THE FIVE O’CLOCK TAUBE
Sep 04, 2018
4 minutes
BY C.G. SWEETING
The people of Paris were nervous, and with good reason. In the days since the August 3, 1914, declaration of war between France and Germany, the Germans had advanced rapidly through Belgium and northern France, and their First Army had reached the Marne River, just 30 miles east of Paris. Parisians could hear the distant rumble of artillery, feeding their fears. Their morale was further depressed when the French government and many wealthy families fled the city and headed southwest to Bordeaux.
To prepare the French capital for a siege, General Joseph Galliéni commandeered every taxi in Paris
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