The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.)

ession of which is of more importance in France than in other countries. . . . It is a delusion to believe that a

physical qualities--and the spread of liberty has undoubtedly lessened the great differences that once were observable in this respect among European peoples--war becomes largely an affair of preliminary organisation. That is to say, it is now a matter of brain rather than muscle. Writers of the school of Carlyle may protest that all modern warfare is tame when compared with

ly and act as "the eyes and ears of an army," as well as to charge in brigades on a wavering foe. Universal military service had been compulsory in Prussia since 1813; but the organisation of territorial army corps now received fuller development, so that each part of Prussia, including, too, most of the North German Confederation, had its own small army complete in all arms, and reinforced from the Reserve, an

t smooth working. Reservists speedily appeared at their regimental dep?ts, there found their equipment, and speedily brought their regiments up to the war footing; trains were ready, timed according to an elaborate plan, to carry them Rhinewards; provisions and stores were sent forward, ohne Hast, ohne Rast, as the Germans s

ew order of things, which aimed at assuring the swift orderly movement of great masses of men by all the resources of mechanical science. Most of the civilised States soon responded to the new needs of the age; but a few (among them Great Britain) were content to make one or two superficial chan

Empire is peace"; and their successes in the Crimea, Lombardy, Syria, and China, everywhere in fact but Mexico, filled them with warlike pride. Armed with the chassep?t, a newer and better rifle than the

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ate, and producing distrust between officers and men; above all, the lack of men and materials; and the outlook was not reassuring to those who knew the whole truth. Inclusive of the levies of the year 1869, which were not quite ready for active service, France would have by August 1, 1870, as many as 567,000 men in her regular army; but of these colonial, garrison, and other duties claimed as many as 230,000--a

hich contained the reservists' equipment; and when these had found their equipment, they often wandered widely before finding their regiments on the way to the frontier. One general officer hunted about on the frontier for a command which did not exist. As a result

er. In 1869 Marshal Leboeuf had done away with the Garde Mobile, a sort of militia which had involved only fifteen days' drill in the year; and the Garde Nationale of the towns was less fit for campaigning than the re-formed Mobiles proved to be late

rces to some 1,180,000 men by calling out all the reserves and Landwehr. These last were men who had served their time and had not, as

s long as Russia favoured the cause of Prussia; for any threatening pressure of the Muscovites on the open flank of the Hapsburg States, Galicia, has sufficed to keep them from embarking on a campaign in the West. In this case, the statesmen of Vienna are said to have known by July 20 that Russia would quietly help Prussia; she informed the Hapsburg

berg was Protestant, but far too democratic to wish for the control of the cast-iron bureaucrats of Berlin. The same was even more true of Saxony, where hostility to Prussia was a deep-rooted tradition; some of the Saxon troops on leaving their towns even shouted Napoleon soll leben[37]. It is therefore quite possible that, had France struck quickly at the valleys of the Neckar and Main, she might have reduced the South German States to neutrality. Alliance perhaps was out of the question save under overwhelming compulsion; for France had alienated the Bavarian and Hessian Governments by her claims in 1866, and the South German pe

of the South. The news that the deservedly popular Crown Prince of Prussia, Frederick William, would command the army now mustering in the Palatinate, largely composed of South Germans, sent a thrill of joy through those States. Taught by the folly of her stay-at-home strategy in 1866, Bavaria readily sent her large contingent beyond the Rhine; and all danger of a French irruption into South Germany was ended by the speedy massing of the Third German Army, some 200,000 strong in all, on the north of

nced troops of the Second German Army from Saarbrücken. The affair was unimportant: it could lead to nothing, unless the French had the means of following up the success. Th

n August 4 a strong Bavarian division advanced against the small fortified town of Weissenburg, which lies deep down in the valley of the Lauter, surrounded by lofty hills. There it surprised a weak French division, the vanguard of MacMahon's army, commanded by General Abel Douay, whose scouts had found no trace of the ad

