A Residence in France: With an Excursion Up the Rhine, and a Second Visit to SwitzerlandCooper, James Fenimore
History
A Residence in France: With an Excursion Up the Rhine, and a Second Visit to Switzerland
Cooper, James Fenimore
France -- Description and travel; Germany -- Description and travel; Switzerland -- Description and travel
As we had several of Napoleon's soldiers at dinner yesterday, and they
had united to praise the military character of the position taken by the
revellers, I was curious to examine it. The Rue St. Méry is narrow, and
the houses are high. The tower of the church is a little advanced, so as
to enfilade it, in a manner, and the paving-stones had been used to make
barricades, as in 1830. These stones are much larger than our own, are
angular, and of a size that works very well into a wall; and the
materials being plenty, a breastwork, that is proof against everything
but artillery, is soon formed by a crowd. Two streets entered the Rue
St. Méry near each other, but not in a right line, so that the approach
along each is commanded by the house that stands across its end. One of
these houses appears to have been a citadel of the disaffected, and most
of the fighting was at and near this spot. Artillery had been brought up
against the house in question, which was completely riddled, though less
injured by round-shot than one could have thought possible. The windows
were broken, and the ceilings of the upper rooms were absolutely torn to
pieces by musket-balls, that had entered on the rise. Some twenty or
thirty dead were found in this dwelling.
I had met Col.--, in the course of the morning, and we visited this spot
together. He told me that curiosity had led him to penetrate as far as
this street, which faces the citadel of the revolters, the previous day,
and he showed me a _porte-cochère_, under which he had taken shelter,
during a part of the attack. The troops engaged were a little in advance
of him, and he described them as repeatedly recoiling from the fire of
the house, which, at times, was rather sharp. The troops, however, were
completely exposed, and fought to great disadvantage. Several hundreds
must have been killed and wounded at and near this spot.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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