The Emperor resigns his command.
When the Emperor suddenly revoked the order to retire upon Chalons, he was influenced partly by military, but chiefly by political considerations. Remonstrances were heard in the camps, remonstrances arrived from Paris, and the combined effect of these open manifestations produced an order to establish the Army in position behind the French Nied, a stream which, rising to the southward, flows parallel to the Moselle, and, after receiving the German Nied, runs into the Saar below Saarlouis. The weather had been wet and tempestuous; the retiring troops, exhausted by night marches and want of food, struggled onward, yet showed signs of “demoralization;” in other words, were out of heart, and insubordinate. Frossard’s men, who had passed the prescribed line before receiving the new instructions, had to retrace their steps; and Decaen, now in command of the 3rd Corps, begged for rest on behalf of his divisions. Yet the three Corps and the Guard occupied, on the 10th, the new position which, selected by Marshal Lebœuf, extended from Pange to Les Etangs. It was intended to fight a battle on that ground, and the men were set to work on intrenchments, some of which were completed before another change occurred in the directing mind. The position was found to be defective; and, on the 11th, the entire Army, abandoning its wasted labours, moved back upon the outworks of Metz itself, almost within range of its guns. Thus had three precious days been spent in wandering to and fro at a time when the military situation required that the Army should be transferred to the left bank of the Moselle, and placed in full command of the route to Chalons, even if it were not compelled to fall back further than the left bank of the Meuse. One explanation, drawn by the official writers of the German Staff history, from French admissions, is that, instead of Metz protecting the Army, the Army was required to protect Metz, seeing that the forts were not in a state to hold out against a siege of fifteen days! The Imperial Commander had not even yet quite made up his mind; but, late on the 12th, finding the burden too severe, and the clamour of public opinion too great, he appointed Marshal Bazaine Commander-in-Chief of “the Army of the Rhine.” It was a damnosa hæreditas; for the campaign was virtually lost during ten days of weakness and vacillation, and especially by the want of a prompt decision between the 7th and the 10th of August, while there was yet time.
As we have said, the main reason was political. The eager aspirants for power, and the friends of the Empress in Paris, ousted the Ollivier Ministry on the 9th, and the new combination, with the Comte de Palikao at its head, felt that they could not retain office, that the “dynasty” even could not survive unless the Emperor and the Army fought and won. Everything must be risked to give the dynasty a chance. The Regency and the Camp fell under the influence of hostile public opinion, which had already begun to associate the name of Napoleon, not only with the reverses endured, but the utter want of preparation for war, now painfully evident to the multitude as well as to the initiated. Yet so menacing and terrible did the actual facts become that even the Emperor could not resist them, and, in handing over the command to Bazaine on the 13th, he ordered that unfortunate, if ambitious, officer to transfer the Army with the utmost speed to the left bank of the Moselle, place Laveaucoupet’s Division in Metz, and gain Verdun as quickly as possible. It was too late, as we shall see; for the Prussians were ready to grasp at the skirts of a retreating Army, and once more thwart the plans of its leaders. In order to track the course of events to this point, the narrative must revert to the morrow of Spicheren.