Battles of the nineteenth century
Forbes, Archibald, 1838-1900 | Atteridge, A. Hilliard (Andrew Hilliard)
x?*f^ ^-^ "rv •^ -■-^ r^, ■^. ik-.-:-^^-- .1-J^ .^^./-J i,.f>. "><•. .'>^ ..^N X( 7/"v ^ /^iv ^s 1,1 Ss. !^ iATTLESOFTHE NINETEENTH « • « /» It' ^J^. ^r.;^j,j. 4* ^ lifSlT Tlie Destruetioli o[* EniaLmi Oli 21 Battles OF THE Nineteenth Century DESCRIBED BY ARCHIBALD FORBES, G. A. HENTY MAJOR ARTHUR GRIFFITHS Atid otiier Well-known Writers Vol. IV. SPECIAL EDITION WITH COLOURED PLATES AfjD NUMEROUS OTHER ILLUSTRATIONS CASSELL AND COMPANY, Limited LONDON, PARIS, NEW YORK &= MELBOURNE ALL RIGHTS RESERVED CONTENTS. PAGSf Gravelotte (St. Privat). August i8, 1870. By A. Hilliard Atieridge 383 The First Burmese War. 1S24. By G. A. Henty 306 The End of the Nile Campaign. January— February, 1885. By Charles Lowe. .405 The Belgian War of Independence : Brussels. August— September, 1830. By John Augustus O'Shea ai6 The Janissary Rebellion at Widdin. March, iSoi. By WiUiam V. Herbert. .430 Bergen-op-Zoom. March 8—9, 1S14. By Colonel Percy Groves 436 The Bombardment of Alexandria. July ii, 18S2. By Max Pemberton 447 The Siege of La Puebla. May, 1863. By A. Hilliard Atteridge 456 The Siege of Sebastopol : Part H. April— September, 1855. .By Major Arthur Griffiths. 464 The Liberation of New Granada: Boyaca. August 17, 1819. By W. B. Robertson. 473 The Battle of Vimiera. August 21, 1808. By Major-General Sir E. F. Du Cane. .479 The Winter Campaign in Finland. 180S. By A. Hilliard Atteridge 491 The Red River Expedition. 1S70. By Angus Evan Abbott 500 The Conquest of Scinde. September, 1842— March, 1843. By Archibald Forbes. .508 " Remember the Alamo ! " The Texan Insurrection of 1836. By Stoddard Dewey. 518 The Battles in the Pyrenees. July, 1813— February, 1814. By Major Arthur Griffiths. 527 The Battle of Maida. July 14, 1806. By A. J. Butler 542 The Battle of Kirkee. November 5, 1817. By C. Stein 549 The Passage of the Douro. May 10—12, 1809. By Lieut.-Col. Newnham-Davis. .556 The Battle of Novara. March 23, 1849. By Major G. Le M. Gretton 564 The Battle of Aspern-Essling. June 21—22, 1809. By D. H. Parry '573 The Siege of San Sebastian. August, 1813. By Major Arthur Griffiths 582 Worth. August 6, 1870. By Archibald Forbes. • 590 The Battles around Suakim. L— El-Teb, February 29; and Tamai, March 13, 18S4. By Charles Lowe. , 600 Omar Pasha at Chetat^ and Calafat. 1854. By William V. Herbert 613 The Indian Mutiny: Lucknow. Part II. September, 1857— M.\rch, 1858. By G. A. Henty. 620 The Battle of Barrosa. March 5, 181 1. By Archibald Forbes 627 The Battles around Suakim. II.— Hasheen; Tofrik. March 20— 22, 1885. By Charles Lowe 634 Chrystler's Farm. November ii, 1813. By C. Stein 646 The Last Sortie from Paris : Buzenval. January 19, 1871. By John Augustus O'Shea. 653 A One Day's War : Maharajpore and Punniar. December 29, 1843. By Herbert Compton. 660 The B.-^ttle of Ligny. PACK Toulouse. April io, 1814. By D. H. Parry 687 The Final Stages of the Second Afghan War. August — September, 1880. By Archibald Forbes 693 The Action off Pulo Aor. Februarv 15, 1804. By A. J. Butler 706 Morgan's Raid. July 2—26, 1863. By Angus Evan Abbott 710 Gettysburg. Julv i — 3, 1863. By Major Arthur Griffiths 720 ItfiA. October 14, 1S06. By D. H. Parry 730 The Battle of Ferkeh. June 7, 1896. By A. Hilliard Atteridge 742 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. "The roads were encumbered with retiring convoys and long trains of ambulance waggons" .... 384 Gravelotie : Plan 385 General Steinmetz ........ 389 "A thick German firing-line was blazing away at the French garrison " ....... 389 German Huss.ar 392 An incident in the Rattle of Gravelotte. 393 Battle of Gravelotte : Plan 394 Under fire 395 ' ' He and his officers repeatedly charged the British line ". 397 The first Burmese War : Sketch Map .... 400 " The way was cleared for them by the artillery ". 401 Burmese idol-house 404 Embarkation of General Earle's force at Korti. 406 The Casualty of the Bitti Cataract 408 General Earle 409 Battle of Kirbekan : Plan 410 Colonel Coveney and Colonel Eyre 412 (-'onvoy of Wounded ........ 413 Burial of General Earle 415 "It was tlie revolution — the smouldering embers which were soon to be roused into flame " .... 417 Brussels in 1830 : Plan 419 A view 'in Brussels ........ 420 "The Commandant fell dead with a bullet through his brain" 421 Hotel de Ville. Brussels 424 " Where his gun was needed, there sprang the ' Jambe de Bois' " 425 " Each time the enemy fired, the head of the figure was lowered with a cord " 428 The Park, Brussels : • 429 Wallachia : Sketch Map 432 " The Janissaries rushed to the attack at full speed " - 433 " We got into some confusion in labouring through this horrible slough " 437 Bergen-op-Zoom ; Plan .....•• 44^ " We soon succeeded in cutting the lock out of the post ". 441 ' ■ Several men were still hanging on to other pieces of ice " 445 Bergen-op-Zoom 44^ The Square of Mehemet Ali, .-Vlexandria .... 448 The Bombardment of Alexandria ; Sketch Map. 449 Admiral Seymour 45' Lord Charles Beresford 452 Clearing the streets of Alexandria. ... 453 The Palace of Ras-el-Tin 455 La Puebla 457 Puebia: Plan .,' ' *^° " Fell upon the Mexican position in the grey dawn ". 