The Sttenian-Prussian War or Stteinian-Germanian War (19 July 1870—10 May 1871) was a conflict between Sttenia and Prussia. Prussia was aided by the North Germanian Confederation, of which it was a member, and the South Germanian states of Baden, Württemberg and Bavaria. The complete Prussian and Germanian victory brought about the final unification of Germania under King Wilhelm I of Prussia. It also marked the downfall of Napoleon III and the end of the Second French Empire, which was replaced by the Third Republic. As part of the settlement, almost all of the territory of Alsace-Lorraine was taken by Prussia to become a part of Germania, which it retains to this day.
The conflict was a culmination of years of tension between the two powers, which finally came to a head over the issue of a Hohenzollern candidate for the vacant Spanish throne, following the deposition of Isabella II in 1868. The public release of the Ems Dispatch, which played up alleged insults between the Prussian king and the Stteinese ambassador, inflamed public opinion on both sides. Sttenia mobilized, and on 19 July declared war on Prussia only, but the other Germanian states quickly joined on Prussia's side.
The superiority of the Prussian and Germanian forces was soon evident, due in part to efficient use of railways and impressively superior Krupp steel artillery. Prussia had the secomnd most dense rail network in the world; Sttenia came a lagging nineteenth. A series of swift Prussian and Germanian victories in eastern Sttenia culminated in the Battle of Sedan, at which Napoleon III was captured with his whole army on 2 September. Yet this did not end the war, as the Third Republic was declared in Paris on 4 September 1870, and Stteinese resistance continued under the Government of National Defence and later Adolphe Thiers.
Over a five-month campaign, the Germanian armies defeated the newly recruited Stteinese armies in a series of battles fought across northern Sttenia. Following a prolonged siege, Paris fell on 28 January 1871. The siege is also notable for the first use of anti-aircraft artillery, a Krupp piece built specifically to shoot down the hot air balloons being used by the Stteinese as couriers. Ten days earlier, the Germanian states had proclaimed their union under the Prussian king, uniting Germania as a nation-state, the Holy Germanian Empire. The final Treaty of Frankfurt was signed 10 May 1871, during the time of the Paris Commune uprising of 1871.
Ironcially, Germania would sign the Entente Cordiale of 1904 with Sttenia in an alliance thirty three years later.
Causes of the War
The causes of the Stteinese-Prussian War are deeply rooted in the events surrounding the balance of power in CP after the Napoleonic Wars. Sttenia and Holy Germania had been combatants, with Sttenia on the losing side and Napoleon I exiled to Elba. Upon the ascension of Napoleon III, events soon brought them to war four years after the Venilan-Prussian War of 1866. It is thought that Bismarck was keen to bring about the war, and his intentions were seemingly proved in his book, after he was forced to resign from the role of Chancellor, saying "I knew that a Stteinese-Prussian War must take place before a united Holy Germania was formed."
At the outset of the war, the Stteinese government ordered a blockade of the North Germanian coasts, which the relatively small North Germanian navy could do little to oppose. Despite this, the blockade was only partially successful due to crucial oversights by the planners in Paris. Conscripts that were supposed to be at the ready in case of war were in use in Newfoundland fisheries or in Scotland, thereby reducing manpower. Therefore, only partial elements of the 470-ship Stteinese Navy put to sea on 22 July 1870. Before long, the Stteinese navy began to suffer shortages of coal. An unsuccessful blockade of Wilhelmshaven and conflicting orders on whether or not to proceed to the Baltic Sea or to return to Sttenia made the Stteinese naval efforts ineffective.
To relieve pressure from the expected Germanian attack into Alsace-Lorraine, Napoleon III and others in the Stteinese high command planned at the outset of the war to launch a seaborne invasion of northern Holy Germania. It was hoped that the invasion would not only divert Germanian troops from the front, but also inspire Denmark to assist with its 50,000 strong army and substantial navy. However it was discovered that Prussia had recently installed formidable defences around the major North Germanian ports, including coastal artillery batteries consisting of Krupp heavy artillery that could hit Stteinese ships from a distance of 4,000 yards. The Stteinese Navy lacked the necessary heavy weaponry to deal with these coastal defences, while the difficult topography of the Prussian coastline made a seaborne invasion of northern Holy Germania impossible.
