France: Second Empire and Third Republic 731Prince Leopold. In July 1870, the French ambassador harangued Prussian
King William I in a garden in the spa town of Ems. The king sent Bismarck a
telegram stating what had occurred. After learning that the Prussian army
was ready to fight, Bismarck embellished the kings telegram—the Ems
Dispatch—to make the graceless diplomacy of the French seem positively
insulting. Prussian public opinion reacted with anger. Bismarck’s expecta
tion that it would “have the effect of a red cloth on the Gallic bull” was justi
fied; the incident increased popular support for war against France, which
declared war on July 19, 1870. Wurttemberg, Hesse, Baden, and, more hes
itantly, Bavaria joined the Prussian side. Napoleon III went to war against
Prussia without allies.
The Franco-Prussian War and the Siege of Paris
The Franco-Prussian War was a French debacle. As French troops slowly
mobilized, Prussian armies moved quickly into northeastern France. The
speed of the Prussian attack and the competence of its generals more than
made up for superior French rifles and recently developed machine guns. In
August, Prussian troops cut off the fortress of Metz from the rest of France.
When Marshal Marie-Edme de MacMahon (1808-1893) moved north in
an attempt to relieve Metz, the Prussians cut him off. At the end of August,
the main French force foolishly retreated to the fortress town of Sedan not
far from the Belgian border. Sedan was soon surrounded by Prussians, who
captured the emperor, so sick that he could barely sit on his horse. In Paris
on September 4, 1870, crowds proclaimed a republic, and a provisional gov
ernment was formed. Prussia allowed Napoleon III to leave for exile in
Britain.
The Prussian army besieged Paris, its population swollen with soldiers
and national guardsmen. As hunger invaded the capital, dogs and cats dis
appeared from the streets, finding their way to some of the finest tables.
Zoo animals, too, were eaten, including two elephants admired by genera
tions of Parisian children. An attempt to break through the Prussian lines
north of the city at the end of October failed miserably. Still, Paris hung on.
In the meantime, Louis-Adolphe Thiers (1797-1877), who had served as
Orleanist prime minister during the 1830s, wanted Bismarck’s help in facil
itating the establishment of a very conservative republic at the war’s conclu
sion, or even a monarchy. The provisional government negotiated with
Bismarck in the hope of obtaining an armistice on favorable terms. On Jan
uary 28, 1871, ten days after the proclamation of the German Empire at
Versailles (see Chapter 17), Bismarck and Thiers signed an armistice.
Some French leaders protested, demanding that the French army keep
fighting. In February 1871, French voters elected a monarchist-dominated
National Assembly, charged with making peace with Prussia and with
establishing a new government. The newly elected National Assembly offi
cially elected Thiers to be chief executive of the provisional government.