and Reichshofen. The line of railway between Strassburg and Bitsch touches Reichshofen; but, for some reason that has never been satisfactorily explained, MacMahon was able to draw up only one division from the side of Strassburg and Belfort, and not one from Bitsch, which was within an easy march. The fact seems to

g the steep wooded slope running north and south, with buttress-like projections,

he Battle

In front of MacMahon's position lay the village of W?rth, deep in the valley of the Sauerbach. The invader would therefore have to carry this village or cross the stream, and press up the long open slopes on which were ranged the French troops and batteries with all the advantages of co

c between division and division, was now fed by a steady stream of German reinforcements, until 87,000 of the invaders sought to wrest from MacMahon the heights, with their woods and villages, which he had but 54,000 to defend. The superiority of numbers soon made itself felt. Pursuant to the Crown Prince's orders, parts of two Bavarian corps began to work their way (but with one strangely long interval of inaction) through the wood to the north of the French left wing; on the Prussian 11th corps fell the severer task of winning their way up the slopes south of W?rth, a

from the Würtembergers held in reserve, few of the Germans were in a condition to press the pursuit. Nevertheless the fruits of victory were very great: 10,000 Frenchmen lay dead or wounded; 6000 unwounded prisoners were taken, with 28 cannon and 5 mitrailleuses. Above all, MacMahon's fine army was utterly broken, and made no attempt to defend any of the positions on the north of the Vosges. Not even a tunnel was there blown up to del

ncing rapidly against it, General Frossard drew back his vanguard some mile and a half to the line of steep hills between Spicheren and Forbach, just within the French frontier. This retreat, as it seemed, tempted General Kameke to attack with a single division, as h

for that place with the utmost speed. He entrained part of his corps and brought it up in time to strengthen the attack on the Rothe Berg and other heights nearer to Forbach. Each battalion as it arrived was hurled forward, and General von Fran?ois, charging with his regiment, gained a lodgment half-way up the broken slope of the Rothe Berg, which was stoutly maintained even when he fell mortally wou

ordered three divisions to march towards the firing: one made for a wrong point and returned; the others made half-hearted efforts, and thus left Frossard to be overborne by numbers. The result of these disjointed movements was that both Frossard and Bazaine hurriedly retired towards Metz, while the First

assador assured the French Ministry that Austria was pushing on her preparations. Victor Emmanuel was with difficulty restrained by his Ministers from openly taking the side of France. On the night of August 6 he received telegraphic news of the Battles of W?rth and Forbach, whereupon he exclaimed, "

ship proved to be mere dreamy philosophising about nationalities; his administrative powers, small at the best, were ever clogged by his too generous desire to reward his fellow-conspirators of the coup d'état of 1851; and his gifts for war were scarcely greater than those of the other Napoléonides, Joseph and Jerome. Nevertheless the reverses of his early life had strengthened that fund of quiet stoicism, that energy to resist if not to dare, which formed the backbone of an otherwise somewhat weak, shadowy, and uninspiring charact

nd it was soon known that their flight could not be stayed at Nancy or even at Toul. During the agony of suspense as to their movements and those of their German pursuers, the Emperor daily changed his plans. First, he and Leboeuf planned a retreat beyond the Moselle and

r to order such a retreat in his own name was thought to be inopportune. Bazaine was a convenient scapegoat, and he himself knew it. Had he thrown an army corps into Metz and obeyed the Emperor's orders by retreating on Verdun, things would certainly have gone better than was now to be the case. In his printed defence Bazaine has urged that the army had

he result was the battle of Colombey on the east of Metz (August 14). It was a stubborn fight, costing the Germans some 5000 men, while the French with smaller losses finally withdrew under the eastern walls of Metz. But that heavy loss meant a great ultimate gain to Germany. The vacillations of Bazaine, wh

fully known, the General heard enough to convince himself that a rapid advance southwards to and over the Moselle might enable him to intercept the French retreat on Verdun, which might now be looked on as certain. Reporting his conviction to his chief as also to the royal headquarters, he struck out with all speed on the 15th, quietly threw a bridge over the riv

