German victory
190-410: [REDACTED] French Third Republic [REDACTED] Paris Commune [REDACTED] Patrice de MacMahon 877 killed 6,454 wounded 10,000-15,000 killed The semaine sanglante (" Bloody Week ") was a weeklong battle in Paris from 21 to 28 May 1871, during which the French Army recaptured the city from the Paris Commune . This was the final battle of the Paris Commune. Following
380-679: A president to serve as head of state. Calls for the re-establishment of the monarchy dominated the tenures of the first two presidents, Adolphe Thiers and Patrice de MacMahon , but growing support for the republican form of government among the French populace and a series of republican presidents in the 1880s gradually quashed prospects of a monarchical restoration. The Third Republic established many French colonial possessions , including French Indochina , French Madagascar , French Polynesia , and large territories in West Africa during
570-497: A 10-year sentence, but Dreyfus was given a pardon and set free. Eventually all the accusations against him were demonstrated to be baseless, and in 1906, Dreyfus was exonerated and re-instated as a major in the French Army. From 1894 to 1906, the scandal divided France deeply and lastingly into two opposing camps: the pro-Army "anti-Dreyfusards" composed of conservatives, Catholic traditionalists and monarchists who generally lost
760-425: A French credit merchant, had served up to three million customers and was affiliated with La Samaritaine , a large French department store established in 1870 by a former Bon Marché executive. The French gloried in the national prestige brought by the great Parisian stores. The great writer Émile Zola (1840–1902) set his novel Au Bonheur des Dames (1882–83) in the typical department store. Zola represented it as
950-503: A French public which wanted territory and a French army which wanted revenge. The situation did not suit either France, which unexpectedly found itself next to the militarily powerful Prussian-led North German Confederation, or Prussia, whose foremost objective was to complete the process of uniting the German states under its control. Thus, war between the two powers since 1866 was only a matter of time. In Prussia, some officials considered
1140-463: A bad situation much worse was the conduct of General Auguste-Alexandre Ducrot , commander of the 1st Division. He told General Abel Douay , commander of the 2nd Division, on 1 August that "The information I have received makes me suppose that the enemy has no considerable forces very near his advance posts, and has no desire to take the offensive" . Two days later, he told MacMahon that he had not found "a single enemy post ... it looks to me as if
1330-543: A broad deployment which made envelopment highly likely but the effectiveness of French Chassepot-rifle fire inflicted costly repulses on infantry attacks, until the French infantry had been extensively bombarded by the Prussian artillery. The Battle of Spicheren on 5 August was the second of three critical French defeats. Moltke had originally planned to keep Bazaine's army on the Saar River until he could attack it with
1520-551: A column or line formation , Prussian infantry moved in small groups that were harder to target by artillery or French defensive fire. The sheer number of soldiers available made encirclement en masse and destruction of French formations relatively easy. The army was equipped with the Dreyse needle gun renowned for its use at the Battle of Königgrätz , which was by this time showing the age of its 25-year-old design. The rifle had
1710-433: A consumer version of the public square. It educated workers to approach shopping as an exciting social activity, not just a routine exercise in obtaining necessities, just as the bourgeoisie did at the famous department stores in the central city. Like the bourgeois stores, it helped transform consumption from a business transaction into a direct relationship between consumer and sought-after goods. Its advertisements promised
1900-692: A contact-detonated shell, the Krupp gun had a longer range and a higher rate of fire than the French bronze muzzle loading cannon, which relied on time fuses. The Prussian army was controlled by the General Staff , under General Helmuth von Moltke . The Prussian army was unique in Europe for having the only such organisation in existence, whose purpose in peacetime was to prepare the overall war strategy, and in wartime to direct operational movement and organise logistics and communications. The officers of
2090-492: A counter-attack 1900. Delescluze, however, refused to recognise that the Versailles forces were already in the city, and refused to make any such public announcement. By the evening the French army had consolidated its positions, and a large force was already inside the city. Dąbrowski's counter-attack failed, and then Dąbrowski disappeared for hours and was rumoured to have been killed. The Commune government did not announce
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#17327978776472280-479: A daily circulation of about 100,000 and Le Petit Meridional had about 70,000. Advertising only filled 20% or so of the pages. The Roman Catholic Assumptionist order revolutionized pressure group media by its national newspaper La Croix . It vigorously advocated for traditional Catholicism while at the same time innovating with the most modern technology and distribution systems, with regional editions tailored to local taste. Secularists and Republicans recognized
2470-572: A decisive defeat for the Boulangists. They were defeated by the changes in the electoral laws that prevented Boulanger from running in multiple constituencies; by the government's aggressive opposition; and by the absence of the general himself, in self-imposed exile with his mistress. The fall of Boulanger severely undermined the conservative and royalist elements within France; they would not recover until 1940. Revisionist scholars have argued that
2660-482: A distant plateau south of the town of Spicheren, and took this as a sign of Frossard's retreat. Ignoring Moltke's plan again, both German armies attacked Frossard's French 2nd Corps, fortified between Spicheren and Forbach. The French were unaware of German numerical superiority at the beginning of the battle as the German 2nd Army did not attack all at once. Treating the oncoming attacks as merely skirmishes, Frossard did not request additional support from other units. By
2850-626: A failed attempt to build the Panama Canal . Plagued by disease, death, inefficiency, and widespread corruption, and its troubles covered up by bribed French officials, the Panama Canal Company went bankrupt. Its stock became worthless, and ordinary investors lost close to a billion francs. France lagged behind Bismarckian Germany, as well as Great Britain and Ireland, in developing a welfare state with public health, unemployment insurance and national old age pension plans. There
3040-459: A few months, as radicals, socialists, liberals, conservatives, republicans and monarchists all fought for control. Some historians argue that the collapses were not important because they reflected minor changes in coalitions of many parties that routinely lost and gained a few allies. Consequently, the change of governments could be seen as little more than a series of ministerial reshuffles, with many individuals carrying forward from one government to
3230-526: A fierce opponent of Prussia who, as French Ambassador to Austria in 1866, had advocated an Austro-French military alliance against Prussia. Napoleon III's worsening health problems made him less and less capable of reining in Empress Eugénie, Gramont and the other members of the war party, known collectively as the "mameluks". For Bismarck, the nomination of Gramont was seen as "a highly bellicose symptom". The Ems telegram of 13 July 1870 had exactly
3420-472: A general in the Union Army . The National Guard came under fire from Fort Mont-Valérien , broke ranks, and fled back to Paris pursued by the French Army. Afterwards, Cluseret resigned and was replaced by Colonel Louis Rossel ; but Rossel resigned on 9 May. He was replaced by Louis Charles Delescluze , an attorney and journalist with extensive political experience, but had no military experience. Delescluze
3610-568: A grandson of King Louis Philippe I , who replaced his cousin Charles X in 1830. The Bonapartists lost legitimacy due to the defeat of Napoléon III and were unable to advance the candidacy of any member of the Bonaparte family . Legitimists and Orléanists eventually agreed on the childless Comte de Chambord as king, with the Comte de Paris as his heir. This was the expected line of succession for
3800-574: A hostile manner toward the State ('Nobilissima Gallorum Gens' ). In 1892, he issued an encyclical advising French Catholics to rally to the Republic and defend the Church by participating in republican politics ('Au milieu des sollicitudes' ). The Liberal Action was founded in 1901 by Jacques Piou and Albert de Mun , former monarchists who switched to republicanism at the request of Pope Leo XIII . From
3990-481: A key defense south of the city, and gradually began digging trenches and fortifications closer to the city, until they were only a hundreds meters from the city walls and prepared for long siege. On Saturday, 20 May, the army began a bombardment of the western gates and the city, particularly the Port de Saint-Cloud. The National Guard considered themselves safe within the ring of ramparts and fortifications that surrounded
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#17327978776474180-516: A major obstacle in terms of logistics. Only one railway there led to the German hinterland but could be easily defended by a single force, and the only river systems in the region ran along the border instead of inland. While the French hailed the invasion as the first step towards the Rhineland and later Berlin, General Edmond Le Bœuf and Napoleon III were receiving alarming reports from foreign news sources of Prussian and Bavarian armies massing to
4370-520: A massacre, the French army disengaged and retreated in a westerly direction towards Bitche and Saverne, hoping to join French forces on the other side of the Vosges mountains . The German 3rd army did not pursue the French but remained in Alsace and moved slowly south, attacking and destroying the French garrisons in the vicinity. About 160,000 French soldiers were besieged in the fortress of Metz following
