A GENERAL'S MISTAKE.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1610, 29 November 1912, Page 5

A GENERAL'S MISTAKE.

HURRIED MOBILISATION. REMARKABLE INCIDENT IN FRANCE. By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright Paris, November 27. Through mistaking instructions the commander of a brigade in tho Department of Meurthe-et-Moselle, on tho Franco-German frontier, directed a general mobilisation instead of a local one. Tho men available in seven communes assembled at night-time, before the error was discovered. The commander has been arrested. (Reel November 28, 9.50 p.m.) Paris, November 28. , Extraordinary scenes occurred at Nancy in connection with the mobilisation mistake. General Blion, Brigadier of Gendarmies, who has been arrested, believing that a telegram was an order to mobilise, opened his Bealed mobilisation instructions. The church bells were rung, and the town crier roused five thousand men from their beds. Posters were hastily pasted on the walls, summoning all men between twenty-five and forty-five years of age to join the colours. The reservists left their weeping wives and hastened to headquarters. It was five hours before the error was discovered. Meanwhile military telegraphists had taken possession of the post offices. Sections had marched to protect the railways, and patrols had hastened, to the frontier.