Franco-Prussian War

The Franco-Prussian War (July 19, 1870 – May 10, 1871) was declared by France on Prussia which was backed by the North German Confederation. The south German states of Baden, Württemberg and Bavaria joined in on the side of Prussia. The conflict marked the culmination of tension between the two powers following Prussia's rise to dominance in Germany, before 1866 still a loose federation of quasi-independent territories.

The war began over the possible ascension of a candidate from Prussia's Hohenzollern royal family to the vacant Spanish throne as Isabella II had abdicated in 1868 -- therefore, the war could technically be known as the Second War of Spanish Succession. This was strongly opposed by France who issued an ultimatum to King Wilhelm I of Prussia to have the candidacy withdrawn, which was done. Aiming to humiliate Prussia, Emperor Napoleon III of France then required Wilhelm to apologize and renounce any possible further Hohenzollern candidature to the Spanish throne. King Wilhelm, surprised at his holiday resort by the French ambassador, declined as he was not informed yet. Prussia's prime minister Otto von Bismarck edited the king's account of his meeting with the French ambassador to a shortened and cutting version, and authorizing its release to the press and embassies, as the famous Ems Dispatch.

The French people and their parliament reacted with outrage, Napoleon III mobilized and declared war, on Prussia only, but effectively also on the states of southern Germany. The German armies quickly mobilized and within a few weeks controlled large amounts of land in Eastern France. Their success was due in part to rapid mobilization by train, one of the first times a nation effectively used railroads to mobilize an army for war, to Prussian General staff leadership and to modern Krupp artillery made of steel. Napoleon III was captured with his whole army at the Battle of Sedan, yet this did not end the war, as a republic was declared in Paris on 4 September 1870, marking the creation of the Third Republic of France under the Government of National Defense and later the "Versaillais government" of Adolphe Thiers. The immediate result was an extension to the war as the Republic proclaimed a continuation of the fights.

Over a five-month campaign, the German armies defeated the newly recruited French armies in a series of battles fought across northern France. Following a prolonged siege, the French capital Paris fell on 28 January 1871. Ten days earlier, the German states had proclaimed their union under the Prussian King, uniting Germany as a nation-state, the German Empire. The final peace Treaty of Frankfurt was signed 10 May 1871, during the time of the bloody Paris Commune of 1871.

In France and Germany the war is known as the Franco-German War ( ), which perhaps more accurately describes the combatants rather than simply France and Prussia alone.

Causes of the war

Tensions had long been running high between Prussia and France following the Prussian victory in the Austro-Prussian War and its subsequent annexation of almost all Northern Germany. The humbling of Austria and Prussia's new territorial gains had shattered the European balance of power that had existed since the end of the Napoleonic Wars.

Prussian Prime Minister Otto Von Bismarck, after proving Prussia to be the most powerful of German States in the Austro-Prussian War, wanted to once again unite the German States under the Prussian banner. This would allow a Prussian Emperor to rule all of the German States in a united German Empire. It would also lead to a more prosperous age in which the might of the German Empire would be unparalleled in Europe.

Following the end of the Austro-Prussian War, Prussian prime minister Otto von Bismarck and the French emperor Napoleon III had attempted to reach a private agreement regarding the balance of power in Europe. Napoleon III wished to realise French aspirations for "natural borders," a long term goal of French foreign policy since the Middle Ages — to annex all land west of the Rhine river and the Alps including the German state of Palatinate-on-Rhine, Belgium, the southern Netherlands, Luxembourg, Savoy, and parts of Hesse and Rhenish Prussia. A solid defensible border was also insurance against the possibility of a united Germany unfriendly to France. However in 1840 the French politician Adolphe Thiers had sparked a Franco-German diplomatic crisis (the Rhine crisis, 1840) over a mention of "natural borders" on the west bank of the Rhine, reminding many Germans of Napoleonic efforts to establish a border on the Rhine.

Savoy had been obtained from Italy following French support for Italian independence from Austria. Now Napoleon III sought Prussian neutrality when attempting to acquire Luxembourg and Wallonia (the French-speaking part of Belgium), while expecting Prussian neutrality as "compensation" for French neutrality during the Austro-Prussian War and for Prussian territorial gains. Bismarck was non-committal at best, but to the French government, Bismarck appeared to agree to or at least agreed not to obstruct any French moves against the Low Countries.

The Luxembourg Crisis

for details, see also de:Luxemburgkrise (in German) Thus in 1867, France began by negotiating the purchase of Luxembourg from the Dutch government, as Luxembourg was then in personal union with the Netherlands. Assuming that Bismarck would honour his part of the agreement, the French government was shocked to learn that instead Bismarck, Prussia and the North German Confederation were threatening war should the sale be completed. Luxembourg lay astride one of the principal invasion routes an army would use to invade either France or Germany. The city of Luxembourg's formidable fortifications, constructed by the famous military engineer Marshal Vauban, were considered "the Gibraltar of the North", and neither side could tolerate the other controlling such a strategic location. To mediate the dispute, the United Kingdom hosted the London Conference (1867) attended by all European great powers. It confirmed Luxembourg's independence from the Netherlands and guaranteed its independence from all other powers. War appeared to have been averted, at the cost of thwarting French desires.

French prestige and domestic politics

France's position in Europe was now in danger of being overshadowed by the emergence of a powerful Prussia, and France looked increasingly flat-footed following Bismarck's successes. In addition, French ruler Napoleon III was on increasingly shaky ground in domestic politics. Having successfully overthrown the Second Republic and established the Bonapartist Second Empire, Napoleon III was confronted with ever more virulent demands for democratic reform from leading republicans such as Jules Favre, along with constant rumours of impending revolution. In addition, French aspirations in Mexico had suffered a final defeat with the execution of the Austrian-born, French puppet Emperor of Mexico Maximilian in 1867.

