Napoleon I (Bonaparte) Emperor of the French

b. Ajaccio, Corsica 1769; d. St Helena 1821

In 1784 he went as a cadet to the military school at Paris, and in January 1786 began his duties as a lieutenant. The death of his father had left him head of the family, and during the years which followed the beginning of his military career he spent his furloughs in Corsica. In 1792 he exceeded his leave to support Gen. Paoli. By now he had become an active sympathiser with the revolutionaries in France. In 1793 his break with the Paolists led him to take refuge in France. He left his mother and sisters in Marseilles, and went to Paris to find employment. Although by his prolonged absence he had theoretically forfeited his position in the army, the revolutionary party could not afford to lose its trained officers, and Napoleon was reinstated. He was given the rank of lieutenant-colonel in 1793 and sent to Toulon, which was holding out against the Convention and being supported by a British fleet under Hood.

At this time the fortunes of the republic were at a very low ebb. In addition to wars with hostile foreign powers, France had also to fight reaction from within. At Toulon Napoleon laid the foundations of his military reputation. He introduced new methods of artillery attack and was ultimately mainly responsible for the withdrawal of the hostile fleet and the recapture of the town. He was made general of a brigade at the end of 1793, and appointed to the command of the artillery of the army of Italy in the following year. Subsequently he fell into disgrace, was recalled to Paris, arrested, and his name struck off the army roll. But he was soon released. Napoleon's chance came with the Parisian insurrection of September 1795. The Paris mob, angered by the work and methods of the Convention, determined to get rid of it. The Convention entrusted its defence to Barras, and he chose as one of his chief subordinates the recently disgraced Napoleon. Napoleon's artillerymen commanded all approaches to the Tuileries, and their fire swept the streets. The immediate result of the crushing of this rising was the imposition of a new constitution, the First Directory, which was still essentially democratic but which paved the way for the ultimate changes which led to the foundation of the Empire of 1804.

In the next year Napoleon married Joséphine, widow of the Vicomte de Beauharnais who had lost his life during the Reign of Terror, and received the command of the army of Italy (January 1796). His Italian campaign is in many respects his most brilliant. It was noted for his dashing energy and the untiring manner in which all attacks were carried out. Features of the whole campaign were rapidity and accuracy. Napoleon fostered a spirit of revolution in the northern Italian states. That spirit was to help him in his campaigns, and later in the war, when, threatened by an overwhelming Austrian army, he was able to depend upon the help of an Italian legion. Slowly but surely he drove back the Austrians and Piedmontese. From the neighbourhood of Savona he drove them back across the Adda, and finally, after the victory at Arcoli, across the line of the Adige. The Austrians having been thus hopelessly defeated, the northern Italian states formed the Cisalpine Republic.

During this period Napoleon was the servant of the Directory, but the spoils of Italy gave France and the Directory a new idea of warfare, a warfare that paid for itself and had enough left to supply magnificent presents to the republic; and the favour of Napoleon grew in proportion to the plunder. He was able to a very great extent to act independently of the Directory, to make his own terms, to set up his own forms of government, to depose and to treat with the princes of the lands conquered. The Treaty of Campo Formio was signed, Lombardy was added to the Cisalpine Republic, Venetia was handed over to Austria, and Napoleon was able to pursue the plans which he had always had of a campaign in the East. Almost immediately after the signing of the treaty, Napoleon returned to Paris. So clearly had he shown his power that the Directory was only concerned to get him away again as soon as possible. He was placed in command of the army originally intended for the invasion of England, but he himself had resolved to go to Egypt. Napoleon also determined to attempt an invasion of Syria - whether he actually contemplated invasion of India, in imitation of Alexander the Great, will never be exactly known - and to return to Europe via the territories of the Sultan. His campaign in Syria was successful until he reached Acre; he failed to take this, chiefly owing to Sir Sidney Smith, and he returned to Egypt. Here news of internal events in France made him decide to go to Paris at once, and in October 1799 he landed in the south of France, having left his army in Egypt in command of Kléber.

