Wednesday, November 6, 2013

Marshalling my forces

It's been a while!

I've now finished the draft manuscript of the first part of the 1870 series, called "A Little Gleam of Light".

It deals with the experiences of a young soldier in the French Army after the battle of Sedan in September 1870. The battle was a catastrophe for the French. Robert, our hero, fled to Paris after barely escaping from the bloodbath. The Germans were right behind him.

My enthusiasm for 1870 as a focus for an epic came from a sudden realization that many linked events that affected world history occurred in 1870. Events were set in action that led to the creation of the German Empire, the destruction of Imperial France under Napoleon III, the restriction of the possessions and powers of the Pope, the unification of Italy as a limited monarchy and the rise of Revolution as a power that would not quit despite the failure of the Paris Commune to achieve state control.

I took a trip to Europe to see the places and soak up the atmosphere of the times when the events I relate took place. The first book happens mostly in Paris. But the little eastern French town of Sedan is also connected. So I went there. The train trip from Paris

On September 4, 1870, at Sedan, something  happened that may never happen again in the history of the world. An Emperor of a major power was captured in battle. Napoleon III surrendered his sword and his army to Otto von Bismarck himself, the personification of what was soon to become the German Empire. Arguably Bismarck was even more important to the success of that Empire than the Emperor.

I walked around Sedan for a few days, taking notes and photographs. Climbing the nearby hill from which the German generals watched the ill-fated French cavalry charges plunged me into the feelings that I imagined the soldiers and journalists of that last day must have felt. Seeing the immense fort in which nearly an entire French army was battered and blasted to pieces by German artillery gave me an intense sensation of the changes that had come about in war since the first Napoleonic era. The time of the machine gun and high explosives had arrived with a vengeance in the heart of Europe.




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