Book: The Insurrection in Paris

A >> An Englishman: Davy >> The Insurrection in Paris




There was a tremendous fire against the bastions this morning at 5
o'clock, and a strong fire has been maintained all day.

The fire of the Insurgents is much weaker than it was yesterday and the
day before, except at Vaugirard, and from there to Montrouge, where
mitrailleuses and musketry were brought into requisition.

Up to 5 o'clock this afternoon Auteuil still shelled.

From 3 o'clock I have observed a very large number of the Versailles
troops under arms at a short distance from the Point du Jour, and a
considerable body of the Insurgents watching them from near the
Vaugirard Gate.

At 5 o'clock the white flag was displayed at the Porte d'Auteuil.

Orders have been given for the troops to march onward and occupy it.

M. Thiers has issued a circular, dated noon to-day, in which he says:--

"Several Prefects having demanded that news should be published, the
following answer has been sent to them:--Those persons who are uneasy
are greatly mistaken. Our troops are working at the approaches, and at
the moment of writing the breaching batteries continue their fire upon
the walls. Never have we been so near the end. The members of the
Commune are busy making their escape."

The breaching batteries are still keeping up a very heavy fire against
the _enceinte_.

M. Thiers has sent a despatch to the Prefects announcing that the gate
of St. Cloud was forced down by the fire of the Versailles guns, and
General Douai then rushed with his men into the interior. The troops
under Generals Ladmirault and Glinchamps were at once set in motion to
follow them.

The Versailles troops entered Paris at 4 o'clock this afternoon at two
different points--namely, by the St. Cloud Gate at Point du Jour, and by
the gate of Montrouge.

The ramparts were abandonned by the Insurgents.

* * * * *


THE CAPTURE OF PARIS.

MAY 21st.--AND 22d.

The great event of yesterday came upon every one by surprise. It had
been expected, but not for yesterday.

Even the Marshal Commanding-in-Chief looked onward to at least six more
days of sapping and mounting of batteries and actual breaching before
his army would be able to make the final movement.

A certain number of the troops were inside the _enceinte_ before any one
but themselves knew of it, and Auteuil and the Point du Jour were
shelled for nearly two hours after they had fallen into possession of
the forces of Versailles.

One man, M. Clement, an officer of Engineers, played a prominent part
in this historical affair. Soon after midday, proceeding cautiously in
advance of a party of his men, who were lying in concealment between the
nearest parallel and the Porte de St. Cloud, he crept up to the bastion
and found it and the ramparts adjoining without a single sentinel.
Keeping near the ground, he waved a white handkerchief; it was seen by
the small party of Engineers who were lying outside the last parallel,
and also by Lieutenant Treves, of the French Navy. At first the signal
was not understood; but M. Clement continued to wave the handkerchief
violently, and beckon to those who saw him to come on immediately. It
was with difficulty 100 men could be collected in the trenches, but
about that number advanced and occupied the deserted position. In the
meantime the word was passed from post to post in their rear, and a
batallion was soon on its way after them. By half-past 3 o'clock
dispositions had been effected for occupying both Auteuil and the Point
du Jour with a sufficient force, and proceeding to the other gates both
right and left. The gates and drawbridge of Auteuil had been demolished
several days previously, but the Insurgents had substituted an enormous
barricade, which shut off the iron bridge uniting the Railway Station
with the Viaduct.

The Division of General Vergee marched direct upon Auteuil. Scarcely had
the first column arrived there, when volleys of musketry were opened by
the Insurgents concealed in houses. A few of the troops were put _hors
de combat_ by this fire, but the artillery of the Division turned their
pieces on the ramparts against the enemy, Mitrailleuses were also
brought into requisition by the troops, and within an hour the
Insurgents had fled to a distance.

The Division of General Douai entered by the gate of St. Cloud, which is
at the Point du Jour, and occupied the salient between the ramparts and
the viaduct. Here there was a second bastion of considerable solidity.
The soldiers entered the half-ruined barracks and casemates, and made
prisoners of a number of Insurgents whom they found concealed there.

Immediate preparations were then made for the advance right and left,
but as the enemy was still keeping up a fire from 7-pounders and
Mitrailleuses, along the bastions between Vaugirard and Montrouge, a
regular assault of these positions by the division under General Cissey
was determined upon. I have already announced that it has been
successful.

