Sedan 1870: Moltke's Mousetrap and the Capture of Emperor Napoleon III

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!

After the costly Battle of Gravelotte, Marshal Bazaine's Army of the Rhine, more than 154,000 men, was besieged in Metz by over 168,000 Prussians. Emperor Napoleon III and Marshal Patrice de MacMahon marched the 130,000-strong Army of Châlons along the Belgian border to relieve him. Helmuth von Moltke, coordinating his armies by telegraph, intercepted them, and after losing 7,500 men and 40 guns at Beaumont, MacMahon fell back to the old fortress town of Sedan to rest. He refused General Félix Douay's request to dig trenches, while the Germans crossed the Meuse and closed the ring.

On 1 September 1870 Bavarians under General von der Tann attacked Bazeilles at 4 a.m. and shelled French marines out of its stone houses. MacMahon was wounded at about 6 a.m. General Ducrot took over and ordered a retreat, but General de Wimpffen produced a secret government commission, took command and ordered a counterattack. Krupp breech-loading guns, 774 against 564 French pieces, poured fire into the valley. Napoleon III raised a white flag, and Wimpffen signed the surrender on 2 September. Over 104,000 French soldiers were captured, and in Paris the Second Empire fell in a bloodless revolution.

• Moltke said he had the French in a mousetrap, while Ducrot said they were in the chamber pot about to be shat upon.
• General Margueritte was mortally wounded leading the first cavalry charge at Floing, and the French lost 791 men in three charges.
• Napoleon III rode the field for hours under fire, likely hoping to be killed rather than captured.
• Prisoners were held for a week in pouring rain on a river peninsula with little food.
• Empress Eugénie reportedly asked why he did not kill himself, and Germans later marked 2 September as Sedantag.