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Following the operations of the German armies from the battle of Gravelotte to the siege of Paris, I may, in conclusion, say that I saw no new military principles developed, whether of strategy or grand tactics, the movements of the different armies and corps being dictated and governed by the same general laws that have so long obtained, simplicity of combination and manoeuvre, and the concentration of a numerically superior force at the vital point.
Seven Luxembourg surgeons who had been in Metz ever since the battle of Gravelotte had written to Marshal Bazaine for leave to go home through the Prussian lines. This letter, sent to the Prussian headquarters, was replied to in a letter carried into Metz by Regnier and by him given to Bazaine, to the effect that the nine surgeons were free to depart.
Resistance like this was so unexpected by the Germans that it dismayed them; and first wavering a moment, then becoming panic-stricken, they broke and fled, infantry, cavalry, and artillery coming down the slope without any pretence of formation, the French hotly following and pouring in a heavy and constant fire as the fugitives fled back across the ravine toward Gravelotte.
In quite as many instances as are presented by the opposite, the forces which put an unexpected end to the military supremacy long possessed by their antagonists were themselves, in the strictest sense of the word, 'regulars. The Thebans whom Epaminondas led to victory over the Spartans at Leuctra no more resembled a hasty levy of armed peasants or men imperfectly trained as soldiers than did Napoleon's army which overthrew the Prussians at Jena, or the Germans who defeated the French at Gravelotte and Sedan.
With this the battle on the right had now assumed a most serious aspect, and the indications were that the French would attack the heights of Gravelotte; but the Pomeranian corps coming on the field at this crisis, was led into action by Von Moltke, himself, and shortly after the day was decided in favor of the Germans.
Bismarck was more fortunate than his friends in that neither of his sons nor any of his near relatives lost his life; Roon's second son fell at Sedan, and the bloody days of Mars-la-Tour and Gravelotte placed in mourning nearly every noble family in Prussia.
Returning to Gravelotte, we next visited that part of the battlefield to the northeast of the village, and before long Count Bismarck discovered in a remote place about twenty men dreadfully wounded. These poor fellows had had no attention whatever, having been overlooked by the hospital corps, and their condition was most pitiful.
Reconciled in Algiers with his regiment, Henri de Prerolles did not again quit the province of Constantine except to serve in the army of the Rhine, as chief of battalion in the line, until the promotions which followed the declaration of war in 1870. Officer of the Legion of Honor for his gallantry at Gravelotte and at St.
Sixteen batteries of the VIIth and VIIIth Corps accordingly drew up to right and left of the highway running through Gravelotte. Their fire was ineffective, as they were too far from the enemy; besides they were suffering from the fire of the French tirailleurs, who had established themselves in the opposite woods. It became necessary to drive them out, so here again there was a sharp skirmish.
By the middle of the afternoon the steady progress of the German left and centre had driven the French from their more advanced positions from behind stone walls and hedges, through valleys and hamlets, in the direction of Metz, but as yet the German right had accomplished little except to get possession of the village of Gravelotte, forcing the French across the deep ravine I have mentioned, which runs north and south a little distance east of ihe town.
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