The Sun.
London, England, 1870-11-04 00:00:00

NAPOLEON'S MANIFESTO.

The long-promised manifesto by Napoleon 111., on the
present campaign has at length been issued. It is a
minute apology. The Emperor says that he
hoped to cross the Rhine, separate North from
South Germany, and by the eclat of a first suc-
cess, secure the alliance of Austria and Italy. He
was aware that Germany had the advantage of numbers,
but hoped to compensate for this by rapidity of
movement. His proposal was to mass 150,000 men
at Metz, 100,000 at Strasbourg, and leave 50,000
at Chalons as a reserve. These positions would leave
the Germans uncertain whether the attack would be upon
the river Saar, or upon the Duchy of Baden. The
two greater armies would be united, and
would forthwith advance into South Germany
at Maxan, leaving Rastadt on the right;
thus securing the neutrality of the Southern States, by
preventing their troops from joining Prussia. But defec-
tive organisation, into the details of which the Emperor
enters at great length, prevented this movement, gave the
enemy time, and enabled him to strike the first blow.
The pamphlet likewise describes the battle
of Sedan and the dispositions which led up
to it. According to his Majesty's view of the
position, he was hemmed in upon the north-east and
east by Prussian army corps, while several bodies
of German cavalry held the ground on the west
of the great bend of the Meuse below Sedan—that
is, between the departmental road to Mezieres, and the
railway which passes just to the north of Donchery.
Tho. 'e six corps were—commencing from the German
right, on the heights between St. Menges and Floing—
posted in the following order :—First came the eleventh
corps, echelonnee upon the M6zieres road. To
their left, and tending slightly northward, was
the terrible fifth corps, which had done so much
of the fighting at Weissenburg and at Woerth. Those
two corps had been thrown across the Meuse, or had
passed round the bend made by the high ground between
Glaire and Iges, and had compelled the seventh
corps of the French army, under General Douay—
supported by a powerful body of cavalry to
wheel into position upon the heights north of
Sedan, between Floing and Illy, in front of
the Bois de la Garenne, thus forming a kind of
acute angle, with their main body fronting to the east-
ward. The line of the Prussians, according to the
Emperor's plan, was continued from Illy—which formed,
so to speak, the northern salient of the French position—
by the Prussian Guard down to the Bouillon rood; thence
on the other side of a little streamlet which flows through
Givonne, Daigny, and Bazeilles, by the twelfth or Saxon
corps (the strongest in the North-German army),
the fourth corps, which had come from Metz, and the first
Bavarian Corps of General Von der Tann. On this line,
beginning from Bazeilles, and going back to the north
towards Illy, the French front west of the rivulet we
have mentioned was formed by the twelfth corps, under
General Lebrun—which occupied Bazeilles in force,
and held also the village of La Moncelle, about a
mile higher up the rivulet. On the left of Lebrun's
corps, stretching from Petite Mcrneelle to Givcmne

—still behind the streamlet and across the route
to Bouillon—was the corps of General Ducrot :
the First, formerly commanded by MacMahon himself,
Wimpffen's corps, the Fifth, formerly commanded
by De Failly, stood in reserve in the eastern horn-work
of Sedan, and on the hills between Givonne and Balan.
The Emperor's position thus shut him out from all
possibility either of advancing upon Metz or of retreating
upon Mezieres without opposition ; but the latter plan,
even on the first of September, was decidedly better than
fighting. The manifesto proves nothing more than
that French generalship was bad again. Says the
Telegraph :—" Nothing in Napoleon's own account
of the conflict, borne out by a plan which as we
may suppose was issued under his own auspices,
warrants us in thinking that he did wisely in delivering
battle au commencement de la journde du premiere
Septembre, 1870,' with his army bent back into the form
of an overstrained bow, while the enemy outflanked him
in two-fold force, and a way of retreat lay open through
Sedan to M4zieres. We have been told that the
Emperor made a final push eastward towards Bazaine on
the Balan road. That was simply rushing into the lion's
jaws."