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Updated: June 12, 2025
On other points, with one important exception, the versions given of the interview by the two participants fairly agree, and Bazaine's account of it may be summarised.
The first was the Army of the Loire, the second of the Jura. When the plan of co-operation with Bazaine's one hundred and seventy-five thousand well-trained troops had failed, and the Army of the Loire had been repulsed at Orleans, Gambetta with his Provisional Government moved to Bordeaux.
It was nothing but a skirmish; the 3d Saxon Cavalry, a squadron or two of the 18th Uhlans, and Zwinker's Battery fought a half-dozen squadrons of chasseurs. But the red-letter mark on the result was unmistakable. Bazaine's correspondence was captured. On the same day the second sortie occurred from Strassbourg.
The solution of the riddle is to be found in Bazaine's despatch of August 17 to the Minister of War: "We are going to put forth every effort to make good our supplies of all kinds in order to resume our march in two days if that is possible ." That the army was badly hampered by lack of stores is certain; but to postpone even for a single day the march to Verdun by the northern road that by way of Briey was fatal.
Detachments of banditti, called by courtesy guerrillas, everywhere infested the roads, even at the very gates of the capital. A picnic was given to us at this time, by some officers of General Bazaine's staff, at a wild, beautiful spot, where the ruins of a graceful aqueduct, built by the Spaniards, formed the principal attraction.
He threatened to open negotiations with him and to send him back to France at the head of Bazaine's army.
Bazaine's wealthy Mexican wife obtained permission to reside near him, with her family and servants, in a pavilion of the sea-fortress. This afforded her an opportunity of bringing about the freedom of her husband in the following year with the aid of her brother.
In his printed defence Bazaine has urged that the army had not enough provisions for the march, and, further, that the outlying forts of Metz were not yet ready to withstand a siege a circumstance which, if true, partly explains Bazaine's reluctance to leave the "virgin city ." Napoleon III. quitted it early on the 16th: he and his escort were the last Frenchmen to get free of that death-trap for many a week.
The Republic Organized The Commune of Paris Instability of the Government Thiers Proclaimed President Punishment of the Unsuccessful Generals MacMahon a Royalist President Bazaine's Sentence and Escape Grevy, Gambetta and Boulanger The Panama Canal Scandal Despotism of the Army Leaders The Dreyfus Case Church and State The Moroccan Controversy
Humbert, recently claimed that she had her "millions" from this Regnier. A sharp criticism on Bazaine's conduct at Metz is given in a pamphlet, Réponse au Rapport sommaire sur les Opérations de l'Armée du Rhin, by one of his Staff Officers. This capitulation, the greatest recorded in the history of civilised nations, dealt a death-blow to the hopes of France.
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