No specific and detailed account, apparently, exists, of this last desperate stand. But it is plain that, as the French centre and right yielded before Von Kirchbach and especially Von Bose, as the impetuous infantry onsets were fruitless, as the cavalry had been destroyed and the French guns could not bear up against the accurate and constant fire of their opponents, so the Germans swept onwards and almost encircled their foes. When Ducrot began to retire, the Bavarians sprang forward up the steeps and through the woods, which had held them so long at bay; the stout and much-tried 5th Corps pushed onward, and the 11th, already on the outskirts of Froeschwiller and extending beyond it, broke into its south-eastern and southern defences; so that portions of all the troops engaged in this sanguinary battle swarmed in, at last, upon the devoted band who hopelessly, yet nobly, clung to the final barrier. How bravely and steadfastly they fought may be inferred from the losses inflicted upon the Germans, whose officers, foremost among the confused crowd of mingled regiments and companies, were heavily punished, whose rank and file went down in scores. Even after the day had been decided, the French in Froeschwiller still resisted, and the combats there did not cease until five o’clock. But in the open the German flanking columns had done great execution on the line of retreat. A mixed body of Prussian and Würtemberg cavalry had ridden up on the extreme left, one Bavarian brigade had moved through Neehwiller upon Niederbronn, and another had marched through Froeschwiller upon Reichshofen. The horsemen kept the fugitives in motion and captured _matériel_; the first mentioned Bavarian brigade struck the division of General Guyot de Lespart, which had reached Niederbronn from Bitsche; and the second bore down on Reichshofen. The succouring division had arrived only in time to share the common calamity, for assailed by the Bavarians and embarrassed by the flocks of fugitives, one-half retreated with them upon Saverne, and the other hastily retraced its steps to Bitsche, marching through the summer night. The battle had been so destructive and the pursuit so sharp that the wrecks of MacMahon’s shattered host hardly halted by day or night until they had traversed the country roads leading upon Saverne, whence they could gain the western side of the Vosges. Nor did all his wearied soldiers follow this path of safety. Many fled through Hagenau to Strasburg, more retreated with the brigade of Abbatucci to Bitsche, and nine thousand two hundred officers and men remained behind as prisoners of war. The Marshal’s Army was utterly ruined, Strasburg was uncovered, the defiles of the Vosges, except that of Phalsbourg, were open to the invader who, in addition to the mass of prisoners, seized on the field, in some cases after a brilliant combat, twenty-eight guns, five mitrailleuses, one eagle, four flags, and much _matériel_ of war.