who was fending off with all his might the converging ma.s.ses of Prussian a.s.sailants, decided to concentrate his troops more closely about the strong position of St. Privat. The retreat from Roncourt would be adequately covered by a small rearguard, since the border of the Bois de Jaumont was being held.

Thus it happened that the Saxons did not find the strong resistance at Roncourt which they had expected, and after a slight skirmish entered the village together with the companies of the extreme left of the Guard; a body of Saxon infantry had previously been diverted to the right from the road to Roncourt and marched direct on St. Privat to the support of the Guard.

The fire of twenty-four batteries of the two German Corps wrought awful havoc there. Many houses were set on fire, or crumbled under the concentrated crash of the sh.e.l.ls. But the French were determined to hold to the last extremity this point, decisive as it was of the fate of the day. The batteries of their right flank were hurried into position between St. Privat and the Bois de Jaumont, whence their fire would enfilade the further advance of the Saxons on the former place. Other batteries went southward to confront the Prussians, and the simultaneous final rush of the German battalions was met by a rattling fire from the French riflemen under cover in their lines of shelter trenches.

All those obstacles were gradually overcome in the course of the a.s.sault, although again with heavy loss; some detachments halting occasionally for a moment to pour in a volley, others again never firing a shot. By sundown the attack had swept up to within 300 paces of St. Privat. Some detachments of the Xth Corps, which had reached St.

Ail, closed up, and now the final onset was made from every side at once. The French still defended the burning houses and the church with great obstinacy, till, finding themselves completely surrounded, they surrendered at about eight o'clock. More than 2000 men were here taken prisoners, and the wounded were rescued from the burning houses.

The defeated troops of the VIth French Corps hurriedly retired into the valley of the Moselle, their retreat covered by the brigade holding the Bois de Jaumont and by the cavalry. Only then did the Guard Grenadier Division make its first appearance, and the Reserve Artillery of the French Army deployed east of Amanvillers. The German batteries at once took up the fight, which lasted till late in the night, and in the course of which Amanvillers was burned.

In that quarter the retirement of the IVth French Corps had also already commenced, masked, however, by repeated heavy attacks to the front. In the course of these there occurred a hand-to-hand encounter with the charging battalions of the right wing of the Guard and the left of the IXth Corps. Amanvillers, however, remained in the hands of the French for the night. Not until three o'clock on the morning of the 19th did the IIIrd French Corps evacuate its position about Moscou; and the IInd Corps held its ground until five o'clock, engaged in constant sharp frays with the outposts of the Pomeranians, who on its withdrawal took possession of the plateaus of Moscou and Point du Jour.

The results attained on the 18th of August had been made possible only by the battles of the 14th and 16th.

The French estimate their losses at 13,000 men. In October 173,000 were still in Metz, consequently it is certain that the enemy had at disposition in the battle of the 18th of August more than 180,000 men.

The exact strength of the seven[15] German Corps on that day amounted to 178,818 men. Thus with the forces on either side of approximately equal strength, the French had been driven out of a position of almost unrivalled natural advantage.

Naturally the loss of the a.s.sailants was much heavier than that of the defence; it amounted to 20,584 men, among them 899 officers.

Whereas by the war-establishment the average is one officer to every forty men, in this battle one officer fell to every twenty-three men; glorious testimony to the example set by their leaders to their brave men, but also a loss which could not be restored during the course of the war. Altogether the six battles fought in the first fourteen days of August had cost the German army 50,000 men.[16] It was naturally impossible immediately to call out at home a sufficient levy in subst.i.tution for the losses; but reinforcements drawn from the time-expired cadres were already bespoken.

First of all that same evening the earliest instalment of the trains and the Field-Hospitals had to be brought up from the right bank of the Moselle; and the ammunition had to be replenished throughout. In Rezonville, thronged as it was with the wounded, it was with difficulty that a little garret for the King and shelter for his General Staff were found. Its members were engrossed throughout the night in preparing the dispositions which the new phase of the situation created by the victory rendered immediately necessary. This exertion enabled all those orders to be laid before his Majesty for approval on the morning of the 19th.