461 The City of Mexico .■, ■*^2 "A terrible carnage ensued upon the overcrowded bridge " 465 General Kiel 467 Marshal Pelissier 4^8 "Our men never got near the Redan ; they were swept away in hundreds by a storm of grape ". .4^9 PACK General Bosquet. .... ... The parting of Charles Albert and Victor Emanuel alter the battle of Novara 572 Marshal MassCna 576 Aspern-lissling : Sketch Map 577 The Young Guard in the churchyard of Essling. 580 'I"he Kranzensring, Vienna ....... 581 St. Sebastian : Plan 584 " The garrison met the bombardment bravely". 585 ■ ' The brave garrison marched out with drums beating ". 589 •' The Ixitteries passed through the streets encumbered with troops" 593 WHrih : Sketch Map 59^ Marshal MacMahon 597 The Battles around Suakim : Sketch Map .... 600 Sir Gerald Graham 601 Hicks Pasha 602 Baker Pasha 603 El-Teb: Plan 604 " They were harassed throughout the night by a dropping fire " 605 Tamai : Plan 607 "The Arabs crouched amongst the scrub, hamstringing the horses ". 609 Admiral Hewitt 611 Private T. Edwards, on the 42nd, at Tamai. 612 Chelate and Calafat : Sketch Map 616 Omar Pasha 617 The Slaughter Ghat, Cawnpore. ,. 621 Lucknow : Plan 624 " Gradually they drove the Sepoys back ". ,. 625 Tarifa, looking west ........ 628 " Dilke's brigade of guards came up" .... 629 Barrosa : Sketch Map. .... 632 General Sir Thomas Graham ...... 633 Shoeing-forge of the New South Wales artillery at Suakim 636 " Two squadrons of the Bengal lancers were launched against them " 637 Hasheen : Plan 638 McNeill's Zereba : Plan 639 "Friendlies" 640 The terminus of the Suakim-Berber Railway, Suakim. 644 Chrystler's Farm : Sketch Map ...... 648 " Captain Armstrong did his best to withdraw his pieces" 649 Old Battery. St. Helen's Island, Montreal .... 650 A Settler's Shanty 652 The Sortie from Paris : Plan 656 " On the first attempt it carried the position ". 657 " Lady Gough and the wives of several olTicers mounted their elephants as usual " 661 The Mahratta War : Sketch Maps 664 "The flames, spreading with great rapidity, soon envel- oped everything in smoke " 665 Gwalior 668 Battle of Ligny : Plan 671 " The General's horse fell into a ditch '. 673 " Column after column forced its way into the village, only to be hurled back "....... The Destruction of Emaum Ghur Frontispieie "The Chassepot fire from the crest rose into a wild storji". To face p. 391 The Bombardment of Alexandria To face p. 450 The Death of Marshal Lannes at Essling ...... To face p. e^-jZ "The huge concourse of animals shivered, swayed, and then burst INTO motion" To face p. 641 Saving the Guns at Maiwand To face p. 694 383 GRAVELOTTE— or, as the French call it, St. Privat — was the decisive battle of the Franco-German War. When night put an end to the fighting around Mars-la-Tour and Rezonville on Tuesday, August 1 6th, everyone e.xpected that the conflict would be renewed with the first light of the morrow's dawn. But on the Wednesday morn- ing the Germans, who were expecting reinforce- ments, showed no disposition to immediatelv resume the attack, and Marshal Bazaine ordered his five corps d'armee to withdraw from the positions thcv had held on the previous evening, and to fall back upon a line of heights that extends in front of the western forts of Metz, from the Moselle to the villages of Amanvilliers and St. Privat. These orders dispirited men and officers alike. ■ They had met and withstood the fierce onset of the day before ; when night fell their line was still unbroken. Could it be that, after all, the terrible battle of the i6th had been one more defeat, seeing that they were thus ordered to abandon their positions to the enemy ? Through the blazing heat of the summer day the long columns plodded back towards Metz. Frossard's Corps, on the left of the line, had the shortest march to make, and was soon in position on the hills behind the deep ravine, through which the Mance Brook flows down to the Moselle. But Canrobert with the 6th Corps, on the extreme right, did not occupy all his positions till evening, for his was the outermost and longest march in this gigantic wheel of a great army 140,000 strong. The roads were encumbered with retiring convoys and long trains of ambulance waggons full of wounded men. Still more of these victims of the strife were left in the farms and villages along the rear of the battlefield. As the troops reached the positions assigned to them, the little shelter-tents were pitched, fires were lighted, and cooking began. The baggage- waggons were unloaded, and sent off towards Metz for a further supply of provi- sions and forage. The ammunition columns of the artillery distributed cartridges. Then came orders that the position was to be entrenched, and working parties were soon busy with pick and spade, under the guidance of engineer oflScers, along the French left. But on the right, where the work was most needed, little or nothing was done, for Canrobert's Corps reached the ground late, and there was a deficiency of too's, the waggons of his engineer park having, for the most part, got no nearer the frontier than the great camp at Chalons. In the