2e Régiment de Ligne

Commanding First Brigade, Third Division,  2nd Corps, Army of the Rhine in 1870 was fifty-nine year old Augustin Axis Döens, a graduate of had Saint Cyr, who had entered the army in 1828 in the infantry. He commenced his career in Algeria in 1838, rising slowly through the ranks to Colonel of the 59th Regiment by 1852. As colonel of the 56th Regiment he fought in Italy with 2nd Brigade, 1st Division, 3rd Corps, and was made général de brigade after Solferino. Following the Italian campaign he held administrative posts as commandant of the subdivisions of Pas de Calais, Médéah in North Africa and finally the Charente. He briefly held command of a brigade in the Army of Lyon. In 1869 he commanded a brigade at the Camp of Chalôns that subsequently became his command in 2nd Corps. Döens's Brigade comprised of the 10th Chasseurs, the 2e Régiment and 63e Régiment.

The 10e Chasseurs have already made their appearance on these pages and the next unit in the brigade is the 2e Régiment.

Formed from Régiment Picardie it became the 2e Régiment in 1791. In the Revolutionary Wars it fought at Tourcoing in 1795, Zurich in 1799 and Genoa in 1800. Under Napoleon it fought at Aspern-Essling and Wagram before going to Spain in 1810. Assigned to as part of the observation force on the Elbe in 1812 it was engaged in the latter part of the Russian campaign at Polotsk and Bérézina.

In the peninsula after  Russia it returned to fight with the Emperor at Dresden and Leipzig in 1813 and fought at La Rothière in 1814. In the 100 Days it fought at Ligne and Waterloo.

After the Second Restoration it became the Legion l'Aisne before regaining the title 2e Régiment in 1820. It served in Spain in 1823 and was in service in Africa from 1842-1847. In the Italian campaign it served in MacMahon's Corps and was engaged at Solferino.

In 1870 the regiment went to war with Colonel Amédée-Henri-Charles Saint-Hillier, a 53 year old native of Prunay in the Loire valley. A graduate of Saint-Cyr, he entered the army in 1837. He served in Algeria, advancing slowly through the ranks to captain, the rank he held during the campaign in Italy, where he fought and Magenta and Solferino. Returning to Algeria, he was made lieutenant-colonel in 1859, then colonel in 1863. 

Colonel de Saint-Hillier

The 2e Régiment's only action in 1870 was at Spicheren where in the mid-afternoon two battalions went forward into the woods on the French right when it encountered the advance of two battalions of the Prussian 48th regiment. The numerically superior Prussians pushed the French back out of the woods and onto their starting position. When the Prussians attempted to advance from the woods the French fire drove them back. Mistaking their fall back as a retreat, Döens, with the help of Saint-Hillier, quickly massed several companies and ordered “à la baïonnette!” With bugles blaring and drums beating, the French stormed forward. It is difficult to understand how Döens, an experienced combat officer, could have believed this tiny force, that cannot have exceeded 300 men, could hope to drive off an enemy force that outnumbered him by five or six times. The result was sudden, brutal and entirely predictable. The six German companies strung along the line of the woods opened with rapid fire, or Schnellfeur, that mowed the French down, leaving the ground littered with dead and wounded. Among the fallen were Saint-Hillier, killed by a bullet to the temple, Döens and Lieutenant-Colonel Boucheporn, both seriously wounded.  Döens' wound would prove to be mortal and he died three days later at Saarguemines. In this battle the regiment lost 24 officers and 357 men from the 1,391 who were with the colours at the beginning of the day.

While the field battalions were taken as prisoners of war at Metz six week later, the depot battalion formed part of the 5e Régiment de Marche that served with 13th Corps.

It fought with distribution on the Western Front in the Great War and fought again in the Battle of France in 1940, being disbanded after that campaign. Recreated in 1954 it fought in Algeria until 1962. It was formally disbanded in 1998.