Napoleon Bonaparte - The Great Commander (from the series “Great People”).

“My policy is to control people, because the majority of them want to be controlled. I believe this is the only way to become a popular ruler." This statement by Napoleon is very significant: he was both the last of the enlightened despots of the 18th century, and the first of the totalitarian rulers of modern Europe. His intellectual baggage consisted of educational cliches about “reason,” “progress,” and the damned legacy of the past. He understood that reputation was deeply educated person can bring political dividends, which is why Napoleon was accompanied on his military campaigns by a mobile library on a gun carriage.

His own images were always important to Napoleon, and his patronage of the artists David and Ingres bore fruit in the form of propaganda portraits that glorified in a stylized form this ruler, who loved power as no one in Europe since the time of Louis XIV. “People,” he said, “love trinkets.” That is why he established the Order of the Legion of Honor and generously distributed its insignia.

Napoleon was born in Corsica, which partly explains his attitude towards the French and the ease with which he sacrificed soldiers (total military casualties amounted to about 1.4 million) throughout the 17 years of war. “In one night the Parisian brothels will make up for them,” he once said after the battle, in which the losses were especially great. However, as a public politician, he identified himself with the new French nationalism, when first the Republic and then the Napoleonic Empire defended themselves against enemies. Napoleon led an army, recruited by conscription, but one that was in awe of him, (“little corporal”), as the soldiers admiringly called him, and completely identified itself with the cause (of the fatherland).

Napoleon was convinced that the French were tired of revolutionary unrest, but needed the legacy of 1789. Therefore, the coup he organized on November 9, 1799, ended French democracy, while ensuring the rejection of feudalism, the sale of church lands, the equality of all before the law and rational management system. His regime could hardly be considered terrorist, and the total number of political prisoners did not exceed 2.5 thousand people. As long as the former royalists or revolutionaries submitted to the new regime, they had no problems. Napoleon knew his people and their weakness for " strong personality"at the top. His subjects allowed him to become the latest in a long line of French rulers who sought personal glory by expanding their national borders. The difference between Napoleon and his predecessors was, however, that he pursued his goals more successfully.

If he had been born a few years earlier, Napoleone di might not have become a Frenchman, since Corsica was transferred from Genoa to France only in 1768. The cynical ability to take advantage of any situation may well have been associated with the circumstances of his birth. The son of an impoverished nobleman, he was sent to a cadet school in Brienne, where the intelligent, lonely youth excelled in mathematics and sometimes in fights. He then entered the elite Royal Cadet School in Paris, where he studied artillery science; deep knowledge of artillery will always be the main feature of his military genius.

First successes and glory

Fame came to him early when Napoleon led a successful attack on the British and royalists who had laid siege to the city of Toulon in 1793. The Directory, the political clique that ruled France from 1795 to 1799, gave him monetary reward when he suppressed the uprising in Paris with remarkable cruelty in the autumn of 1795. Along with money and fame came success in amorous affairs: Napoleon became first the lover and then the husband of Josephine de Beauharnais, the former mistress of Barras, the main figure of the Directory regime. Italian campaign 1796-1797 brought him onto the European stage and brought military victories over the Austrians in Lombardy and over the army of the Papal State. By this time, the main part of Northern Italy, the Rhineland and the Netherlands were under French control.

Many of Napoleon's ordinary soldiers were confident that he remembered their names, which formed the basis of the magnetism and strength of his personality as a commander. However, equally important was the skill with which Napoleon used intelligence and counterintelligence, flooding enemy camps with spies. In Italy, Napoleon demonstrated his talent as a journalist-propagandist: he published two newspapers for distribution among his troops and partly in France, and published a third in Paris. All these publications created his reputation as a man of the future, while the Directory was drowning in corruption and mediocrity.

The Egyptian campaign of 1798-1799, the purpose of which was to cut off the trade routes between England and India passing through this provincial province of the Ottoman Empire, showed Napoleon as a patron of science. In his Egyptian expedition he included several scientists whose research on antiquities, subsequently published, laid the foundation for modern Egyptology. The kings of France patronized learning, and Napoleon decided to follow them.

Board of the First Consul

Upon his return from Egypt, Napoleon organized a coup that made him first consul. This title owes its appearance to the idealization of Roman republican values common among French revolutionaries. However, Napoleon gave France a system of government that, in its efficiency and organization, surpassed any successes of revolutionary leaders. Reforms in taxation, transportation, secondary education and banking bore the imprint of his military approach, transforming chaos into centralized order. He organized France in the same way as he organized his army. Napoleon had neither the time nor the desire to enter into the boring agreements and cabinet intrigues characteristic of civilian politicians, so he simply refused to engage in such matters.

The Napoleonic Code, a set of civil laws drawn up by jurists and approved by the ruler, had an impact not only on France, but on all countries affected by the revolution and its consequences. Other Napoleonic codes reformed criminal and commercial laws, and the division of France into regional departments headed by prefects who carried out orders from Paris became an essential part of Napoleon's legacy.

Victory over the Austrians at Marengo (1800) provided a brief respite from the war during the Peace of Amiens (1802-1803), and Napoleon began to think about how to ensure dynastic continuity. Proclaimed Emperor of the French on May 18, 1804, he was crowned in Paris on December 2 in the presence of an accommodating Pope. The second coronation, which took place on May 26, 1805 in Milan, made him King of Italy.

The renewal of the war brought Napoleon victories at Austerlitz, Jena and Friedland and led to the creation of a French empire stretching from the Baltic to the Adriatic and satellite states in Germany, Warsaw and Italy. Another achievement was the founding of a dynasty: Napoleon placed his brothers on several new thrones. Jerome became King of Westphalia in North-West Germany, Louis became King of Holland, and Joseph first became King of Naples and Sicily before being transferred to the Spanish throne.

The fate of Napoleon's sister Eliza, whom her brother made Duchess of Lucca, turned out to be surprisingly successful. She became a good ruler, doubling silk production in three years and opening marble quarries in Carrara. Meanwhile, another sister, Pauline, married Prince Camillo Borghese and shocked Roman society by posing nude for the sculptor Canova's Venus. Perhaps this marble sculpture, depicting Pauline's beautiful body, is the most significant legacy left from the dynastic adventurism of that time.

