The Paris Commune. The Bloody Week. Thursday, May 25, 1871. The Versailles army has concentrated its offensive against the Butte-aux-Cailles, a neighborhood in the eastern part of Paris. Facing the 3,500 communards commanded by Wroblewski are the 24,000 men of General Cissey. After hours of bombardment, around noon the general attack begins. The Versaillais encounter massive barricades and the tenacity of the best battalions of the National Guard. The soldiers of Versailles blow up the walls of the Salpêtrière hospital gardens to allow their troops to pass through. This movement increases the pressure on the federate rear and Wroblewski must therefore retreat to the right bank across the Pont d’Austerlitz with a thousand men and part of his artillery. Many federates remain in their neighborhood, but many of them are captured and shot. Other fierce fighting took place at Place du Chateau-d’Eau (later Place de la République). On this barricade Delescluze dies, the civil delegate for war who is essentially the minister of war of the Paris Commune. Rather than be captured, he deliberately exposes himself to enemy fire. Five Dominicans from Arcueil and nine workers from the convent are shot dead because they were apparently fleeing, being accused of being spies for the Versaillais.
