British Quarterly Review, American Edition, Vol. LIII / January and April, 1871

by Various

The affair at Weissenburg was only the prelude of operations of a more serious kind. The 5th of August was spent by the Crown Prince in bringing the mass of his troops forward, and in arraying them for a formidable attack on the French forces in his immediate front. There can be no doubt that in making these dispositions he exposed his flank to the corps of De Failly, which, stationed at Bitsche, beyond the Vosges, ought to have combined with that of McMahon, and fallen on the right of the Prussian commander, while, as yet, his columns were not closed up, and his whole line was somewhat out of order. This movement, however, was not executed; the want of intelligence and the vacillation which characterised the operations of the French, were again too painfully conspicuous; and though De Failly sent one division through the hill passes to the aid of his colleague, he remained at Bitsche with the bulk of his troops, and left MacMahon completely isolated. Meanwhile that brave, but unfortunate chief, made preparations to resist the attack of the Germans, now evidently impending. It is a misconception to suppose, as some have done, that he advanced recklessly against his foe; what he did was to take and occupy a defensive position on the flank of the Germans, where he could hope to give them battle, under circumstances of the least disadvantage, and De Failly, if he wished, could come to his aid; and we assert, with confidence, that this strategy was the best open to the Duke of Magenta. The marshal by the evening of the 5th had drawn up his forces along the crest of a range which extends from Reichsofen on the left by Woerth to Elsasshausen, and Marbronn on the right, and which, with the stream of the Sauer in front, and with broken ground along the rising slopes, formed a strong position against his enemy. MacMahon's object evidently was to compel the Germans to turn against him, and assail him as they changed their front; he would thus divert them from the road to Strasburg, and engage them as favourably for himself as possible; and at the same time, he as it were summoned the corps of De Failly to join his rear, while he kept open several lines of retreat. These were the arrangements of an able commander; and considering that MacMahon had not more than 50,000 men in his band, his dispositions certainly give proof of the tactical skill for which he is renowned. On the morning of the 6th, the Crown Prince advanced to the attack, with 130,000 men, and not less than 440 guns. As MacMahon had calculated, the change of front, which the Germans were compelled to make, threw their line for some time into confusion; and the French repelled for several hours a somewhat feeble and disunited effort against their left, at and near Reichsofen. Meantime the French centre at Woerth had been engaged; there too, for a considerable time, MacMahon's divisions resisted stoutly, and even for a moment assumed the offensive. But about two o'clock the huge German line had come up on all sides in strength; and the Crown Prince prepared to turn the French wings at both sides, combining with this an attack in front—a movement justified by his superiority in force, but certainly not without hazard. MacMahon, who, at this conjuncture, De Failly not having come up, ought, in our judgment, to have retreated, struck desperately at the German centre at Woerth, thinned by the extension of its flanks; but the French onset was bravely resisted, and indeed it could not have been successful. Ere long the formidable outflanking movement developed itself, and became decisive; and from Reichsofen to beyond Marbronn the dense German columns extended threateningly, and overlapped the whole French position. A sudden panic fell on MacMahon's army; its right and centre gave way; and it was soon a mass of disheartened fugitives, broken on all sides into disunited fragments. Six thousand prisoners and thirty guns were the spoils of the victorious Germans; and for some time the defeated force was annihilated, in a military point of view.