Napoleon's mother Letitia left Corsica in 1793 and took refuge in the new Parisian court, where she received the title of Her Imperial Highness and became known as "Madame Mire de l" "Empereur". “If only this could last longer,” she is said to have said in her rough Corsican French as she watched her family’s meteoric rise.

Napoleon on the defensive

Economic factors, foreign nationalism, and British naval power crushed the Napoleonic dynasty. On the periphery of Europe there were two powers, Russia and Britain. Napoleon was ready to negotiate with Russia, but in no case with Britain, which for him was Carthage in relation to his Rome and a greedy trading power. The abandonment of the plan to invade Britain, which had been imprudently paid for by the sale of the French colony of Louisiana, infuriated him even more. Having taken over the shaky French economy, Napoleon tried to revive it from 1806, for which he introduced protectionist measures and forced the Napoleonic empire to import goods from France.

This "continental blockade" was another example of Napoleon's imperial strategy, which inevitably included bleeding the vanquished to death. Thus, Austria had to pay 125 million francs, Saxony 25 million, and Prussia was obliged to pay all tax revenues for sixteen years. On the contrary, the British Empire, instead of the senseless bloody wars that made up Napoleonic “glory,” made full use of its trading opportunities.

By overthrowing the Bourbon dynasty in 1808, the emperor provoked a powerful wave of Spanish nationalism and was forced to go on the defensive. Napoleon attempted to occupy Spain, a country inhabited, he believed, by superstitious peasants, but the Spaniards put up fierce guerrilla resistance. Russia, which concluded a peace treaty with Napoleon in 1807, tied itself to the selfish French economy within the framework of the “continental blockade” system, for which it paid with the invasion of 1812. When retreating from Moscow, Napoleon lost about half a million soldiers and a significant part of his cavalry.

Glorious defeat and exile

The fall of Paris to the Allies on March 31, 1814; Napoleon's exile on the island of Elba and subsequent escape to mainland France; The "hundred days" of spirited upsurge, ending with final defeat by British and Prussian forces at the Battle of Waterloo, and finally exile to St. Helena for eternity, all provided the basis for posthumous Napoleonic mythology.

The fate of the emperor was a source of inspiration for such romantic writers as Victor Hugo, who sang of glorious defeat and nobility broken by fate. Ideas of this kind will have a significant political impact on the subsequent history of France. Napoleon also proved to be the inspiration for future dictators. His technocrat nephew Napoleon III continued the family tradition and in 1852 carried out a coup that made him emperor. He was present at the reburial of his uncle's remains, placed in a richly decorated sarcophagus, in the Invalides on April 2, 1861. And in December 1940, after the fall of France, Adolf Hitler ordered the transfer of the remains of Napoleon II (1811 -1832), the emperor's son from the second marriage with Archduchess Maria Louise of Austria, whom he proclaimed King of Rome, from Vienna to Paris and bury next to his father’s tomb.

Napoleon I Bonaparte (cor. Napulione Buonaparte, Italian. Napoleone Buonaparte, French. Napoleon Bonaparte). Born 15 August 1769, Ajaccio, Corsica - died 5 May 1821, Longwood, St Helena. Emperor of the French in 1804-1815, a great commander and statesman who laid the foundations of the modern French state.

Napoleon was born in Ajaccio on the island of Corsica, which for a long time was under the control of the Genoese Republic.

In 1755, Corsica overthrew Genoese rule and from that time on virtually existed as an independent state under the leadership of the local landowner Pasquale Paoli, whose close assistant was Napoleon's father.

In 1768, the Republic of Genoa transferred its rights to Corsica to the French king Louis XV for 40 million francs.

In May 1769, at the Battle of Ponte Nuovo, French troops defeated the Corsican rebels. Paoli and 340 of his companions emigrated to England. Napoleon's parents remained in Corsica; he himself was born 3 months after these events. Paoli remained his idol until the 1790s.

The Buonaparte family belonged to minor aristocrats; Napoleon's ancestors came from Florence and lived in Corsica since 1529.

Carlo Buonaparte, Napoleon's father, served as assessor and had an annual income of 22.5 thousand francs, which he tried to increase through litigation with neighbors over property.

Napoleon's mother, Letizia Ramolino, was an attractive and strong-willed woman, but lacking any education. Her marriage to Carlo was arranged by their parents. As the daughter of the former governor of Ajaccio, Letizia brought with her a dowry of 175 thousand francs.

Napoleon was the second of 13 children, five of whom died at an early age. In addition to Napoleon himself, 4 of his brothers and 3 sisters survived to adulthood:

Joseph Bonaparte (1768-1844)
Lucien Bonaparte (1775-1840)
Eliza Bonaparte (1777-1820)
Louis Bonaparte (1778-1846)
Pauline Bonaparte (1780-1825)
Caroline Bonaparte (1782-1839)
Jerome Bonaparte (1784-1860)

The name that Napoleon's parents gave him was quite rare: it appears in Machiavelli's book on the history of Florence, and it was also the name of one of his great-uncles.

ABOUT early childhood Little is known about Napoleon. As a child, he suffered from a dry cough that could have been bouts of tuberculosis. According to his mother and older brother Joseph, Napoleon read a lot, especially historical literature. He found himself a small room on the third floor of the house and rarely came down from there, missing family meals. Napoleon subsequently claimed that he first read Rousseau's La Nouvelle Heloise at the age of nine. However, his childhood nickname “Balamut” (Italian: “Rabulione”) does not fit well with this image of a frail introvert.

Napoleon's native language was the Corsican dialect of Italian. He learned to read and write Italian in elementary school and began to learn French only when he was almost ten years old. All his life he spoke with a strong Italian accent.

Thanks to cooperation with the French and the patronage of the governor of Corsica, Count de Marbeuf, Carlo Buonaparte managed to obtain royal scholarships for his two eldest sons, Joseph and Napoleon.

In 1777, Carlo was elected deputy to Paris from the Corsican nobility.