FOOTNOTES:

[11] The XIIth Corps never stood on the right. It occupied its a.s.signed position on the extreme left, and the delay arose from the Guard Corps having occupied a position other than that designed for it, and having been allowed to remain there.

[12] Vionville in text seems a slip of the pen for Verneville.

[13] Commanding the Guard Corps.

[14] Of Saxony, commanding XIIth Corps.

[15] These figures represent only the infantry of the eight (not seven) Corps engaged; they do not include the cavalry, 24,584; the artillery, at least as strong; nor the officerhood of the two armies, numbering several thousands. Inclusive of those items the German host "employed"

in the battle of Gravelotte--St. Privat numbered, in round figures, 232,000 combatants. Accepting Moltke's own estimate of ten defenders per "Schrith" of front, there works out a total of 133,000 men, as the strength of the French army "employed" in the battle.

[16] During the first fourteen days of August, the German troops were in conflict with the enemy on five occasions: viz. Saarbrucken, 2nd, loss 79; Weissenburg, 4th, loss 1551; Worth, 6th, loss 10,642; Spicheren, 6th, loss 4871; Borny, 14th, loss 5000. Total losses during the fourteen days, 22,143.

NEW DISTRIBUTION OF THE ARMY.

The siege of Metz had formed no part of the original plan of campaign; it had been intended to do no more than merely to maintain an observation on the place when the main army should have pa.s.sed it on the advance towards Paris; and a Reserve Division, consisting of eighteen battalions, sixteen squadrons, and thirty-six guns, detailed for that duty, was now near at hand.

Under the altered conditions, however, the regular investment of Metz was now necessary, and this involved a radical alteration of the existing arrangements throughout the whole army.

A separate army under the command of Prince Frederick Charles, consisting of the Ist, VIIth, and VIIIth Corps of the former Ist Army, the IInd, IIIrd, IXth, and Xth Corps of the IInd Army, the Reserve Division and the 1st and 3rd Cavalry Divisions, in all 150,000 men, was a.s.signed to the duty of investing Metz.

The Guard, IVth, and XIIth Corps and the 5th and 6th Cavalry Divisions were formed into a separate army under the command of the Crown Prince of Saxony; it was styled "The Army of the Meuse" and was 138,000 strong.[17] This and the IIIrd Army, which numbered 223,000 men, were directed to advance against the new French army forming at Chalons.

Certainly the army investing Metz was left weaker than the blockaded enemy. It was to be expected that the latter would renew his efforts to break out to the westward. Prince Frederick Charles' main forces were therefore to remain on the left bank of the Moselle.

All these orders received the approval of the King, and were dispatched to the commanding officers by eleven o'clock on the morning of the 19th.

In accordance with the orders of Prince Frederick Charles, the Xth Corps occupied the woodland districts of the lower Moselle as far as St.

Privat, while the IInd held the high ridge from that point to Moscou. To the right of the IInd, the VIIIth and VIIth Corps followed on, the latter positioned on both sides of the Upper Moselle. The Ist Corps occupied the Pouilly upland to left and right of the Seille, specially charged to protect the great magazines which were being established at Remilly and Pont a Mousson. The 3rd Reserve Division moved to the vicinity of Retonfay, north-east of Metz. The IXth and IIIrd Corps cantoned at St. Marie and Verneville as reserve. All the troops immediately set about the construction of earthworks, and of bridges over the Moselle above and below the fortress.

Of the Corps now belonging to the Army of the Meuse, the XIIth a.s.sembled at Conflans and the Guards at Mars la Tour; the IVth Corps, which had not been ordered to Metz, had already reached Commercy.

The IIIrd Army, after crossing the Vosges range, and having left a Bavarian brigade blockading Toul, was pressing forward in three columns. Its foremost Corps had already reached the Meuse, but were obliged to halt there for two days, so as to cross the river approximately abreast of the Meuse army. Its cavalry meanwhile patrolled three marches ahead as far as Chalons and Vitry, where, for the first time since Worth, it regained touch of the enemy. The French encountered were only guarding posts on the Marne railway-line, which retired when the traffic thereon ceased.

