carried passengers in addition to the cargo of mail, most notably Léon Gambetta, the minister for War in the new government, who was flown out of Paris on 7 October. The balloons also carried homing pigeons out of Paris to be used for pigeon post. This was the only means by which communications from the rest of France could reach the besieged city. A specially laid telegraph cable on the bed of the Seine had been discovered and cut by the Prussians on 27 September, couriers attempting to make their way through the German lines were almost all intercepted, and although other methods were tried, including attempts to use balloons, dogs, and message canisters floated down the Seine, these were all unsuccessful. The pigeons were taken to their base, first at Tours and later at Poitiers, and when they had been fed and rested were ready for the return journey. Tours lies some from Paris and Poitiers some distant. Before release, they were loaded with their dispatches. Initially the pigeon post was only used for official communications but on 4 November the government announced that members of the public could send messages, these being limited to twenty words at a charge of 50 centimes per word. [[File:Siege of Paris.jpg|thumbnail|right|The Siege of Paris by Jean-Louis-Ernest Meissonier. Oil on canvas.]] These were then copied onto sheets of cardboard and photographed by a M. Barreswille, a photographer based in Tours. Each sheet contained 150 messages and was reproduced as a print about in size: each pigeon could carry nine of these. The photographic process was further refined by René Dagron to allow more to be carried: Dagron, with his equipment, was flown out of Paris on 12 November in the aptly named Niépce, narrowly escaping capture by the Prussians. The photographic process allowed multiple copies of the messages to be sent, so that although only 57 of the 360 pigeons released reached Paris more than 60,000 of the 95,000 messages sent were delivered. (some sources give a considerably higher figure of around 150,000 official and 1 million private communications, but this figure is arrived at by counting all copies of each message.) Aftermath Late in the siege, Wilhelm I was proclaimed German Emperor on 18 January 1871 at the Palace of Versailles. The kingdoms of Bavaria, Württemberg, and Saxony, the states of Baden and Hesse, and the free cities of Hamburg and Bremen