In December 1778, going to Versailles, he took with him both his sons and his brother-in-law Fesch, who had achieved a scholarship to the Aix seminary. The boys were placed at a college in Autun for four months, mainly for the purpose of learning French.

In May 1779, Napoleon entered the cadet school (college) in Brienne-le-Chateau. Napoleon had no friends at college, since he came from a not very rich and noble family, and besides, he was a Corsican with pronounced patriotism for his native island and hostility towards the French as the enslavers of Corsica. The bullying of some classmates forced him to withdraw into himself and devote more time to reading. He read Corneille, Racine and Voltaire, his favorite poet was Ossian.

Napoleon was especially fond of mathematics and history; he was fascinated by antiquity and such historical figures as Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar.

Napoleon achieved particular success in mathematics, history and geography; on the contrary, he was weak in Latin and German. In addition, he made quite a lot of mistakes when writing, but his style became much better thanks to his love of reading. The conflict with some teachers even made him popular among his peers and gradually he became their informal leader.

While still in Brienne, Napoleon decided to specialize in artillery. His mathematical talents were in demand in this branch of the military, and here there were the greatest opportunities for a career, regardless of origin. Having passed the final exams, in October 1784 Napoleon was admitted to the Paris Military School. There he studied mathematics, natural sciences, horse riding, military technology, tactics, including becoming acquainted with the innovative works of Guibert and Gribeauval. As before, he shocked teachers with his admiration for Paoli, Corsica, and hostility towards France. He studied excellently during this period, read a lot, making extensive notes.

In total, Napoleon was not in Corsica for almost eight years. Studying in France made him a Frenchman - he moved here at an early age and spent many years here, France was culturally superior to the rest of Europe at the time and the French identity was very attractive.

In 1782, Napoleon's father received a concession and a royal grant of 137.5 thousand francs to create a nursery (fr. pépinière) of mulberry trees. Three years later, the Corsica parliament revoked the concession, allegedly due to non-fulfillment of its terms. At the same time, the Bonapartes were left with large debts and an obligation to repay the grant.

On February 24, 1785, his father died, and Napoleon took over the role of head of the family, although according to the rules his older brother Joseph should have done so. On September 1 of the same year, he completed his education ahead of schedule and began his professional career in the de La Fère artillery regiment in Valence with the rank of second lieutenant of artillery, a rank that was finally confirmed on January 10, 1786.

The expenses and litigation over the nursery completely upset the Bonapartes' financial affairs. In September 1786, Napoleon requested leave with pay, which was then extended twice at his request. During his vacation, Napoleon tried to settle family affairs, including traveling to Paris. In June 1788, he returned to military service and went to Osong, where his regiment was transferred. To help his mother, he had to send her part of his salary. He lived extremely poorly, ate once a day, but tried not to show his depressing financial situation.

According to Russian sources, in 1789 Napoleon tried to enter Russian service. However, shortly before submitting his petition, a decree was issued to accept foreigners into service of a lower rank, to which Napoleon did not agree. French sources deny this story.

Although Napoleon was involved in suppressing revolts, he was one of the early supporters of the Society of Friends of the Constitution. In Ajaccio, his brother Lucien joined the Jacobin club. In August 1789, having again received sick leave, Bonaparte went to his homeland, where he stayed for the next eighteen months and actively participated with his brothers in the local political struggle on the side of the revolutionary forces. Napoleon and Salicetti, a member of the Constituent Assembly, supported the transformation of Corsica into a department of France. Paoli, seeing this as a consolidation of the power of Paris, protested from exile. In July 1790, Paoli returned to the island and led the way for separation from France. The Bonapartes, on the contrary, remained loyal to the central revolutionary authorities, approving the unpopular nationalization of church property in Corsica.

In February 1791, Napoleon returned to service, taking with him his younger brother Louis (for whose studies he paid from his salary, Louis had to sleep on the floor). In June 1791 he was promoted to lieutenant and transferred back to Valence. In August of the same year, he again received leave to Corsica (for four months, with the condition that if he did not return before January 10, 1792, he would be considered a deserter).

Arriving in Corsica, Napoleon again plunged into politics and was elected lieutenant colonel in the emerging National Guard. He never returned to Valence. Having entered into conflict with Paoli, in May 1792 he left for Paris at the disposal of the War Ministry. In June he received the rank of captain (although Napoleon insisted that he be confirmed with the rank of lieutenant colonel received in the National Guard). From the moment he entered service in September 1785 until September 1792, Napoleon spent a total of about four years on leave. In Paris, Napoleon witnessed the events of June 20, August 10 and September 2, and supported the overthrow of the king, but spoke disapprovingly of his weakness and the indecisiveness of his defenders.

In October 1792, Napoleon returned to Corsica to his duties as lieutenant colonel of the National Guard. Bonaparte's first combat experience was participation in an expedition to the islands of Maddalena and San Stefano, belonging to the Kingdom of Sardinia, in February 1793.

The landing force landed from Corsica was quickly defeated, but Captain Buonaparte, who commanded a small artillery battery of two cannons and a mortar, distinguished himself: he made every effort to save the guns, but they still had to be abandoned on the shore.

In the same 1793, Paoli was accused before the Convention of seeking to achieve the independence of Corsica from Republican France.

Napoleon's brother Lucien was involved in the accusations. As a result, there was a final break between the Bonaparte and Paoli families. The Bonapartes openly opposed Paoli's course on complete independence Corsica and, due to the threat of political persecution, in June 1793 the whole family moved to France. That same month, Paoli recognized George III as King of Corsica.

Napoleon was assigned to the revolutionary Italian Army, then to the Army of the South. At the end of July he wrote a pamphlet in the Jacobin spirit, “Dinner at Beaucaire”(French “Le Souper de Beaucaire”), which was published with the help of the Commissars of the Convention Salichetti and the younger Robespierre and created the author’s reputation as a revolutionary-minded soldier.

In September 1793, Bonaparte arrived in the army besieging Toulon, occupied by the British and royalists, and in October received the post of battalion commander (corresponding to the rank of major). Finally, appointed chief of artillery, in December he carried out a brilliant military operation. Toulon was taken, and at the age of 24 he himself received the rank of brigadier general from the commissioners of the Convention - something between the ranks of colonel and major general. The new rank was assigned to him on December 22, 1793, and in February 1794 it was approved by the Convention.

