The Campaign of Sedan, August-September, 1870
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Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2007 with funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/campaignofsedanaOOhoopuoft WAR BOOKS THE CAMPAIGN OF SEDAN THE CAMPAIGl^J^ ^OF SEDA AUGUST-SEPTEMBER 1870 BY GEORGE HOOPER For many years a member of the Daily Telegraph Staff .*^'^' P HO ODER AND STOUGHTON LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO MCMXIV — r CONTENTS PAGE Introduction xi CHAPTER I The Causes of the War French Demands for the Rhine—Luxemburg —An Interlude of Peace—The Salzburg Inter- view—The Emperor seeks Allies—^The Hohen- zoUern Candidature—The French Government and the Chamber i CHAPTER II The Gathering of the Hosts German Mobilization—French Mobilization War Methods Contrasted 37 CHAPTER III Stage Thunder The Combat at Saarbriick—Preparing to go Forward—Positions on August 4th—The Moral and Political Forces 52 vi CONTENTS CHAPTER IV Invasion in Earnest The Combat on the Lauter—French Position on the Saar—German Position on the Saar . CHAPTER V Two Staggering Blows I. Woerth—The Battle Begins—Attack on Woerth—Attack on the French Right—Attack on Elsasshausen—MacMahon Orders a Retreat —The Close of the Battle. 2. Spicheren—The Germans Begin the Fight—The Red Hill Stormed —Progress of the Action—Frossard Retires . CHAPTER VI Vacillation in Metz The Emperor Resigns his Command—The German Advance—The German Cavalry at Work—The Germans March on the Moselle . CHAPTER VII Von Moltke Keeps the Whip Hand The French Propose to Move—The Battle of Colombey-Nouilly—Von Golz Dashes in—The — 1 CONTENTS vii PAGE End of the Battle—The French Retreat—The Germans Cross the Moselle—^The Cavalry Beyond the Moselle—Orders for the Flank March—The Emperor Quits the Army 12 CHAPTER VIII The French Retreat Thwarted Vionville-Mars la Tour—The Vionville Battle- field—The French are Surprised—The Third Corps Strikes In—Arrival of Bazaine—Bredow's Brilliant Charge—The Fight becomes Stationary —Arrival of the Tenth Corps—The Great Cavalry Combat—End of the Battle 142 CHAPTER IX Pressed Back on Metz Marshal Bazaine—The Battlefield of Grave- lotte—The German Plans—The Battle of Grave- lotte—Prince Frederick Charles at the Front Steinmetz Attacks the French Left—Operations by the German Left Wing—General Frossard Repels a Fresh Attack—The Last Fights near St. Hubert—The Prussian Guard on the Centre and Left—The Capture of St. Privat . ; . 162 — viii CONTENTS CHAPTER X The State of the Game, and the New Moves The King Marches Westward—The Cavahy Operations—The Emperor at Chalons and Reims — MacMahon Retires to Reims — The Chalons Army Directed on the Meuse .... CHAPTER XI The Grand Right Wheel The Cavalry Discover the Enemy—Move- ments of the French—The Marshal Resolves, Hesitates, and Yields—Movements of the Ger- mans—Effects of MacMahon's Counter-orders German and French Operations on the 29th The Combat at Nouart—The State of Affairs at Sundown—^The Battle of Beaumont—The Surprise of the Fifth Corps—The FHght to Mouzon 212 CHAPTER Xn Metz and Strasburg The Battle of Noisseville 240 — ^ CONTENTS ix i PAOB CHAPTER XIII ? Sedan German Decision—Confusion in the French Camp—The Movements of the Germans—The Battlefield of Sedan—The Battle of Sedan MacMahon's Wound and its Consequences- Progress of the Battle on the Givonne—The March on St. Menges—The Eleventh and Fifth Corps Engage—The Condition of the French Army—The French Cavalry Charge—General de Wimpffen's Counter stroke—The Emperor and his Generals —King William and his Warriors—How the Generals Rated Each Other —The Generals Meet at Donchery—Napoleon III. Surrenders—the French Generals Submit The End 248 MAP AND PLANS I. Battle of Woerth. II. Battle of Spicheren. III. Battle of Colombey-Nouilly. 1 IV. Battle of Vionville-Mars la Tour. V. Battle of Gravelotte. VI. General Map (End Paper.) VII. Battle of Sedan (End Paper) THE CAMPAIGN OF SEDAN INTRODUCTION In July, 1870, fifty-five years after the Allied Annies, who had marched from the decisive field of Waterloo, entered Paris, a young diplomatist. Baron Wimpfen, started from the French capital for Berlin. He was the bearer of a Declaration of War from the Emperor Napoleon III. to William I., King of Prussia; and the fatal message was dehvered to the French Charge d' Affaires, M. le Sourd, and by him to the Prussian Government on the 19th of July. Thus, once again, a Napoleon, at the head of a French Empire, was destined to try his strength against the principal German Power beyond the Rhine. Yet, under what different conditions ! The Em- peror was not now the Napoleon who surrounded the Austrians at Ulm, broke down the combined forces of Austria and Russia at Austerlitz, and extorted a peace