After the Chateaudun affair the Germans secured possession of Chartres, whence they proceeded to raid the department of the Eure. Going by way of Nogent-le-Roi and Chateauneuf-en-Thimerais, they seized the old ecclesiastical town of Evreux on November 19, whereupon the French hastily retreated into the Orne. Some minor engagements followed, all to the advantage of the Germans, who on the 22nd attacked and occupied the ancient and strategically important town of Nogent-le-Rotrou--the lordship of which, just prior to the great Revolution, belonged to the family of the famous Count D'Orsay, the lover of Lady Blessington and the friend of Napoleon III. The occupation of Nogent brought the Germans to a favourable point on the direct railway-line between Paris and Le Mans, the capital of Maine. The region had been occupied by a somewhat skeleton French army corps--the 21st--commanded by a certain General Fiereck. On the loss of Nogent, Gambetta immediately replaced him by one of the many naval officers who were now with the French armies, that is Post-Captain (later Admiral) Constant Jaures, uncle of the famous Socialist leader of more recent times. Jaures at once decided to retreat on Le Mans, a distance of rather more than a hundred miles, and this was effected within two days, but under lamentable circumstances. Thousands of starving men deserted, and others were only kept with the columns by the employment of cavalry and the threat of turning the artillery upon them. Directly Gambetta heard of the state of affairs, he hastened to Le Mans to provide for the defence of that extremely important point, where no fewer than five great railway lines converged, those of Paris, Alencon, Rennes, Angers, and Tours. The troops commanded by Jaures were in a very deplorable condition, and it was absolutely necessary to strengthen them. It so happened that a large body of men was assembled at Conlie, sixteen or seventeen miles away. They formed what was called the "Army of Brittany," and were commanded by Count Emile de Keratry, the son of a distinguished politician and literary man who escaped the guillotine during the Reign of Terror. The Count himself had sat in the Legislative Body of the Second Empire, but had begun life as a soldier, serving both in the Crimea and in Mexico, in which latter country he had acted as one of Bazaine's orderly officers. At the Revolution Keratry was appointed Prefect of Police, but on October 14 he left Paris by balloon, being entrusted by Trochu and Jules Favre with a mission to Prim, in the hope that he might secure Spanish support for France. Prim and his colleagues refused to intervene, however, and Keratry then hastened to Tours, where he placed himself at the disposal of Gambetta, with whom he was on terms of close friendship. It was arranged between them that Keratry should gather together all the available men who were left in Brittany, and train and organize them, for which purposes a camp was established at Conlie,