Having received an appointment to the post of chief artilleryman of the Italian army on February 7, Napoleon participated in a five-week campaign against the kingdom of Piedmont, became acquainted with the command of the Italian army and the theater of operations, and sent proposals to the War Ministry for organizing an offensive in Italy. At the beginning of May, Napoleon returned to Nice and Antibes to prepare a military expedition to Corsica. At the same time, he began to court Desiree Clary, the sixteen-year-old daughter of the late millionaire, a fabric and soap merchant. In August 1794, Désirée's older sister married Joseph Bonaparte, bringing with her a dowry of 400 thousand francs (which finally put an end to the financial problems of the Bonaparte family).

After the Thermidorian coup, Bonaparte was arrested due to his connections with the younger Robespierre (August 10, 1794, for two weeks). After liberation, he continued preparations for the reconquest of Corsica from Paoli and the British. On March 3, 1795, Napoleon set sail from Marseille with 15 ships and 16,900 soldiers, but his expedition was soon dispersed by a British squadron.

In the spring of the same year, he was assigned to the Vendée to pacify the rebels.

Arriving in Paris on May 25, Napoleon learned that he had been appointed to command the infantry, while he was an artilleryman. Bonaparte refused to accept the appointment, citing health reasons. In June, Desiree ended her relationship with him, according to E. Roberts, under the influence of her mother, who believed that one Bonaparte in the family was enough. Being on half pay, Napoleon continues to write letters to War Minister Carnot regarding the actions of the Italian army. In the absence of any prospects, he even considered the possibility of entering the service of East India Company.

In August 1795, the War Department required him to undergo a medical examination to confirm the illness. Turning to his political connections, Napoleon received a position in the topographical department of the Committee of Public Safety, which at that time played the role of the headquarters of the French army.

At a critical moment for the Thermidorians, Napoleon was appointed by Barras as his assistant and distinguished himself during the dispersal of the royalist rebellion in Paris on October 5, 1795 (Napoleon used cannons against the rebels on the streets of the capital), was promoted to the rank of division general and appointed commander of the rear forces. Released in 1785 from the Paris Military School into the army with the rank of junior lieutenant, Bonaparte in 10 years went through the entire hierarchy of ranks in the army of what was then France.

At 10 pm on March 9, 1796, Bonaparte had a civil marriage with the widow of General Count Beauharnais, executed during the Jacobin terror, Josephine, the former mistress of one of the then rulers of France, Barras. The witnesses at the wedding were Barras, Napoleon's adjutant Lemarois, husband and wife Tallien and the bride's children - Eugene and Hortensia. The groom was two hours late for the wedding, being very busy with a new appointment. Some consider Barras's wedding gift to the young general position of commander of the Italian army Republic (the appointment took place on March 2, 1796), but Carnot proposed Bonaparte for this position.

Italian campaign

Having taken command of the army, Bonaparte found it in the most pitiful financial situation. Salaries were not paid, ammunition and supplies were almost never delivered. Napoleon managed to partially remove these problems, but he understood that to completely solve them he needed to move to enemy territory and organize supplies for the army at its expense.

He based his operational plan on speed of action and on the concentration of forces against enemies who adhered to a cordon strategy and disproportionately stretched their troops. Napoleon himself, by contrast, followed a strategy of "central position", in which his divisions were within a day's march of each other. Being inferior to the allies in numbers, he concentrated his troops for decisive battles and gained a numerical superiority in them. With a quick offensive during the Montenotte campaign in April 1796, he managed to separate the troops of the Sardinian General Colli and the Austrian General Beaulieu and defeat them.

The Sardinian king, frightened by the successes of the French, concluded a truce with them on April 28, which gave Bonaparte several cities and free passage across the Po River. On May 7, he crossed this river, and by the end of May he cleared almost all of Northern Italy from the Austrians. The Dukes of Parma and Modena were forced to conclude a truce, bought with a significant amount of money; A huge indemnity of 20 million francs was also taken from Milan. The pope's possessions were overrun by French troops; he had to pay 21 million francs in indemnity and provide the French with a significant number of works of art. Only the fortress of Mantua and the citadel of Milan remained in the hands of the Austrians. Mantua was besieged on June 3. On June 29, the Milan Citadel fell.

Wurmser's new Austrian army, which arrived from Tyrol, could not improve the situation; after a series of failures, Wurmser himself, with part of his forces, was forced to lock himself in Mantua, which he had previously tried in vain to liberate from the siege. In November, new troops were sent to Italy under the command of Alvintsi and Davidovich. As a result of the battles at Arcola on November 15-17, Alvintsi was forced to retreat. Napoleon showed personal heroism by leading one of the attacks on the Arcole Bridge with a banner in his hands. His adjutant Muiron died, shielding him with his body from enemy bullets.

After the Battle of Rivoli on January 14 - 15, 1797, the Austrians were finally pushed out of Italy, suffering huge losses. The situation in Mantua, where widespread disease and famine were raging, became desperate; on February 2, Wurmser capitulated. On February 17, Bonaparte marched on Vienna.

The weakened and frustrated Austrian troops could no longer offer him stubborn resistance. By the beginning of April, the French were only 100 kilometers from the Austrian capital, but the forces of the Italian army were also running out. On April 7, a truce was concluded, and on April 18, peace negotiations began in Leoben.

Egyptian campaign

As a result of the Italian campaign, Napoleon gained great popularity in France. On December 25, 1797, he was elected a member of the Institute in the class of physics and mathematics, section of mechanics.

On January 10, 1798, the Directory appointed him commander of the English army. It was planned that Napoleon would organize an expeditionary force to land on the British Isles. However, after several weeks of inspecting the invasion force and analyzing the situation, Napoleon recognized the landing as impracticable and put forward a plan to conquer Egypt, which he saw as an important outpost in the attack on British positions in India. On March 5, Napoleon received carte blanche to organize an expedition. Remembering that Alexander the Great was accompanied by scientists on his eastern campaigns, Napoleon took with him 167 geographers, botanists, chemists and representatives of other sciences (31 of them were members of the Institute).