4560-502: A newspaper would blackmail a business by threatening to publish unfavorable information unless the business immediately started advertising in the paper. Foreign governments, especially Russia and Turkey, secretly paid the press hundreds of thousands of francs a year to guarantee favourable coverage of the bonds it was selling in Paris. When the real news was bad about Russia, as during its 1905 Revolution or during its war with Japan, it raised
4750-576: A provisional government on 4 September 1870. The deputies then selected General Louis-Jules Trochu to serve as its president. This first government of the Third Republic ruled during the Siege of Paris (19 September 1870 – 28 January 1871). As Paris was cut off from the rest of unoccupied France, the Minister of War Léon Gambetta succeeded in leaving Paris in a hot air balloon , and established
4940-571: A provisional government, ("head of the executive branch of the Republic pending a decision on the institutions of France"). The new government negotiated a peace settlement with the newly proclaimed German Empire : the Treaty of Frankfurt signed on 10 May 1871. To prompt the Prussians to leave France, the government passed a variety of financial laws, such as the controversial Law of Maturities , to pay reparations. In Paris, resentment built against
5130-399: A public health law which began in the 1880s as a campaign to reorganize the nation's health services, to require the registration of infectious diseases, to mandate quarantines, and to improve the deficient health and housing legislation of 1850. However, the reformers met opposition from bureaucrats, politicians, and physicians. Because it was so threatening to so many interests, the proposal
5320-665: A quarter of the Parisian market and forced the rest to lower their prices. The main dailies employed their own journalists who competed for news flashes. All newspapers relied upon the Agence Havas (now Agence France-Presse ), a telegraphic news service with a network of reporters and contracts with Reuters to provide world service. The staid old papers retained their loyal clientele because of their concentration on serious political issues. While papers usually gave false circulation figures, Le Petit Provençal in 1913 probably had
5510-436: A range of only 600 m (2,000 ft) and lacked the rubber breech seal that permitted aimed shots. The deficiencies of the needle gun were more than compensated for by the famous Krupp 6-pounder (6 kg despite the gun being called a 6-pounder, the rifling technology enabled guns to fire twice the weight of projectiles in the same calibre) steel breech-loading cannons being issued to Prussian artillery batteries. Firing
5700-583: A reserve and to guard against a Prussian advance through Belgium . A pre-war plan laid down by the late Marshal Niel called for a strong French offensive from Thionville towards Trier and into the Prussian Rhineland. This plan was discarded in favour of a defensive plan by Generals Charles Frossard and Bartélemy Lebrun , which called for the Army of the Rhine to remain in a defensive posture near
5890-667: A result of the Franco-Austrian War of 1859 . During the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, the Empress Eugénie , Foreign Minister Drouyn de Lhuys and War Minister Jacques Louis Randon were concerned that the power of Prussia might overtake that of France. They unsuccessfully urged Napoleon to mass troops at France's eastern borders while the bulk of the Prussian armies were still engaged in Bohemia as
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6080-488: A return to the French borders of 1814, with the annexation of Luxembourg , most of Saarland , and the Bavarian Palatinate . Bismarck flatly refused what he disdainfully termed France's politique des pourboires ("tipping policy"). He then communicated Napoleon III's written territorial demands to Bavaria and the other southern German states of Württemberg , Baden and Hesse-Darmstadt , which hastened
6270-542: A revolutionary uprising which seized and held power for two months before its suppression; the event would influence the politics and policies of the Third Republic . The causes of the Franco-Prussian War are rooted in the events surrounding the lead up to the unification of the German states under Otto von Bismarck . France had gained the status of being the dominant power of continental Europe as
6460-471: A rubber ring seal and a smaller bullet, the Chassepot had a maximum effective range of some 1,500 metres (4,900 ft) with a short reloading time. French tactics emphasised the defensive use of the Chassepot rifle in trench-warfare style fighting—the so-called feu de bataillon . The artillery was equipped with rifled, muzzle-loaded La Hitte guns . The army also possessed a precursor to the machine-gun:
6650-586: A series of elections in which he would resign his seat in the Chamber of Deputies and run again in another district. At the apogee of his popularity in January 1889, he posed the threat of a coup d'état and the establishment of a dictatorship. With his base of support in the working districts of Paris and other cities, plus rural traditionalist Catholics and royalists, he promoted an aggressive nationalism aimed against Germany. The elections of September 1889 marked
6840-582: A steady financial basis for publishing, but it did not cover all of the costs involved and had to be supplemented by secret subsidies from commercial interests that wanted favourable reporting. A new liberal press law of 1881 abandoned the restrictive practices that had been typical for a century. High-speed rotary Hoe presses , introduced in the 1860s, facilitated quick turnaround time and cheaper publication. New types of popular newspapers, especially Le Petit Journal , reached an audience more interested in diverse entertainment and gossip than hard news. It captured
7030-637: A strong League of Nations after the war, and the maintenance of peace through compulsory arbitration, controlled disarmament, economic sanctions, and perhaps an international military force. Followers of Léon Gambetta , such as Raymond Poincaré , who would become President of the Council in the 1920s, created the Democratic Republican Alliance (ARD), which became the main center-right party after World War I. Governing coalitions collapsed with regularity, rarely lasting more than
7220-421: A symbol of the new technology that was both improving society and devouring it. The novel describes merchandising, management techniques, marketing, and consumerism. The Grands Magasins Dufayel was a huge department store with inexpensive prices built in 1890 in the northern part of Paris, where it reached a very large new customer base in the working class . In a neighbourhood with few public spaces, it provided
7410-402: A war against France both inevitable and necessary to arouse German nationalism in those states that would allow the unification of a great German empire. This aim was epitomized by Prussian Chancellor Otto von Bismarck's later statement: "I did not doubt that a Franco-German war must take place before the construction of a United Germany could be realised." Bismarck also knew that France should be
7600-557: A warning that no territorial changes could be effected in Germany without consulting France. As a result of Prussia's annexation of several German states which had sided with Austria during the war and the formation of the North German Confederation under Prussia's aegis, French public opinion stiffened and now demanded more firmness as well as territorial compensations. As a result, Napoleon demanded from Prussia
7790-757: The Action française , the movement declined from 1908, when it lost the support of Rome. Nevertheless, the ALP remained until 1914 the most important party on the right. Franco-Prussian War Before 18 January 1871 : [REDACTED] North German Confederation [REDACTED] Bavaria [REDACTED] Württemberg [REDACTED] Baden Total deployment : Initial strength : Peak field army strength : Total deployment : Initial strength : Peak field army strength : 756,285 144,642 The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War , often referred to in France as
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7980-642: The Paris Commune preceded the final defeat. The German Empire , proclaimed by the invaders in Palace of Versailles , annexed the French regions of Alsace (keeping the Territoire de Belfort ) and Lorraine (the northeastern part, i.e. present-day department of Moselle ). The early governments of the French Third Republic considered re-establishing the monarchy, but disagreement as to
8170-411: The 1848 French Revolution , particularly the way to overcome barricades. Instead of attacking them head-on, the army moved slowly and systematically, tunneling through walls of buildings around the barricades and positioning soldiers on the upper floors of buildings to fire at the barricades from above. In most cases, the barricades that were outflanked were quickly abandoned. The National Guard also tried
8360-578: The Cour de Comptes , and the Palais de la Légion d'Honneur . Fighting continued until 28 May, when the last Communard soldiers surrendered. 43,522 Communards were taken prisoner, including 1,054 women. More than half were quickly released. Fifteen thousand were tried, 13,500 of whom were found guilty. Ninety-five were sentenced to death, 251 to forced labor, and 1,169 to deportation (mostly to New Caledonia ). Thousands of other Commune members, including several of
8550-627: The Franco-Prussian War , until 10 July 1940, after the Fall of France during World War II led to the formation of the Vichy government . The French Third Republic was a parliamentary republic . The early days of the French Third Republic were dominated by political disruption caused by the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–1871, which the French Third Republic continued to wage after the fall of Emperor Napoleon III in 1870. Social upheaval and
8740-551: The Franco-Prussian War . The Treaty of Frankfurt, which ended the war, forced France to pay billions of francs in war indemnity and cede Alsace–Lorraine . In Paris, soldiers from the National Guard clashed with the French Army on 18 March when the army tried to remove 227 cannons from a depot on Montmartre. The guardsmen killed two army generals, and the National Guard seized control of the city. Adolphe Thiers ,
8930-576: The Hotel de Ville , the headquarters of the Commune. It was six meters high and several meters deep, built of paving stones, with a protective ditch and sheltered firing positions. Similar barricades had been or built or were begun on Place Saint-Jacques, rues Auber, de Châteaudun, Faubourg Montmartre, Notre-Dame de Lorette, at the Trinité, La Chapelle, Bastille, Buttes Chaumont, boulevard Saint-Michel , and at