The French imperial government now looked to a diplomatic success to stifle demands for a return to either a republic or a Bourbon monarchy — the Empress Eugénie, wife of Napoleon III, was quoted as saying, "If there is no war, my son will never be emperor." A war with Prussia and resulting territorial gains in the Rhineland and later Luxembourg and Belgium seemed the best hope to unite the French nation behind the Bonapartist dynasty. With the resulting prestige from a successful war, Napoleon III could then safely suppress any lingering republican or revolutionary sentiment behind reactionary nationalism and return France to the center of European politics.

Bismarck and German nationalism

Prussia in turn was also beset with problems. While revolutionary fervour was far more muted than in France, Prussia had in 1866 acquired millions of new, suspect citizens as a result of the Austro-Prussian War which was also a civil war among German states. The remaining German kingdoms and principalities maintained a steadfastly parochial attitude towards Prussia and German unification. The German princes insisted upon their independence and balked at any attempt to create a federal state that would be dominated by Berlin. Their suspicions were heightened by Prussia's quick victory and her subsequent annexations. Before the war, only some Germans, inspired by the recent unification of Italy, accepted and supported what the princes began to realise: That Germany must unite in order to preserve the fruit of an eventual victory.

The Prussian premier Otto von Bismarck had an entirely different view. He was interested only in strengthening Prussia and the power of her king. Uniting Germany appeared immaterial to him unless it improved Prussia's position. Bismarck considered the conflict with France inevitable, knowing that France would not quietly tolerate a powerful state to its east. He also viewed the war as a means to end the influence which France had long since exercised over Germany. The defeated South German states had to sign mutual defense treaties with the North German Confederation, but only a clear aggression from outside could make sure they would ally with Prussia, rather than against her once more.

Crisis and the outbreak of war

Napoleon III and Bismarck independently sought a suitable crisis to ferment, and in 1870 one arose. The Spanish throne had been vacant since the revolution of September 1868. The Spanish offered the throne to the German prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, a Catholic as well as a distant cousin of King Wilhelm of Prussia. Fearing that a Hohenzollern king in Prussia and another one in Spain would put France into a two-front situation, Napoleon III was determined this time to stand up to the expansion of Prussian influence. He successfully forced King Wilhelm to urge the prince's withdrawal from his Spanish candidacy. Disappointed that the Prussians had backed down so easily, the French government tried to prolong the crisis. In a newspaper interview, Napoleon III announced that a renewal of the Hohenzollern candidature would result in France going to war, and the secretary of foreign affairs, Duc de Gramont, did the same in a speech in front of the Chambre législative. The French ambassador in Prussia Vincent Benedetti was then ordered to require Wilhelm I to guarantee that no Hohenzollern would ever again be a candidate for the Spanish throne. When the French ambassador bypassed diplomatic channels and directly confronted the king at his holiday resort, King Wilhelm was "very polite but cooly categorical." His message to Berlin (the Ems Dispatch) reporting this event with the French ambassador reached the desk of Bismarck. Bismarck edited the telegram in such a way as to arouse French indignation, and then released it for publication. France officially declared war on July 19, 1870.

Alliances and diplomacy

Diplomatically and militarily, Napoleon III looked for support from Austria, Denmark, Bavaria, Baden, and Württemberg, as all had recently lost wars against Prussia. However, Napoleon III inexplicably failed to conduct any diplomacy to secure revanchist alliances from these states. Denmark had twice fought Prussia (a stalemate victory in 1846, and a defeat 1864 against a confederation of north German states and Austria under the leadership of Prussia) during the First and Second Wars of Schleswig and was unwilling to confront Prussia again. Austria also refused to risk confronting Prussia again so soon after the near disaster of the Austro-Prussian War.

To make matters worse, acts by Napoleon III and his governments had isolated France from the other European powers. Russia remained neutral, unwilling to aid France after French participation in Russia's humiliation during the Crimean War. Italy was also disinclined to assist France, having been forced to surrender claims to Savoy to France as the price for assistance against Austria during the Italian wars for unification. In addition, Napoleon III had made himself protector of the Papal States, infuriating Italian nationalists who wanted Italy united with Rome as the capital.

Bismarck had also worked assiduously to diplomatically isolate France from the other European powers. As part of the settlement of the Austro-Prussian War, secret treaties of mutual defense were signed between Prussia and Bavaria, Baden, and Württemberg. Bismarck also added the threat that should the south German monarchs refuse to honour their treaty commitments, he would personally appeal to pan-German nationalists in southern Germany to overthrow their royal houses. Bismarck then made public French correspondence demanding Belgium and Luxembourg as the price for remaining neutral during the Austro-Prussian War. The United Kingdom in particular took a decidedly cool attitude to these French demands — which they called 'tipping policy' — and showed no inclination to aid France. Though it had enjoyed some time as the leading power of continental Europe, the French Empire found itself dangerously isolated in the face of the allied German states.

According to the secret treaties signed with Prussia and in response to popular opinion, Bavaria, Baden, and Württemberg mobilised their armies and joined the war against France. While not prepared to join a united Germany, the south German monarchs could not ignore public opinion which would not stand for another Bonapartist invasion of Germany.

