It was on the day of the 18th of March, exactly six months after the appearance of Prussians beneath the walls of Paris, that the Government had chosen for the repression of the rebellion. At four o’clock in the morning, the troops of the army of Paris received orders to occupy the positions that had been assigned to them. All were to take part in the action, but it is just to add here that the most arduous and fatiguing part fell to the share of the Lustielle division, composed of the Paturel brigade (17th battalion of Chasseurs), and of the Lecomte brigade (18th battalion of Chasseurs). Three regiments of infantry were entrusted with the guard of the HÔtel de Ville; another, the 89th, mounted guard at the Tuileries. The Place de la Bastille was occupied by a battalion of the 64th, and two companies of the 24th. Three other battalions remained confined to barracks on the Boulevard du Prince Eugene. The Rue de Flandre, the Rue de Puebla, and the Rue de CrimÉe were filled with strong detachments of Infantry; a battalion of the Republican Guard and the 35th Regiment of Infantry were drawn up in the neighbourhood of the Buttes Chaumont. The whole quarter around the Place Clichy was occupied by the Republican Guard, foot Chasseurs, mounted gendarmes, Chasseurs d’Afrique, and a half battery of artillery. Other troops, starting from this base-line of operation, were led up the heights of Montmartre, together with companies of Gardiens de la Paix (the former Sergents-de-Ville converted into soldiers). At six o’clock in the morning the first orders were executed; the Gardiens de la Paix surrounded a hundred and fifty or two hundred insurgents appointed to guard the park of artillery, and the troops made themselves masters of all the most important points. The success was complete. Nothing remained to be done but to carry off the guns. Unhappily, the horses which had been ordered for this purpose did not arrive at the right moment. The cause of this fatal delay remains still unknown, but it is certain that they were still on the Place de la Concorde at the time when they ought to have been harnessed to the guns at Montmartre. Before they arrived, agitation had broken out and spread all over the quarter. The turbulent population, complaining in indignant tones of circulation being stopped, insulted the sentinels placed at the entrances of the streets, and threatened the artillerymen who were watching them. At the same time, the Central Committee caused the rappel to be beaten, and towards seven o’clock in the morning ten or twelve thousand National Guards from the arrondissements of Batignolles, Montmartre, La Villette, and Belleville poured into the streets. Crowds of lookers-on surrounded the soldiers who were mounting guard by the recaptured pieces, the women and children asking them pleadingly if they would have the heart to fire upon their brothers.

Meanwhile, about a dozen tumbrils, with their horses, had arrived on the heights of the Buttes, the guns were dragged off, and were quietly proceeding down hill, when, at the corner of the Rue Lepic and the Rue des Abbesses, they were stopped by a concourse of several hundred people of the quarter, principally women and children. The foot soldiers, who were escorting the guns, forgetting their duty, allowed themselves to be dispersed by the crowd, and giving way to perfidious persuasion, ended by throwing up the butt ends of their guns. These soldiers belonged to the 88th Battalion of the Lecomte brigade. The immediate effect of their disaffection was to abandon the artillerymen to the power of the crowd that was increasing every moment, rendering it utterly impossible for them either to retreat or to advance. And the result was, that at nine o’clock in the morning the pieces fell once more into the hands of the National Guards.

Judging that the enterprise had no chance of succeeding by a return to the offensive, GÉnÉral Vinoy ordered a retreat, and retired to the quarter of Les Ternes. This movement had been, moreover, determined by the bad news arriving from other parts of Paris. The operations at Belleville had succeeded no better than those at Montmartre. A detachment of the 35th had, it is true, attacked and taken the Buttes Chaumont, defended only by about twenty National Guards; but as soon as the news of the capture had spread in the quarter, the drums beat to arms, and in a short time the troops were found fraternising with the National Guards of Belleville, who got possession again of the Buttes Chaumont, and not only retook their own guns, but also those which the artillery had brought up to support the manoeuvre of the infantry of the line. At the same time, the 120th shamefully allowed themselves to be disarmed by the people, and the insurgents became masters of the barracks of the Prince EugÈne.

At about four o’clock in the afternoon, two columns of National Guards, each composed of three battalions, made their way towards the HÔtel de Ville, where they were joined by a dozen other battalions from the left bank of the river; at the same hour, the insurgent guards of Belleville took and occupied the Imprimerie Nationale, the Napoleon Barracks, the staff-quarters of the Place VendÔme, and the railway stations; the arrest of GÉnÉral Chanzy completed the work of the day, which had been put to profitable account by the insurgents.—“Guerre de Comunneux de Paris.”