The Division began to march in by the Gates of Vaugirard and Montrouge.
At 2 o'clock this morning La Muette was occupied without serious
resistance.

A Division subsequently advanced to Passy to join that which had taken
La Muette.

Such was the suddenness with which the occupation of the Point du Jour
had been effected that, as I have stated, the firing from the military
batteries continued for a considerable time after the first of the
troops were in it. It was not till 4 o'clock that the order to cease
firing in that direction left the Head-Quarters. In the meantime,
hundreds of people stood on the Avenue and Terrace of Meudon watching
the cannonade, and believing that all the posts of the Insurgents were
still occupied by the enemy. Even the officers and men in the batteries
did not know why the order to cease firing had been sent round.

I have just returned, after having followed in the rear of General
Vinoy's last column, going to take up positions in the neighbourhood of
the Trocadero. I have wandered all over the Point du Jour, visited
Auteuil, and have walked along by the bastions between the Gate of St.
Cloud at the Point du Jour and the Gate of Auteuil. Having watched the
other side of the Sevres Bridge, I was surprised on passing along the
Sevres road to observe that, very little damage had been done to the
houses at the end of it near the _enceinte_. One or two bore the marks
of shells, but the fact is that nearly all had escaped, and what I saw
at the _enceinte_ and within it, shows that the artillery practice of
the Versailles side had been exceedingly good throughout the
bombardment. The people on the Sevres road had kept their shops open
amid all the terrible firing. Only some two or three houses had been
closed. They stood at a dangerous angle to the batteries at Meudon. On
one of them was chalked "_fermee pour cause du bombardement._" Between
the last of the houses and the ramparts, and at a distance of not more
than 100 yards from the latter, were the newly-cut trenches which the
troops had constructed. Good gabions protected them in front, and there
was a plentiful supply of fascines lying all about. The doors of the
Porte were no longer to be seen, except in little bits on the roadway.
The drawbridge had succumbed bodily, and its place was supplied with
some planks. The posthouse was in ruins, and the stone walls on either
side between the gates and the parapet of the fortifications had been
crumbled into rubbish; the glacis from the Point du Jour to Auteuil had
been ploughed up in such a manner that not a yard of it was to be seen
without a shell hole. To say that the parapet had been riddled would not
be correct. It is smashed here and there, and at intervals everywhere,
but in no place between the two Gates I am referring to is the earthwork
inside the parapet laid bare, nor has a breach, properly so called, been
anywhere made. The doors and gate walls of both gates are smashed
through, but all along, despite serious disfigurement, the parapet is
strong still.

To come back to the Point du Jour--that is as much a ruin as the town of
St. Cloud. From the gate to the Railway Station there is not a single
habitable house; not three have roofs, and not one has its windows and
walls intact. Every lamppost has been scattered about the road in small
pieces, and a stranger who had not heard of the bombardment might be
pardoned for supposing that the streets had been macadamized with the
fragments of shells. Strange to say, the staircase leading from the
Booking Office of the Railway Station to the line over head is
uninjured, or nearly so, and by its means I was enabled to ascend and
walk through that Viaduct which I have been looking at from a distance
as shells have been battering it for the last six weeks. It is much
knocked about, and so is the bridge underneath it, which in a series of
arches spans the river, but both will be serviceable still after some
repair. Huge stones, displaced from their settings and broken into
small pieces, lie scattered on the bridge and its approaches. From the
Viaduct I could see an immense conflagration in the neighbourhood of the
Champ de Mars, and a combat between the troops and the Insurgents was
going on. In the Place de la Concorde and the Rue de Rivoli, all down to
the Trocadero, reserves were in waiting with their chassepots stacked on
each side of the road, but there was no fighting along the Quays.
General Vinoy had established himself in his new Head-Quarters, and the
70,000 or 80,000 men already in the heart of the city are believed to be
quite sufficient to dispose of the last desperadoes of the Commune. The
sounds of battle we heard from more than one point, and yet every one
spoke of the Insurrection as in its last agonies. Men and women once
more held up their heads and snapped their fingers at Delescluze,
Dombrowski, and the Commune, but there was sad evidence all around us of
what this rebellion had done. There in the little cemetery behind the
ramparts lay the unburied and mangled remains of 32 National Guards who
had been killed at the batteries just above. The whole place was a
picture of ruin and desolation. Passing out of the Point du Jour by the
opining where the Porte de St. Cloud had stood, whole and entire, even
after the Prussian bombardment, but where there is not a vestige of it
bigger than a splinter now, I walked along the glacis in the direction
of Auteuil. I was surprised to find that, at a distance of less than an
eighth of a mile from the latter place, the military had fixed their
gabions, sapped right up the glacis, and to within four or five yards of
the fosse. The trenches had been cut across the Bois de Boulogne.
Nothing, however, like enough of the parapet and the earthwork above had
been thrown down to fill up the fosse. Indeed, no effort whatever had
been made in the way of filling up, except at either side of the two
Portes, so that an assault at any other than these points would have
been a very difficult undertaking. On the glacis I saw the dead and
decomposed body of a man not in uniform. He lay on his side, with one
hand under his head and the other raised in the air. A gentleman who
lives close by stated that the deceased, with two or three other men,
had come out to fire stray shots at the soldiers in the trenches. As he
lay there to-day I perceived that he had been pierced by several rifle
balls. The gates at Auteuil have disappeared as completely as those at
Point du Jour, and at the Railway Station behind the iron railway bridge
over the road all the habitations are, so to speak, in a heap. The
French term "_debris_" best describes what is left of Auteuil and its
surroundings. Stone, mortar, iron bridge metal, lamp posts, trees, are
smashed, pounded, and scattered. No one who visited Auteuil in happier
times would recognize even the spot on which it stood. As specimens of
successful bombardment the Point du Jour and the three barracks behind
the _enceinte_ that lie between them may be cited among the most
complete that even modern artillery has succeeded in producing.