9120-520: The Jesuits and Assumptionists —indoctrinated anti-republicanism into children. Determined to root this out, republicans insisted they needed control of the schools for France to achieve economic and militaristic progress. (Republicans felt one of the primary reasons for the German victory in 1870 was their superior education system.) The early anti-Catholic laws were largely the work of republican Jules Ferry in 1882. Religious instruction in all schools
9310-605: The Panthéon . Others were begun along the length of boulevard Saint-Michel and rue Saint-Jacques . The defenders soon ran into a new problem. The Committee of Artillery of the Central Committee argued about which positions had the greatest need for cannons. As a result, many of the barricades were never finished or fully armed. Once the Army entered Paris, several factors worked against the Commune. The wide boulevards were not conducive to defensive urban warfare , while
9500-471: The Scramble for Africa , all of them acquired during the last two decades of the 19th century. The early years of the 20th century were dominated by the Democratic Republican Alliance , which was originally conceived as a centre-left political alliance, but over time became the main centre-right party. The period from the start of World War I to the late 1930s featured sharply polarized politics, between
9690-596: The Siege of Metz and the Battle of Sedan , resulted in the capture of the French Emperor Napoleon III and the decisive defeat of the army of the Second Empire ; a Government of National Defense was formed in Paris on 4 September and continued the war for another five months. German forces fought and defeated new French armies in northern France, then besieged Paris for over four months before it fell on 28 January 1871, effectively ending
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#17327978776479880-555: The Treaty of Frankfurt and France's loss in the Franco-Prussian War , on 18 March the new French government under Prime Minister Adolphe Thiers attempted to remove a large number of cannon from a park in Montmartre , to keep them out of the hands of the more radical soldiers of the Paris National Guard . In the confrontation that followed, two French generals were seized and executed by the National Guard. Thiers,
10070-576: The Treaty of Paris following the Crimean War a precondition for the union. But Imperial France was not ready to do this. "Bonaparte did not dare to encroach on the Paris Treaty: the worse things turned out in the present, the more precious the heritage of the past became". The French Army consisted in peacetime of approximately 426,000 soldiers, some of them regulars, others conscripts who until March 1869 were selected by ballot and served for
10260-658: The War of 1870 , was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the North German Confederation led by the Kingdom of Prussia . Lasting from 19 July 1870 to 28 January 1871, the conflict was caused primarily by France's determination to reassert its dominant position in continental Europe, which appeared in question following the decisive Prussian victory over Austria in 1866 . According to some historians, Prussian chancellor Otto von Bismarck deliberately provoked
10450-539: The anti-clerical middle class, who saw the Church's alliance with the monarchists as a political threat to republicanism, and a threat to the modern spirit of progress. The republicans detested the Church for its political and class affiliations; for them, the Church represented the Ancien Régime , a time in French history most republicans hoped was long behind them. The republicans were strengthened by Protestant and Jewish support. Numerous laws were passed to weaken
10640-463: The constitutional laws of the new republic . At its head was a President of the Republic. A two-chamber parliament consisting of a directly elected Chamber of Deputies and an indirectly elected Senate was created, along with a ministry under the President of the council ( prime minister ), who was nominally answerable to both the President of the Republic and the legislature. Throughout the 1870s,
10830-422: The mitrailleuse , which could unleash significant, concentrated firepower but nevertheless lacked range and was comparatively immobile, and thus prone to being easily overrun. The mitrailleuse was mounted on an artillery gun carriage and grouped in batteries in a similar fashion to cannon. The army was nominally led by Napoleon III, with Marshals François Achille Bazaine and Patrice de MacMahon in command of
11020-501: The "Lascars de Montmartre", which did not answer to the central command. The artillery also considered itself a separate branch, not under Commune army command In the early afternoon of 21 May, an agent of the Versailles government forces, camped just outside the walls, explored the neighbourhood near the Point du Jour rampart, and saw that the rampart was not manned by Commune troops. General Félix Douay telegraphed Marshal MacMahon and
11210-576: The 1870s "the form of government that divides France least"; however, politics under the Third Republic were sharply polarized. On the left stood reformist France, heir to the French Revolution . On the right stood conservative France, rooted in the peasantry, the Catholic Church , and the army. In spite of France's sharply divided electorate and persistent attempts to overthrow it, the Third Republic endured for 70 years, which makes it
11400-459: The 2nd Army in front and the 1st Army on its left flank, while the 3rd Army closed towards the rear. The aging General von Steinmetz made an overzealous, unplanned move, leading the 1st Army south from his position on the Moselle . He moved straight toward the town of Spicheren, cutting off Prince Frederick Charles from his forward cavalry units in the process. On the French side, planning after
11590-399: The Army brought up additional charges against Dreyfus based on false documents. Word of the military court's attempts to frame Dreyfus began to spread, chiefly owing to the polemic J'accuse , a vehement open letter published on the liberal newspaper L'Aurore in January 1898 by the notable writer Émile Zola . Activists put pressure on the government to re-open the case. In 1899, Dreyfus
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#173279787764711780-475: The Austro-Prussian War, were treading carefully before stating that they would only side with France if the south Germans viewed the French positively. This did not materialize as the four South German states had come to Prussia's aid and were mobilizing their armies against France. Napoleon III was under substantial domestic pressure to launch an offensive before the full might of Moltke's forces
11970-517: The Boulangist movement more often represented elements of the radical left rather than the extreme right. Their work is part of an emerging consensus that France's radical right was formed in part during the Dreyfus era by men who had been Boulangist partisans of the radical left a decade earlier. The Panama scandals of 1892, regarded as the largest financial fraud of the 19th century, involved
12160-639: The Catholic Church. In 1879, priests were excluded from the administrative committees of hospitals and boards of charity; in 1880, new measures were directed against the religious congregations; from 1880 to 1890 came the substitution of lay women for nuns in many hospitals; in 1882, the Ferry school laws were passed. Napoleon's Concordat of 1801 continued in operation, but in 1881, the government cut off salaries to priests it disliked. Republicans feared that religious orders in control of schools—especially
12350-520: The Chamber and called for a new general election to be held the following October. He was subsequently accused by Republicans and their sympathizers of attempting a constitutional coup d'état, which he denied. The October elections again brought a Republican majority to the Chamber of Deputies, reiterating public opinion. The Republicans would go on to gain a majority in the Senate by January 1879, establishing dominance in both houses and effectively ending
12540-468: The Church's perspective, its mission was to express the political ideals and new social doctrines embodied in Leo's 1891 encyclical " Rerum Novarum ". Action libérale was the parliamentary group from which the ALP political party emerged, adding the word populaire ("popular") to signify this expansion. Membership was open to everyone, not just Catholics. It sought to gather all the "honest people" and to be
12730-607: The Communard position at the Butte-aux-Cailles . The Commune soldiers captured a group of a dozen Dominican monks who were fleeing the city, and later shot them. French Third Republic The French Third Republic ( French : Troisième République , sometimes written as La III République ) was the system of government adopted in France from 4 September 1870, when the Second French Empire collapsed during
12920-482: The Commune headquarters at the Hôtel de Ville, but Montmartre received no reinforcements or ammunition; each neighbourhood was left to defend itself. By the end of the day, the army effectively controlled half the city, along a line from Montmartre in the north to Parc Montsouris in the south. Jarosław Dąbrowski went to the most violent fighting, where he was fatally wounded. He died in the ambulance taking him back to
13110-508: The Commune positions. The French Army pushed along the avenues toward the Place d'Italie via Avenue d'Italie and Avenue de Choisy, which were blocked by massive barricades. The National Guard created a distraction by setting fire to the Gobelins tapestry factory, but the Versailles soldiers bypassed the barricades by moving through neighborhood gardens. By this means they were able to outflank
13300-411: The Commune, and they were still there, but without ammunition. Commune soldiers at Place Clichy and Place des Abbesses were able to repulse several attacks by the army, but the Imperial German Army , which controlled the zone outside the city walls, allowed the French Army to move troops along the city walls to outflank the Commune forces. Pleas for reinforcement and munitions for Montmartre were sent to
13490-438: The Commune, was later elected President of the Republic in May 1873 and would hold the office until January 1879. A staunch Catholic conservative with Legitimist sympathies and a noted mistrust of secularists, de MacMahon grew to be increasingly at odds with the French parliament as liberal and secular republicans gained a legislative majority during his presidency. In February 1875, a series of parliamentary acts established