FOOTNOTE:

[17] These figures are erroneous. It is manifest that three Corps and two Cavalry Divisions, most of which had been materially weakened by casualties, could not furnish a strength of 138,000 men; nor could the IIIrd Army, originally 130,000 strong, swelled by one Corps and diminished by battle losses of 12,000, approximate a strength of 223,000. As a matter of fact, on August 22nd, the Meuse Army was 86,275 strong, and the IIIrd Army 137,622; the two armies together had a total strength, in round numbers, of 224,000 men.

THE ARMY OF CHaLONS.

Meanwhile at Chalons there had been formed a French army of 166 battalions, 100 squadrons, and 380 guns, consisting of the Ist, Vth, VIIth, and XIIth Corps.

Of the last the Division which had been left behind on the Spanish frontier formed the nucleus, to which was added a body of very superior troops, consisting of four regiments of marines; later the two cavalry divisions also joined. General Trochu, who had been made Governor of Paris, had taken back with him thither eighteen battalions of Gardes-Mobiles, they having already given such proofs of insubordination that it was thought unsafe to confront them with the enemy.

The Emperor had arrived in Chalons and had placed Marshal MacMahon in command of the newly-formed army. In the French Head-quarter it was not unnaturally a.s.sumed that Marshal Bazaine was in retreat from Metz. By an advance of the Army of Chalons merely to Verdun the armies could form a junction with each other in the course of a few days, and so a fighting force be formed which might make head against the hitherto victorious enemy. On the other hand, MacMahon had to concern himself with the duty of covering Paris, and that capital, no less than his own right flank, was threatened by the appearance of the Crown Prince of Prussia's army on the Meuse.

For the attainment of a decision between advancing and retiring, it was beyond everything necessary to know the direction which Marshal Bazaine might have taken.

On the 18th tidings had come from him, that he had maintained his position in a battle about Rezonville, but that his troops had to be supplied with ammunition and supplies before they could renew the march.

From this it seemed only too probable that the communications of the Army of the Rhine were already threatened; and MacMahon determined to march on Rheims, whence he could either reach Paris, though by a somewhat circuitous route, or move in the direction of the other army.

But when it became known that the Crown Prince of Prussia's army had not even been near Metz, and that Prussian cavalry had already appeared before Vitry, the Marshal could not deceive himself as to the danger involved in the latter alternative. With sound judgment, therefore, he stood out against the order of the Empress and the Ministry to undertake that enterprise; he determined against it, and announced his resolution to march to Paris. Under its walls he could accept a battle with advantage, since the fortifications, even in the event of defeat, a.s.sured a safe retreat and precluded pursuit.

Further reports from Metz did not afford a clear insight into the situation there. Also on the 18th, "the army had held its position," the narrative ran--only the right wing had changed front. "The troops required two or three days' rest," but the Marshal "counted still on being able to move out in a northerly direction," and fight his way to Chalons by the Montmedy--Ste. Menehould route, if this road was not strongly held by the enemy. In that case, he would march on Sedan, and even by Mezieres, in order to reach Chalons.

Bazaine might already have committed himself to the movement thus indicated, and therefore Marshal MacMahon, who was not the man to leave his fellow-soldier in the lurch, instead of marching on Paris, set forth on the 23rd in the direction of Stenay.

The suddenness of this decision caused all the preparations for the undertaking to be left unexecuted. At the end of the first day's march the troops reached the Suippe late in the evening in pouring rain. They lacked every necessary, and two Corps remained entirely without food.

The Marshal was therefore forced to move his army further northward to Rethel, where large magazines of provisions had been established, and where the railway facilitated the bringing up of stores. Even on the third day's march the army had made little progress eastward. The left wing remained at Rethel, the right reached the Aisne, near Vouziers. On August 26th the main army was still standing between Attigny and Le Chene on the Ardennes ca.n.a.l, while the VIIth Corps and a regiment of Hussars lay in front of Vouziers for the protection of the right flank.

While the French army was thus marching eastward by a wide detour, the German forces, which had been put in motion at the same time, were for their part marching due westward.