A significant problem was the Royal British Navy, whose squadron under the command of Nelson entered the Mediterranean Sea. The expeditionary force (35 thousand people) secretly left Toulon on May 19, 1798 and, avoiding a meeting with Nelson, crossed the Mediterranean Sea in six weeks.

Napoleon's first target was Malta, the seat of the Order of Malta. After the capture of Malta in June 1798, Napoleon left a garrison of four thousand on the island and moved with the fleet further to Egypt.

On July 1, Napoleon's troops began landing near Alexandria, and the very next day the city was captured. The army marched on Cairo. On July 21, French troops met with the army assembled by the Mameluke leaders Murad Bey and Ibrahim Bey, and the Battle of the Pyramids took place. Thanks to their enormous advantage in tactics and military training, the French completely defeated the Mameluke troops with minor losses.

On July 25, from the accidentally dropped words of his adjutant, Bonaparte learned what had long been gossiped about in Parisian society - that Josephine was unfaithful to him. The news shocked Napoleon. “From that moment on, idealism left his life, and in subsequent years his selfishness, suspicion and egocentric ambition became even more noticeable. All of Europe was destined to feel the destruction of Bonaparte’s family happiness.”

On August 1, the British squadron under the command of Nelson, after two months of searching in the vastness of the Mediterranean Sea, finally overtook the French fleet in the Gulf of Abukir. As a result of the battle, the French lost almost all of their ships (including the flagship Orient, which carried 60 million francs of Maltese indemnity), and the survivors had to return to France. Napoleon found himself cut off in Egypt, and the British gained control of the Mediterranean Sea.

On August 22, 1798, Napoleon signed a decree establishing the Institute of Egypt, consisting of 36 people. One of the results of the Institute’s work was the monumental “Description of Egypt,” which created the preconditions for modern Egyptology. The Rosetta Stone, discovered during the expedition, opened up the possibility of deciphering ancient Egyptian writing.

After the capture of Cairo, Napoleon sent a detachment of 3 thousand people under the leadership of Dese and Davout to conquer Upper Egypt, and in the meantime he began active and largely successful measures to subjugate the country and attract the sympathy of influential sections of the local population. Napoleon tried to find mutual understanding with the Islamic clergy, but nevertheless, on the night of October 21, an uprising broke out against the French in Cairo: about 300 French were killed, more than 2,500 rebels were killed during the suppression of the uprising and executed after its completion. By the end of November, calm had established itself in Cairo; opening an amusement park on November 30, Napoleon met Pauline Fouret, the twenty-year-old wife of an officer, whom Napoleon immediately sent on an errand to France.

He took Giza and Jaffa by storm, but was unable to capture Acre, which was supplied from the sea by the British fleet. On May 20, 1799, the retreat began. Napoleon was still able to defeat the Turks, who were stationed near Aboukir (July 25), but realized that he was trapped. On August 23, he secretly sailed to France on the frigate Muiron, throwing his army at General Kleber.

Consulate

The crisis of power in Paris reached its climax by 1799, when Bonaparte was with troops in Egypt.

The European monarchies formed a second coalition against Republican France. The Directory could not ensure the stability of the republic within the framework of the norms of the current constitution and resorted to open dictatorship, increasingly relying on the army. In Italy, Russian-Austrian troops under the command of Field Marshal Suvorov liquidated all Napoleon's acquisitions, and there was even a threat of their invasion of France. In conditions of crisis, emergency measures were taken, reminiscent of the times of terror of 1793.

To prevent the “Jacobin” threat and give greater stability to the regime, a conspiracy was formed, which even included the directors Sieyès and Ducos themselves. The conspirators were looking for a “saber” and turned to Bonaparte as a person who suited them in terms of his popularity and military reputation. Napoleon, on the one hand, did not want to be compromised (contrary to his custom, he wrote almost no letters these days and wore the uniform of the Institute, rather than a general’s uniform, to public events); on the other hand, he actively participated in the preparation of the coup.

Sieyès and Ducos immediately resigned, and Barras did the same (under pressure and thanks to a bribe), thereby ending the powers of the Directory and creating a vacuum of executive power. However, the Council of Five Hundred, which met on November 10, in which there was a strong influence of the Jacobins, refused to approve the required decree. Its members attacked Bonaparte with threats, who entered the meeting room with weapons and without an invitation. Then at Lucien's call, former chairman Council of Five Hundred, soldiers under the command of Murat burst into the hall and dispersed the meeting. That same evening, it was possible to gather the remnants of the Council (approximately 50 people) and “adopt” the necessary decrees on the establishment of a temporary consulate and a commission to develop a new constitution.

Under Bonaparte's merciless pressure, her project was developed in less than seven weeks. Bonaparte held discussions until late at night in order to break his opponents with fatigue.

In these few weeks, Bonaparte was able to subjugate many of those who had previously supported Sieyès and introduce fundamental amendments to his draft constitution. Sieyès, having received 350 thousand francs and real estate in Versailles and Paris, did not object. According to the project, legislative power was divided between the State Council, the Tribunate, the Legislative Corps and the Senate, which made it helpless and clumsy. The executive power, on the contrary, was gathered into one fist by the first consul, that is, Bonaparte, appointed for ten years. The second and third consuls (Cambaceres and Lebrun) had only advisory votes.

The Constitution was promulgated on December 13, 1799 and approved by the people in a plebiscite in the VIII year of the Republic (according to official data, about 3 million votes against 1.5 thousand, in reality the constitution was supported by about 1.55 million people, the remaining votes were falsified).

At the Battle of Marengo on June 14, 1800, Napoleon initially succumbed to pressure from the Austrians under the command of Melas, but a counterattack by Dese, who arrived in time, allowed the situation to be corrected (Dese himself was killed). The victory at Marengo made it possible to begin negotiations for peace in Leoben, but it took Moreau's victory at Hohenlinden on December 3, 1800 for the threat to the French borders to be finally eliminated.

