Paris in Peril

Henry Vizetelly (1820-94), whose two-volume Glances Back through Seventy Years is also reissued in this collection, was an English journalist based in Paris during the Franco-Prussian War, which concluded with the downfall of Napoleon III and the end of the second French Empire. First published in 1882, this is the second in a two-volume collection of his writings during this turbulent period. Describing the effects of the blockade of Paris on the civilian population as well as the army, he praises the continuing bravery of the French even in the face of inevitable defeat. In an interesting epilogue, he holds the French General Trochu’s ‘frivolous’ approach accountable for the fall of Paris to the much better led Prussian army. Caricatures of the day depicted Trochu as a donkey restraining the lions of the French army - an image which was used again to great effect during the First World War.