A great explosion, followed by a conflagration, occurred at half-past 12
at the Staff Quarters near the Esplanade of the Invalides.

Paris is now completely surrounded.

It is asserted that Dombrowski is hemmed in at Ouen.

The Insurgents have established a battery upon the terrace of the Garden
of the Tuileries, the fire of which sweeps over the Champs Elysees; but
this position has been turned by General Clinchamp, and there is reason
to hope that the resistance will not be of long duration.

The Versailles troops have already captured from 8,000 to 10,000
prisoners.

Fighting has been going on all this morning, the cannonade and musketry
fire being incessant.

There is a large fire in the neighbourhood of the St. Lazare Railway
Station, and a dense cloud of smoke hangs over the heights of
Montmartre. Not only have the Germans completely isolated Paris, but all
communication between Versailles and St. Denis is also cut off. Trains
arriving from the North no longer enter Paris, but stop at St. Denis.

It is rumoured that the Prussians occupy Fort Vincennes.

The strictest orders have been given to the German outposts to drive
back all Insurgents, and the advanced corps have been doubled tonight to
prevent any from breaking through the circle of investment north of
Paris.

A wounded Insurgent General attempted to pass the Prussian outposts, but
was forced to retrace his steps.


MAY THE 23d.

It may be desirable that I should add some particulars to the account I
have already given of the way in which the troops moved from the
_enceinte_ to the different positions they occupied in Paris last night.
The first column, proceeding between the railway and the Fortifications,
made its way from Auteuil to La Muette; the second, starting from
Auteuil, threw down a barricade which had been erected behind the
railway arch, and, taking the Rue Raynouard and the Rue Franklin,
proceeded by the high ground to the Trocadero. This march was not a
rapid one, because at every step precautions had to be taken against
snares that might have been laid by the Insurgents. The Artillerymen and
the Engineers entered the houses on the terraces and examined the powder
stores in the Rue Beethoven in order to ensure the column against an
explosion. The third column, setting out from the Point du Jour, marched
along the quays to the Bridge of Jena. At this point there was a
junction of the three columns, and a line of occupation from Passy to
the river side at that bridge was established. The fourth column crossed
the river at the Point du Jour, and marched along the quay of Grenelle.
Upon entering the Champs de Mars they found that the Insurgents were
encamped in considerable force there. Skirmishers were thrown out, and,
opening fire, they drove out the enemy without any serious difficulty,
although the latter had a park of artillery. The Insurgents showed fight
for some time, and a struggle was maintained on the right of the Champs
de Mars, where the temporary wooden barracks have been erected. The
Insurgents formed in a sort of hollow square at the four sides of the
portion of the ground which for some time has been covered with
artillery _caissons_, and responded to the attack upon them by a
vigorous fire, but being opposed on two sides by an overwhelming force,
they gave way, without any very great loss on either side. The tricolour
was planted on the Pavilion d'Ecole.

