On October 7, 1870, one of those minor, anecdotal episodes that pepper History amidst greater events took place. A hydrogen balloon named Armand-Barbès lifted off from Paris, setting out towards Tours with an unusual passenger: none other than Léon Michel Gambetta, Minister of the Interior and War in the National Defense Government, a provisional administration established to respond to the fall of the Second French Empire following the defeat at Sedan against the Prussians, who had now laid siege to the capital.

Gambetta, of Italian descent—he was the son of Genoese immigrants—had given up the ecclesiastical career his parents wished for him, instead graduating in law, working as a lawyer and journalist—he even founded the newspaper La Revue Politique.

A Mason and a Republican, when he obtained a seat as a deputy, he could only position himself in opposition to Napoleon III, advocating for universal suffrage, the abolition of the nobility, the separation of Church and State, and socioeconomic measures to address the poverty affecting much of the French population.

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The Siege of Paris, by Jean-Louis Ernest Meissonier (1870). Credit: Public domain / Wikimedia Commons

On July 19, 1870, the Franco-Prussian War broke out, fueled by the growing expansionism of the Kingdom of Prussia as it absorbed German territories one after another, in what constituted a unification process. This broke the status quo established at the Congress of Vienna in 1815 and threatened the primacy that France had maintained on the continent thanks to its victorious role in the Crimean War and its successful intervention in Italy, aiding the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont. The spark that ignited the conflict was France’s refusal to accept Leopold of Hohenzollern’s candidacy to the Spanish throne, vacant since the Revolution of 1868, which Bismarck viewed as an affront and used to cunningly stoke German nationalism.

The conflict was disastrous for the French, whose army suffered resounding defeats at the battles of Gravelotte and Sedan. The latter was decisive because Napoleon III himself was captured, signaling the fall of his regime and the proclamation of the Third Republic. On September 9, the National Defense Government was established at the Hôtel de Ville in Paris.

It included some prominent politicians under the leadership of General Louis Jules Trochu, a veteran of Algeria and Italy who had fallen from favor during the empire for being an Orleanist, thus denied a wartime appointment. Trochu was named governor of Paris, tasked with defending it from the advancing forces of General Helmuth von Moltke.

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Léon Gambetta portrayed by Léon Bonnat. Credit: Public domain / Wikimedia Commons

Gambetta, one of the few who had opposed the war, later accepted that the country had been unwillingly dragged into it, and took a patriotic stance, assuming leadership to depose the emperor and proclaim the new republican regime. As Minister of the Interior, he advised this improvised cabinet to leave Paris as soon as possible and settle in a provincial city. Tours was chosen, yet, despite the Prussian threat, the fear of a revolution lingered, so he decided to stay in the capital to prevent it.

Indeed, two enemy columns were advancing toward Paris relentlessly. One was the Third Army, commanded personally by King William I himself, who had ascended the throne in 1861 after his brother’s death without an heir and wisely left the reins of government—and of unification—to Chancellor Otto von Bismarck.

He was joined by Moltke, Chief of the General Staff and architect of the victories over Denmark and Austria (in 1865 and 1866 respectively), in disputes over Schleswig. The other army, the Fourth or Meuse Army, was led by Crown Prince Albert of Saxony, a seasoned military leader who had demonstrated his skill at Sedan. Together, they amassed nearly a quarter of a million men.

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Louis Jules Trochu and Helmuth von Moltke. Credit: Image 1: Public domain / Wikimedia Commons – Image 2: Public domain / Wikimedia Commons

For his part, Trochu had a diverse amalgam of forces to defend Paris, including soldiers who managed to escape from Sedan, reserves, naval infantry, and, above all, national guardsmen; in total, a little over half a million fighters, though most lacked military training, as a general mobilization had been decreed.

He also had at his disposal two and a half thousand cannons, as well as a system of fortifications known as the Thiers Wall (named after the minister who had ordered its construction thirty years earlier, during the reign of Louis-Philippe of Orléans), covering a perimeter of 33 kilometers and reinforced with 16 forts, 94 bastions, ditches, etc.

On September 15, the Prussians reached the capital and began preparing for a siege, cutting off the rail line connecting the city with Orléans and occupying Versailles, where the headquarters was set up. General Leonhard Graf von Blumenthal, another veteran of the aforementioned conflicts whose effective performance at the Battle of Königgrätz had delivered victory to Crown Prince Frederick III, was given command of operations. He was the first to refuse Bismarck’s order to bombard Paris to secure a swift victory.

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William I and Albert of Saxony. Credit: Image 1: public domain on Wikimedia Commons – Image 2: public domain on Wikimedia Commons

Von Blumenthal, like Moltke, considered that such an action violated the laws of war and would kill thousands of civilians, irreversibly turning world opinion against the Germans. He also argued tactical reasons: it was preferable to wear down the French troops, leaving them incapacitated for the post-war period, thus saving their own casualties. William I approved of this perspective, and Paris was consequently doomed to endure a siege.