Napoleon's administrative and legal innovations laid the foundation for the modern state, many of which are still in effect today. Having become a full-fledged dictator, Napoleon radically changed the country's government; carried out an administrative reform, establishing the institution of department prefects and sub-prefects of districts accountable to the government (1800). Mayors were appointed to cities and villages.

The French Bank was established (1800) to store gold reserves and issue money (this function was transferred to it in 1803).

Until 1936, no major changes were made to the management system of the French Bank, created by Napoleon: the manager and his deputies were appointed by the government, and decisions were made jointly with 15 board members from the shareholders - this ensured a balance between public and private interests.

Fully aware of the importance of influencing public opinion, Napoleon closed 60 of 73 Parisian newspapers and brought the rest under government control.

A powerful police force was created, led by Fouche, and an extensive secret service, headed by Savary.

There was a gradual return to monarchical forms of government. The “you” address, adopted during the years of the revolution, has disappeared from everyday life. Liveries, official ceremonies, palace hunts, and masses in Saint-Cloud returned. Instead of the personalized weapons awarded during the years of the revolution, Napoleon introduced a hierarchically organized Order of the Legion of Honor (May 19, 1802). But while attacking the “left” opposition, Bonaparte, at the same time, sought to preserve the gains of the revolution.

Napoleon concluded a concordat with the Pope (1801). Rome recognized the new French government, and Catholicism was declared the religion of the majority of the French. At the same time, freedom of religion was preserved. The appointment of bishops and the activities of the church were made dependent on the government. These and other measures forced Napoleon’s opponents “on the left” to declare him a traitor to the Revolution, although he considered himself a faithful successor of its ideas. Napoleon feared the Jacobins more than the royalist conspirators because of their ideology, knowledge of the mechanisms of power and excellent organization. When the “infernal machine” exploded on December 24, 1800, on the Rue Saint-Nicèse, along which Napoleon was traveling to the Opera, he used this assassination attempt as a pretext for reprisals against the Jacobins, although Fouché provided him with evidence of the royalists’ guilt.

Napoleon managed to consolidate the main revolutionary gains (the right to property, equality before the law, equality of opportunity), ending revolutionary anarchy. In the minds of the French, prosperity and stability were increasingly linked to his presence at the helm of state, which contributed to next step Bonaparte to strengthen personal power - the transition to a lifelong consulate.

In 1802, Napoleon, based on the results of the plebiscite, held a senatus consultation through the Senate on the life of his powers (August 2, 1802). The First Consul received the right to present his successor to the Senate, which brought him closer to restoring the hereditary principle. On April 7, 1803, paper money was abolished; the monetary unit became the franc, equal to a five-gram silver coin and divided into 100 centimes; The metal franc established by Napoleon was in circulation until 1928.

Napoleon's domestic policy consisted of strengthening his personal power as a guarantee of preserving the results of the revolution: civil rights, land ownership rights of peasants, as well as those who bought national property during the revolution, that is, confiscated lands of emigrants and churches. The Civil Code (ratified on March 21, 1804), which went down in history as the “Napoleonic Code,” was supposed to ensure all these conquests.

After the discovery of the Cadoudal-Pichegru plot (the so-called “conspiracy of the year XII”), in which the princes of the royal house of Bourbon outside France were supposed to participate, Napoleon ordered the capture of one of them, the Duke of Enghien in Ettenheim, not far from the French border. The Duke was taken to Paris and executed by military court on March 21, 1804. The XII conspiracy caused indignation in French society and was used by the official press to instill in readers the idea of the need for the hereditary power of the First Consul.

First Empire

On Floreal 28 (May 18, 1804), by resolution of the Senate (the so-called Senate Consultation of the XII year), a new constitution was adopted, according to which Napoleon was proclaimed Emperor of the French, the positions of the highest dignitaries and great officers of the Empire were introduced, including the restoration of the marshal rank, abolished in the years revolution.

On May 19, 1804, eighteen popular generals were appointed marshals of France, four of them being considered honorary and the rest valid.

In November, the Senate Consultation was ratified following a plebiscite. As a result of the plebiscite and despite the resistance of the State Council, it was decided to revive the tradition of coronation. Napoleon certainly wanted the Pope to participate in the ceremony. The latter demanded that Napoleon marry Josephine according to church rites. On the night of December 2, Cardinal Fesch performed the wedding ceremony in the presence of Talleyrand, Berthier and Duroc.

On December 2, 1804, during a magnificent ceremony held in Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris with the participation of the pope, Napoleon crowned himself Emperor of the French.

The coronation brought to light the hitherto hidden hostility between the Bonaparte families (Napoleon's brothers and sisters) and Beauharnais (Josephine and her children). Napoleon's sisters did not want to carry Josephine's train. Madame Mother refused to come to the coronation at all. In quarrels, Napoleon took the side of his wife and stepchildren, but remained generous towards his brothers and sisters (however, constantly expressing dissatisfaction with them and the fact that they did not live up to his hopes).

On March 17, 1805, the Kingdom of Italy was created from the “daughter” Italian Republic, in which Napoleon was president. In the newly formed kingdom, Napoleon received the title of king, and his stepson Eugene Beauharnais received the title of viceroy.

The decision to crown Napoleon with the Iron Crown did a disservice to French diplomacy, as it aroused the hostility of Austria and contributed to its joining the newly formed anti-French coalition.

In May 1805, the Ligurian Republic became one of the departments of France.

War of the Third Coalition

In April 1805, Russia and Great Britain signed the Treaty of St. Petersburg alliance treaty, which laid the foundation for the third coalition. That same year, Great Britain, Austria, Russia, the Kingdom of Naples and Sweden formed the Third Coalition against France and its allied Spain.

French diplomacy managed to achieve Prussian neutrality in the impending war (Talleyrand promised Frederick William III that Hanover would be taken from the British).

In October 1805, Napoleon created the Office of Extraordinary Property (French domaine extraordinaire) - a special financial institution headed by La Bouierie, designed to collect payments and indemnities from conquered countries and territories. These funds were spent mainly to finance the following military campaigns.