Opposing forces

The French Army comprised approximately 400,000 regular soldiers, some veterans of previous French campaigns in the Crimean War, Algeria, Franco-Austrian War in Italy, and in Mexico supporting the Second Mexican Empire. The infantry were equipped with the breech-loading Chassepot rifle, one of the most modern mass-produced firearms in the world at the time. With a rubber ring seal and a smaller bullet, the Chassepot had a maximum effective range of some 1,500 meters with a rapid reload time. The artillery was equipped with rifled, muzzle-loaded Lahitte '4-pounder' (actual weight of shot: 4 kg / 8.4l lb) guns. In addition, the army was equipped with the precursor to the machine-gun — the mitrailleuse, which was mounted on an artillery gun carriage and grouped in batteries in a similar fashion to cannon. The army was nominally led by Napoleon III with Marshals François Achille Bazaine, Patrice MacMahon and Jules Trochu among others.

The Prussian Army was composed not of regulars but conscripts. Service was compulsory for all men of military age, thus Prussia and its North and South German allies could mobilise and field some 1.2 million soldiers in time of war. The sheer number of soldiers available made mass-encirclement and destruction of enemy formations advantageous. The army was still equipped with the "needle-gun" Dreyse rifle of fame from the Battle of Königgrätz which was by this time showing the age of its 25 year old design. The deficiencies of the needle-gun were more than compensated for by the famous Krupp 6 pounder (3 kg) breech-loading cannons being issued to Prussian artillery batteries. Firing a contact-detonated shell filled with zinc balls and explosive, the Krupp gun had a range of 4,500 meters and blistering rate of fire compared to muzzle loading cannon. The Prussian army was commanded by Field-Marshal Helmuth von Moltke and the Prussian General Staff. The Prussian army was unique in Europe for having the only General Staff in existence, whose sole purpose was to direct operational movement, organise logistics and communications and develop the overall war strategy. In practice, a chief of staff was a much more important figure in the Prussian Army than in any other army, because he had the right to appeal against his superior to the commander of the next highest formation. Thus, for example, the Crown Prince was unable to contradict the advice of his Chief of Staff, General Leonhard, Count von Blumenthal, for fear of a direct appeal (in this case) to his father the King.

Given that France maintained a strong standing army, and that Prussia and the other German states would need weeks to mobilise their conscript armies, the French held the initial advantage of troop numbers and experience. French tactics emphasised the defensive use of the Chassepot rifle in trench-warfare style fighting; however, German tactics emphasised encirclement battles and using artillery offensively whenever possible.

French incursion

On 28 July 1870, Napoleon III left Paris for Metz and assumed command of the newly titled Army of the Rhine, some 100,000 strong and expected to grow as the French mobilisation progressed. Marshal MacMahon took command of I Corps (4 divisions) near Wissembourg, Marshal François Canrobert brought VI Corps (4 divisions) to Châlons-sur-Marne in northern France as a reserve and to guard against a Prussian advance through Belgium. A pre-war plan laid out by the late Marshal Adolphe Niel called for a strong French offensive from Thionville towards Trier and into the Prussian Rhineland. This plan was discarded in favour of a defensive plan by Generals Charles Frossard and Bartélemy Lebrun, which called for the Army of the Rhine to remain in a defensive posture near the German border and repel any Prussian offensive. As Austria along with Bavaria, Württemberg and Baden were expected to join in a revenge war against Prussia, I Corps would invade the Bavarian Palatinate and proceed to "liberate" the south German states in concert with Austro-Hungarian forces. VI Corps would reinforce either army as needed. Unfortunately for General Frossard's plan, the Prussian army was mobilising far more rapidly than expected. Against all expectations, the south German states had come to Prussia's aid and were mobilising their armies against France. The Austro-Hungarians, still smarting after their defeat by Prussia, seemed content to wait until a clear victor emerged before committing to France's cause.

Already, by August 3 1870 some 320,000 German soldiers were now massed near the French border. A 40,000 strong French offensive into southern Germany would run into superior numbers and be rapidly cut off and destroyed. Napoleon III, however, was under immense domestic pressure to launch an offensive before the full might of Moltke's forces were mobilised and deployed. Reconnaissance by General Frossard had identified only one Prussian division guarding the border town of Saarbrücken, right before the entire Army of the Rhine. Accordingly, on July 31 Napoleon III ordered the Army forward across the Saar River to seize Saarbrücken.

Occupation of Saarbrücken

General Frossard's II Corps and Marshal Bazaine's III Corps crossed the German border on August 2, 1870 and evicted the Prussian 40th Regiment of the 16th Division from the town of Saarbrücken. The Chassepot rifle proved its worth against the Dreyse rifle, French riflemen regularly outdistancing their Prussian counterparts in the skirmishing around Saarbrücken. However the French suffered 86 casualties to the Prussian 83 casualties. Saarbrücken also proved to be a dead-end in terms of logistics — only one single railway there led from the border to the German hinterland which could be easily defended by a single force, and the only river systems in the region ran along the border instead of inland.

While the French hailed the invasion as the first step towards the Rhineland and later Berlin, General Frossard was receiving alarming reports from foreign news sources of Prussian and Bavarian armies massing to the southeast in addition to the forces to the north and northeast.

Moltke had indeed massed three armies in the area — the Prussian First Army commanded by General Karl von Steinmetz (50,000 soldiers) opposite Saarlouis, the Prussian Second Army commanded by Prince Friedrich Karl (134,000 soldiers) opposite the line Forbach — Spicheren, and the Prussian Third Army commanded by Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm (125,000 soldiers) poised to cross the border at Wissembourg. Cavalry reconnaissance had identified a French division of MacMahon's corps at Wissembourg. The Third Army moved forward to engage this division. The Second Army moved forward towards the border and Forbach and Spicheren beyond. The First Army marched to Saarlouis, to catch in the flank and rear any French forces moving to reinforce Spicheren. Moltke planned for the First Army in concert later with the Third Army to envelop the entire French army against the Second Army and destroy the entire force.