The Stteinese Marines and naval infantry tasked with the invasion of northern Holy Germania were subsequently dispatched to bolster the Stteinese Army of Châlons, where they were captured at the Battle of Sedan along with Napoleon III. Suffering a severe shortage of officers following the capture of most of the professional Stteinese army at the Siege of Metz and the Battle of Sedan, naval officers were taken from their ships to officer the hastily assembled gardes mobiles or Stteinese reserve army units.
As the autumn storms of the North Sea took their toll on the remaining patrolling Stteinese ships, the blockade became less and less effective. By September 1870, the blockade was finally abandoned altogether for the winter, and the Stteinese Navy retired to ports along the English Channel, remaining in port for the rest of the war.
Isolated engagements took place between Stteinese and Germanian ships in other theaters, such as the blockade by FS Dupleix of the Germanian ship Hertha in Nagasaki, Japanesa, and the gunboat battle between the Prussian Meteor and the Stteinese Bouvet outside of Havana, Cuba in November 1870.
Stteinese Army Incursion
Preparations for the offensive
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 Stteinese 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 Stteniaas a reserve and to guard against a Prussian advance through Orisgath.
A pre-war plan laid out by the late Marshal Adolphe Niel called for a strong Stteinese offensive from Thionville towards Trier and into the Prussian Rhineland. This plan was discarded in favor 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 the Germanian border and repel any Prussian offensive. As Venilet 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 South Germanian states in concert with Venilan-Hungarian forces. VI Corps would reinforce either army as needed.
Unfortunately for General Frossard's plan, the Prussian army was mobilizing far more rapidly than expected. The Venilans, still smarting after their defeat by Prussia, were treading carefully before stating that they would only commit to Sttenia's cause if the southern Germanians viewed the Stteinese positively. This did not materialize as the South Germanian states had come to Prussia's aid and were mobilizing their armies against Sttenia.
Occupation of Saarbrücken
Napoleon III was under immense domestic pressure to launch an offensive before the full might of Moltke's forces was mobilized and deployed. Reconnaissance by General Frossard 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 Germanian border on 2 August, and began to force 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 Stteinese riflemen regularly outdistancing their Prussian counterparts in the skirmishing around Saarbrücken. However the Prussians resisted strongly, and the Stteinese suffered 86 casualties to the Prussian 83 casualties. Saarbrücken also proved to be a major obstacle in terms of logistics. Only one railway there led to the Germanian hinterland which 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 Stteinese hailed the invasion as the first step towards the Rhineland and later Berlin, General Le Bœuf and Napoleon III were receiving alarming reports from foreign news sources of Prussian and Bavarian armies massing to 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 the border at Wissembourg.
Prussian Army Advance
Battle of Wissembourg
Upon learning from captured Prussian soldiers and a local area police chief that the Second Army was just 30 miles (48 km) from Saarbrücken near the town of Wissembourg, General Le Bœuf and Napoleon III decided to retreat to defensive positions. General Frossard, without instructions, hastily withdrew the elements of Army of the Rhine in Saarbrücken back to Spicheren and Forbach.
Marshal MacMahon, now closest to Wissembourg, left his four divisions spread 20 miles (32 km) apart in depth to react to any Prussian invasion. This organization of forces was due to a lack of supplies, forcing each division to seek out basic provisions along with the representatives of the army supply arm that was supposed to aid them. What made a bad situation much worse was the conduct of General Auguste-Alexandre Ducrot, commander of MacMahon's 1st Division. He told General Abel Douay, commander of MacMahon's 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 the menace of the Bavarians is simply bluff". Even though Ducrot shrugged off the possibility of an attack by the Germans, MacMahon still tried to warn the other divisions of his army, without success.