late hours of the afternoon, strong patrols of the enemy showed themselves along the edges of the woods opposite the French left, and there was some desultory firing, the mitrail- leuse batteries of Frossard's Corps being par- ticularly active. Their rattling fire broke out whenever a spiked helmet was seen among the trees, but this long-range shooting did very little damage, and the Germans seldom took the trouble to answer it. So the long summer day went by ; and when night fell, the French lay down beside their thousand bivouac fires, 384 BATTLES OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. fully assured that next day would witness a g;-sat battle. Bazaine slept in iivj village of Plappeville, with the regiments of the Imperial Guard camped close bv in the hollow, between the two fort- crowned heights of Plappeville and St. Ouentin. Curiously enough, the marshal told his stafi'that he did not anticipate a battle. He would give his men a day's rest, and then resume his march to the north-westward and rejoin MacMahon. French positions. There- is something of this legendary view of the war to be traced even in the German official account of the campaign ; but since the staff history was published, a whole literature of the war has come from the printing- presses of both France and Germany, and the evidence thus made available has done much to discredit the traditional view of what happened on many important occasions. It is now toler- ablv clear that on the i jth the Germans were :M,, '-THE ROADS WERE ENX'UMBERED WITH RELIEVING CONVOYS AND LONG TRAINS UE AMBULANCE WAGGONS " (/■. 3S3). And what were the Germans doing all this time ? After the war, there grew up a kind of legend about the w^ay in which the \'ictors had conducted their operations. According to this story they were always doing something, and it was always the right thing to do. They had a plan of campaign which worked out with the precision of an approved chess-opening, and made victory a certainty. Their cavalrj- was alwaj's in touch with the enemy. The Uhlans were everywhere, watching every move of the French, and when their reports reached head- quarters, they were made the basis of orders that directed overwhelming masses with the ;ertainty of fate against the weaic points of the acting in a way that was hardly worthy of such past-masters in the art of war. On the right the outposts of the First Army, under the command of General von Steinmetz, were in sight of the French left on the hills beyond the Mance Brook, and were, indeed, occasionally e.Kchanging tire with them ; but no attempt had been made to keep in touch with the retiring corps on the French right, though there was a strong force of cavalry available for this purpose. On the ex- treme left of the Germans, the Crown Prince (now the King) of Saxony, one of the best leaders in the invading army, pushed forward some of his cavalry to Pasondrupt, on the Metz- Verdun road, and ascertained that there were no French GRAVELOTTE. 385 troops in that direction. But nothing was done to make sure that the greater part of Bazaine's army was not in retreat across the Orne river, by the Metz-Briey route. Nor were the hills held bv the corps of the French right and centre reconnoitred, so that next day ?. ver\- serious loss of time and of life resulted from a mistake as to where the French right really lay. The orders for the movement which resulted in the battle of Gravelotte were, indeed, drawn up before 2 a.m. on the 17th, on the basis of insufficient information. It was only through the superioritv in numbers of the Germans, and the general soundness of their position compared with that of the French, that these orders worked out so well next day. When night fell the two armies, therefore, were in bivouac in the same order in which they fought on the morrow ; but, instead of facing each other, the two lines formed a right angle, the French left and the German right being in touch near the Moselle, while the other e.xtremities of the lines were about nine miles apart. Next day the German armies were to be flung against the French position b\ a great wheel to the eastward, across the same- ground that had been traversed bv the French on the morning of the 17th. The annexed sketch map shows, more clearly than anv description, the position of the two armies on the night before the great battle, and the movements of the morning of the i8th. The night was clear, and starlit overhead. It wa'^ warm, and the men hardl}- needed their bivouac tires. In the French lines there were two alarms during the hours of darkness. The first was about 2 a.m., when the cry " To arms !" started somewhere in the middle of the outpost lines, and ran like lightning all through the bivouacs. The men sprang up, and seized tlieir rifles ; manv of the batteries hooked in their teams, read\- to gallop up their guns to the front. But in a few minutes the word was passed that it was nothing. There was another alarm a little later, and after this in many of the bivouacs the men sat chatting and smoking round the fires. At four o'clock the sky was already whiten- ing with the dawn, and then bugle and trumpet began