German advance

Battle of Wissembourg

On learning that the Second Army was just 30 miles from Saarbrücken and was moving towards the border, General Frossard hastily withdrew the elements of Army of the Rhine in Saarbrücken back to Spicheren and Forbach. Marshal MacMahon however was unaware of Prussian movements beyond vague rumours from newspapers, and left his four divisions spread 20 miles apart in depth to react to any Prussian invasion. At Wissembourg on August 4, MacMahon's 2nd Division commanded by General Abel Douay was the first to make contact with leading elements of the Prussian Third Army, beginning the Battle of Wissembourg.

The first action of the Franco-Prussian War (excluding the push into Saarbrücken by elements of Frossard's French II Corps on 2nd August) took place on 4th August 1870. This bloody little battle saw the unsupported division of General Douay of I Corps, with some attached cavalry, which was posted to watch the border, attacked in overwhelming but poorly coordinated strength by the German 3rd Army. As the day wore on elements of one Bavarian and two Prussian Corps became embroiled in the fight which was notable for the complete lack of higher direction by the Prussians and blind offensive haste by their low level officers.

Douay held a very strong position but his force was too thinly stretched to hold it and his division was driven south by way of Riedseltz at dusk. Douay himself was killed in the early afternoon when a caisson of the divisional mitrailleuse battery exploded near him. General Pelle took up command and withdrew the remnants of the division.

Although Failly's V Corps was just a few miles away at Bitsche and the other three divisions of MacMahon's I Corps were a similar distance away to the south at Worth, neither moved to assist, despite the clear rumble of guns.

Battle of Wœrth

The two armies clashed again only two days later (August 6, 1870) near Wœrth, less than ten miles from Wissembourg. The German 3rd army had drawn reinforcements which brought its strength up to 140,000 troops. The French had also been reinforced, but their recruitment was slow, and their force numbered only 35,000. Although badly outnumbered, the French bravely defended their position along a ridge at the western outskirts of Woerth. By afternoon, both sides had suffered about 10,000 casualties, and the French army was reduced to a size which did not permit it to maintain a battle order. Also, the Germans had taken the town of Froeschwiller which sat on a hilltop in the center of the French line. Having lost any outlook for victory and facing a massacre, the French army broke off the battle and retreated in a western direction, hoping to join other French forces on the other side of the Vosges mountains. The German 3rd army did not pursue the withdrawing French. It remained in Alsace and moved slowly south, attacking and destroying the French garrisons remaining in Alsace.

The battle of Woerth was the first major one of the Franco-German war, with more than 100,000 troops in the battlefield. It was also one of the first clashes where troops from various German states (Prussians, Badeners, Bavarians, Saxons, etc.) fought jointly. These facts have led some historians to call the battlefield of Woerth the 'cradle of Germany'.

Battle of Spicheren

The Battle of Spicheren, on August 5, was the second of three critical French defeats. The French were able to stall the German I Army until the German II Army under Prince Friedrich Karl of Prussia came to the aid of their compatriots and routed the French. Together with the Battle of Worth, on the following day, the Prussians succeeded in separating the northern and southern flanks of the French army. The German victory compelled the French to withdraw to the defenses of Metz.

Battle of Mars-La-Tour

130,000 French soldiers were bottled up in the Fortress of Metz after suffering several defeats at the front. Four days after their retreat, on the 16th, the ever-present Prussian forces, here a group of grossly outnumbered 30,000 men of the advanced III Corps (of the 2nd Army) under General Konstantin von Alvensleben, found the French Army near Vionville, east of Mars-la-Tour. Despite odds of four to one, the III Corps routed the French and captured Vionville, blocking any further escape attempts to the West. Once blocked from retreat, the French in the fortress of Metz had no choice but to fight in a battle that would see the last major cavalry engagement in Western Europe. III corps was decimated by the incessant cavalry charges, losing over half its soldiers, while the French suffered equivalent numerical loses of 16,000 soldiers, but still held on to overwhelming numerical superiority.

On August 16, 1870 the French could have swept away the key Prussian defence and escaped. Two Prussian corps attacked the French advanced guard thinking that it was the rearguard of the retreat of the French Army of the Meuse. Despite this misjudgment the two Prussian corps held the entire French army for the whole day. Outnumbered 5:1 the extraordinary self-belief of the Prussians prevailed over gross indecision by the French.

Battle of Gravelotte

The Battle of Gravelotte, or Gravelotte-St. Privat, was the largest battle during the Franco-Prussian War. It was fought about six miles west of Metz, Lorraine, France where on the previous day, having intercepted the French army's retreat to the west at the Battle of Mars-La-Tour, the Prussians were now closing in to complete the destruction of the French forces.

The combined German forces, under Field Marshal Count Helmuth von Moltke, were the Prussian First and Second Armies of the North German Confederation numbering about 210 infantry battalions, 133 cavalry squadrons, and 732 heavy cannons totaling 188,332 officers and men. The French Army of the Rhine, commanded by Marshal François-Achille Bazaine, numbering about 183 infantry battalions, 104 cavalry squadrons, backed by 520 heavy cannons, totaling 112,800 officers and men, dug in along high ground with their southern left flank at the town of Rozerieulles, and their northern right flank at St. Privat.

