The Battle of Mars-la-Tour was fought on 16 August 1870, during the Franco-Prussian War, near the village of Mars-La-Tour in northeast France. One Prussian corps, reinforced by two more later in the day, encountered the entire French Army of the Rhine in a meeting engagement and, following the course of battle, the Army of the Rhine retreated toward the fortress of Metz.
Heinrich XVII, Prince Reuß, on the side of the 5th Squadron I Guards Dragoon Regiment at Mars-la-Tour, 16 August 1870. Emil Hünten, 1902.
La ligne de feu, 16 août 1870 by Pierre-Georges Jeanniot (1886). French infantry at the battle of Mars-la-Tour.
The 4th Thuringian Infantry Regiment No. 72 storming Maison Blanche in front of Rezonville on 16 August 1870.
Grenadiers of the French Imperial Guard. Detail from Édouard Detaille's painting of the battle of Rezonville.
The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War, often referred to in France as the War of 1870, was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the North German Confederation led by the Kingdom of Prussia. Lasting from 19 July 1870 to 28 January 1871, the conflict was caused primarily by France's determination to reassert its dominant position in continental Europe, which appeared in question following the decisive Prussian victory over Austria in 1866. According to some historians, Prussian chancellor Otto von Bismarck deliberately provoked the French into declaring war on Prussia in order to induce four independent southern German states—Baden, Württemberg, Bavaria and Hesse-Darmstadt—to join the North German Confederation; other historians contend that Bismarck exploited the circumstances as they unfolded. All agree that Bismarck recognized the potential for new German alliances, given the situation as a whole.
(clockwise from top right) Battle of Mars-la-Tour, 16 August 1870 The Lauenburg 9th Jäger Battalion at Gravelotte The Last Cartridges The Defense of Champigny The Siege of Paris in 1870 The Proclamation of the German Empire
French soldiers drill at IIe Chambrière camp near Metz, 1870
Prussian field artillery column at Torcy in September 1870
Bavarian infantry at the Battle of Wissembourg, 1870