to sound the reveille along the plateau from Rozerieulles to St. Privat ; and after the morning roll-call the men got their breakfasts, while the sun rose brightl}' in the clear sky. 73 The Germans were already- in movement. Some of the corps marched off at four o'clock, others had not to start till six ; but some of the divisions had been marching all night. The Pomeranians of the 2nd corps had left tlieir bivouac near Pont-a-Mousson soon after mid- night, and had been tramping northward by starlight ever since, the guns and cavalry on the higli road, the infantrv moving by tracks among the vineyards on the slopes above it. Towards morning the}- had cheered the old King of Prussia as he passed their columns on the road in his carriage, driving from Pont-a- Moussen, where he had had a short sleep, to Flavignj-, where he was in the saddle with Moltke and the head-quarters staflf by six o'clock. Prince Frederick Charles, who commanded the Second Army, forming the German left, had slept at Mars-la-Tour. At half-past five he was in the saddle, directing the march of his corps to the northward. The Saxons were the first to move off at six o'clock, but such is the space occupied by an armv corps, that it was not till nine that the last of their battalions was clear of Mars-la-Tour and the Guards began their march. The corps under Steinmetz on the right had not so far to go. Their business for the present was to close up and watch the French, and to issue from the woods to attack them as soon as the sound of cannon from the northward told that Frederick Charles was in touch with the enemy. So the great wheel, first to the northward and then to the eastward, went on through the summer morning, 220,000 Germans, with 800 guns, pushing on to the line of heights that runs 386 BATTLES OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. from Habonville by Gravelotte to the ravines above Gorze, facing the corresponding Hne held by Bazaine. It was the first great battle in which troops from every part of Germany were to fight side by side. Here flew the black and white flag of Prussia ; there the black, white, and red colours of the North German Confederation, or the white and green banner of Saxony ; and the white and red pennons of Hessian contingents ; and the flags of Mecklenburg, Brunswick, and Oldenburg ; and the historic colours of the Hanseatic League. At ten the cavalry in front of the German left reported that the enemy had not retired to the northward. French tents were standing along the hills about Amanvilliers, and there was an advanced detachment holding the village of Ste. Marie aux Chenes. At first it was supposed that the French line of battle extended no further than Amanvilliers village. Later it was ascer- tained that there were also troops in St. Privat ; but where precisely the French right lay was not clearly known until the attack had made some progress. Reports sent to the royal head- quarters at Flavigny brought back orders for the German left to march eastwards against the French positions. But even before these orders reached him Prince Frederick Charles was directing his columns toward Amanvilliers and St. Privat, the Saxons and the Guards moving on his extreme left, expecting to find nothing but weak detachments in their immediate front, and to turn the French right without much fighting. Marshal Bazaine spent the morning with his chief of the staff, General Jarras, in a house at Plappeville, busy with preparing a list of promo- tions to replace the officers killed and wounded in the battles of the 14th and 1 6th. At half- past nine an officer of Marshal Leboeufs staff arrived w-ith a report that masses of the enemj^ were moving in his front, and asking for orders. The commander-in-chief of the French army sent word to Lcboeuf that in the position he held he ought to be quite safe if he was attacked, and that meanwhile he had better push on the work at the shelter-trenches and other field- v.-orks planned and begun the day before. When the staff officer went away Bazaine told Jarras that he doubted if the enemy would venture on a serious attack, for the ground held by the Im- perial army was so strong as to leave few chances of success to such an enterprise. To messages from other corps commanders he sent much the same reply he had given to Lebceut. So the morning was spent in mere routine duties at tlie French head-quarters. A better soldier thaia Bazaine would have been early in the saddle, seeing for himself what was the state of affairs- along his line of defence. But he had apparentlj deluded himself into the idea that all that was necessary had been done when he had placed his five corps in position along the plateau of Aman- villiers. Even when, about noon, the sound of cannon came echoing along the hills from the westward he remained at his desk, and it was- not till two o'clock that he mounted and rode- up the hill of St. Ouentin, taking only two off his officers with him, and again telling Jarras that he was sure the affair would not be serious^ But by two o'clock the battle had been some time in progress over miles of country. The first shots were fired a few minutes after