The fortresses still held by French troops in the districts occupied by the Germans were assigned a rayon in proportion to their importance.
In carrying out the details of the agreement a liberal interpretation was in most instances allowed. The arrangements had the sanction of those members of the Government of National Defence who were in Paris; while the delegates at Bordeaux, who had hitherto conducted the war, at first held aloof, and indeed, as yet had not been made acquainted with the detailed conditions. Gambetta, it is true, allowed the suspension of operations, but could not give the commanders more precise instructions.
General Faidherbe was thus without orders with regard to the evacuation of Dieppe and Abbeville. General von Goeben, however, refrained from taking immediate possession of these places. On the west of the Seine, the Grand Duke was forced to proclaim that the non-recognition of the line of demarcation would be followed by an immediate recommencement of hostilities.
The commandant of the garrison at Langres also raised difficulties, and only withdrew within his rayon on February 7th, as did General Rolland later at Besançon. Auxonne was at first unwilling to give up control of the railway. Bitsch, which had not been worth the trouble of a serious attack, repudiated the convention; the investment had therefore to be strengthened, and only in March, when threatened with a determined attack, did the garrison abandon its peak of rock.
Nor did the volunteers acquiesce at once, and there were collisions with them at various points. But after the conditions were finally settled, no more serious quarrels occurred between the inhabitants and the German troops during the whole course of the armistice.
All the German corps before Paris occupied the forts lying in their front, more specifically the Vth took over Mont Valérien, and the IVth the town of St. Denis. Between the forts and the enceinte there lay a neutral zone, which civilians were allowed to cross only by specified roads placed under control of German examining troops.
Apprehensive as it was of the indignation of the populace, the French Government had hesitated so long to utter the word "capitulation," that now, even with the resumption of free communication, Paris was threatened with an outbreak of actual famine. The superfluous stores in the German magazines were therefore placed at the disposal of its authorities. The respective chief-Commands, the local Governments-General, and the Etappen-Inspections received instructions to place no difficulties in the way of the repair of the railways and roads in their districts, and the French authorities were even allowed to make use, under German supervision, of the repaired railroads which the invaders used to supply their own army. Nevertheless, the first provision-train only arrived in Paris on February 3rd, and it was the middle of the month before the French had succeeded in remedying the prevalent distress in the capital.
The German prisoners were at once given up. The surrender of arms and war-material followed by degrees, also the payment of the 200 million francs war-contribution imposed on the city.
But it was still doubtful if the party of "war to the bitter end" in Bordeaux would fall in with the arrangements made by the Paris Government, and whether the National Assembly about to be convened would finally ratify the conditions of peace imposed by the conquerors. The necessary measures in case of the resumption of hostilities were therefore taken on the French as well as on the German side.
The distribution of the French forces at the establishment of the armistice was not favourable.