Trois Decauville locomotives 'départ pour Metz'

Éric Fresné commented on 26 March 2023: I think it is 5 September 1914 or some days after in the Paris area. In 2008' the Revue Historique des Armées published a very well documented article on Vincennes in the war (A Marzona and E Pénicaut). We learn that the castle and its surroundings will become a huge factory town commanded by Colonel Jacquillat, an artilleryman. From August 1914 onwards, Vincennes became what we would call today a logistical base with the reception of material evacuated by the armies of the east and north which had been pushed around but also by the sending of material during the counter-offensive... All this to tell you that in August 14, Jacquillat ordered four 020T Progrès (his name appears on the Decauville register) plus one from the Vincennes Artillery Park. With two or three others, these are the only Progrès delivered to the army still for artillery parks.
INTERPRETATION We are in the rear, we do not see how it could be otherwise with the woman on the picture. For the precise location, joker. As the personnel is military, I would say Vincennes... But Corbeil is plausible. We must be a few days after September 5, 1914. That's the date of delivery of the three des Progrès ordered by Jacquillat. If we read the numbers on the plates' we should see 883, 888 & 889...