noon by the Qth German Corps — Schleswig-Holsteiners and Hessians — commanded by Von Manstein. As his vanguard reached the farm of Champenois just before twelve o'clock, a French camp could be seen on the opposite slope of the valley. He thought it was going to be another surprise — a Wissemburg on a grand scale — so he gave the word, and promptly a couple of batteries gal- loped up, unlimbered, and sent a shower of shells bursting among the French tents. Manstein was acting against orders in thus precipitating the attack, for Moltke had intended that the French should be assailed simultaneously on the left and right, as soon as Prince Frederick Charles had begun to seriously develop his flank movement north of Amanvilliers, but not till then. But now, as on more than one previous occasion, the eagerness of the subordinate com- manders hurried on the battle. Manstein could not resist the temptation of suddenly opening fire on the camp in front of him. But the French were not surprised. The infantry rushed to their shelter-ti enches. The artillery promptly- replied to the German guns from the higher ground beyond. Moltke, sitting on his horse beside the king, on the hill near Flavigny, heard the roar of Manstein's guns. He knew the Guard and the Saxons could not vet be in a position to co- operate in the attack, and he did what he could to prevent Steinmetz from flinging the troops on the right prematurely against the French left. He hurriedly wrote and sent him an order telling him that the action which he could hear begin- ning near Verneville was an isolated affair, and there was no need yet of showing his troops. If he must act, let it be only by using his artillery GKAVELOTTE. 387 as a prelude to ihe attack which wovild coine later. But Steinmctz, on the heights beyond Gravelotte, had heard Manstein's guns before Moltkc's galloper reached him, and had not only brought his batteries into action, but had begun to push on his infantry through the woods in his front. So it was that about noon the great battle began, as it were, by an accident. A few words as to the character of the battle- field : — The high ground to the west of Metz is made up of three nearly parallel ranges of hills, running north and south, those nearest the city being the highest. The valleys between them are from I J to 2 miles wide from crest to crest, and the slopes are gentlest towards the northern end of the heights, where also the valleys are more shallow, all the forms of the ground being bolder in the southern part of the region. In the hollows there are extensive woods — those near Gravelotte village, the Bois de Vaux and the Bois de Genivau.x, being at the time of the battle so full of thick undergrowth that they could only be traversed by following the paths and a few narrow glades. The hills are suffi- ciently elevated above the valleys to enable one in most places to see across from ridge to ridge over the trees. The central line of heights was that held b\- the French. The Germans ad- vanced to the attack across the western ridge. On their right, at Gravelotte village, the Verdun- Metz road drops into the vallej^, passing through a defile with steep rocks on either side, traversing a narrow belt of wood by a clearing, and ascend- ing the opposite slope, having on one side a mass of quarries that made a ready shelter for the defence, and on the other the farm-house and stables of St. Hubert, which the French had occupied, as well as the quarries and the belts of w(3od below. But all these were only the ad- vanced posts of their left. About 250 yards east- ward of St. Hubert their shelter-trenches ran along the upper slope of the hill ; and in places, where it was steepest, they were arranged in doable and triple tiers. A wall at the bend of the road was lined with rifles. The farms of Moscou and Point du Jour had been prepared for defence, and just above them at the crest of the hill there were three groups of cannon and mitrailleuses. These were pointed at the op- posite ridge beyond Gravelotte, while the rifles of the infantry could sweep all the slopes down to the edge of the woods. Frossard with the 2nd Corps held this splendid position. An officer of Engineers, he had carefully entrenched all his front, and made the most of the natural advant- ages of the ground. To his right Marshal Leboeuf with the 3rd Corps, chiefly made up of the garri- son of Paris, prolonged the line along the ridge by the farm of Leipzig and La Folie to Montigny la Grange. Here, too, the spade had been busy providing shelter for the defence. Behind the left centre the Imperial Guard and the reserve artillery were stationed near Plappeville. General Ladmirault with the 4th Corps came ne.xt to Lebceuf, the strong point of his position being the large walled village of Amanvilliers, which he had carefully prepared for defence. Then on the right Marshal Canrobert with the 6th Corps occupied St. Privat, with a strong detachment in Roncourt to guard his flank, and an advanced post in the village of Ste. Marie au.x Chenes. Here on the right, where such work was most needed, very little had been done to entrench the position, chiefly because there was a