It cannot be said that the Germans' tactics were remarkable for ability or boldness during the first part of this desperate battle. They attacked weakly, and in divided masses; they gave MacMahon more than one chance; and with their immense superiority of numbers their victory ought to have been more decisive. On the other hand the French Marshal showed talent in his original dispositions; he resisted his enemy during several hours, and at one time placed him in much danger; and had he when he had been assured that De Failly's corps was not coming up, effected a rapid and confident retreat, he would have been entitled to commendation. MacMahon, however, held his ground too long; and when the Crown Prince, who, as soon as he had ascertained the inferiority of the French in strength, displayed consummate energy and skill, had advanced on Reichsofen and Marbronn, it was almost inevitable that the French line should give way and be totally defeated. As regards the conduct of the opposing armies, the Germans, cautious and slow at first, became at last self-reliant and bold; the French fought long with 'consummate bravery,'—we quote the German official report—but they broke up hastily under the stress of disaster—a fault almost a national characteristic. The strategic consequences of the battle were in the highest degree important. The whole right wing of the French army, overpowered by immensely superior forces, was driven in and almost destroyed; it had no chance but to retreat behind the Vosges, too fortunate if it could make its escape; Alsace was thrown open to the enemy, and an avenue into the heart of France laid bare. This result was in some measure due to the criminal negligence of De Failly, who, if he had chosen, might have joined MacMahon, and whose corps might have changed the fate of the day; but it was also caused by the bad arrangement of the whole French line upon the position, which at no point was in sufficient strength to offer a firm and certain resistance. This, indeed, was made evident, at the same time, at another part of the theatre of operations. While the Crown Prince was attacking MacMahon, a German division of the First Army crossed the Saar and advanced to Saarbrück, where a few days before the corps of Frossard had made a demonstration on the frontier, in order, it has been supposed, to gratify the curiosity of the Prince Imperial. The French were completely surprised; but, pressing hastily forward, they advanced to repulse the audacious foe, who with great boldness resisted steadily for some time. Meanwhile another German division had come to the aid of their comrades; and seizing promptly the cover of woods which overlapped the right of the French, they wasted it away with a destructive fire; and further supports having come up, the Germans stormed with heroic valour a line of heights called the Spicheren hills, which formed the front of the French position. The whole French line had begun to give way; and an additional mass of foes appearing on their extreme left, and having outflanked it, they retreated in precipitate haste, leaving a considerable number of guns and prisoners.

The two engagements of the 6th of August, named respectively those of Woerth and Forbach, were fraught with results of great moment. It was not only that the renowned French army which had been supposed to be the first in the world had suffered a double crushing defeat, in one instance of a dishonourable kind; not only that it had lost its prestige and given proof of want of steadiness, of indiscipline, and of disorganization; the invasion of Germany was now impossible; the South had been united to the North by the pledge of common military success; and there was nothing to avert the victorious progress of the German masses on the French frontier. The situation, in fact, had been suddenly changed; and Europe, which up to that moment had been expecting a French advance, was now to witness the calamitous recoil of the Imperial forces at all points, attended with ever increasing disasters. The right wing of the French army, well-nigh cut off and destroyed at Woerth, was driven in rout out of Alsace and compelled to abandon Strasburg to its fate; and it would be too fortunate if it could rally at Châlons, drawing to it the corps of De Failly and Douay. The right centre, broken through at Forbach, was forced backward upon Metz; and the centre and left, involved in its defeat, were obliged to fall back in the same direction. Meanwhile the Germans ably directed, and collected in overwhelming strength, poured into France in the successive waves of an invasion that nothing could resist. The Crown Prince's army, in communication with the Second by a cordon of cavalry sent through the Vosges, detached a part of its force to besiege Strasburg, and with its remaining divisions poured forward through Lower Alsace in pursuit of MacMahon. The Second Army advancing from the Rhineland, swept across the Saar in immense forces, and passed into the north of Lorraine, driving before it the feeble French corps now seeking a refuge under the guns of Metz. Meanwhile, the Third Army made a parallel movement; and, uniting with the right of the Second, marched rapidly in overwhelming front on Metz, already threatening with its right wing to overlap and surround the great fortress. By the 18th August, 300,000 Germans with large reserves in their immediate rear had made good their way into France, and from Strasburg to Thionville and thence into the heart of Lorraine, were taking military possession of the country and menacing with ruin the enemy in their path.