which set him free to overthrow, at Jena and Auerstadt, the fine army left by Frederick the Great, and allowed to crystallize by his weak successors. Nor did the late Emperor find in his front a divided Germany, and the mere survival of a great miUtary organization. He found a united people, and an army surpassing in completeness, as it did in arma- ments—the victors of Prague, Rosbach, and Leuthen. The Germany known to the Congress of Vienna had disappeared—the deformed had been transformed. xii Introduction The little seed of unity, sown early in the century, had grown into a forest tree. The spirit of Arndt had run through the whole Teutonic nation, which, after the turmoil of 1848 had subsided, and the heavy hand of Russia had been taken off by the Crimean War, found a leader in the strongly- organized kingdom of Prussia. When the weak and hesitating will of Frederick William IV. ceased, first, by the operation of a painful disease, and then by extinction, to disturb the course of his country's fortune, Prussia, in a few years, became practically a new Power. King William I., who crowned himself with his own hands at Konigsberg, began his task, as a ruler, in a grave and earnest spirit, holding that kingship was not only a business, but a trust, and taking as his watchwords, Work and Duty. No monarch in any age, no private man, ever laboured more assiduously and conscienti- ously at his metier, to use the word of Joseph II., than the King of Prussia. He became Regent in 1858, when Napoleon III. was engaged in preparing for his Italian campaign against the House of Austria. French policy, with varying watchwords had run that road for centuries ; and, during the summer of 1859, it was the good fortune of the Emperor to win a series of victories which brought his army to the Mincio, and before the once famous Quadrilateral. The German Bund had taken no part in the fray, but the rapid successes of the French aroused some apprehensions in Berlin, and there went forth an order to mobilize a part of the army, which means to put each corps on a war- footing, and to assemble a force in Rhenish Prussia. Whatever share that demonstration may have had in producing the sudden arrangement between the rival Emperors, who made peace over their cigarettes and coffee at Villafranca, the experiment tried by the Berlin War Office had one important result—it brought to light serious defects in the system then practised, and revealed the relative weakness of the Prussian army. From that moment, the Regent, who soon became King by the death of his brother, began the work of ; Introduction xiii reforming the military system. For this step, at least from a Prussian standpoint, there was good reason since the kingdom, although it was based on a strong and compact nucleus, was, as a whole, made up of scattered fragments lying between great mihtary Powers, and therefore could not hope to subsist without a formidable army. The relative weakness of Prussia had, indeed, been burnt into the souls of Prussian statesmen ; and King WilUam, on his accession, determined that as far as in him lay, that grave defect should be cured. A keen observer, a good judge of character and capacity, his experience of men and things, which was large, enabled him at once to select fit instruments. He picked out three persons, two soldiers and a statesman, and severe ordeals in after years justified his choice. He appointed General von Roon, Minister of War, and no man in modern times has shown greater quaUties in the organization of an army. He placed General von Moltke at the head of the General Staff, which that able man soon converted into the best equipped and the most effective body of its kind known to history. It rapidly became, what it now is, the brain of the army, alike in quarters and in the field. Fi- nally, after some meditation, he called Herr Otto von Bismarck from the diplomatic service, which had revealed his rare and peculiar qualities, and made this Pomeranian squire his chief poUtical adviser and the manager of his deUcate and weighty State affairs. Thenceforth, the long-gathering strength of Prussia, the foundations of which were bedded deep in the history of its people, began to assume a form and a direction which great events revealed to astonished and incredulous Europe. The experiment undertaken by the King and his chief councillors was rendered less difficult by that effect of the Crimean War which so materially lessened the influence of Russia in Germany. The intimate and friendly -relations sub- sisting between the two Courts remained unbroken, and to its preservation in fair weather and foul, ; xiv Introduction Prussia owed, to a large extent, the favourable con- ditions surrounding the application and development of her poHcy.