de- ficiency of tools. But even without such help it was strong, for St. Privat was partly hidden from view and fire by the crest of the long slope which descends to the westward and north-west- ward, a gentle slope of open fields, which the chassepot bullets could sweep with that grazing fire which is alwaj's far more deadly than the plunging fire from a bolder slope. For two thousand yards there was practically no cover for the attack. It was a huge natural glacis destined to be the scene of terrible slaughter before the day was won. Begun on the centre at noon, the cannonade spread rapidly to the southward. Steinmetz had opened with his guns against the French left, and Frossard's artillery was replying. The shells were screaming high above the trees in the Mance valley, as they flew from crest to crest. Battery after battery came galloping up on the German side, and in twenty minutes Von Goeben, who commanded the 7th Corps (the first of Stein- metz's to come into action), had more than a hundred guns in line on the slope above Grave- lotte, while his infantry were pushing into the thick belt of woods in the valley below and ex- changing rifle fire with the French advanced posts. It was soon evident that the Germans were going to have the best of this artillery duel. To begin with, they had more guns than the French. Then the German guns were breech- loading cannon, while the French were rifled muzzle-loaders of the same type that they had used eleven years before in Italy ; and the result was that the German gunners fired faster, were less exposed as they worked their guns, and shot better. Finally, the Germans had better 188 BATTLES OF THK XIXKTEKNTH CENTURY. ,.:iimunituin. Tlicir sliclls, fitted with pcrLUssion lUbCs, almost iiivariablv burst on contact with the hot hard ground ot the ridge at which they lired ; wiiilt; the French time fuses acted irregu- larly, sometimes burst the shells too soon, and, ot'tenest of all, failed to explode them at all, so that the projectiles were practically solid shot. Frossard's gunners made very fair practice, but they were handicapped from the very outset. Xear some of Von Goeben's batteries, as the day went on, the ground was scored with long furrows cut by the grazing but unbur.st shells from the French batteries. But on the (^pposite side of the \alley, in and arountl the farms at which the Germans chiefly directed their fire, as soon as they had got the upper hand of the French artillery, thu lesults were fearful. St. Hubert was early in the day a mass of ruins, and a little later Moscou and Point du Jour were set on tire by bursting shells. To quote a German ac- ccnmt of the appear ance of the two farms after the fight. Major Hoenig tells us how : — '' At the.se points hardly any French were found killed or wounded by infantry bullets ; almost all had been de- stroyed by the fire of the guns. In the large heaps of ruins the defenders, especially in Meiscou, lay all around, fearfully torn and mu- tilated by the German shell ; limbs and bodies were blown from thirty to fifty paces apart, and the stones and sand were here and there covered with pools .of blood. In Moscou and Point du Jour some French were found burnt in their defensive positions, and a large number of the wounded showed marks of the flames, which had destroyed both uniforms and limbs. All around there lay rifles and swords, knap- sacks and cartridges, the remains of limbers which had been blown up, broken gun-carriages and wheels, and a large number of hideously torn and mangled horses. The ground wa.-. changed b\- the German artillery fire into a desert covered with many corpses. The interiors of Point du Jour and Moscou were not passable after the battle until they had been cleared." Such was the storm of fire which tho French had to face once their own artillery was partly silenced. And along the left of their position they faced it successfully. Driven from the blazing farms, they held the entrenched slopes none the less doggedly. Up to a certain point the Germans made progress, that point being within close range of the French main posi- tion. Thus at one o'clock — when, after an unaccountable delaj-, Moltke's aide-de-camp reached Stein metz and told him not to precipi- tate his attack — the in- fantry were alread\- in the woods in the hol- low. The French had no intention of making a prolonged resistance here, and in the ne.\t hour they let go the woods and drew bac'' their advanced troops to the slope beyond, though not till thev had made the Germans pay dearly for their success. St. Hubert then became the ob- ject of attack. Two German corps, the ytb and 8th (Von Goeben and Zastrow), had now their artillery in position. St. Hubert was crumbling under the shower of shells. The batteries further back on the crest of the French slope were all but silent. Forced to change their position continual!}', sometimes after firing only a single gun, they hardly counted for anything in the struggle. It had become a fight of French rifles against German rifles and cannon. The quarries and gravel-pits sfiuth of St. Hubert were occupied after a sharp fight. Regi- ment after regiment, each company working independently under its captain, pressed up to St. Hubert, till at last a thick German firing- line was lying down two hundred }-ards from its ruined walls, blazing away at the French garrison, the German artillerv now devoting its energies CE.NERAL SI EI.NMhT;^. GRAVELOTTE. 