HMR Webpack Configuration, giving a 404 - reactjs

Question

I am trying to achieve some sort of auto reloading in my project using webpack-dev-server and react-hot.
I am using babel to transform my js from a src directory to a public directory.
With my current config I can see that the .json and .js update files are making it to the public directory.
But in my error console I can see this:
app.js:4473 GET http://localhost:3000/sockjs-node/info?t=1473946358314 404 (Not Found)AbstractXHRObject._start # app.js:4473(anonymous function) # app.js:4362
app.js:795 [WDS] Disconnected!
I have a webpack.config.js (baseConfig) which looks like this:
require('dotenv').config();
var path = require('path');
var autoprefixer = require('autoprefixer');
var precss = require('precss');
var cssnano = require('cssnano');
var ROOT_PATH = path.resolve(__dirname, 'src');
var BUILD_PATH = path.resolve(ROOT_PATH, '../public');
module.exports = {
entry: '',
output: {
path: BUILD_PATH,
filename: 'app.js'
},
module: {
loaders: [
{
test: /\.jsx?$/, // test for js and jsx files only
loader: ['babel'],
exclude: /node_modules/,
query: {
"presets": ["es2015", "react"],
"ignore": ["/node_modules/"],
}
},
{
test: /\.css$/,
loaders: [
'isomorphic-style-loader',
'css-loader',
'postcss-loader'
],
exclude: /node_modules/
}
]
},
postcss: function() {
return [autoprefixer({browsers: ['last 2 versions']}), precss, cssnano];
},
plugins: []
}
Also a webpack-client-config.js, which looks like this:
require('dotenv').config();
var webpack = require('webpack');
var path = require('path');
var ROOT_PATH = path.resolve(__dirname, 'src');
var BUILD_PATH = path.resolve(ROOT_PATH, '../public');
var baseConfig = require('./webpack.config.js');
baseConfig.entry = [
'webpack/hot/dev-server',
'webpack-dev-server/client?http://localhost:3000',
(ROOT_PATH + '/client-render.js'),
];
baseConfig.plugins = [
new webpack.HotModuleReplacementPlugin(),
]
baseConfig.devServer = {
hot: true,
publicPath: 'http://localhost:3000'
}
module.exports = baseConfig;
I have obviously mis-understood something about webpack, anyone care to enlighten me as to why this is not working? I can visit localhost:3000/app.js and can see the script right there in the browser. I set public as static with express.