ng their line of retreat, and the splendid results that must follow on the interception of that retreat. The operations of war must always be attended with risk, and the great commander is

nd against the onsets of two French corps. Early in the fight Bazaine galloped up, but he did not bring forward the masses in his rear, probably because he feared to be cut off from Metz. Even so, all through the forenoon, it seemed that the gathering forces of the French must break through the thin lines audaciously thrust into that almost open plain on the flank of their line of march. But Alvensleben and his men held their ground with a dogged will that nothing could shatter. In on

h corps towards Vionville threatened to sweep away the wearied Brandenburgers, six squadrons of the 7th regiment of Cuirassiers with a few Uhlans flung themselves on the new lines of foemen

all, but kept them in reserve. As the afternoon sun waned, the whole weight of the German 10th corps was thrown into the fight about Vionville, and the vanguards of the 8th and 9th came up from Gorze to threaten the French left. Fearing that he might be cut off from Metz on the south--a fear which had unaccountably haunted him all the day--Bazaine continued to feed that part of his lines; and thu

attle, which in a tactical sense seemed to be inconclusive, became, when viewed in the light of strategy, the most decisive of the war. Had Bazaine used even the forces which he had in the field ready to hand he must have overborne Alvensleben; and the arrival of 170,000 good troops at Verdun or Chalons would have changed the whole course of the war. The campaign would probably have followed the course of the many campaigns waged in the valleys of the Meuse and Marne; and Metz, held by a garrison of suitable size, m

half, steep slopes to the assailants. It also sloped away to the rear, thus enabling the defenders (as was the case with Wellington at Waterloo) secretly to reinforce any part of the line. On the French left wing, too, the slopes curved inward, thus giving the defenders ample advantage against any flanking movements on that side. On the north, between Amanvillers and Ste. Marie-aux-Chênes, the defence had fewer strong points except those villages, the Jaumont Wood, and the gradual slope of the ground away to the little River Orne, which formed an open glacis. Bazaine massed his reserves on the plateau of Plappevi

in order to resume our march in two days if that is possible[41]." That the army was badly hampered by lack of stores is certain; but to postpone even for a single day the march to Verdun by the northern

tead of waiting for the hoped-for flank attack on the north to take effect, sent the columns of the First Army to almost certain death in the defile in front of Gravelotte, and he persisted in these costly efforts even when the strength of the French position on that side was patent to all. For this the tough old soldier met with severe censure and ultimate disgrace. In his defence, however, it may be urged that when a great battle is raging with doubtful fortunes, the duty of a commander on the attacking side is to busy the enemy at as many points as p

aving some 40,000 men under Canrobert in and between these villages, whose solid buildings gave the defence the best of cover, Bazaine had latterly taken little thought for

ghold on the right, St. Privat. The struggle of the Prussian Guards up the open slope between that village and Amanvillers left them a mere shadow of their splendid array; but the efforts of the German artillery cost the defenders dear: by seven o'clock St. Privat was in flames, and as the Saxons (the 12th corps), wheeling round

the (in part) unskilful character of the German attack. On this latter point the recently published Journals of Field-Marshal Count von Blumenthal supply some piquant details. He describes the indignation of King William at the wastefulness of the German tactics at Gravelotte: "He complained bitterly that the officers of the higher grades appeared to have forgotten all that had been so carefully taught them at manoeuvres, and had apparentl

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n war with a light heart, it should be added that he has since explained his

TNO

the reserve, and five in the Landwehr. Three new army corps (9th, 10th, and 11th) were formed in the newly

art of war, while most of them looked on favouritism as the only means of promotion. The warnings of Colonel Stof

he author had this from an Englis

I had expected to take place on the 7th, and for which I had prepared a

argely indebted to my friend, Mr. Bernard Pares, M.A., who has mad

a staff-officer pointed out in his incisive Réponse, this reason must have been equally cogent whe

efence which Bazaine and his few defenders later on put forward, as well as the a

French and German General Staffs; Bazaine, L'Armée du Rhin, and Episodes de la Guerre; General Blumenthal's Journals; Aus drei Kriegen, by Gen. von