13680-477: The Commune; the Central Committee, which claimed control over the National Guard, and the Committee of Public Safety, also claiming responsibility for the defense of the Commune. The Commune forces on that day paper amounted 200,000 men, but in reality there were no more than 60,000 ready combatants, under several different commands. There were a host of independent units, such as the "Zouaves de la Republique", and
13870-578: The Comte de Chambord based on France's traditional rule of agnatic primogeniture if the renunciation of the Spanish Bourbons in the Peace of Utrecht was recognised. Consequently, in 1871 the throne was offered to the Comte de Chambord. Chambord believed the restored monarchy had to eliminate all traces of the Revolution (most famously including the tricolore ) , to restore unity between
14060-543: The Democratic Republican Alliance and the Radicals . The government fell less than a year after the outbreak of World War II, when Nazi forces occupied much of France , and was replaced by the rival governments of Charles de Gaulle 's Free France ( La France libre ) and Philippe Pétain 's French State ( L'État français ). During the 19th and 20th centuries, the French colonial empire
14250-506: The Franco-Prussian War broke out before these reforms could be completely implemented. The mobilisation of reservists was chaotic and resulted in large numbers of stragglers, while the Garde Mobile were generally untrained and often mutinous. French infantry were equipped with the breech-loading Chassepot rifle , one of the most modern mass-produced firearms in the world at the time, with 1,037,555 available in French inventories. With
14440-440: The French Army and captured three cannon. On the right bank the French Army continued to move forward. In a short time the army captured the ruins of the Hôtel de Ville, and moved on toward the Place de la Bastille , the central strong point of the Commune lines. Instead of attacking the barricades directly, the French Army spread out and worked their way through the narrow streets around it, tunnelling through walls and outflanking
14630-495: The French Army, established his headquarters at the École militaire . At the Commune headquarters, the alarm was not formally sounded and bells rung until early Monday morning. Louis Charles Delescluze issued a proclamation calling on Parisians to rally to the defense of the city. The proclamation had the opposite of the intended effect. Instead of joining together into a single force, the battalions dispersed, each to defend its own neighborhood. Many men who were formally members of
14820-420: The French army to take up positions outside the city walls on the west. French Army casualties during the battle were 877 killed, 6,454 wounded, and 183 missing. 43,000 Communards were taken prisoner, and 6,500 to 7,500 fled abroad. The number of Communard soldiers killed during the week has long been disputed: Prosper-Olivier Lissagaray put the number at twenty thousand, but estimates by later historians put
15010-459: The French defended their position just outside Frœschwiller. By afternoon, the Germans had suffered c. 10,500 killed or wounded and the French had lost a similar number of casualties and another c. 9,200 men taken prisoner, a loss of about 50%. The Germans captured Fröschwiller which sat on a hilltop in the centre of the French line. Having lost any hope for victory and facing
15200-461: The French had a chance to sweep away the key Prussian defense, and to escape. Two Prussian corps had attacked the French advance guard, thinking that it was the rearguard of the retreat of the French Army of the Meuse. Despite this misjudgment the two Prussian corps held the entire French army for the whole day. Outnumbered 5 to 1, the extraordinary élan of the Prussians prevailed over gross indecision by
15390-524: The French into declaring war by releasing an altered summary of the Ems Dispatch , a telegram sent by William I rejecting French demands that Prussia never again support a Hohenzollern candidacy. Bismarck's summary, as mistranslated by the French press Havas , made it sound as if the king had treated the French envoy in a demeaning fashion, which inflamed public opinion in France. French historians François Roth and Pierre Milza argue that Napoleon III
15580-443: The French into declaring war on Prussia in order to induce four independent southern German states— Baden , Württemberg , Bavaria and Hesse-Darmstadt —to join the North German Confederation ; other historians contend that Bismarck exploited the circumstances as they unfolded. All agree that Bismarck recognized the potential for new German alliances, given the situation as a whole. France mobilised its army on 15 July 1870, leading
15770-751: The General Staff were hand-picked from the Prussian Kriegsakademie (War Academy). Moltke embraced new technology, particularly the railroad and telegraph, to coordinate and accelerate mobilisation of large forces. On 28 July 1870 Napoleon III left Paris for Metz and assumed command of the newly titled Army of the Rhine, some 202,448 strong and expected to grow as the French mobilization progressed. Marshal MacMahon took command of I Corps (4 infantry divisions) near Wissembourg , Marshal François Canrobert brought VI Corps (4 infantry divisions) to Châlons-sur-Marne in northern France as
15960-627: The German Embassy in Paris and sent to the penal colony at Devil's Island in French Guiana (nicknamed la guillotine sèche , the dry guillotine), where he spent almost five years. Two years later, evidence came to light that identified a French Army major named Ferdinand Walsin Esterhazy as the real spy. After high-ranking military officials suppressed the new evidence, a military court unanimously acquitted Esterhazy. In response,
16150-517: The German border and repel any Prussian offensive. As Austria, along with Bavaria, Württemberg, and Baden were expected to join in a revenge war against Prussia, I Corps would invade the Bavarian Palatinate and proceed to "free" the four South German states in concert with Austro-Hungarian forces. VI Corps would reinforce either army as needed. Unfortunately for Frossard's plan, the Prussian army mobilised far more rapidly than expected. The Austro-Hungarians, still reeling after their defeat by Prussia in
16340-583: The Guard stayed home. A women's battalion had been created, which included the activist and future anarchist Louise Michel , and was assigned to defend the Square des Batignolles , Place Blanche , or Place Clignancourt. Other than the soldiers of the National Guard, few Parisians were armed and prepared to fight. Following the entry of the Army into Paris, the Commune soldiers abandoned the Ministry of War , which
16530-709: The Hôtel de Ville and Tuileries Palace, included the Palais de Justice (which was also damaged on the outside by artillery fire from the French Army) the Ministry of Finance, the Cour des Comptes , the Palais de la Légion d'Honneur , the Gobelins Manufactory , the Palais d'Orsay . and the commercial piers along the Seine . Early in the morning on the 24th, the Commune leaders abandoned their headquarters at
16720-503: The Hôtel de Ville and moved to the city hall of the 11th arrondissement. They set fire to the hôtel, gutting the structure and destroying city archives and property records stored inside. This left the Commune without a central command post. National Guard soldiers began preparing a bonfire inside Notre Dame de Paris to burn the cathedral, following the example of the Tuileries Palace and other government buildings. At three in
16910-427: The Hôtel de Ville to turn him over to the Committee of Public Safety. Dąbrowski had dinner with a group of officers, who did not believe the rumors, and reentered combat. On the 23rd, the Commune built or strengthened barricades by pulling up the paving stones of the Paris streets. Early in the morning, the French Army resumed its offensive toward the east. The army had learned important lessons in street fighting during
17100-668: The III Corps launched a risky attack. The French were routed and the III Corps captured Vionville, blocking any further escape attempts to the west. Once blocked from retreat, the French in the fortress of Metz had no choice but to engage in a fight that would see the last major cavalry engagement in Western Europe. The battle soon erupted, and III Corps was shattered by incessant cavalry charges , losing over half its soldiers. The German Official History recorded 15,780 casualties and French casualties of 13,761 men. On 16 August,
17290-539: The Interministerial Press Commission to supervise the press closely. A separate agency imposed tight censorship that led to blank spaces where news reports or editorials were disallowed. The dailies sometimes were limited to only two pages instead of the usual four, leading one satirical paper to try to report the war news in the same spirit: Regional newspapers flourished after 1900. However the Parisian newspapers were largely stagnant after
17480-701: The North German Confederation to respond with its own mobilisation later that day. On 16 July 1870, the French parliament voted to declare war on Prussia; France invaded German territory on 2 August. The German coalition mobilised its troops much more effectively than the French and invaded northeastern France on 4 August. German forces were superior in numbers, training, and leadership and made more effective use of modern technology, particularly railways and artillery. A series of hard-fought Prussian and German victories in eastern France, culminating in
17670-448: The President of France, withdrew the government of France from Paris, first to Bordeaux and then to Versailles . The Commune government was divided into various political factions. Being led by several committees with different political agendas, it lacked a commander. In April, the Commune launched a military expedition against the Versailles government led by Gustave Paul Cluseret , who had fought with Giuseppe Garibaldi and had been
17860-437: The Prussian 40th Regiment of the 16th Infantry Division from the town of Saarbrücken with a series of direct attacks. The Chassepot rifle proved its worth against the Dreyse rifle , with French riflemen regularly outdistancing their Prussian counterparts in the skirmishing around Saarbrücken. However the Prussians resisted strongly, and the French suffered 86 casualties to the Prussian 83 casualties. Saarbrücken also proved to be
