Annals of a Fortress

by Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc

Rincourt allowed his troops the night of the 9th for repose, as half the garrison had been engaged the night before. On the morning of the 10th one of the spies whom he was careful to employ in the country, and even in the camp of the enemy, came to inform him that Galas had departed the evening before with an inconsiderable escort, and that the Imperialist troops were placed under the command of one of his lieutenants. This news set the governor gravely thinking; he knew that Saint-Jean-de-Losne was still holding out, and he gained a glimpse of the real state of affairs. Devoted to the Count de Rantzau, he felt it his duty more than ever to give the enemy so much to do as to render it impossible for him to think of reducing the number of troops assembled around La Roche-Pont, to reinforce those engaged in the siege of Saint-Jean-de-Losne.

The garrison was full of confidence and determination; and the militia of the town asked to share in the sorties. This militia consisted of a body of about twelve hundred men, which Rincourt had divided into companies of one hundred men each, commanded by ten subalterns and a captain. He had divided these companies into two battalions of six hundred men each. The first was composed of the robuster men who had had some experience in arms; the second was composed of the householders, men of mature age inexperienced in war. These latter were especially employed as guards of the ramparts, as a daily and nightly patrol, and as a police for the town. With the regular troops, therefore, the governor had at his disposal, even after the losses he had sustained, and after leaving in the town artillerymen enough to man the guns, about two thousand two hundred men.

The women of Roche-Pont had also offered their services. Rincourt formed them into brigades of ten; and their duty was to bring ammunition, prepare the provisions, repair military accoutrements, and make fascines and bags.

Even since the enemy's arrival, the governor had been able to get some cattle, grain, and fodder into the town, affording a supply for sixteen days longer.

He had good hopes of getting rid of the Germans before the end of this period. The townspeople, moreover, were rationed like the garrison, and the inhabitants were obliged under pain of death to deposit all the provisions they had in the public storehouses. The two churches of the upper town had been converted into hospitals for the wounded.

If the spirits of the garrison were kept up and even raised, such was by no means the case with the Imperialists. Forcia lost no time in announcing to the German troops that he was appointed commander-in-chief; he called the captains together and thought it incumbent upon him to address them in a somewhat long and high-flown discourse, accompanied by theatrical gestures.

This had but a slight effect on the minds of the officers, who were for the most part veterans, and who had no great respect for Forcia. They returned to their quarters, therefore, somewhat depressed, and auguring no good for the prospects of the siege. Following the instructions left him by Galas, Forcia gave orders for the complete investment of the place.

Deducting the losses suffered since the beginning of the siege, and the desertions, Forcia when entrusted with the command had little more than five thousand men. The object to be secured was to maintain at the point of attack a body of troops numerous enough to prevent the sorties of the garrison from not being formidable to them, and to distribute around the cité posts sufficiently well connected and defended to cut off all communication between the town and the outside; for it was certain that the inhabitants would be reduced to famine before many days elapsed.

Prudence therefore demanded that a line of contravallation should be established, and provided with artillery, that every point should be efficiently guarded, and that the garrison should be so occupied as to make vigorous sorties impossible. These tactics must infallibly result in the surrender of the town at no distant time. Such were in substance the instructions of Galas. But Forcia had a more ambitious aim; these methods appeared to him tedious and unworthy of him; and he saw himself in imagination master of the place, and sending the news of its capitulation to Galas in a message worthy of ancient Rome.

Still he dared not formally disregard his instructions, but he resolved merely to affect compliance with them, eager to show the army how an engineer of first-rate ability can conduct a siege. He believed that three thousand men would be enough to keep the besieged in awe on the north, to prosecute the approach-works vigorously and to take the place. With two thousand men he made sure of intercepting all communication between the inhabitants and the outside. Accordingly he established a post of two hundred men along the river on the left bank, two hundred yards from the angle of the curtain K;[1] a second post of two hundred men on the right bank, in front of the destroyed wooden bridge O; a third post of one hundred men, opposite the ancient bridge P; a fourth post of three hundred men, two hundred yards from the stone bridge; a fifth post of three hundred men along the rivulet to the south-east of the escarpment of the castle; a sixth post of two hundred men behind the embankment of the mills on the east; and a seventh post of three hundred men above the pool to the north-east—in all sixteen hundred men. Four hundred men were commissioned to connect these principal posts, or to strengthen them at need. The rampart L[See [Fig. 59].], prevented the besieger from making his way between the pool and the town, the fifth, sixth, and seventh posts communicated with headquarters only by a long détour, and could not be supported by the posts of the right bank unless a bridge were thrown across below the stone bridge. This was a serious disadvantage. Forcia had no idea of taking possession of the stone bridge by a sudden attack, as this passage was commanded by a cavalier and by the bastions of the castle. He preferred throwing a bridge across below to put his posts in communication with each other.