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The Siege of Paris, lasting from September 19, 1870 – January 28, 1871, brought about French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War and led to the establishment of the German Empire. As early as August 1870 the Prussian 3rd Army led by the Crown Prince (the future Emperor) Frederick III had been marching towards Paris, but was recalled to deal with French forces accompanied by Napoleon III himself. These forces were crushed at the Battle of Sedan and the road to Paris was left open. Personally leading the Prussian forces Wilhelm I of Prussia along with his chief of staff Helmuth von Moltke, took the 3rd Army along with the new Prussian Army of the Meuse under Crown Prince Albert of Saxony and marched on Paris virtually unopposed. In Paris the Governor and commander-in-chief of the city's defenses General Louis Jules Trochu, assembled a force of regular soldiers that had managed to escape Sedan under Joseph Vinoy plus the National Guards and a brigade of sailors which totalled around 400,000. The German armies quickly reached Paris and on September 15 Moltke issued orders for the investment of the city. Crown Prince Albert's army closed in on Paris from the north unopposed, while Crown Prince Frederick moved in from the south. On September 17 a force under Vinoy attacked Frederick's army near Villeneuve Saint Georges in an effort to save a supply depot there and were eventually driven back by artillery fire. The railroad to Orleans was cut and on the 18th Versailles was taken, which would then serve as the 3rd Army's and eventually Wilhelm's headquarters. By September 19 the encirclement was complete and the siege officially began. Prussia's prime minister von Bismarck suggested to shell Paris in order to ensure the city's quick surrender and render all French efforts to free the city pointless, but the German high command, headed by the king of Prussia, turned down the proposal on the insistence of General Leonhard Graf von Blumenthal, who commanded the siege, on the grounds that a bombardment would affect civilians, violate the rules of engagement, and turn the opinion of third parties against the Germans, without speeding up the final victory. It was contended also that a quick French surrender would leave the new French armies undefeated and allow France to renew the war shortly after. The new French armies would have to be annihilated first, and Paris would have to be starved into surrender.
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