During this mighty advance of the Germans, the strategic operations of the French, in part owing to the bad disposition of their forces for combined movements, and in part to the weakness of their commanders, had been characterised by much indecision. MacMahon, indeed, had effected his retreat from the field of Woerth with the wreck of his troops, and escaped safely through the Vosges passes; and though his corps was almost ruined, he had shown some ability in getting away, for he ought to have been destroyed by the Germans. In fact, the pursuit of the Crown Prince had not been marked by energy or speed, whatever indiscriminate flatterers may urge; his own reports more than once refer to the comparative slackness of his cavalry or at least to their extreme caution. De Failly, too, though the disaster at Woerth must be laid to a great extent to his charge, had been prompt in breaking up from Bitsche, and he had succeeded in approaching MacMahon without being caught by the enemy; his escape, however, being in a great measure due to the resistance made by the fortress of Bitsche, which retarded the march of one of the Crown Prince's columns. The broken right of the French army, though its losses had been terrible, and its morale was destroyed, was, in a word, making good its way to Châlons; and, as the corps of Douay was moving towards it, and as the whole mass was about to concentrate, we cannot find fault with these arrangements. But in the remaining part of the theatre of war the French dispositions revealed nothing but feebleness, vacillation, and want of forethought. The instant Woerth and Forbach were fought, and the right and right centre of the French were forced back on either side of the Vosges, it cannot be doubted that the whole French army ought to have retreated in a parallel line; and it ought certainly to have retired on Châlons, having thrown a strong garrison into Metz, for it was at Châlons only that it could hope to reunite, and when there it would be in a position to save Paris and defend the interior on the well-known lines of the Marne and Seine. To effect this would not have been easy, for the disseminated state of the corps on the frontier from Thionville to Forbach and thence backward to Metz exposed them whatever moves they attempted; but this was what ought to have been done, and the attempt would have probably succeeded. Instead of this the unfortunate emperor drew in his left and centre on the Nied—and when he had collected these behind the river, he halted five or six days at Metz, uncertain evidently what to do next, and hesitating, while there was time to fall back on Châlons. The reason of this strange and fatal fault, through which the main body of the French army was exposed to be cut off and destroyed, remains as yet to be explained; it was probably owing to vacillation and to the dread of terrifying Paris by the news of a general retrograde movement. While the bulk of the Army of the Rhine was being detained in camp around Metz, completely separated from its supports in Champagne, the German armies advanced to the Moselle; and while a part of the First and Second Armies were massed close to the great fortress a considerable detachment was thrown forward, to menace and fall on the French line of retreat should an attempt be made to retire on Châlons.

The results of these strategic arrangements, so different in ability and forethought, were developed ere long with great distinctness. On the 14th of August one detachment of the French army with the Emperor at its head, left Metz and crossed to the left bank of the Moselle; and this ultimately reached Châlons, where it effected its junction with MacMahon. The remaining corps endeavoured to begin their retrograde movement the same day, but being on the eastern side of the fortress, and their great numbers impeding their march, they were attacked by two corps of the Germans, whose vigorous onset held them in check. The combat lasted the whole day; and each side claimed to have won the victory; but the real issue was in favour of the Germans, who detained their antagonists round Metz, while their own troops were being pushed forward to occupy the French line of retreat. Next day, the 15th, the whole French army began to defile to the left bank of the Moselle; but it marched only ten or twelve miles on the two roads to Verdun and Etain, the avenues by which it would reach Châlons; and it bivouacked at Mars La Tour and Doncourt, still, as it proved, not far from its enemy. The causes of this disastrous delay, fraught with consequences of a ruinous kind, remain yet to be explained; much was doubtless due to the extreme difficulty of moving columns of great length and size, encumbered with baggage and other impediments; and it is not improbable that a desire to avoid the appearance of a hasty retreat may have had influence on the French commanders. It is certain, however, that a greater distance should have been accomplished by the retiring force; it was of vital importance to get clear at once of the foes gathering on the flank and rear; and Marshal Bazaine, who by this time certainly had been invested with the supreme command, unquestionably committed a grave error in not having pressed forward the movement. The next day it was too late; and the Germans found themselves in a position to achieve success, which it is quite clear from their own despatches, they never expected. On the morning of the 16th, the retreating French were attacked on the Verdun road by the cavalry and infantry of a German corps, which continued for some hours to hold them in check; and aid having come to the assailants, a sanguinary battle raged at Mars La Tour, one side endeavouring to cut its way through, the other struggling to bar the passage. Throughout the day fresh supports thrown forward judiciously on the flanks of the French, gave terrible effect to the German attacks; and their enemy, bound to a single road, and in their extended columns fatally exposed, was compelled to fight at a great disadvantage. The French, however, fought desperately, aware of the importance of the issue; and it is possible that they would have resisted successfully, had it not been for a brilliant charge of a large mass of cavalry towards the evening, which forced them back a considerable distance. Meanwhile, a simultaneous attack had been made on the Etain road, and though the French struggled with great courage, this too ultimately proved successful. The whole French army about nightfall withdrew sullenly towards Metz, having failed to make its retreat good, and the Germans, closing on its communications, already stood on its way to Châlons.