From the Arc de Triomphe there was no fighting down the Champs Elysees,
but there was a struggle at the Palais de l'Industrie before the troops
obtained possession of that building. Under the orders of certain
members of the Commune, the Insurgents resisted with a musketry fire.

Montmartre kept firing in the direction of the Trocadero throughout the
day. Its fire did not kill or wound many men, but it retarded the
advance of the troops towards the heart of the city.

The fire which I mentioned yesterday as having been seen by me from the
Viaduct of the Point du Jour was caused by the blowing up of the riding
school of the Ecole d'Etat Major, which was filled with cartridges.

Dombrowski has not been taken. He escaped from La Muette when the troops
entered, leaving behind him the silver service which was in the room
where he had been about to sit down to dinner.

Assy, was taken on the Quai de Billy.

Montmartre has been carried after a rather sharp struggle. The tricolour
now waves over the Buttes.

For some hours I witnessed the fighting to day. I found that early this
morning all the important positions of Montmartre had been taken by the
two Corps d'Armee of Generals Douai and Ladmirault. The latter General
had occupied the station of St. Ouen and the Place of Clichy, and he had
advanced to Montmartre by an external movement, keeping for some
distance outside the ramparts. At the same time General Douai made a
direct movement from inside the city by the Parc de Monceaux. In this
manner Montmartre had been almost entirely surrounded. There was a hard
contest, but the troops succeeded in entering the Buttes. A large number
of the Insurgents were killed in the action, and about 4,000 were made
prisoners. The number of cannon and mitrailleuses taken was very
considerable, amounting to some hundreds. Belleville is still in the
hands of the Insurgents, as are also the Hotel de Ville and the
Tuileries. The Red flag was floating on them at half-past 5 o'clock.
Severe fighting was going on across the Place de la Concorde between the
Insurgents occupying the mansion of the Ministry of Marine, at the
corner of the Rue Royale, and the troops on the other side of the river
in the Palace of the Corps Legislatif. A gunboat which the Insurgents
had under the Pont Royal, close to the Tuileries, was firing constantly.
The Insurgents in the Rue de Rivoli and the garden of the Tuileries were
using mitrailleuses and rifles, and the troops along the Boulevard at
the edge of the Place des Invalides, close to the river, were attacking
them with four-pounder guns. Fort Vanves was firing on the Insurgent
positions in the neighbourhood of Montrouge and the Faubourg St.
Germain, and the Federalists were shelling Vanves from Forts Montrouge
and Bicetre. There was musketry skirmishing at various points in the
Faubourg St. Germain. The Insurgents occupy houses, from which they keep
up a rapid fire to impede the march of General Cissey's troops. Among
the prisoners taken to-day many have been recognized as old Reds who
were actively engaged in the insurrection of June, 1848. A movement has
been ordered which will result in completely shutting in the Insurgents
within a circle formed by the whole Army of Paris. The Madeleine is in
the hands of the military. Several fires have broken out in the city.
Colonel Piquemalle, Chief of the Staff of General Verge, was killed
to-day.

The following circular despatch was yesterday forwarded to the Prefects
of the several Departments.

"The tricolour flag waves over the Buttes-Montmartre and the Northern
Railway station. These decisive points were carried by the troops of
Generals Ladmirault and Clinchant, who captured between 2,000 and 3,000
prisoners. General Douai has taken the Church of the Trinity, and is
marching upon the Mairie in the Rue Drouot.

"Generals Cissey and Vinoy are advancing towards the Hotel-de-Ville and
the Tuileries.


MAY 24th.

"The Generals, desiring to treat the city with lenity, withheld any
attack upon public monuments in which the insurgents had taken up
positions. This morning they carried the Place de la Concorde. The
Ministry of Finances, the Hotel of the Conseil d'Etat, the Palace of the
Legion of Honour, and the Palace of the Tuileries were burnt by the
insurgents. When the troops gained possession of the Tuileries, it was
but a mass of smouldering ashes. The Louvre will be saved. The Hotel de
Ville is in flames. I am convinced that the insurrection will be
completely conquered by this evening at the latest. No one could have
prevented the crime of these wicked wretches. They have made use of
petroleum for their incendiary purposes, and have sent petroleum bombs
against the soldiers. What remedy can be applied? The best of the
Generals of the army have shown an amount of talent and valour which has
excited the admiration of foreigners.

