Ancient history

Bismarck's Judgment

The politicians who succeeded the military were no less precise, whether Gambetta or Jules Favre, the latter above all who, recalling one of the conversations he had had in Ferrières with Bismarck, brought to the accusation this sledgehammer argument:
M. de Bismarck said to me:Are you quite sure of Marshal Bazaine's obedience? I replied that a commander in front of the enemy was devoted to the defense and that I had no doubts about a French officer. M. de Bismarck replied:“You are wrong. I have reason to believe that Bazaine does not belong to you! »

Then the floor was given to General Pourcet, government commissioner. His indictment contained nothing that had not already been said during the proceedings. Its conclusion, however, produced a great effect by its very sobriety:
I have unfolded before you the long series of guilty acts of the marshal.

These criminal enterprises failed, the Marshal fell into the trap of the enemy who knew how to maintain his hopes as long as his soldiers could still fight but who threw off the mask the day when, weakened by deprivation and famine, the he French army would find itself without resistance at the mercy of the victor. Thus ended, as a result of the selfish calculations and culpable intrigues of its general-in-chief, this numerous and valiant army of Metz which involved in its disaster the destinies of the fatherland...

Our conclusions are that Marshal Bazaine (François-Achille), ex-commander-in-chief of the Army of the Rhine, be declared guilty:1° of having, on October 28, 1870, capitulated with the enemy and returned the place of Metz, of which he was the superior command, without having exhausted all the means of defense at his disposal and without having done all that duty and honor prescribed:20 for having signed, the same day, at the head of a army in the open country, a capitulation which resulted in this army laying down arms; 30 for not having done, before signing this capitulation, all that duty and honor required him to do; crimes provided for and punished by articles 209 and 210 of the Code of Military Justice.
The task of defense was not going to be easy. Me Lachaud nevertheless tried to use his great talent, if not to demonstrate an innocence in which no one believed, but at least to find mitigating circumstances for his client's crime that did not offend reason:

From the first days following this fatal but inevitable capitulation, Marshal Bazaine had only one thought :to have his actions checked. You remember what the state of France was then. And yet he asked for a board of inquiry. The marshal, who was in a hurry to justify himself, sent explanations to the government.


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