ten o'clock
At nine o'clock the gunners , match alight and in hand , came to take their places at the batteries . The deepest terror prevailed throughout the town . From the arrangements which they saw being made , the Frankforters judged that no mercy was to be expected from the Prussian generals . The whole population was shut up indoors waiting anxiously for the stroke of ten o'clock to announce the town 's doom . All at once a terrible rumour began to circulate , that the burgomaster , rather than denounce his fellow-citizens , had ended his life -- had hanged himself . At a few minutes before ten , a man dressed in black came out of Herr Fellner 's house ; it was his brother-in-law , Herr von Kugler , and he held in his hand a rope . He walked straight on , without speaking to anybody , or stopping till he reached the Roemer , pushed aside with his arm the sentinels who attempted to prevent his passing , and , entering the hall in which General von Roeder was presiding , he advanced to the scales and threw into one of them the rope that he had been carrying .