On the 25th of March the third parallel was finished. The place was thenceforth only defended by musketry, and a few stone mortars, and grenades, which small sallying parties threw into the trenches at night.
The approaches to crown the covered way and set up breach batteries were advancing but slowly, thanks to the activity of the garrison, whose courage seemed redoubled in seeing the enemy approaching and which defended its glacis foot by foot.
On the 1st of April came the news of the capitulation of Paris, the abdication of the Emperor, and the order to suspend hostilities. The garrison was allowed to retire to Nevers, through Auxonne, Beaune, Autun and Château-Chinon.
On the 5th of April Colonel Dubois quitted La Roche-Pont at the head of seven hundred soldiers of all arms, who were all the able-bodied men left him.
[Footnote 61: See for the numbers of the enemy's batteries, Fig. 72.]
Notwithstanding its bastioned enclosure and great outwork which was still existing in 1870, exactly as Vauban had planned it, the town of La Roche-Pont could not have held out forty-eight hours before the German artillery. A few batteries to the north, on the plateau, and on the west and east on the sides of the hills placed at nearly two miles distant would have overwhelmed the place with projectiles without a possibility of replying; for in September 1870 the small arsenal of La Roche-Pont contained only six cast iron guns, and four bronze pieces with smooth bore, two thousand pounds of powder and two or three hundred solid balls.
It was not attacked, though bodies of the enemy showed themselves not far from its walls.
Its garrison consisted then of a guard of the engineers and a brigade of gendarmes.
The inhabitants of La Roche-Pont are, however, patriotic, and mention with pride the numerous sieges they have experienced.
They had organized their national guard as early as August, including an artillery corps. It is true they had not been able to supply these National Guards with more than a hundred flint guns which were lying in the citadel, and about thirty muzzle-loading guns. These brave people were not less determined to defend themselves, and began to cast bullets and make cartridges. They had not the pain of seeing the Germans there.