18050-557: The Prussian Army, when potentially 1,000,000 would be required. Under Marshal Adolphe Niel , urgent reforms were made. Universal conscription and a shorter period of service gave increased numbers of reservists, who would swell the army to a planned strength of 800,000 on mobilisation. Those who for any reason were not conscripted were to be enrolled in the Garde Mobile , a militia with a nominal strength of 400,000. However,
18240-400: The Republic was finally governed by Moderate Republicans (pejoratively labelled "Opportunist Republicans" by Radical Republicans ) who supported moderate social and political changes to nurture the new regime, such as a purge of the civil service . The Jules Ferry laws making public education free, mandatory, and secular ( laїque ), were voted in 1881 and 1882, one of the first signs of
18430-611: The Republicans' rising popularity and limit their political influence through a series of actions known as le seize Mai . On 16 May 1877, de MacMahon forced the resignation of Moderate Republican prime minister Jules Simon and appointed the Orléanist Albert de Broglie to the office. The Chamber of Deputies declared the appointment illegitimate, exceeding the president's powers, and refused to cooperate with either de MacMahon or de Broglie. De MacMahon then dissolved
18620-508: The Rhine in Saarbrücken back across the river to Spicheren and Forbach. Marshal MacMahon, now closest to Wissembourg, spread his four divisions 20 miles (32 km) to react to any Prussian-Bavarian invasion. This organization was due to a lack of supplies, forcing each division to seek out food and forage from the countryside and from the representatives of the army supply arm that was supposed to furnish them with provisions. What made
18810-522: The Semaine sanglante the Commune forces had, on paper, fifty thousand men in combat companies. with ten thousand soldiers on the south line, two thousand to the west, and six thousand in the southwest. South of the city, about 7,500 Communards were entrenched. Several thousand National Guard soldiers were kept as a reserve in barracks within the city, including three thousand at the Champ de Mars . However, at
19000-443: The Versailles government, Adolphe Thiers, entered the city and visited MacMahon at his command post that afternoon. The Polish nobleman Jarosław Dąbrowski was a senior military commander of the Commune, but rumours had spread that he had received a large bribe in exchange for surrendering the city to the Army. His advice and commands were largely ignored. At ten o'clock in the evening, a group of Commune officers escorted Dąbrowski to
19190-412: The Versailles government, marched on Paris and succeeded in dismantling the Commune during what would become known as The Bloody Week . The term ordre moral ("moral order") subsequently came to be applied to the budding Third Republic due to the perceived restoration of conservative policies and values following the suppression of the Commune. De MacMahon, his popularity bolstered by his victory over
19380-668: The aftermath when the regime of Napoleon III collapsed, resulted in a monarchist majority in the French National Assembly that favoured a peace agreement with Prussia. Planning to restore the monarchy, the " Legitimists " in the National Assembly supported the candidacy of Henri, Comte de Chambord , alias "Henry V," grandson of King Charles X , the last king from the senior line of the Bourbon dynasty . The Orléanists supported Louis-Philippe, Comte de Paris
19570-400: The aggressor in the conflict to bring the four southern German states to side with Prussia, hence giving Germans numerical superiority. He was convinced that France would not find any allies in her war against Germany for the simple reason that "France, the victor, would be a danger to everybody—Prussia to nobody," and he added, "That is our strong point." Many Germans also viewed the French as
19760-522: The ante to millions. During the World War, newspapers became more of a propaganda agency on behalf of the war effort and avoided critical commentary. They seldom reported the achievements of the Allies, crediting all the good news to the French army. In a sentence, the newspapers were not independent champions of the truth, but secretly paid advertisements for banking. The World War ended a golden era for
19950-485: The armies of France would take up a defensive position that would protect against every possible attack point, but also left the armies unable to support each other. While the French army under General MacMahon engaged the German 3rd Army at the Battle of Wörth , the German 1st Army under Steinmetz finished their advance west from Saarbrücken. A patrol from the German 2nd Army under Prince Friedrich Karl of Prussia spotted decoy fires nearby and Frossard's army farther off on
20140-499: The army commander Patrice de MacMahon and the French government hurriedly left the city, and established their headquarters in Versailles , and prepared plans to recapture the city. The Paris Commune made an unsuccessful attack on Versailles under the leadership of Louis Charles Delescluze . Between 8 and 20 May, French forces had retaken the territory surrounding Paris and began bombarding the city. On 21 May, French forces entered
20330-884: The army, were also likely to be shot immediately. Most prisoners were transferred to military tribunals for trial. Military tribunals were created at the headquarters of each army corps and division. Tribunals met at the Ecole Militaire , Parc Monceau , the Luxembourg Palace , Place Vendôme , the Gare du Nord , the city halls of the First and Fifth Arrondissement , the Panthéon, the [Arts et Métiers ParisTech|École des Arts et Métiers, and other locations, Following their trials, those who were sentenced to death were taken immediately to nearby execution sites; these included
20520-516: The authority of Versailles, responding with the foundation of the Paris Commune in March. The principles underpinning the Commune were viewed as morally degenerate by French conservatives at large while the government at Versailles sought to maintain the tenuous post-war stability which it had established. In May, the regular French Armed Forces , under the command of Patrice de MacMahon and
20710-640: The battle. The practice of shooting prisoners was not consistent or universal. Some units never shot prisoners, other shot prisoners immediately, and in later battles some units handed over prisoners to military courts. Once the Verailles army entered Paris, it was soon overwhelmed by the large numbers of Commune prisoners it captured. Different commanders had different practices. In some units, Commune prisoners who were captured holding weapons, or with their hands darkened by gunpowder, were shot immediately. Commune soldiers who were foreigners, or who had deserted from
20900-416: The beginning of May, twenty percent, or ten thousand, were reported absent without leave. The Commune historian Prosper-Olivier Lissagaray in 1876 gave slightly smaller numbers; according to his figures, 20,000 Commune soldiers defended the right bank and 17,000 defended the left bank, or 37,000. Once the fighting began, a large number of Commune soldiers, as many as half, simply stayed home and went into
21090-478: The border at Wissembourg. Upon learning from captured Prussian soldiers and a local area police chief that the Prussian Crown Prince's Third Army was just 30 miles (48 km) north from Saarbrücken near the Rhine river town Wissembourg, General Le Bœuf and Napoleon III decided to retreat to defensive positions. General Frossard, without instructions, hastily withdrew his elements of the Army of
21280-415: The border, attacked in overwhelming but uncoordinated fashion by the German 3rd Army. During the day, elements of a Bavarian and two Prussian corps became engaged and were aided by Prussian artillery, which blasted holes in the city defenses. Douay held a very strong position initially, thanks to the accurate long-range rapid fire of the Chassepot rifles, but his force was too thinly stretched to hold it. Douay
21470-480: The cellars under their buildings. 45,522 Commune soldiers, most of whom had not fought, were taken prisoner after the fighting ended. Jacques Rougerie put the numbers of National Guard fighters who fought at just twenty thousand. The French Army , the official forces of the Third Republic , grew from 55,000 men at the beginning of April to 120,000 men by the end of May. In the beginning, the army had few experienced officers or trained soldiers. This problem eased with
21660-671: The city and began the Semaine Sanglante. During the week of combat, an estimated ten to fifteen thousand Commune soldiers were killed in combat or executed afterwards. The Communards took and executed about one hundred hostages, including Georges Darboy , the Archbishop of Paris, and committed arson against many Paris landmarks, including the Tuileries Palace , the Hôtel de Ville , the Palais de Justice building,
21850-589: The city. On 20 May, a concert was held in the Tuileries Garden to raise funds for widows and orphans, though the Versailles artillery could be heard from the army positions outside the city. On the afternoon of Sunday, 21 May, despite the sound of artillery bombardment from the Versailles batteries outside, a charity concert to raise funds for orphans and war victims went ahead in the Tuileries Garden, and attracted some eight thousand people. It
22040-415: The command center. His last reported words were, "Do they still say I was a traitor?" In the evening the National Guard adopted a new tactic; they began setting fire to the government buildings they still controlled, beginning with the Tuileries Palace . A group of arsonists spread through the building, soaking the interior with oil, and setting it on fire. The buildings set on fire by the Commune, besides
22230-578: The comparatively long period of seven years. Some of them were veterans of previous French campaigns in the Crimean War , Algeria , the Franco-Austrian War in Italy, and in the Mexican campaign . However, following the " Seven Weeks War " between Prussia and Austria four years earlier, it had been calculated that, with commitments in Algeria and elsewhere, the French Army could field only 288,000 men to face
22420-401: The conclusion of defensive military alliances with these states. France had been strongly opposed to any further alliance of German states, which would have threatened French continental dominance. The only result of French policy was the consent of Prussia to nominal independence for Saxony, Bavaria, Wurttemberg, Baden, and Hessia-Darmstadt; this was a small victory, and one without appeal to