Napoleon planned a landing on the British Isles, but, having received information about the actions of the coalition forces, he was forced to postpone the landing indefinitely and move troops from the coast of Pas-de-Calais to Germany. The Austrian army capitulated at the Battle of Ulm on October 20, 1805. Napoleon occupied Vienna without serious resistance. Russian Emperor Alexander I and Austrian Emperor Franz II arrived at the army. At the insistence of Alexander I, the Russian army stopped retreating and, together with the Austrians, on December 2, 1805, entered the battle with the French at Austerlitz, in which the allies suffered a heavy defeat and retreated in disarray. On December 26, Austria concluded the Peace of Presburg with France.

In June 1806, the Kingdom of Holland replaced the puppet Batavian Republic. Napoleon placed his younger brother, Louis Bonaparte, on the throne of Holland.

In July 1806, an agreement was concluded between Napoleon and many rulers of the German states, by virtue of which these rulers entered into an alliance with each other, called the Union of the Rhine, under the protectorate of Napoleon and with the obligation to maintain an army of sixty thousand for him. The formation of the union was accompanied by mediatization (subordination of small immediate (immediat) owners supreme power major sovereigns). On August 6, 1806, the Austrian Emperor Franz II announced his abdication of the title and powers of the Holy Roman Emperor and, thus, this centuries-old entity ceased to exist.

War of the Fourth Coalition

Frightened by the growing influence of France, Prussia spoke out against it, putting forward an ultimatum on August 26 demanding the withdrawal of French troops beyond the Rhine. Napoleon rejected this ultimatum and attacked Prussia. In the first major battle at Saalfeld, on October 10, 1806, the Prussians were defeated. This was followed on October 14 by their complete defeat at Jena and Auerstedt. Two weeks after the Jena victory, Napoleon entered Berlin, and soon after Stetin, Prenzlau, and Magdeburg surrendered. An indemnity of 159 million francs was imposed on Prussia.

From Königsberg, where the Prussian king Frederick William III had fled, he begged Napoleon to end the war, agreeing to join the Confederation of the Rhine. However, Napoleon became more and more demanding, and the Prussian king was forced to continue the war. Russia came to his aid, fielding two armies in order to prevent the French from crossing the Vistula. Napoleon addressed the Poles with an appeal inviting them to fight for independence and on December 19, 1806, he entered Warsaw for the first time.

Fierce battles near Charnov, Pultusk and Golymin in December 1806 did not reveal any winners. Returning to Warsaw from Pułtusk, on January 1, 1807, at the post station in Błon, Napoleon first met twenty-one-year-old Maria Walewska, the wife of an elderly Polish count, with whom he had a long affair.

In the bloody battle between the main forces of the French and Russian armies under the command of General Bennigsen, there were no winners; for the first time in many years, Napoleon did not win a decisive victory.

After the French occupation of Danzig on May 27, 1807 and the Russian defeat at Friedland on June 14, which allowed the French to occupy Königsberg and threaten the Russian border, the Peace of Tilsit was concluded on July 7. The Grand Duchy of Warsaw was formed from the Polish possessions of Prussia. All of its possessions between the Rhine and the Elbe were also taken away from Prussia, which, together with a number of former small German states, formed the Kingdom of Westphalia, headed by Napoleon's brother Jerome.

Continental blockade

Having won the victory, on November 21, 1806 in Berlin, Napoleon signed a decree on the continental blockade. From that moment on, France and its allies ceased trade relations with England. Europe was the main market for British goods, as well as colonial goods imported by England - the largest maritime power.

The continental blockade caused damage to the English economy: a year later, a crisis of overproduction in the wool and textile industries began in England; the pound sterling fell.

The blockade also hit the continent. French industry was not able to replace English industry on the European market. In response, in November 1807, London announced a blockade of European ports.

The disruption of trade relations with the English colonies led to the decline of French port cities: La Rochelle, Bordeaux, Marseille, Toulon. The population (and the emperor himself, as a big coffee lover) suffered from a lack of familiar colonial goods: coffee, sugar, tea. At the same time, Napoleon established a huge prize of a million francs for the inventor of the technology for producing sugar from beets, which spurred research by scientists in this area and eventually led to the appearance of cheap beet sugar in Europe.

Iberian Wars

On November 13, 1807, the government "Le Moniteur" sardonically announced that "the House of Braganza has ceased to rule - a new proof of the inevitable death of all who associate themselves with England."

Napoleon sent Junot's 25,000-strong corps to Lisbon. After a grueling two-month march through Spanish territory, Junot arrived in Lisbon on November 30 with 2 thousand soldiers. The Portuguese Prince Regent João, hearing of the approach of the French, abandoned his capital and fled with his relatives and court to Rio de Janeiro. Napoleon, enraged that the royal family and Portuguese ships had eluded him, on December 28 ordered an indemnity of 100 million francs to be imposed on Portugal.

Expecting to become a sovereign prince under the terms of a secret treaty, Godoy allowed a large number of French troops to be stationed on Spanish territory.

On March 13, 1808, Murat was in Burgos with 100 thousand soldiers and was moving towards Madrid. To calm the Spaniards, Napoleon ordered the rumor to be spread that he intended to besiege Gibraltar. Realizing that with the death of the dynasty he would also die, Godoy began to convince the Spanish king Charles IV of the need to flee from Spain to South America. However, on the night of March 18, 1807, he was overthrown during the rebellion in Aranjuez by the so-called “Fernandists,” who achieved his resignation, the abdication of Charles IV and the transfer of power to the king’s son, Ferdinand VII.

On March 23, Murat entered Madrid. In May 1808, Napoleon summoned both Spanish kings - father and son - to Bayonne for explanations. Finding themselves captured by Napoleon, both monarchs renounced the crown, and the emperor placed his brother Joseph, who had previously been the King of Naples, on the Spanish throne. Now Murat became the king of Naples.

Great Britain began to support the anti-French uprising that broke out in Spain, which forced Napoleon to personally undertake a campaign against the rebels in November 1808.

