NOTES:
[98] It was known by this time at Versailles in what a desperate condition was the Commune, by the information of persons devoted to order, but who remained amongst the insurgents to keep watch over and restrain them as much as possible.
The Versailles authorities know that, thanks to the well-directed fire of Montretout, the bastions of the Point du Jour were no longer tenable, and that their defenders had abandoned them and had organized new works of defence; nevertheless, the operations were earned on just as systematically as if the fire of the besieged had not ceased for several days, when, on Sunday, the 21st May, about midday, an officer on duty in the trenches, in course of formation in the Bois de Boulogne, perceived a man making signs with a white handkerchief near the military post of Saint Cloud; the officer immediately approached near enough to hear the bearer of the flag of truce, say:—
“My name is Ducatel, and I belong to the service of the Engineers of Roads and Bridges, and I have been a soldier. I declare that your entrance into Paris is easy, and as a guarantee of the truth of what I say, I am about to give myself up;” so saying, he passed over the fosse by means of one of the supports of the drawbridge, in spite of several shots fired at him by Federals hidden in the houses at Auteuil, but none of which reached him.
A few resolute men now passed over the fosse, and arrived without accident on the other side. A few insurgents, who were still there, made off without loss of time, leaving the invaders to establish themselves, and wait for reinforcements.
A short time after a white flag was exhibited in the neighbouring bastion, which bore the number 62, and the fire from Montretout and Mont Valérien was stopped, the infantry of the Marine took possession of the gate, out the telegraphic wires which were supposed to be in communication with torpedoes, while information was immediately despatched to Versailles of these important events.
The division of General Vergé, placed for the time under the orders of General Douay, entered the gate at half-past three in the afternoon, and took possession of Point du Jour, after having taken several barricades; at one of these, Ducatel was sent with a flag of trace towards the insurgents, who offered to surrender, but he received a bayonet wound, was carried off to the École Militaire, tried by court-martial and condemned to death, from which he was fortunately snatched by the arrival of the Versailles troops at the Trocadéro at two o’clock in the morning.
At the same time, the first corps d’armée (that of General L’Admirault), made its way into the city by the Portes d’Auteuil and Passy, and took up a strong position in the streets of Passy.
[99] At ten o’clock at night, the army had taken possession of the region comprised between the ceinture, or circular railway, and the fortifications, the streets of Auteuil to the viaduct, and the bridge of Grenelle.
At midnight, the movement which had been suspended for a time to rest the troops, was recommenced all along the line.
At two o’clock in the morning, General Douay occupied the Trocadéro; and at about four o’clock his soldiers, after a short struggle, captured the chateau of La Muette, making about six hundred prisoners, and then, advancing in the direction of Porte Maillot, they joined the troops of General Clinchant, who had got within the ramparts on that side.
At the break of day, the tricolour floated over the Arc de Triomphe, without the Versailles forces having sustained sensible loss. All this passed on the right bank of the Seine.
[100] The insurrectionists followed a decided and pre-conceived plan. The barricades, which intersected the streets of Paris in every direction, were arranged on a general system which showed considerable skill. Was this ensemble a conception of Cluseret? or a plan of Gaillard, or Eudes, or Rossel? No one now could say which, but at any rate we are able to deduce the plan from the facts and set it out as follows:—
Within the line of the fortifications the insurgents had formed a second line of defence, which runs on the right bank of the river, by the Trocadero, the Triumphal Arch, the Boulevard de Courcelles, the Boulevard de Batignolles, and the Boulevard de Rochechouart; and on the left across the bridge of Iéna, the Avenue de la Bourdonnaye, the École Militaire, the Boulevard des Invalides, the Boulevard Montparnasse, and the Western Railway Station. Along the whole extent of this circuit the entrances of the streets were barricades, and the “Places” turned into redoubts.
From this double enceinte of fortifications the lines of defence converged along the great boulevards, the Rue Royale, by the Ministry of Marine, the terrace of the Tuileries Gardens, the Place de la Concorde, the Palace of the Corps Législatif, the Rue de Bourgogne, and the Rue de Varenne. This third enceinte of defence was the pride of the insurgents; they were never tired of admiring their celebrated barricade of the Rue St. Florentin, and that which intercepted the quay at the corner of the Tuileries Gardens on the Place de la Concorde.
This is not all. Supposing that the third line were forced, the insurgents would not even then be without resource. On the left bank of the Seine they fell back successively on the Rue de Grenelle, Rue Saint Dominique, and Rue de Lille, all three closed by barricades; on the right bank they could carry on the struggle by the Rue Neuve-des-Petits-Champs, the Rue de la Paix, and the Place Vendôme, and even when beaten back from these last retreats, they could still defend the Rue St. Honoré and operate a retreat by the Palace of the Tuileries, the Louvre, and the Hôtel de Ville.
[101] In the following proclamation, published on the 21st May, Delescluze stimulated the Communist party, which felt its power melting away on all sides:
“TO THE PEOPLE OF PARIS, TO THE NATIONAL GUARD.
“CITIZENS,—We have had enough of militaryism; let us have no more stuffs embroidered and gilt at every seam!
“Make room for the people, the real combatants, the bare arms! The hour of the revolutionary war has struck!
“The people know nothing of scientific manoeuvres, but with a rifle in hand and the pavement beneath their feet, they fear not all the strategists of the monarchical school.
“To arms, citizens! To arms! You must conquer, or, as you well know, fall again into the pitiless hands of the réactionaires and clericals of Versailles; those wretches who with intention delivered France up to Prussia, and now make us pay the ransom of their treason!
“If you desire the generous blood which you have shed like water during the last six weeks not to have been shed in vain, if you would see liberty and equality established in France, if you would spare your children sufferings and misery such as you have endured, you will rise as one man, and before your formidable bands the enemy who indulges the idea of bringing you again under his yoke, will reap nothing but the harvest of the useless crimes with which he has disgraced himself during the past two months.
“Citizens! your representatives will fight and die with you, if fall we must; but, in the name of our glorious France, mother of all the popular revolutions, the permanent source of ideas of justice and unity, which should be and which will be the laws of the world, march to the encounter of the enemy, and let your revolutionary energy prove to him that Paris may he sold, but can never be delivered up or conquered.
“The Commune confides in you, and you may trust the Commune!
“The civil delegate at the Ministry of War,
“(Signed)
“CH. DELESCLUZE.
“Countersigned by the Committee of Public Safety:—Antoine Arnauld, Billioray, E. Eudes, F. Gambon, G. Ranvier.”
Such was the despairing cry of the insurrection at bay.