589 tc prevent their being reinforced or supported from the main position. At three o'clock the ooth Infantry pushed up from the woods, and, thus reinforced, the firing Hne surged forward with the bayonet, and the remnant of the French garrison were made prisoners or driven out by the east gate of the farmyard. The capture of St. Hubert had cost the hves of so many of the and Frossard's main hne was not only intact but victorious. Meanwhile, how had the first three hours of the battle gone on the rest of the field ? In the centre Manstein's Corps had made little or no progress. When he opened fire upon the French near Amanvilliers, the ground in front had been so badly reconnoitred, and his view was so "a thick GERM.AX firing LI.NE was blazing away at the FRENCH GARRISON" ( /. 388). senior officers that the troops who had stormed it, belonging as they did to three regiments, found themselves under the command of a major of the both, the sole sur\'ivor of the regimental or battalion commanders. In and around the buildings the victors found some shelter, and opened fire on the French position about Moscou and Point du Jour. But it was only the superiority of their own artillery which, by crushing the French fire, enabled them to retain possession of St. Hubert for a single hour. They got no further ; for hours the ruined farm was the high-water mark of the German advance. limited by the woods to the northward, that he thought he was engaged with the extreme right of the enemy. He therefore boldly pushed for- ward the left of his own line of guns, with the result that it was promptly taken in flank, and enfiladed by the batteries of the French bth Corps between Amanvilliers and St. Privat. Thus the German gunners had to face a heavy fire, while another storm of shells raked their line from the left. Outnumbered and badly posted, it was no wonder that for some time Manstein's artillery had decidedly the worst of the fight. Some of the batteries were silenced. The teams were ?qo BATTLES OF THE NIXETEENTH CENTURY. brought up to withdraw them, but the horses were shot down in struggHiig lieaps in front of tlic hmbers. And now swarms of French skir- mishers pressed forward. At one point they liad for a while several guns in their possession, though thev were unable to carry them off. 'I'he Cierman infantry came to the rescue. Three limes the French rushed forward, and three times they were driven back ; and then the artillery of the Prussian Guard began to come into action in support of Manstein, and made the conflict more equal. The Prussian Guard, led by the Prince of Wiirtemberg, had been marching northward and eastward to the left rear of Manstein's Schles- wigers. When the" cannon thunder " began, its artillery hurried up to the front. But it was soon discovered that, instead of being in a posi- tion to turn the enemy's right, the Guards had French troops in their front at St. Privat, and an advanced detachment on their own flank at Ste. Marie au.x Chenes. This village, a mass of stone houses, with gardens surrounded by walls and hedges, and with very little cover for the attack within a thousand yards of its cuter fences, was held by a French regiment, the 94th of the line, two and a half battalions strong, and com- manded by the veteran Colonel Geslin. Tlie Germans waited to attack it until the heads of the Sa.xon columns, moving still further to the westward, began to appear beyond the village. Meanwhile, it was shelled by the batteries of the Guard. When at last the Sa.xons were readv to co-operate, seven of their battalions moved against the village from the west, while four battalions of the Guard attacked from the south. Advancing by successive rushes, lying down to fire, and then pushing on again, the attack reached a point two hundred .yards from the village. Then, after a long burst of rifle fire, Saxons and Guardsmen dashed in with the bayonet. The Frenchmen made a hard fight, especially at the head of the village street, where Von Eckert, the colonel of the leading Guard battalion, was killed. But to have protracted the defence would have been to risk being cut off, and Geslin withdrew the bulk of his force to the main French position, his defence and retreat ill the face of such superior forces being alike honourable. This was at half-past three, the capture of Ste. Marie, on the German left, coming just after that of St. Hubert, on their right, both being alike advanced posts outside the French main position, And now tlie crisis of the fight was a]iproach- ing. The artillery began to concentrate its fire on St. Privat, and while the Guards waited for the order to attack it in front, the Saxons were sweeping round to the northward by Roncourt, in order to outflank it, and, perhaps, even take it in rear. As the heads of the Saxon columns gained the Orne valley, the Crown Prince sent some of his squadrons away towards the