Driven thus to bay under the guns of Metz, Bazaine resolved to concentrate his forces in order to fight a decisive battle. He had probably 130,000 men in hand, with from 400 to 500 guns, the flower and strength of the French army; and his plan was to choose a defensive position where he could resist the onslaught of the Germans, and, having repulsed it, could break through their lines, and get off with the mass of his troops. With this object he drew up his men along the summit of a range of uplands, extending from Gravelotte before Metz, to beyond the hamlet of Privat La Montagne, and which, broken by streams and difficult ground, and with woods, villages, and thickets in front, offered a strong barrier to an attacking enemy. The French left rested on Gravelotte, the centre on Vionville and Amanvilliers, and the right stretched away to Doncourt and Jaumont, the whole line thus holding the roads which debouche to Verdun, Etain, and Sedan, protected by natural and artificial obstacles. This was a position of the strongest kind, considered as a scheme of defence, for it exposed the assailants at most points, and especially at that of Gravelotte, to a terrible fire at great disadvantage; but, as the result showed, it was deficient in this, that it gave no opportunity for a counter attack, and it enabled the Germans to draw round from all sides on the enemy before them. The 17th was spent by each army in preparing for a decisive engagement. The German commanders by this time had 240,000 men, with from 700 to 800 guns, and they resolved to attack according to a plan, which, if perilous in some degree, was justified by their superior numbers, and promised great and remarkable success. While the right of the Germans was to restrain the French left, their centre and left were to march across the whole front of Bazaine's position, and having overwhelmed his right wing, the weakest point in his defensive lines, they were to converge inwards upon the French and force them back in retreat on Metz. On the morning of the 18th, three German corps began to engage the French at Gravelotte, while at the same time, five and a half corps moved towards Vionville and Privat La Montagne, in order to execute the great turning movement which was to lead to the expected victory. The French, immoveable in their positions, were compelled to await the circling attack which threatened to stifle and hem them in; unlike Napoleon I. at Austerlitz, Bazaine had not secured the means of striking his enemy as he swept round on him. Towards the afternoon, the Prussian guards had outflanked the right of the Marshal; soon afterwards, his centre was fiercely assailed, and by degrees the great German line advanced snakelike to encompass its foe. It was now time for the German right to strike fiercely at Gravelotte; and here a battle of the most desperate kind raged until nightfall for several hours, the French certainly having the advantage, and destroying the Germans with frightful carnage. But gradually the German plan was worked out; the German masses converging on all sides forced the French backward from point to point; and at last the whole line of defence gave way, and retreating, slowly fell back on Metz, having lost the real object of the battle.

It is not improbable that, in this conflict, the losses of the Germans exceeded those of the French. At Gravelotte the corps commanded by Steinmetz was repeatedly driven back with terrific slaughter, and at other points the ranks of the assailants were cruelly thinned by a destructive fire. But if in a tactical point of view the battle was hardly a German victory, and if the resistance of Bazaine with an inferior force was honourable to him, the strategic results were great and decisive. The Germans had now obtained possession of the entire line of the Marshal's retreat; they barred the way to Châlons completely, and he had been forced back with his army on Metz, where, his communications with France being cut off, he would be ultimately compelled to surrender. Unless he could again begin the contest and pierce through the encircling foes, no prospect awaited him but to resist until famine dashed the sword from his grasp, and made the army of the Rhine captive—so ruinous had been the disastrous generalship which had detained it in isolation at Metz, and had allowed its enemies to gather round it instead of effecting a speedy retreat!

Leaving Bazaine in this perilous strait, we must now turn to another part of the theatre, where folly, rashness, and above all the exigencies of the political situation, were to complete the work of irresolute weakness in contributing to the ruin of France. About the 16th or 17th of August MacMahon had made good his way to Châlons with the wreck of his corps defeated at Woerth, and he was rejoined in a day or two by De Failly, who had contrived to elude the pursuing Germans—a retreat which proves that the Crown Prince had moved slowly and with much caution, and had not made the most of his brilliant victory. About the 19th of August the corps of Douay, marched back from Belfort, arrived at Châlons; this body, at the news of the battle of Woerth, having properly retired to the great strategic point which nature and history have alike marked out as the position where the defence of France should be undertaken in front of Paris. Next day, the 20th, about 70,000 men, with more than 100 guns, came up hastily from the French capital, the Government under Count Palikao having certainly made energetic efforts to reorganize and recruit the army; and thus MacMahon, by the 21st, had probably about 150,000 men, with from 400 to 500 guns, under his orders at the great camp at Châlons. When we recollect what Napoleon I. accomplished on this very ground—the memorable lines of the Marne and Seine—with a force greatly inferior in numbers, against more than 300,000 Germans, it cannot be doubted that a great commander would have made such an use of this army that he would long have kept the invaders back, and possibly changed the whole situation. But ability and caution were especially requisite, for the troops now under MacMahon's orders were in fact raw or demoralized soldiers; and plain common sense ought to have suggested that they were not fit for operations that demanded speed, or that could bring them in contact with a superior enemy.

