Otherwise, throughout the first half of the month of October the garrison of Paris restricted itself for the most part to daily cannonades. Guns of the heaviest calibre were directed on the most petty objects. It was sheer waste of ammunition, just as though the aim was to get rid of the stores on hand. If one of the gigantic long shells happened to fall on an outpost, the destruction was of course terrible; but on the whole they did little execution.
Apart from the noise of the cannonade to which one soon became accustomed, in Versailles, whence none of the residents had fled, it might have been thought a time of profound peace. The admirable discipline of the German troops allowed the townsfolk to pursue their business undisturbed; the hosts were well paid for the billeting imposed on them, and the country people could cultivate their fields and gardens in peace. At St. Cloud every room was kept in the same order as when the Imperial family had left it, till the shells from Mont Valérien reduced that delightful palace with all its treasures of art to a heap of charred ruins. It was the French fire, too, which wrecked the Château of Meudon, the porcelain factory of Sèvres, and whole villages in the nearer environs. And it was also the French themselves who, without any necessity, felled half the Bois de Boulogne.
The investment line was considerably strengthened on the 10th and 16th of October, when the 17th Division arriving from Toul relieved the 21st at Bonneuil, and the latter took up a position between the Bavarians and the Vth Corps, in the Meudon--Sèvres tract; and when the Guard Landwehr Division came up and occupied St. Germain.
These movements were observed from Paris, and to clear up the situation, General Vinoy advanced at nine o'clock on 13th October with about 26,000 men and 80 guns, against the position held by the IInd Bavarian Corps.
Four battalions of Gardes-Mobiles, protected by the fire of the nearest forts and of field batteries, advanced to the attack of Bagneux, and forced their way over the entrenchments wrecked by artillery fire, into the heart of the place, whence the defenders retired to Fontenay, when at eleven o'clock the French 10th Regiment of the line had also come up. Reinforced by a fresh battalion, and supported by an effective flanking fire from Châtillon, the Bavarians now made so firm a stand that the enemy could make no further progress, but began to put Bagneux in a state of defence. Meanwhile the 4th Bavarian Division had stood to arms, and by about 1.30 General von Bothmer (its commander) moved it up from Sceaux and from Fontenay, and proceeded to surround Bagneux. The barricades erected by the enemy were carried, who however still offered an obstinate resistance in the northern part of the village.