On August 18, 1870, the battle began when at 08:00 Moltke ordered the First and Second Armies to advance against the French positions. By 12:00, General Manstein opened up the battle before the village of Amanvillers with artillery from the 25th Infantry Division. But the French had spent the night and early morning digging trenches and rifle pits while placing their artillery and their mitrailleuses, an early type of machine gun, in concealed positions. With them finally aware of the Prussian advance, the French opened up a massive return fire against the mass of advancing Germans. The battle at first appeared in favour of the French with their superior Chassepot rifle. However, the Prussian artillery was superior with the all-steel Krupps breech-loading gun.

By 14:30, General Steinmetz, the commander of the First Army, unilaterally launched his VIII Corps across the Mance Ravine in which the Prussian infantry were soon pinned down by murderous rifle and mitrailleuse fire from the French positions. At 15:00, the massed guns of the VII and VIII Corps opened fire to support the attack. But by 16:00, with the attack in danger of stalling, Steinmetz ordered the VII Corps forward, followed by the 1st Cavalry Division.

By 16:50, with the Prussian southern attacks in danger of breaking up, the 3rd Prussian Guards Brigade of the Second Army opened an attack against the French positions at St-Privat which were commanded by General Canrobert. At 17:15, the 4th Prussian Guards Brigade joined the advance followed at 17:45 by the 1st Prussian Guards Brigade. All of the Prussian Guard attacks were too pinned down by lethal French gunfire from the rifle pits and trenches. At 18:15 the 2nd Prussian Guards Brigade, the last of the Guards Division, was committed to the attack on St Privat while Steinmetz committed the last of the reserves of the First Army across the Mance Ravine. By 18:30, a considerable portion of the VII and VIII Corps disengaged from the fighting and withdrew towards the Prussian positions at Rezonville.

With the defeat of the First Army, Crown Prince Frederick Charles ordered a massed artillery attack against Canrobert's position at St. Privat to prevent the Guards attack from failing too. At 19:00 the 3rd Division of Fransecky's II Corps of the Second Army advanced across Ravine while the XII Corps cleared out the nearby town of Roncourt and with the survivors of the Guards Division launched a fresh attack against the ruins of St. Privat. At 20:00, the arrival of the Prussian 4th Division of the II Corps and with the Prussian right flank on Mance Ravine, the line stabilised. By then, the Prussians of the Guards Division and the XII and II Corps captured St. Privat forcing the decimated French forces to withdraw. But with the Prussians exhausted from the fighting, the French were now able to mount a counter-attack. But then General Bourbaki refused to commit the reserves of the French Old Guard to the battle because he considered it a 'defeat'.

By 22:00, firing largely died down across the battlefield for the night. The next morning, the French Army of the Rhine, rather than resume the battle with an attack of its own against the battle-weary German armies, retreated to Metz where they were besieged and forced to surrender two months later.

The casualties were horrible, especially for the attacking Prussian forces. A grand total of 20,163 German troops were killed, wounded or missing in action during the August 18 battle. The French losses were 7,855 killed and wounded along with 4,420 prisoners of war (half of them were wounded) for a total of 12,275. While most of the Prussians fell under the French Chassepot rifles, most French fell under the Prussian Krupp shells. In a breakdown of the casualties, Frossard's II Corps of the Army of the Rhine suffered 621 casualties while inflicting 4,300 casualties on the Prussian First Army under Steinmetz before the Pointe du Jour. The Prussian Guard Division losses were even more staggering with 8,000 casualties out of 18,000 men. The Special Guard Jäger lost 19 officers, a surgeon and 431 men out of a total of 700. The 2nd Guards Brigade lost 39 officers and 1,076 men. The 3rd Guards Brigade lost 36 officers and 1,060 men. On the French side, the units holding St Privat lost more than half their number in the village.

Siege of Metz

With the defeat of Marshal Bazaine's Army of the Rhine at Gravelotte, the French were forced to retire to Metz where they were besieged by over 150,000 Prussian troops of the First and Second Armies. The further crushing French loss was sealed when he surrendered 180,000 soldiers on October 27.

Battle of Sedan

Emperor Napoleon III, along with Field Marshal MacMahon, formed the new French Army of Châlons to march on to Metz to rescue Bazaine. With Napoleon III personally leading the army with Marshal MacMahon in attendance, they led the Army of Chalons in a left-flanking march northeast towards the Belgian border in an attempt to avoid the Prussians before striking south to link up with Bazaine.

The Prussians, under the command of Field Marshal Count Helmuth von Moltke, took advantage of this incompetent manoeuvre to catch the French in a pincer grip. Leaving the Prussian First and Second Armies besieging Metz, Moltke took the Prussian Third Army and the Army of the Meuse northward where they caught up with the French at Beaumont on August 30. After a hard-fought battle with the French losing 5,000 men and 40 cannons in a sharp fight, they withdrew toward Sedan. Having reformed in the town, the Army of Chalons was immediately isolated by the converging Prussian armies. Napoleon III ordered the army to break out of the encirclement immediately. With MacMahon wounded on the previous day, General Auguste Ducrot took command of the French troops in the field.

On September 1, 1870, the battle opened with the Army of Châlons, with 202 infantry battalions, 80 cavalry squadrons and 564 artillery guns, attacking the surrounding Prussian Third and Meuse Armies totaling 222 infantry battalions, 186 cavalry squadrons and 774 artillery guns. General De Wimpffen, the commander of the French V Corps in reserve, hoped to launch a combined infantry and cavalry attack against the Prussian XI Corps. But by 11:00, Prussian artillery took a toll on the French while more Prussian troops arrived on the battlefield. The French cavalry, commanded by General Marguerite, launched three desperate attacks on the nearby village of Floing where the Prussian XI Corps was concentrated. Marguerite was killed leading the very first charge and the two additional charges led to nothing but heavy losses.

