New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1871-06-18
THE FALL OF THE COMMUNE.
The Horrors of the Last Days.

Ine hOrfOfs OF the Last Days.
lFrom the Cincinnati Gazettel
New YORK, June l4.-Letters from Paris
to May 30 give additional particulars of the
collapse OF the commune. One letter saws
| over 1000 insurgents have been killed,
wounded, or taken prisoners during the
seven days struggle, and probably more
than lOO, ,OGO will be prisoners in the end on
both sides. l estimate the losses as follows:
Killed, q, 900; wounded, 10000; burning of
property in Paris, 1000. .0OO, 900 francs; loss
OF rents, injury to business, and deprecia-
ton ofcredit, 300, 100000 francs.
France has never seen such a week as the
last one here There has been every form
of torture, every exaggeration of cruelty;
age, sex, sickness or natural deformity has
kept none from the ruthless brutality of a
mad pOpulace, and the cool savagery of un-
disciplined soldiery. -
The commune, the first to break last Sun
day night, has been narrowing its circum-
ference every day, and at the same time the
chances of escape of the hostages remaining
in its hands, and whom, too, it murdered
and put to death. Its encroachments have
ceased, and its end has been swift and sum-
mary; but l would not write one single line
to defend the horrid butcheries practieed
by the government troops. No man who is
a man can stand by and see women shot
and children from ten to fifteen put to death
Even allowing that the leaders have been
guilty of terribly revolving crimes, as they
have been, it formed no excuse for the ter
rible excesses of soldiers. At Luxemburg,
in Park MOrceau, and in the town of St.
Jaques, there are large trenches filed to the
brink with human bodies, many of them
only half killed, and yet warm with life.
Insurgents, men and women, with hands
tied behind their backs, are taken to the
brink. There is a vOlley of musketry, the
smoke clears away and the victims are en-
quilted in the trenches. No mercy has so
far been shown to women. Wherever they
have been caught they have been treated
with all the cruelty imaginable, especially
during the first three days.
Fourteen sewing girls, employed in the
establishment of Madame Roger, were suf-
focated in the cellar, where they sought
refuge from shot and shell. When the
house was set on fire they perished. On
the Rue Royal was house where poor
women are cared for during childbirth. The
insurgents set it on fire, and twenty-five of
these poor creatures perished in the flames
The little garden of the Tour st. Jacques, on
the boulevard SebastopOl, was a mass of
dead bodies awaiting burial. The Omni-
buses of L'OdeOn and BattignOle were en-
ployed in removing them. The barricades
in the vicinity were in dreadful state from
dead bodies half covered lying therein.
This little green square, so filled with trees,
flowers and shrubs few days since, is now
turned into a burial ground. Over one
thousand are already buried there. Large
trenches are dug, aud twenty bodies thrown
into each trench. Near Mr.. Washburne's
house six children, between the ages of
eight and ten years, taken in the act of set
ting fire to houses, were shot on the spot,
not by the mob, but by an officer of high
rank.
Another letter says some curious facts
are coming to light. There is much evi-
dence going to show that Bismarck coolly
contemplated the end desired to bring
about the exterminntion of every red re-
publican throughout Europe who could be |
induced to go to Paris. Let them alone |
long enough, said he, and every revolu- |
ZIONIST in Europe will make his rendezvous |
in Paris, then when the trap is perfectly |
full we will shut the door and bag the |
whole of them. The plan was a shrewd |
one, and it has worked we'll. The Germans
keep the door open at ST. Denis to the very
last moment, any one who wished to enter
Paris could do so up to the Sunday morning
before the Versailles troops made their
entry.
Then the door was shut to with bang;
no one was allowed to come out: the Ger
mans moved up closer, and drove back or
killed every one who attempted to escape;
and now, doubtless through his influence,
Belgium, Switzerland, Spain and Italy are
ready to seize and to send back to death
any fugitive who may have escaped by
balloon or otherwise The trap was full of
foreign revOlutionists, that is certain The
Figaro to-day publishes list of the names
of the military and political leaders of the
commune, and of this list forty-nine are
foreigners. There were of these twenty
one Poles, eight Italians, seven Germans.
Il zcD ID -
chians, Hungarians, Portuguese Spaniards
and SoidiSant Americans.
Another writer says it was Rapias Piquet
who set fire to the library of the Louvre, to
the Palais Royal, etc. He was going to in
cite his companions to destroy the shops of
the Louvre, when he was seized by some of
the troops and shot in sight of his daughter,
who was accompanying him. His last and
only regret, he bawled out, was that he had
not had time to finish his enterprise.
Another letter describes the manner of
executions. The prisoners are
,aken down in patches to certain specified
places, were firing parties are
stationed, and deep trenches dug, before
land. One of these is the Ecole Militaire,
another the Caserne Napoleon, Immediately
behind the Hotel de Vile. One of the men
Engaged in this work of blood has given me
ome particulars. He tells me that at the
Caserne Napoleon, since last night, five
hundred persons have been shot, and that
he court yard is full of blood and dead
'odies. To induce the prisoners to march,
Without resistance, they are told that they
re to be taken to Versailles for trial, and it
) only when they arrive at the place of exc
utiOn that the blood and bodies before
hem make known to them that their last
our has arrived. There are invariably
Tomen and children among them and they
cream, and cry, and beg tor mercy, but are
ushed forward and shot down. 1t is said
hat ten thousand persons have thus been
xecuted, but trust that this is gross ex-
ggeration.