3-043-835 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Civil War in Paris: the cannon at Montmartre, 1871. Scene during the '...conflict in that city between the insurgent Red Republican portion of the National Guards and the Government of M. Thiers, appointed by the National Assembly. The immediate occasion of this conflict was the intention of the Government to take possession of all the artillery presented to the National Guard by public subscription during the siege of Paris by the German army. It will be remembered that when the Germans were about to enter the Champs Elysées, after the capitulation, a tumultuous multitude of National Guards from the battalions of Belleville and Montmartre, under the influence of Ultra-Democratic leaders, seized these guns in the night, and carried them off to the hill called the Butte de Montmartre...[in the] north-western quarter of Paris. They have since the attempt of the Government, by aid of the regular troops, to recover this artillery, converted the Butte de Montmartre into a formidable redoubt, and parked the guns, with the ammunition-waggons behind, along the steep, winding roads towards the summit of the hill.' From "Illustrated London News", 1871.