By the end of the day, with no hope of breaking out, Napoleon III called off the attacks. The French lost over 17,000 men killed and wounded with 21,000 captured. The Prussians reported their losses at 2,320 killed, 5,980 wounded and 700 captured or missing.

By the next day, on September 2, Napoleon III surrendered and was taken prisoner with 104,000 of his soldiers. It was an overwhelming victory for the Prussians, for they not only captured an entire French army, but the leader of France as well. The defeat of the French at Sedan had decided the war in Prussia's favour. One French army was immobilised and besieged in the city of Metz, and no other forces stood French ground against the Germans, yet the war would not end within the next five months to come.

Overthrow of the French monarchy and armistice negotiations

When news hit Paris of Emperor Napoleon's III capture, the French Second Empire was overthrown in a bloodless and successful coup d'etat which was launched by General Trochu, Jules Favre, and Léon Gambetta at Paris on September 4. They removed the second Bonapartist monarchy and proclaimed ^* a republic led by a Government of National Defense, leading to the Third Republic. Napoleon III was taken to Germany, and released later. He went into exile in the United Kingdom, dying in 1873.

After the German victory at Sedan, most of France's standing forces were out of combat, one army was immobilised and besieged in the city of Metz, and the army led by Emperor Napoleon III himself had surrendered to the Germans. Under these circumstances, the Germans hoped for an armistice which would put an official end to the hostilities and lead to peace. Especially Prussia's Prime Minister von Bismarck entertained that hope for he wanted to end the war as soon as possible. To a nation with as many neighbours as Prussia, a prolonged war meant the growing risk of intervention by another power, and von Bismarck was determined to limit that risk.

At first, the outlook for peace seemed fair. The Germans estimated that the new government of France could not be interested in continuing the war that had been declared by the monarch they had quickly deposed of. Hoping to pave the road to peace, Prussia's Prime Minister von Bismarck invited the new French Government to negotiations held at Ferrières and submitted a list of moderate conditions, including limited territorial demands in Alsace. This area west of the Rhine, inhabited by Germans for over thousand years (bi-lingual Oaths of Strasbourg 842), had been annexed by Louis XIV in 1681. Further claims of a French border along the Rhine in Palatinate had been made since (Adolphe Thiers, Rhine crisis 1840), while the Germans vowed to defend both banks of the Rhine (Die Wacht am Rhein, Deutschlandlied). As Prussia had recently acquired large areas populated by Catholics, further extensions were not considered desirable by Bismarck, though.

But while the republican government was amenable to reparation payments or transfer of colonial territories in Africa or in South East Asia to Prussia, Jules Favre on behalf of the Government of National Defense declared on September 6 that

"We are not going to cede a single inch of our territory and not a single stone of our (Vauban-built) fortresses"

Nous ne céderons ni un pouce de notre territoire ni une pierre de nos forteresses. ^*

The republic renewed the declaration of war, called for recruits in all parts of the country, and pledged to drive the enemy troops out of France.

Under these circumstances, the Germans had to continue the war, yet couldn't pin down any proper military opposition in their vicinity. As the bulk of the remaining French armies were digging-in near Paris, the German leaders decided to put pressure upon the enemy by attacking the capital of France. In October 1870, German troops reached the outskirts of Paris, a heavily fortified city. The Germans surrounded it and erected a blockade, as already established and ongoing at Metz.

The war is continued

The French republican government's decision to continue the war changed public opinion in Germany for most Germans did not understand why France would not accept the German peace offer. Germans generally agreed that the outcome of the war was certain and that France could not reverse the military situation in her favor. Continued warfare would only lead to more bloodshed.

In the autumn of 1870, many Germans accepted the opinion that not only French leaders, but the French people itself, regarded by many as a role model in their previous fight for the French Revolution, were aggressive and would not accept defeat. Germans, now also dropping republican hopes in favor of the successful Prussian monarchy, began to view France as an 'hereditary enemy' (Erbfeind, French-German enmity), whom their ancestors had been made to fight for over 200 years since the Thirty Years' War, and who would continue to assault Germany if left unchecked. Many Germans demanded that:

Germany should be strengthened and France should be weakened in order to rule out any future war ^*
France should be occupied by German troops after the war
France should be made to pay a high sum in reparations
And most important, the German-speaking areas in eastern France should be annexed by a new, strong German Empire which was to be founded in order to unite the Germans against France

Prussia's prime minister von Bismarck had little respect for such plans. He refused to consider France an Erbfeind and aimed to appease France, like prior adversaries, by moderate conditions for peace which included only minor annexations. He was also sceptical about incorporating more of the South German Catholics, especially Austria, into a united Germany for it might weaken protestant Prussia's dominant position. But finally, when the German nobility began to accept the new popular opinion, von Bismarck reluctantly began to prepare to unite Germany.

Siege of Paris

The Siege of Paris lasting from September 19, 1870 – January 28, 1871 brought about the final defeat of the French Army during the Franco-Prussian War. On January 18, 1871 the new German Empire was proclaimed at the Palace of Versailles.

Faced with the German blockade of Paris, the new French government called for the establishment of several large armies in France's provinces. These new bodies of troops were to march towards Paris and attack the Germans there from various directions at the same time. In addition, armed French civilians were to create a guerilla force - the so-called Francs-tireurs - for the purpose of attacking German support lines.