22610-775: The construction site for the Gare du Nord , the esplanade in the Tuileries Garden the Luxembourg Gardens , Place du Châtelet , the Mazas Prison and later, as the army moved east, the Père Lachaise Cemetery . By the evening of the 22nd, the Army had reached the Gare Saint Lazare and the Place de la Concorde , and had occupied the Gare Montparnasse . General MacMahon established his headquarters near Trocadéro. The head of
22800-469: The day, especially striking young people in their twenties. Germany set up vigorous measures of public hygiene and public sanatoria, but France let private physicians handle the problem. The French medical profession guarded its prerogatives, and public health activists were not as well organized or as influential as in Germany, Britain or the United States. For example, there was a long battle over
22990-651: The day, the Army had reached the Champs de Mars . As word spread that the Army was already within Paris, the National Guard began to react. The defense of the city was the responsibility of two separate organisations, the Committee of Public Safety (which took its name from the committee that had conducted the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution) and the Central Committee of the Commune . There
23180-631: The decentralized nature had no structure for joint action between the forces of the different neighborhoods. Each part of the city was entirely on its own. The French Army had superiority in numbers, command, and equipment. By the end of the first day, the Army had occupied a large part of the west of the city, as far as the Champs de Mars and the Trocadéro. By 9:30 a.m. on Monday the 22nd, fifty thousand French Army soldiers were already in Paris. General Ernest Courtot de Cissey , commander of one wing of
23370-419: The defeats on the frontier. A retirement from Metz to link up with French forces at Châlons was ordered on 15 August and spotted by a Prussian cavalry patrol under Major Oskar von Blumenthal. Next day a grossly outnumbered Prussian force of 30,000 men of III Corps (of the 2nd Army) under General Constantin von Alvensleben , found the French Army near Vionville, east of Mars-la-Tour. Despite odds of four to one,
23560-450: The disaster at Wissembourg had become essential. General Le Bœuf, flushed with anger, was intent upon going on the offensive over the Saar and countering their loss. However, planning for the next encounter was more based upon the reality of unfolding events rather than emotion or pride, as Intendant General Wolff told him and his staff that supply beyond the Saar would be impossible. Therefore,
23750-421: The dissolution of both the Commune and the National Assembly, the withdrawal of the army from Paris, the election of new governments in the large cities, and a general amnesty. This was posted on the walls of Paris still controlled by the Commune. The army headquarters ignored the peace offer and continued to move through Paris. A delegation led by Gustave Genton, a member of the Committee of Public Safety, went to
23940-418: The dominant European land power. Bismarck maintained great authority in international affairs for two decades, developing a reputation for Realpolitik that raised Germany's global stature and influence. In France, it brought a final end to imperial rule and began the first lasting republican government. Resentment over the French government's handling of the war and its aftermath triggered the Paris Commune ,
24130-529: The effect on French public opinion that Bismarck had intended. "This text produced the effect of a red flag on the Gallic bull", Bismarck later wrote. Gramont, the French foreign minister, declared that he felt "he had just received a slap". The leader of the monarchists in Parliament, Adolphe Thiers , spoke for moderation, arguing that France had won the diplomatic battle and there was no reason for war, but he
24320-541: The end, it recruited mostly among the liberal-Catholics ( Jacques Piou ) and the Social Catholics ( Albert de Mun ). The ALP was drawn into battle from its very beginnings (its first steps coincided with the beginning of the Combes ministry and its anticlerical combat policy), as religious matters were at the heart of its preoccupations. It defended the Church in the name of liberty and common law. Fiercely fought by
24510-456: The entry of the French Army until the following morning, by which time the army was solidly established within the city. Once inside the city, the Army spread out and captured two major city gates , the Port d'Auteuil and the Port de Versailles from behind. By the late afternoon sixty thousand Army soldiers were inside the city. Passy and the Trocadéro were quickly occupied. By the end of
24700-537: The exciting complex interactions with the newest and most fashionable merchandise and upscale customers. Throughout the lifetime of the Third Republic (1870–1940), there were battles over the status of the Catholic Church in France among the republicans, monarchists and the authoritarians (such as the Napoleonists). The French clergy and bishops were closely associated with the monarchists and many of its hierarchy were from noble families. Republicans were based in
24890-563: The expanding civic powers of the Republic. From that time onward, the Catholic clergy lost control of public education. To discourage the monarchists, the French Crown Jewels were broken up and sold in 1885. Only a few crowns were kept, their precious gems replaced by coloured glass. In 1889, the Republic was rocked by a sudden political crisis precipitated by General Georges Boulanger . An enormously popular general, he won
25080-533: The field armies. However, there was no previously arranged plan of campaign in place. The only campaign plan prepared between 1866 and 1870 was a defensive one. The German army comprised that of the North German Confederation led by the Kingdom of Prussia , and the South German states drawn in under the secret clause of the preliminary peace of Nikolsburg, 26 July 1866, and formalised in the Treaty of Prague , 23 August 1866. Recruitment and organisation of
25270-513: The government from late March through May 1871. Paris workers and National Guards revolted and took power as the Paris Commune , which maintained a radical left-wing regime for two months until the Thiers government bloodily suppressed it in May 1871. The ensuing repression of the communards had disastrous consequences for the labour movement . The French legislative election of 1871 , held in
25460-514: The government which would come to evolve into the Third Republic. These representatives – predominantly conservative republicans – enacted a series of legislation which prompted resistance and outcry from radical and leftist elements of the republican movement. In Paris, a series of public altercations broke out between the Versailles-aligned Parisian government and the city's radical socialists. The radicals ultimately rejected
25650-465: The heights. The Battle of Wörth began when the two armies clashed again on 6 August near Wörth in the town of Frœschwiller , about 10 miles (16 km) from Wissembourg . The Crown Prince of Prussia's 3rd army had, on the quick reaction of his Chief of Staff General von Blumenthal, drawn reinforcements which brought its strength up to 140,000 troops. The French had been slowly reinforced and their force numbered only 35,000. Although badly outnumbered,
25840-584: The high command, and the army immediately began moving troops through the gap into the city. General Jarosław Dąbrowski , the Polish nobleman and Commune commander of that sector, was at his headquarters at the Château de la Muette . When he learned of the intrusion, he quickly notified the Commune Minister of War and the Commune leader, Delescluze, asked for reinforcements, and announced he would make
26030-519: The initiative to the anti-clerical, pro-republican "Dreyfusards", with strong support from intellectuals and teachers. It embittered French politics and facilitated the increasing influence of radical politicians on both sides of the political spectrum. The democratic political structure was supported by the proliferation of politicized newspapers. The circulation of the daily press in Paris went from 1 million in 1870 to 5 million in 1910; it later reached 6 million in 1939. Advertising grew rapidly, providing
26220-424: The issue of whether a monarchy should replace or oversee the republic dominated public debate. The elections of 1876 demonstrated strong public support for the increasingly anti-monarchist republican movement. A decisive Republican majority was elected to the Chamber of Deputies while the monarchist majority in the Senate was maintained by only one seat. President de MacMahon responded in May 1877, attempting to quell
26410-469: The leaders, fled abroad, mostly to England, Belgium and Switzerland. All the prisoners and exiles received pardons in 1880 and could return home, where some resumed political careers. On paper the Paris Commune's military force, the National Guard, was formidable; all able-bodied men in the Commune, numbering 150,000, were required to serve, and half were enrolled in armed units. At the beginning of
26600-511: The long-term survival of the House of Bonaparte . A national plebiscite held on 8 May 1870, which returned results overwhelmingly in favor of the Emperor's domestic agenda, gave the impression that the regime was politically popular and in a position to confront Prussia. Within days of the plebiscite, France's pacifist Foreign Minister Napoléon, comte Daru , was replaced by Agenor, duc de Gramont ,
26790-554: The longest-lasting system of government in France since the collapse of the Ancien Régime in 1789. The Franco-Prussian War of 1870–1871 resulted in the defeat of France and the overthrow of Emperor Napoleon III and his Second French Empire . After Napoleon's capture by the Prussians at the Battle of Sedan (1 September 1870), Parisian deputies led by Léon Gambetta established the Government of National Defence as
26980-419: The melting pot sought by Leo XIII where Catholics and moderate Republicans would unite to support a policy of tolerance and social progress. Its motto summarized its program: "Liberty for all; equality before the law; better conditions for the workers." However, the "old republicans" were few, and it did not manage to regroup all Catholics, as it was shunned by monarchists, Christian democrats, and Integrists . In