In this way, Trochu was left unable to take advantage of his defensive positions and had to go on the offensive, successfully capturing Châtillon and Le Bourget at the end of October. It was then that Gambetta escaped by balloon—the only means of communication with the outside world, along with carrier pigeons—and, after a 200-kilometer flight, he reached Tours, where he skillfully organized a relief army.

However, before this, the Gauls lost those positions again, and this news, combined with the fall of Metz, struck like a heavy blow; the troops gathered by Gambetta would no longer be useful.

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Leonhard Graf von Blumenthal. Credit: Public domain / Wikimedia Commons

To try to counteract the negative trend, Trochu ordered a new sortie on November 30, capturing Champigny, Créteil, and Villiers, but the Prussians retook them two days later. On January 19, a final attempt was made to break the blockade at Rueil-Malmaison, which failed. Trochu resigned and was replaced by General Joseph Vinoy.

The situation then changed, but not due to the new commander-in-chief, rather because of a shift in Prussian tactics. The siege was now entering its fourth month, and although the defenders were beginning to suffer from hunger, the arrival of winter threatened to create problems for the besiegers as well, particularly in terms of maintaining the necessary flow of supplies and provisions.

Meanwhile, Bismarck expressed his concern to the king about the possible emergence of anti-war sentiment in Prussia or the effect the war might have on the national economy if it dragged on much longer. This was not to mention that, if there was no imminent French defeat, they could reorganize or even request intervention from other powers in exchange for renouncing the republic in favor of a monarchy, as Thiers proposed.

The departure of Léon Gambetta (Jules Didier and Jacques Guiaud). Credit: Public domain / Wikimedia Commons

This led to the deployment of the large-caliber Krupp artillery, doing what had previously been avoided: bombarding Paris. Thousands of shells fell on the capital, worsening an already extreme situation, as provisions had run out and animals, from domestic to stray and even those in the zoo, became food.

Since there was no possibility of relief, negotiations between the two sides began on January 23, lasting four days, and were personally led at Versailles by Vice President Jules Favre and Bismarck. Favre, who, along with Gambetta and Thiers, had initially opposed the war and was one of the key figures in the removal of Napoleon III, had declared in September that he would not give Germany a single inch of territory or a single stone from a fortress; when the time came, things turned out very differently. Among other reasons, because Favre himself was unsure and feared that the National Guard might not accept a capitulation, potentially rebelling. The cunning Bismarck even suggested that he provoke an insurrection while he still had an army to suppress it.

In the end, the regular French troops were disarmed, the perimeter forts were surrendered to the enemy, and thus, Paris officially surrendered on January 28, 1871. France committed to paying 200 million francs in indemnities in exchange for a cessation of hostilities, at least until the end of February, and the besiegers allowed food convoys organized by Britain and the USA (whose ambassador had remained in his post, trying to broker an agreement between the parties and aiding Parisians of German origin) to enter the city. On March 1, German troops entered the capital but camped on the outskirts to avoid incidents (at which point Parisians symbolically scrubbed the streets).

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Prussian artillerymen during the siege. Credit: Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-H26707 / Wikimedia Commons

Under the subsequent Treaty of Frankfurt, signed in May by Bismarck and Thiers, France had to cede Alsace, Lorraine, and the Vosges, as well as pay 5 billion francs in gold within three years, during which time German troops would remain on French soil to ensure the delivery of the money (which was done within that period). Moltke and Blumenthal were promoted to field marshals, and Wilhelm I was proclaimed Kaiser (emperor) of the new German Empire even before the siege ended (on January 18), finally consummating the unification of the German territories that Bismarck had ignited the war to achieve. The proclamation of the Kaiser and the Empire took place in the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles.

Meanwhile, as Favre feared, the power vacuum in Paris and the news of the capitulation incited an uprising by the National Guard, supported by workers, socialists, anarchists… indeed, a people who refused to accept the situation after being dragged into a war they did not want by those now surrendering, suspecting that a monarchical restoration was being planned.

This was what became known as the Commune, considered the first true proletarian revolution, although many of the radical measures adopted were driven by the need to escape the misery and hunger caused by the siege. But that is another story.

This article was first published on our Spanish Edition on September 18, 2019: Cómo el asedio de París de 1871 permitió lograr la unificación alemana, proclamada en Versalles

SOURCES

J.A.S. Grenville, La Europa remodelada 1848-1878

Pedro Voltes, Bismarck

Karl Marx, La Comuna de París

Alistair Horne, The fall of Paris. The siege and the Commune 1870–71

Michael Howard, The Franco-Prussian War: The german invasion of France 1870–1871

Wikipedia, Sitio de París (1870-1871)

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