The Loire Campaign

Dispatched from Paris as the republican government's emissary, Léon Gambetta passed over the German lines in a hot air balloon and organized the recruitment of new French armies.

News about an alleged German 'extermination' plan infuriated the French and strengthened their support to their new government. Within a few weeks, five new armies totaling more than 500,000 troops were recruited.

The Germans noticed this development and dispatched some of their troops to the French provinces in order to detect, attack, and disperse the new French armies before they could become a menace, for the blockade of Paris or elsewhere. The Germans were not prepared for an occupation of the whole of France. This would stretch them out, and they would become vulnerable.

On October 10, fighting erupted between German and French republican forces near Orléans. At first, the Germans were victorious, but the French drew reinforcements and defeated the Germans at Coulmiers on November 9. But after the surrender of Metz, more than 100,000 well-trained and battle-experienced German troops joined the German 'Southern Army'. With these reinforcements, the French were forced to abandon Orléans on December 4, to be finally defeated near Le Mans between January 10 and 12, 1871.

A second French army which operated north of Paris was turned back near Amiens (November 27 1870), Bapaume (January 3, 1871) and St. Quentin (January 19).

Northern Campaign

Following the Army of the Loire's defeats, Gambetta turned to General Faidherbe's Army of the North. The Army of the North had achieved several small victories at towns such as Ham, La Hallue, and Amiens, and was well-protected by the belt of fortresses in northern France, allowing Faidherbe's men to launch quick attacks against isolated Prussian units, then retreat behind the belt of fortresses. Despite the army's access to the armaments factories of Lille, the Army of the North suffered from severe supply difficulties which kept the soldiers' already poor morale at a permanently low level. In January 1871, Gambetta forced Faidherbe to march his army beyond the fortresses and engage the Prussians in open battle. The army was severely weakened by low morale, supply problems, the terrible winter weather, and low troop quality, whilst General Faidherbe himself was unable to direct battles effectively due to his terrible health, the result of decades of campaigning in West Africa. At the Battle of St Quentin, the Army of the North suffered a crushing defeat and was scattered, releasing thousands of Prussian soldiers to be relocated to the East.

Eastern Campaign

Following the destruction of the French Army of the Loire, remnants of the Loire army gathered in eastern France to form the Army of the East, commanded by General Charles Bourbaki. In a final attempt to cut the German supply lines in northeast France, Bourbaki's army marched north to attack the Prussian siege of Belfort and relieve the beleaguered French defenders.

In the battle of the Lisaine, Bourbaki's men failed to break through German lines commanded by General August von Werder. Bringing in the German 'Southern Army', General von Manteuffel then drove Bourbaki's army into the mountains near the Swiss border. Facing annihilation, this last intact French army crossed the border and was disarmed and imprisoned by the neutral Swiss near Pontarlier (February 1, 1871).

Naval blockade

At the outset of the war, elements of the 470-ship French Navy were put to sea and to attempt a blockade of the north German coasts, which the relatively small north German navy (Norddeutsche Bundesmarine) could do little to oppose. Despite this, the blockade was only partially successful as the French navy suffered chronic shortages of coal and the lack of a forward military base in the North Sea and especially the Baltic Sea.

To take pressure from the expected German attack into Alsace-Lorraine, Napoleon III and others in the French high command planned at the outset of the war to launch a seaborne invasion of northern Germany. It was hoped that the invasion would not only divert German troops from the front, but also inspire Denmark to assist with its 50,000 strong army and the substantial Danish Navy. However it was discovered that Prussia had recently installed formidable coastal defenses around the major north German ports, including coastal artillery batteries consisting of Krupp heavy artillery tubes made of steel. The French Navy lacked the necessary heavy weaponry to deal with these coastal defences, while the difficult topography of the Prussian coastline, made a seaborne invasion of northern Germany impossible.

The French Marines and naval infantry tasked with the invasion of northern Germany were subsequently dispatched to bolster the French Army of Châlons, where they were captured at the Battle of Sedan along with Napoleon III. Suffering a severe shortage of officers following the capture of most of the professional French army at the Siege of Metz and the battle of Sedan, naval officers were taken from their ships to officer the hastily assembled gardes mobiles or French reserve army units.

As also the autumn storms of the North Sea took their toll on the remaining patrolling French ships, the blockade became less and less effective. By September 1870 the blockade was finally abandoned altogether for the winter, and the French Navy retired to ports along the English Channel, remaining in port for the rest of the war.

Isolated engagements took place between French and German ships in other theaters, such as the blockade by FS Dupleix of the German ship Hertha in Nagasaki, Japan.

Armistice

On January 28 1871, the Government of National Defense based in Paris negotiated an armistice with the Prussians. With Paris starving, and Gambetta's provincial armies reeling from one disaster after another, French Premiere Jules Ferry was permitted to leave Paris and arrived at Versailles on January 24th to discuss peace terms with Bismarck.

Bismarck agreed to end the siege and allow food convoys to immediately enter Paris (including trains carrying millions of German army rations), on condition that the Government of National Defence surrendered several key fortresses outside Paris to the Prussians. Without the forts, the French Army would no longer be able to defend Paris. Although public opinion in Paris was strongly against any form of surrender of concession to the Prussians, the Government realised that it could not hold the city for much longer, and that Gambetta's provincial armies would probably never break through to relieve Paris. President Jules Trochu resigned on January 25th and was replaced by Jules Favre, who signed the surrender on January 27th at Versailles, with the armistice coming into effect at midnight on the night of the 27th/28th. Several sources claim that in his carriage on the way back to Paris, Favre broke into tears, and collapsed into his daughter's arms as the guns around Paris fell silent at midnight.