27170-457: The menace of the Bavarians is simply bluff" . Even though Ducrot shrugged off the possibility of an attack by the Germans, MacMahon tried to warn his other three division commanders, without success. The first action of the Franco-Prussian War took place on 4 August 1870. This battle saw the unsupported division of General Douay of I Corps, with some attached cavalry, which was posted to watch
27360-482: The monarchy and the nation. Compromise on this was impossible, Chambord believed, if the nation were to be made whole again. The general population, however, was unwilling to abandon the Tricolour flag. Monarchists therefore resigned themselves to delay the monarchy until the death of the ageing, childless Chambord, then to offer the throne to his more liberal heir, the Comte de Paris. A "temporary" republican government
27550-569: The morning of Thursday, 25 May, the entire western portion of the city was controlled by the French Army. During the night before, the National Guard, who were overstretched, had withdrawn from their barricades in the 10th arrondissement . By morning these positions were occupied by the Versailles troops. On the left bank, the French Army occupied the Jardin du Luxembourg . A force of National Guard counterattacked in Asnières and Neuilly , pushed back
27740-492: The morning, an official arrived from the Commune headquarters. He pointed out that a fire in Notre-Dame would set fire to the neighbouring Hôtel-Dieu Hospital , which held eight hundred patients. The fire was put out and the cathedral was evacuated, and spared from bombardment through the rest of the Commune. The Commune Central Committee issued a peace offer for delivery to the Versailles military headquarters. They proposed
27930-437: The nature of that monarchy and the rightful occupant of the throne could not be resolved. Consequently, the French Third Republic, originally envisioned as a provisional government , instead became the permanent form of government of France. The French Constitutional Laws of 1875 defined the composition of the Third Republic. It consisted of a Chamber of Deputies and a Senate to form the legislative branch of government and
28120-511: The neighbourhoods prepared shelters in the cellars. The first serious fighting took place on the afternoon of the 22nd with an artillery battle between French Army batteries on the Quai d'Orsay and National Guard batteries on the terrace of the Tuileries Palace . On 22 May, the first documented executions of National Guard soldiers by the French Army inside Paris took place at Parc Monceau . Fifteen men and one woman captured in combat were shot after
28310-437: The new headquarters of the Commune at the city hall of the 11th arrondissement and demanded the immediate execution of the hostages at the prison of La Roquette . The prosecutor of the Commune, Théophile Ferré , drafted an order to execute six hostages. Genton went to the prison and was given a list of hostages from which he selected six names, including Georges Darboy , the Archbishop of Paris, and three priests. The governor of
28500-532: The newspaper as their greatest enemy, especially when it took the lead in attacking Dreyfus as a traitor and stirring up anti-Semitism. After Dreyfus was pardoned, the Radical government closed down the entire Assumptionist order and its newspaper in 1900. Banks secretly paid certain newspapers to promote particular financial interests and hide or cover up misbehaviour. They also took payments for favourable notices in news articles of commercial products. Sometimes,
28690-432: The next, often in the same posts. The Dreyfus affair was a major political scandal that convulsed France from 1894 until its resolution in 1906, and then had reverberations for decades more. The conduct of the affair has become a modern and universal symbol of injustice. It remains one of the most striking examples of a complex miscarriage of justice in which a central role was played by the press and public opinion. At issue
28880-431: The opportunity to participate in the newest, most fashionable consumerism at reasonable cost. The latest technology was featured, such as cinemas and exhibits of inventions like X-ray machines (that could be used to fit shoes) and the gramophone . Increasingly after 1870, the stores' work force became feminized , opening up prestigious job opportunities for young women. Despite the low pay and long hours, they enjoyed
29070-468: The potential for a monarchist restoration. De MacMahon himself resigned on 30 January 1879 to be succeeded by the moderate Republican Jules Grévy . He promised that he would not use his presidential power of dissolution, and therefore lost his control over the legislature, effectively creating a parliamentary system that would be maintained until the end of the Third Republic. Following the 16 May crisis in 1877, Legitimists were pushed out of power, and
29260-452: The press. Their younger staff members were drafted, and male replacements could not be found (female journalists were not considered suitable). Rail transportation was rationed and less paper and ink came in, and fewer copies could be shipped out. Inflation raised the price of newsprint, which was always in short supply. The cover price went up, circulation fell and many of the 242 dailies published outside Paris closed down. The government set up
29450-446: The prison refused to give up the Archbishop without a specific order from the Commune. Genton sent his deputy back to Ferré, who gave the order for the execution. Archbishop Darboy and five other hostages were taken out into the courtyard of the prison, lined up against the wall, and shot. After the end of the Commune, Ferré was singled out for prosecution because of his order, and was one of two dozen Commune leaders who were executed. By
29640-408: The probable number between ten and fifteen thousand. Most of the dead were collected by city authorities and buried in city cemeteries after the Semaine Sanglante, with a smaller number buried in suburban cemeteries. A handful of rudimentary graves were discovered during the construction of the Paris Metro and at other building sites. By March 1871, the French Army had been defeated by German forces in
29830-407: The provisional republican government in the city of Tours on the Loire river. After the French surrender in January 1871, the provisional Government of National Defence disbanded, and national elections were called to elect a new French government. French territories occupied by Prussia at the time did not participate. The resulting conservative National Assembly elected Adolphe Thiers head of
30020-411: The release of thousands of soldiers and officers captured during the Franco-Prussian War from German prison-camps, who returned to service upon their release. The German Army , which occupied parts of France in the aftermath of the Franco-Prussian War, took no direct part in the semaine sanglante . However, their troops stood in reserve to intervene if necessary. More importantly, the Germans allowed
30210-418: The roles of railroads, republican schools, and universal military conscription . He based his findings on school records, migration patterns, military service documents and economic trends. Weber argued that until 1900 or so a sense of French nationhood was weak in the provinces. Weber then looked at how the policies of the Third Republic created a sense of French nationality in rural areas. Weber's scholarship
30400-411: The same strategy but lacked the tools and manpower to tunnel through interior walls. The strongest resistance against the French Army on the 23rd was in Montmartre, where the Commune had originally been launched. Extensive barricades had been built at Place Blanche and at Place Saint Jacques. A large number of cannon had been captured by the National Guard from the army at Montmartre at the beginning of
30590-453: The southeast in addition to the forces to the north and northeast. Moltke had indeed massed three armies in the area—the Prussian First Army with 50,000 men, commanded by General Karl von Steinmetz opposite Saarlouis , the Prussian Second Army with 134,000 men commanded by Prince Friedrich Karl opposite the line Forbach - Spicheren , and the Prussian Third Army with 120,000 men commanded by Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm , poised to cross
30780-400: The time he realized what kind of a force he was opposing, it was too late. Seriously flawed communications between Frossard and those in reserve under Bazaine slowed down so much that by the time the reserves received orders to move out to Spicheren, German soldiers from the 1st and 2nd armies had charged up the heights. Because the reserves had not arrived, Frossard erroneously believed that he
30970-443: The town of Wissembourg finally surrendered to the Germans. The French troops who did not surrender retreated westward, leaving behind 1,000 dead and wounded and another 1,000 prisoners and all of their remaining ammunition. The final attack by the Prussian troops also cost c. 1,000 casualties. The German cavalry then failed to pursue the French and lost touch with them. The attackers had an initial superiority of numbers,
31160-425: The traditional destabilizer of Europe, and sought to weaken France to prevent further breaches of the peace. The immediate cause of the war was the candidacy of Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen to the throne of Spain. France feared an encirclement resulting from an alliance between Prussia and Spain. The Hohenzollern prince's candidacy was withdrawn under French diplomatic pressure, but Otto von Bismarck goaded
31350-446: The various armies were almost identical, and based on the concept of conscripting annual classes of men who then served in the regular regiments for a fixed term before being moved to the reserves. This process gave a theoretical peace time strength of 382,000 and a wartime strength of about 1,189,000. German tactics emphasised encirclement battles like Cannae and using artillery offensively whenever possible. Rather than advancing in
31540-431: The war virtually without allies. The calculation was for a victorious offensive, which, as the French Foreign Minister Gramont stated, was "the only way for France to lure the wary Austrians, Italians and Danes into the French alliance". The involvement of Russia on the side of France was not considered by her at all, since Russia made the lifting of restrictions on its naval construction on the Black Sea imposed on Russia by