At this critical moment a plan was formed, the responsibility for which is unknown, but which led to the greatest of military disasters. Considering the state of MacMahon's forces, there can be no doubt that his proper course was to delay his enemies as they advanced on Châlons, to endeavour to defend the Marne and the Seine, and, retreating slowly, to fall back until he had reached a position at which he would be in the flank of the Germans as they approached Paris. A great general, operating in this way, would have retarded the foe for weeks, would certainly have inflicted much injury on him, and while he inured his own troops to war, would assuredly have kept his army intact in order to make a stand for the capital, the fortifications of which, with a force before them, would perhaps have changed the issue of the campaign. It is true that the strategy would have been an apparent abandonment of Bazaine; but this really was inevitable. Bazaine, as the event proved, was not in need of immediate relief; shut up, as he was, inactive at Metz, he still detained an immense mass of Germans around the great fortress; and in any case, as affairs now stood, the first consideration ought to have been the security of the last army of France, and a settled purpose to defend the capital. Had Wellington been in MacMahon's place, we are convinced that these would have been his tactics; and we feel certain that he would have succeeded, if not in defeating the Germans in the field, at least in greatly reducing their strength, in preserving Paris from real danger, and in saving his forces for an effort to be undertaken when his raw troops were rendered more equal to their antagonists. Instead of a rational operation like this, a resolve was made at the French head-quarters which can only be described as insanely rash. It was determined to relieve Bazaine with MacMahon's weak and undisciplined army; and the manner in which this was to be done was marked by thoughtless and strange presumption. The French troops were to leave Châlons, and moving northwards to Rheims and Rethel, were to strike from that place across the Argonnes, to pass the Meuse and attain Montmédy, and descending thence upon Thionville, were to fall on the rear of the Germans at Metz, to extricate Bazaine, and in conjunction with him, to annihilate the astounded enemy by an attack worthy of the first Napoleon. By this operation MacMahon's army was to slip round the flank of the Crown Prince, known to be advancing from Nancy on Châlons; it would probably attain the northern frontier before its destination could be ascertained; and if it ever reached the neighbourhood of Metz and came into communication with Bazaine, what would be the fate of the insolent invaders, and what the triumphant issue of a campaign begun under ill-omened auspices?

Whether the pamphlet recently published at Brussels be the work of Napoleon III. or not, it is now clear that Marshal MacMahon was not the real author of this strategy. A glance at the map will clearly show that it exposed the French army to ruinous disaster, and it has been proved that it was inspired by the Government of the Regency at Paris, ill-informed as to the real situation, and fearful lest a retrograde movement should cause the sudden fall of the Empire. And what was the projected operation, which it was assumed was proposed by an eminent French Marshal, who, we may suppose, knew the art of war, and certainly had very great experience? It was simply to make an immense flank march with a weak and thoroughly untrained army, within full reach of an enemy twice as strong, who would be able to arrest the movement, and to fall on his adversary in overwhelming force; and it was to do this along a line on which a defeat would probably entail destruction, or a surrender upon the Belgian frontier. Let it be granted that MacMahon might expect to cross the Meuse before he would be intercepted, still it was all but certain that the German armies, which assuredly would turn northward at once, would come up with him between the Meuse and Thionville; and if he were caught, what chance had he of contending against the enormous forces which, in that event, would be directed against him? A crushing defeat was to be expected, and if he were defeated would not his army, hemmed in along the narrow belt of land extending from the northern Argmues to Lorraine, be either utterly broken to fragments or forced helplessly to lay down its arms? And it was for a reckless scheme such as this—one in which success was hardly conceivable, and of which ruin would be the natural result—that the rational and legitimate course of retreating leisurely and defending Paris from point to point, was to be abandoned! The correspondence recently published shows that this plan did not originate with MacMahon; and that it was adopted must be ascribed to the necessity felt at the Tuileries of avoiding a retrograde movement in the interest of the tottering Empire. MacMahon, however, did consent to it; and for this he must be held responsible. Beyond all doubt he ought to have rejected a project fraught with calamity to his country, at the risk even of resigning his command; had he done so, the position of France might have been different from what it is now, and his own reputation would not have suffered from the consequences of a dire catastrophe. Making every allowance for his difficult situation, we cannot acquit him of want of resolution, though sheer ignorance and incapacity did not lead him to make the greatest of blunders ever made perhaps by a commander-in-chief.