At Tours, Gambetta received word from Paris on January 30th that the Government had surrendered. Furious, he refused to surrender and launched an immediate attack on German forces at Orleans which, predictably, failed. A delegation of Parisian diplomats arrived in Tours by train on February 5th to negotiate with Gambetta, and on February 6 1871, Gambetta stepped down and surrendered control of the provincial armies to the Government of National Defence, which promptly ordered a ceasefire across France.

The Treaty of Frankfurt was signed 10 May 1871, marking the end of the Franco-Prussian War that in hindsight was the first Franco-German War, as the French aggression united the German states.

Aftermath

For detailed information on the Commune and civil war, see Paris Commune

The Prussian Army held a brief victory parade in Paris on February 17, 1871 and Bismarck honoured the armistice by sending trainloads of food into Paris and withdrawing Prussian forces to the east of the city, which would be withdrawn as soon as France paid the agreed war indemnity. At the same time, Prussian forces were withdrawn from France and concentrated in the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine. A mass exodus occurred from Paris as some 200,000 people, predominantly middle-class, left the city for the countryside. Paris was quickly re-supplied with free food and fuel by the United Kingdom and several accounts recall life in the city settling back to normal. National elections returned an overwhelmingly conservative government, which, under President Adolphe Thiers, established itself in Versailles, fearing that the political climate of Paris was too dangerous to set up the capital in the city. The new government, formed mainly of conservative, middle-class rural politicians, passed a variety of laws which greatly angered the population of Paris, such as the controversial Law of Maturities, which decreed that all rents in Paris, which had been postponed since September 1870, and all public debts across France, which had been given a moratorium in November 1870, were to be paid in full, with interest, within 48 hours. Paris shouldered an unfairly high proportion of the indemnity payments made to the Prussians, and the population of the city quickly grew resentful of the Versailles government. With Paris under the protection of the revolutionary National Guard and few regular soldiers in the city, left-wing leaders established themselves in the Hôtel de Ville and established the Paris Commune.

Countries previously without a General Staff or a system of universal conscription soon adopted both, along with developments in logistics, military use of railways, and the telegraph system, all proven by the war to be indispensable. The creation of a unified German Empire destroyed the balance of power that had been created with the Congress of Vienna after the end of the Napoleonic Wars. Germany quickly established itself as the main power in Europe with one of the most powerful and professional armies in the world (although the United Kingdom remained the dominant world power, British involvement in European affairs during the late nineteenth century was very limited, allowing Germany to excercise great influence over the European mainland). In France, the defeat gave way to a feeling of revanchism that, by creating a permanent state of crisis between Germany and France, would be one of the contributing factors leading to World War I.

References

Mitchner, E. Alyn, R. Joanne Tuffs. Century of Change. Canada: Reidmore Books Inc., 1997.
Michael Howard: Franco-Prussian War 1870-1871, ^*

Lexikon der deutschen Geschichte – Ploetz, Verlag Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau, Österreich 2001
Der große Ploetz, Verlag Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau, Österreich 1998
Dtv-Atlas Weltgeschichte, Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, München 2000
Dennis E. Showalter: Das Gesicht des modernen Krieges. Sedan, 1. und 2. September 1870, in: Schlachten der Weltgeschichte. Von Salamis bis Sinai, hrsg. v. Stig Förster, Dierk Walter und Markus Pöhlmann, München ²2004. ISBN 3-423-34083-5
Theodor Fontane: Band 1 - Der Krieg gegen Frankreich 1870-1871, Weißenburg - Wörth - Spicheren - Colombey -Vionville - Gravelotte - Sedan - Wilhelmshöhe - Straßburg - Toul - Metz, Verlag Rockstuhl, Bad Langensalza, Reprint 1873/2004, ISBN 3-937135-25-1
Theodor Fontane: Band 2 - Der Krieg gegen Frankreich 1870-1871, Vor und in Paris vom 20. September bis 24. Dezember 1870 - Die großen Ausfallgefechte - Vor Paris im Dezember 1870 - Orleans, Verlag Rockstuhl, Bad Langensalza, Reprint 1876/2004, ISBN 3-937135-26-X
Theodor Fontane: Band 3 - Der Krieg gegen Frankreich 1870-1871, Amiens - Dijon - Le Mans - Belfort -(Vor) Paris 25. Dezember 1870 bis 2. März 1871 - Bapaume = St. Quentin - Pontarlier, Verlag Rockstuhl, Bad Langensalza, Reprint 1876/2004, ISBN 3-937135-27-8
Max Riemschneider: Ein Erfurter im Deutsch-Französischen Krieg 1870/71, Verlag Rockstuhl, Bad Langensalza, 2005, ISBN 3-937135-01-4
Sigismund von Dobschütz: „Wir sind dahin gekommen, ganze Dörfer niederzubrennen“ -– Briefe aus dem Deutsch-Französischen Krieg 1870/71 und der Okkupationszeit 1872/73 von Paul von Collas an seine Eltern., Ostdeutsche Familienkunde (OFK), Heft 1/2006, Seite 321f., Verlag Degener & Co., Neustadt (Aisch) 2006, . -- (Paul von Collas war damals Generalstabsoffizier und Adjutant unter Karl Friedrich von Steinmetz und später unter General Edwin von Manteuffel, dessen Memoiren er schrieb.)

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