31730-422: The war. In the final days of the war, with German victory all but assured, the German states proclaimed their union as the German Empire under the Prussian king Wilhelm I and Chancellor Bismarck. With the notable exceptions of Austria and German Switzerland , the vast majority of German-speakers were united under a nation-state for the first time. Following an armistice with France, the Treaty of Frankfurt
31920-469: The war. The major postwar success story was Paris Soir , which lacked any political agenda and was dedicated to providing a mix of sensational reporting to aid circulation and serious articles to build prestige. By 1939, its circulation was over 1.7 million, double that of its nearest rival the tabloid Le Petit Parisien . In addition to its daily paper, Paris Soir sponsored a highly successful women's magazine Marie-Claire . Another magazine, Match ,
32110-405: Was an accident insurance law for workers in 1898, and in 1910, France created a national pension plan. Unlike Germany or Britain, the programs were much smaller – for example, pensions were a voluntary plan. Historian Timothy Smith finds French fears of national public assistance programs were grounded in a widespread disdain for the English Poor Law . Tuberculosis was the most dreaded disease of
32300-477: Was blatant anti-Semitism as practised by the French Army and defended by conservatives and Catholic traditionalists against secular centre-left, left and republican forces, including most Jews. In the end, the latter triumphed. The affair began in November 1894 with the conviction for treason of Captain Alfred Dreyfus , a young French artillery officer of Alsatian Jewish descent . He was sentenced to life imprisonment for communicating French military secrets to
32490-431: Was debated and postponed for 20 years before becoming law in 1902. Implementation finally came when the government realized that contagious diseases had a national security impact in weakening military recruits, and keeping the population growth rate well below Germany's. There is no evidence to suggest than French life expectancy was lower than that of Germany. The most important party of the early 20th century in France
32680-410: Was drowned out by cries that he was a traitor and a Prussian. Napoleon's new prime minister, Emile Ollivier , declared that France had done all that it could humanly and honorably do to prevent the war, and that he accepted the responsibility "with a light heart". A crowd of 15,000–20,000 people, carrying flags and patriotic banners, marched through the streets of Paris, demanding war. French mobilization
32870-491: Was forbidden, and religious orders were forbidden to teach in them. Funds were appropriated from religious schools to build more state schools. Later in the century, other laws passed by Ferry's successors further weakened the Church's position in French society. Civil marriage became compulsory, divorce was introduced, and chaplains were removed from the army. When Leo XIII became pope in 1878, he tried to calm Church-State relations. In 1884, he told French bishops not to act in
33060-461: Was in grave danger of being outflanked, as German soldiers under General von Glume were spotted in Forbach. Instead of continuing to defend the heights, by the close of battle after dusk he retreated to the south. The German casualties were relatively high due to the advance and the effectiveness of the Chassepot rifle. They were quite startled in the morning when they had found out that their efforts were not in vain—Frossard had abandoned his position on
33250-427: Was killed in the late morning when a caisson of the divisional mitrailleuse battery exploded near him; the encirclement of the town by the Prussians then threatened the French avenue of retreat. The fighting within the town had become extremely intense, becoming a door to door battle of survival. Despite an unceasing attack from Prussian infantry, the soldiers of the 2nd Division kept to their positions. The people of
33440-423: Was mobilized and deployed. Reconnaissance by Frossard's forces had identified only the Prussian 16th Infantry Division guarding the border town of Saarbrücken , right before the entire Army of the Rhine. Accordingly, on 31 July the Army marched forward toward the Saar River to seize Saarbrücken. General Frossard's II Corps and Marshal Bazaine's III Corps crossed the German border on 2 August, and began to force
33630-444: Was modelled on the photojournalism of the American magazine Life. France was a rural nation, and the peasant farmer was the typical French citizen. In his seminal book Peasants into Frenchmen (1976), historian Eugen Weber traced the modernization of French villages and argued that rural France went from backward and isolated to modern with a sense of national identity during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He emphasized
33820-487: Was near the new front line. They failed to take away or burn the records and documents of the Commune armed forces, which gave the Versailles government the names and history of all the Commune soldiers. Only a few barricades were already in place, notably on the Rue Saint-Florentin , the Avenue de l'Opéra , and the rue de Rivoli . The National Guard began to build new ones; some nine hundred barricades were built hurriedly out of paving stones and sacks of earth. Residents of
34010-423: Was no centralized military leader, with each neighborhood having its own commander, and no comprehensive plan for the defense of the city. The major defensive activity of the Commune, following the model of the 1848 Revolution , was the construction of barricades . The most imposing barricade was erected on the Rue de Rivoli at the entrance of the Place Saint-Jacques and the corner of Rue Saint-Denis to protect
34200-444: Was ordered early on 15 July. Upon receiving news of the French mobilization, the North German Confederation mobilized on the night of 15–16 July, while Bavaria and Baden did likewise on 16 July and Württemberg on 17 July. On 19 July 1870, the French sent a declaration of war to the Prussian government. The southern German states immediately sided with Prussia. Napoleonic France had no documented alliance with other powers and entered
34390-416: Was originally planned for the Place de la Concorde , but was moved to the Tuileries because of the bombardment. At the end of the concert, the master of ceremonies promised that the Versailles Army would never enter the city, and that another concert would be held at the same site the following Sunday. But by the following Sunday, the Commune no longer existed. As the week began, there were two governments of
34580-439: Was pressured by a bellicose press and public opinion and thus sought war in response to France's diplomatic failures to obtain any territorial gains following the Austro-Prussian War . Napoleon III believed he would win a conflict with Prussia. Many in his court, such as Empress Eugénie , also wanted a victorious war to resolve growing domestic political problems, restore France as the undisputed leading power in Europe, and ensure
34770-458: Was returned to France for another trial. The intense political and judicial scandal that ensued divided French society between those who supported Dreyfus (now called "Dreyfusards"), such as Anatole France , Henri Poincaré and Georges Clemenceau , and those who condemned him (the anti-Dreyfusards), such as Édouard Drumont , the director and publisher of the anti-Semitic newspaper La Libre Parole . The new trial resulted in another conviction and
34960-420: Was signed on 10 May 1871, giving Germany billions of francs in war indemnity , as well as most of Alsace and parts of Lorraine , which became the Imperial Territory of Alsace-Lorraine ( Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen ). The war had a lasting impact on Europe. By hastening German unification , the war significantly altered the balance of power on the continent, with the new German state supplanting France as
35150-408: Was stability. The workers' demands for strikes threatened such stability and pushed many Radicals toward conservatism. It opposed women's suffrage for fear that women would vote for its opponents or for candidates endorsed by the Catholic Church. It favoured a progressive income tax, economic equality, expanded educational opportunities and cooperatives in domestic policy. In foreign policy, it favoured
35340-512: Was the Radical Party , founded in 1901 as the "Republican, Radical and Radical-Socialist Party" ("Parti républicain, radical et radical-socialiste"). It was classically liberal in political orientation and opposed the monarchists and clerical elements on the one hand, and the Socialists on the other. Many members had been recruited by the Freemasons. The Radicals were split between activists who called for state intervention to achieve economic and social equality and conservatives whose first priority
35530-428: Was the civilian delegate of the War Committee, which effectively made him the military leader of the Commune. In the weeks before the Bloody Week, the French Army was reorganized and vetted for loyalty. Soldiers suspected of sympathies to the Communards were transferred to other regiments, and often sent to French outposts in North Africa or regions distant from Paris. On 8 May, the French Army occupied Fort d'Issy ,
35720-429: Was the second largest colonial empire in the world only behind the British Empire ; it extended over 13,500,000 km (5,200,000 sq mi) of land at its height in the 1920s and 1930s. In terms of population however, on the eve of World War II, France and its colonial possessions totaled only 150 million inhabitants, compared with 330 million for British India alone. Adolphe Thiers called republicanism in
35910-498: Was therefore established. Chambord lived on until 1883, but by that time, enthusiasm for a monarchy had faded, and the Comte de Paris was never offered the French throne. Following the French surrender to Prussia in January 1871, concluding the Franco-Prussian War , the transitional Government of National Defence established a new seat of government at Versailles due to the encirclement of Paris by Prussian forces. New representatives were elected in February of that year, constituting
36100-408: Was widely praised, but was criticized by some who argued that a sense of Frenchness existed in the provinces before 1870. Aristide Boucicaut founded Le Bon Marché in Paris in 1838, and by 1852 it offered a wide variety of goods in "departments inside one building." Goods were sold at fixed prices, with guarantees that allowed exchanges and refunds. By the end of the 19th century, Georges Dufayel ,
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