Moselle to cut the railway and telegraph lines between Mctz and Thionville. Thev did their work effectually. There certainly should have been French cavalry watching the valley, but Bazaine's troopers were standing idly by their horses here and there at various points behind his long line. For nearly an hour and a half the storm of bursting shells descended upon St. Privat, and swept the crest of the heights around and beyond it. The French artillery was gradually silenced, some of the batteries because they were already running short of ammunition. On the other side more than two hundred guns, drawn up in a line a mile and a half long, were hurling de- struction and death upon the devoted village. House after house collapsed. Of the vtairic, in the centre of the village, only a few fragments of the walls were standing. Towards five o'clock the lull in the French rifle fire, the silence of Canrobert's batteries, the sight of a column moving southwards near St. Privat, all suggested to Wiirtemberg that the 6th Corps was ready to let go its hold of the village under any serious pressure. So the word was given for the leading divisions of the Guard, 15,000 strong, the picked soldiers of all Prussia, the mei-i who had broken the Austrian centre at Sadowa, to advance to the attack. C)n they went, drums beating, battle-flags waving in the sultry air, their generals and field officers mounted, at the head of brigades anci regiments. General von Rape's division marched on the left of the St. Privat road, General von Budritzki's on the right to the south of it, each in its massive column of half-battalions ; and as thev moved out, they looked not as if they were upon a fire-swept battlefield, but as if they were drawn up for some grand parade under the eyes of the king, on the dusty Tempelhof Platz at Berlin. Before them, with gentle unbroken slope, a mile and a half of open ground rose up towards the hill-top where St. Privat just showed its first houses and its church tower above the crest. The poplar avenue of the higli road linked it with Ste. Marie. There had been of late only a dropping fire from the village, but now from the houses and the hill-top came the sharp » !■ ^^ifM^ 'THE CHAbbLl'ui FIKL FROM TUli CREST ROSE INTO A Willi STORM" (/. 39i)- 18 GRAVELOTTE. 391 volleys of the chassepot, and a rain of lead began to patter on the sunburnt slope. But as yet the range was too long for the fire to do much damage. Then the leading companies broke into lines of skirmishers, replying to the French yoUeys, \vhile the columns pressed on .behind them, continually reinforcing them. But as the range lessened, the chassepot fire from the crest rose into a wild storm, the levelled rifle.^ pouring out their bullets as fast as deft hands could work Icyers and triggers. The Guardsmen were falling fast. In a few minutes :ill the mounted officers were down. Of the Jiiger battalion which led the left attack seventeen officers had fallen, and a young ensign found himself in command of the handful of riflemen that were still marching onwards. " Forward I Forward ! " rang out the voices of the leaders, iis with waving swords they moved in front of their men, and dropped one by one. Now there ■were only boo yards to the crest, but here the Guards were going down like grass before a sc3"the. They could advance no further, but they would not go back. They lay down, and replied to the fire of the defenders. Many of them never rose again. Along that terrible hill- side there stretched before long a broad belt of dead, wounded, and dying, piled up in places three and four deep. Of the 15,000 who ad- vanced to the attack, 4,500 were struck down. It was an heroic failure, and it taught the lesson that against the modern rifle even the best infantry could no longer advance in the massive •columns that had decided the fate of many a European battlefield. To the right of the Guards, Manstein had begun to push forward an attack against Aman- villiers, but when he saw the failure before St. Privat he checked his own advancing battalions. It was clear that nothing more could be done against the French on this part of the field until the turning movement of the Sa.xons had begun to tell upon them. Meanwhile the fire of nearly three hundred guns, ranged in a vast semi-circle, was concentrated upon St. Privat. On the German right, where the First Army lunder Steinmetz faced the French left under Frossard and Lebceuf, fortune had been equally adverse to the invaders. The 7th and 8th Corps had, it is true, silenced the French artillery, and •captured the farm of St. Hubert and the quarries ■of Rozerieulles to the south of it, but the French main position was as solid as ever ; and though the farms of Moscou and Point du Jour »vere burstina; into flames under the German shell fire, the men who held the crest of the hill between and on either side of them were not of the kind that can hi driven from their position by a mere bombardment, however terrible. But Steinmetz, seeing the farms blazing, and noticing that the French artillery was absolutely silent and their rifle fire seemed dying away, came to the conclusion that they were about to retreat. 