I have just returned from witnessing one of the saddest sights that has
occurred in the world's history.

I announced that the insurgents had set fire to several of the public
buildings of Paris, the Royal and historical Tuileries included. Flames
and bombshells are fast reducing the magnificent city to a huge and
shapeless ruin. Its architectural glories are rapidly passing away in
smoke and flame, such as have never been witnessed since the burning of
Moscow, and amid a roar of cannon, a screaming of mitrailleuses, a
bursting of projectiles, and a horrid rattle of musketry from different
quarters which are appalling. A more lovely day it would be impossible
to imagine, a sky of unusual brightness, blue as the clearest ever seen,
a sun of surpassing brilliancy even for Paris, scarcely a breath of wind
to ruffle the Seine. Such of the great buildings as the spreading
conflagration has not reached stand in the clearest relief as they are
seen for probably the last time; but in a dozen spots, at both sides of
the bridges, sheets of flame and awful volumes of smoke rise to the sky
and positively obscure the light of the sun. I am making these notes on
the Trocadero. Close and immediately opposite to me is the Invalides,
with its gilded dome shining brightly as ever. The wide esplanade of the
Ecole Militaire, almost immediately underneath it, is nearly covered
with armed men, cannon, and horses. Shells from the positions of General
Cissey, at Montrouge, are every minute falling close to the lofty dome
of the Pantheon. It and the fine building of Val de Grace, near it, seem
certain to be destroyed by missiles before the incendiary fire reaches
them. There is a dense smoke close to St. Sulpice, and now flame rises
amid the smoke, and the two towers of the church are illuminated as no
electric light could illuminate them. Some large building is on fire
there. Every one asks which it is; but no one can approach that Quarter
to put the matter beyond doubt. Burnt leaves of books are flying towards
us, and the prevailing opinion is that the Sorbonne and its Library are
being consumed. There are a dozen other fires between that and the
river. No one doubts that the Palais de Justice is sharing the fate of
the Tuileries and the Louvres. The Chateau of the Tuileries has all but
disappeared. The centre cupola has fallen in, and so has the roof along
the entire length of the building. Some of the lower stories yet burn,
for fire and smoke are rushing fiercely from the openings where up to
this morning there were window-frames and windows.

The Louvre is not yet wholly gone, and perhaps the fire will not reach
all its Courts. As well as we can make out through the flame and smoke
rushing across the gardens of the Tuileries, the fire has reached the
Palais Royal. Every one is now crying out, "The Palais Royal burns!" and
we ascertain that it does. We cannot see Notre Dame or the Hotel Dieu.
It is probable that both are fast becoming ashes. Not an instant passes
without an explosion. Stones and timber and iron are flying high into
the air, and falling to the earth with horrible crashes. The very trees
are on fire. They are crackling, and their leaves and branches are like
tinder. The buildings in the Place de la Concorde reflect the flames,
and every stone in them is like bright gold. Montmartre is still outside
the circle of the flames; but the little wind that is blowing carries
the smoke up to it, and in the clear heavens it rises black as Milton's
Pandemonium. The New Opera House is as yet uninjured; but the smoke
encircles it, and it will be next to a miracle if it escapes. We see
clearly now that the Palais de Justice, the Ste. Chapelle, the
Prefecture of Police, and the Hotel de Ville are all blazing without a
possibility existing of any portion of any one of them being saved from
the general wreck and ruin.

The military are as far as the Pont Neuf on the left bank of the river,
and just beyond the Hotel de Ville on the right. Now, at 6 o'clock, it
is all but certain that when this fire is extinguished scarcely one of
the great monuments of Paris will have escaped entire destruction.

The barricade of the Insurgents at the end of the Rue Royale was taken
last night by a movement in which the troops made their way from house
to house, starting from the Rue Boissy d'Anglas, to the Rue Faubourg St.
Honore. The fighting in the Rue Faubourg St. Honore and the Avenue
Marigny was very severe. Six shells fell and exploded in the grounds of
the British Embassy. The two houses which formed the angles at the
corners of the Rue Royale and the Rue Faubourg St. Honore were burnt to
the ground. The Place Vendome was taken by the troops. In the Faubourg
St. Germain during the whole night an energetic combat was raging
between the Insurgents and the men of General Cissey's division.

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