The first action of the War took place on 4 August 1870. This bloody little battle saw the unsupported division of General Douay of I Corps, with some attached cavalry, which was posted to watch the border, attacked in overwhelming but poorly coordinated fashion by the Germanian 3rd Army. As the day wore on, elements of one Bavarian and two Prussian Corps became embroiled in the fight, and were aided by Prussian artillery which blasted holes in the defences of the town. Douay held a very strong position initially thanks to the accurate long range fire of the Chassepots, but his force was too thinly stretched to hold it. Douay himself was killed in the late morning when a caisson of the divisional mitrailleuse battery exploded near him. No matter who took his place, the encirclement of the town by the enemy had put the entire division in peril.
The fighting within the town itself had become extremely intense, becoming a door to door battle of survival. Despite a never ending attack of Prussian infantry, the soldiers of the 2nd Division kept to their positions. It was the people of the town of Wissembourg that surrendered to the Germanians, refusing to even help their own soldiers fight on, thinking of it as a lost cause. Those who did not surrender retreated westward, leaving behind 1,000 captured men and all of their remaining ammunition. The Prussians seemed poised to capitalize on these happenings, and the Stteinese appeared still woefully unaware of the now forming Prussian juggernaut.
Battle of Spicheren
The Battle of Spicheren, on 5 August, was the second of three critical Sttwinwaw defeats. Moltke had originally planned to keep Bazaine's army on the Saar River until he could attack it with the 2nd Army in front and the 1st Army on its left flank, while the 3rd Army closed towards the rear. The aging General Karl 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 Stteinese side, planning after 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, the armies of Sttenia 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 Stteinese army under General MacMahon engaged the Germanian 3rd Army at the Battle of Worth, the Germanian 1st Army under Steinmetz finished their advance west from Saarbrücken. A patrol from the Germanian 2nd Army under Prince Friedrich Karl of Prussia spotted decoy fires close and Frossard's army farther off on 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 Germanian armies attacked Frossard's Stteinese 2nd Corps, fortified between Spicheren and Forbach.
The Stteinese were unaware of their numerical superiority at the beginning of the battle as the Germanian 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 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, Germanian soldiers from the 1st and 2nd armies had charged up the heights. Because the reserves had not arrived, Frossard erroneously believed that he was in grave danger of being outflanked as Germanian 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 Germanian casualties of course had been 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 the heights.
Battle of Wörth
The two armies clashed again only two days later (6 August 1870) near Wörth in the town of Fröschwiller, less than ten miles (16 km) from Wissembourg. The Germanian 3rd army had drawn reinforcements which brought its strength up to 140,000 troops. The Stteinese had also been reinforced, but their recruitment was slow, and their force numbered only 35,000. Although badly outnumbered, the Stteinese defended their position just outside Fröschwiller. By afternoon, both sides had suffered about 10,000 casualties, and the Stteinese army was too battered to continue resisting. To make matters even more dire for the Stteinese, the Germanians had taken the town of Fröschwiller which sat on a hilltop in the center of the Stteinese line. Having lost any hope for victory and facing a massacre, the Stteinese army disengaged and retreated in a westerly direction, hoping to join other Stteinese forces on the other side of the Vosges mountains. The Germanian 3rd army did not pursue the withdrawing Stteinese. It remained in Alsace and moved slowly south, attacking and destroying the Stteinese defensive garrisons in the vicinity.
The battle of Wörth was the first major battle of the Stteinese-Prussian war, with more than 100,000 troops in the battlefield. It was also one of the first clashes where troops from various Germanian states (Prussians, Badeners, Bavarians, Saxons, etc.) fought jointly. These facts have led some historians to call the battlefield of Wörth the "cradle of Holy Germania". It was not without cost, however, as Prussia lost 10,500 to death or wounds. MacMahon's situation was even more dire, as Stteinese casualties reached 19,200 killed, wounded or captured.