In Europe the work of his Italian campaign had been well nigh undone by the second coalition, and the Directory was tottering to its fall. Napoleon's moment had come. The Directory was overthrown, and a new constitution gave the power into the hands of three consuls, The First Consul, Napoleon, being the head of the state, with practically all the power, the other two being mere figureheads. Napoleon's personal rule meant the end of the factional government which had weakened the country during recent years. He acted swiftly. The insurrections in the country were immediately put down, and overtures of peace held out to Austria and Britain. Napoleon wished to be thought of as aiming at peace for his country, not universal empire. Next he determined upon a campaign which should bring glory to his name, and thus add to the security of his tenure of power. The campaign against the Austrians ended with the battle of Marengo, which the Austrians, after virtually gaining victory, lost owing to the magnificent cavalry charges of Kellerman. Hohenlinden, a victory gained by Moreau, followed. Then came the treaties of Lunéville (1801) and Amiens (1802), and also the concordat with Rome. In August 1802, as a reward for peace, Napoleon was created first consul for life. Then, the objects of peace having been accomplished, Napoleon was again anxious for war. His aggressions in Europe soon led to the resumption of hostilities with Britain, and he seized Hanover and prepared for the policy of aggression which he was to adopt towards Prussia. In 1804 he declared himself 'Emperor of the French'. His gigantic preparations for the invasion of England were finally abandoned after the battle of Trafalgar (1805), but his policy of aggression had made possible another coalition, and having struck his camp at Boulogne, just before Trafalgar, he was soon to shake Europe by his land victories against Austria and Prussia. Violating the neutrality of Prussia, he overwhelmed the Austrians at Ulm and marched into Vienna (1805). The Austrians and Russians, impatient of delay, and not waiting for reinforcements from their Prussian allies, were struck down at Austerlitz (1805). These two blows established the empire of Napoleon, overthrew the ancient Holy Roman Empire, and established the Confederacy of the Rhine under Napoleonic influence. Peace negotiations were broached but failed. Prussia, stung by its contemptuous treatment by Napoleon, appealed to arms, but was crushed and disheartened by the terrible blows of Jena and Auerstadt. Again at Eylau (February 1807) and at Friedland in the same year, he routed the combined Prussians and Russians, and the Tsar Alexander was compelled to sign the Peace of Tilsit. Prussia was broken and dismembered.

The continental system by which Napoleon sought to conquer Britain was now in full force. He had reached the height of his power. Thereafter the progress of his decline is to be traced in three facts: first, the attempted annexation of Spain; secondly, the invasion of Russia; thirdly, the rising of the powers of Germany against him. In 1808 he compelled the Spanish king to abdicate and placed his brother, Joseph, on the Spanish throne. This led to war with Spain, a war in which the national spirit of the Spaniards was aided by the arms of Britain, and which for the rest of the period occupied a fair proportion of the French troops. The defeat and capitulation of Dupont at Baylen and of Junot at Cintra mark the beginning of the end of Napoleon's ascendancy. But he was yet to win many remarkable victories. The Austrians were defeated at Ratisbon and then at Wagram, and in 1809 peace was again signed, but the fact that the terms were prejudicial to Russia sowed the seeds of further trouble.

In 1810 Napoleon divorced Joséphine, who had given him no heir for his empire, and married the Archduchess Marie Louise of Austria, and a son was born in the following year, to whom the title of 'King of Rome' was given. The economic difficulties caused by Napoleon's attempt to exclude British goods from Europe still exasperated Russia, and in 1812 Napoleon decided to invade that country. His army reached Vilna. He hesitated and then went on. He defeated the Russians at Smolensk; again he hesitated, yet again he went on, and reached Moscow, where he stayed until October, the city being in the meantime burned by the Russians. It was then that he resolved to retreat from Moscow, and although the retreat was indeed carried out, five-sixths of the army he had taken with him perished. The next move was a virtual coalition of all nations against him; Russia and Prussia, then most of the German states, and finally Austria were in alliance. The allies, with troops numbering 500,000 men, now turned to face Napoleon, the morale of whose army was by this time low. The allies held their own, now inflicting a defeat, now sustaining one, until the great contest at Leipzig, which crushed Napoleon and drove him back across the Rhine. The Rhine Confederacy was dissolved. The negotiations for peace which were opened almost immediately after this failed, and the allies invaded France. In these circumstances Napoleon surrendered and, after attempting useless negotiations, abdicated (1814).

He retired to Elba, being given the sovereignty of that island, and the Bourbons, in the person of Louis XVIII were restored to the throne of France. But Napoleon still had great appeal in France. Early in 1815 he escaped from Elba and landed in France. He was enthusiastically received and the Bourbons fled. Europe declared war against him, but only Prussia and Britain were ready to meet him, and their combined forces were victorious at Waterloo. Napoleon then fled to Paris, where for the second time he abdicated. On 15 July he surrendered to Captain Maitland of the Bellerophon at Rochefort. He was sent in October 1815 to St Helena, where he spent the rest of his life in exile, dying there on 5 May 1821, probably of cancer of the stomach.

The period of Napoleon's stay in St Helena is of great interest, for during it were laid the foundations of a Napoleonic legend, on which Napoleon III was to raise himself to the throne. Napoleon's intellectual brilliance and military genius are undisputed. He was at heart a cynic - cynical of mankind, cynical of religion - and his ruthlessness extended to the most personal details of his life. His career ultimately weakened France: yet today it is his military glories and administrative reforms which are remembered, and the final defeats and the resultant chaos tend to be pushed into the background. Even during his lifetime, when he was dying on St Helena, the Napoleonic legend took root and flourished. It was to weaken France for the next half-century; for many whom the reaction of the restoration antagonised turned to the mirage of Napoleon the liberator, and gave their support to his nephew, Louis Napoleon (Napoleon III), who was clear-sighted enough to see its tremendous value and to adopt the legend himself. Before him it had influenced the young Duke of Reichstadt, son of Napoleon and Marie Louise, passing his adolescent years in the Austrian court. During his short life there were endless Bonaparte conspiracies centred around his person, and Metternich considered him, with justification, a standing menace to European peace.

© JM Dent/Historybookshop.com

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