War of the Fifth Coalition

On April 9, 1809, the Austrian Emperor Franz II declared war on France and moved his army simultaneously to Bavaria, Italy and the Duchy of Warsaw, but Napoleon, reinforced by the troops of the Union of the Rhine, repelled the attack and on May 13 had already captured Vienna.

The French then crossed the Danube and won a victory at Wagram on July 5-6, followed by the Truce of Znaim on July 12, and the Peace of Schönbrunn on October 14. Under this treaty, Austria lost access to the Adriatic Sea. Austria also pledged to transfer part of Carinthia and Croatia to France. France received the county of Görtz (Gorica), Istria with Trieste, Carniola, Fiume (modern Rijeka). Subsequently, Napoleon formed the Illyrian provinces from them.

Crisis of the Empire

Napoleon's policies in the first years of his reign enjoyed the support of the population - not only owners, but also the poor (workers, farm laborers). The fact is that the revival in the economy caused an increase in wages, which was also facilitated by constant recruitment into the army. Napoleon looked like the savior of the fatherland, wars caused national uplift, and victories caused a sense of pride. After all, Napoleon Bonaparte was a man of the revolution, and the marshals around him, brilliant military leaders, sometimes came from the very bottom.

But gradually the people began to get tired of the war, which had lasted for about 20 years. Military recruitment began to cause dissatisfaction. In addition, in 1810 the economic crisis broke out again. Wars in the vastness of Europe were losing their meaning, the costs of them began to irritate the bourgeoisie. It seemed that nothing threatened the security of France, and in foreign policy an increasingly important role was played by the emperor’s desire to strengthen and ensure the interests of the dynasty, preventing, in the event of his death, both anarchy and the restoration of the Bourbons.

In the name of these interests, Napoleon divorced his first wife Josephine, with whom he had no children, and in 1808, through Talleyrand, asked the Russian Emperor Alexander I for the hand of his sister Grand Duchess Catherine Pavlovna, but the emperor rejected this offer.

In 1810, Napoleon was also refused a marriage with another sister of Alexander I, 14-year-old Grand Duchess Anna Pavlovna (later Queen of the Netherlands).

In 1810, Napoleon finally married the daughter of the Austrian Emperor, Marie-Louise. An heir was born (1811), but the Emperor's Austrian marriage was extremely unpopular in France.

In February 1808, French troops occupied Rome. By decree of May 17, 1809, Napoleon declared the papal possessions annexed to the French Empire and abolished the power of the Pope.

In response to this, Pope Pius VII excommunicated the “robbers of the inheritance of St. Peter" from the church. The papal bull was nailed to the doors of the four main churches of Rome and sent to all ambassadors of foreign powers at the papal court. Napoleon ordered the Pope's arrest and held him prisoner until January 1814.

On July 5, 1809, the French military authorities took him to Savona and then to Fontainebleau near Paris. Napoleon's excommunication had a negative impact on the authority of his government, especially in traditionally Catholic countries.

Napoleon's allies, who accepted the continental blockade against their interests, did not strive to strictly observe it. Tensions grew between them and France. The contradictions between France and Russia became increasingly obvious. Patriotic movements expanded in Germany, and guerrilla violence continued unabated in Spain.

Trek to Russia

Having broken off relations with Alexander I, Napoleon decided to go to war with Russia. 450 thousand soldiers gathered into the Great Army from different countries Europe, crossed the Russian border in June 1812; they were opposed by 193 thousand soldiers in two Russian Western armies.

Napoleon tried to force a general battle on the Russian troops; Dodging the superior enemy and trying to unite, the two Russian armies retreated inland, leaving devastated territory behind them. The Grand Army suffered from hunger, heat, dirt, overcrowding and the diseases they caused; By mid-July, entire detachments had deserted from it.

Having united near Smolensk, the Russian armies tried to defend the city, but to no avail; On August 18, they had to resume their retreat towards Moscow. The general battle fought on September 7 in front of Moscow did not bring Napoleon a decisive victory. Russian troops again had to retreat; on September 14, the Great Army entered Moscow.

Having failed to overcome the defenses of the Russian army on October 24 at Maloyaroslavets, the Grand Army was forced to retreat through the already devastated terrain in the direction of Smolensk.

The Russian army followed a parallel march, inflicting damage on the enemy both in battles and through partisan actions. Soldiers suffering from hunger Great Army turned into robbers and rapists; the angry population responded with no less cruelty, burying the captured marauders alive. In mid-November, Napoleon entered Smolensk and did not find food supplies here. In this regard, he was forced to retreat further towards the Russian border. With great difficulty he managed to avoid complete defeat when crossing the Berezina on November 27-28.

Napoleon's huge, multi-tribal army did not carry within itself the previous revolutionary spirit; far from its homeland in the fields of Russia, it quickly melted away and finally ceased to exist. Having received reports of a coup attempt in Paris and wanting to raise more troops, Napoleon left for Paris on December 5th. In his last bulletin he acknowledged the disaster, but attributed it solely to the severity of the Russian winter.

War of the Sixth Coalition

The Russian campaign marked the beginning of the collapse of the Empire. As the Russian army moved west, the anti-Napoleonic coalition grew. Russian, Austrian, Prussian and Swedish troops totaling 320 thousand came out against a hastily assembled new French army of 160 thousand people in the “Battle of the Nations” near Leipzig (October 16 - 19, 1813). On the third day of the battle, the Saxons under the command of Rainier, and then the Württemberg cavalry, went over to the Allied side. Defeat in the Battle of the Nations led to the fall of Germany, Holland, and the collapse of the Italian kingdom. In Spain, where the French were defeated, Napoleon had to restore the power of the Spanish Bourbons (November 1813).

At the end of 1813, the Allied armies crossed the Rhine, invaded Belgium and marched on Paris. Napoleon could oppose an army of 250 thousand with only 80 thousand recruits.

In a series of battles, Napoleon won victories over individual Allied formations. However, on March 31, 1814, coalition troops led by the Russian Tsar and the King of Prussia entered Paris.

First renunciation and first exile

On April 6, 1814, at the Fontainebleau Palace near Paris, Napoleon abdicated the throne. On the night of April 12-13, 1814 in Fontainebleau, experiencing defeat, abandoned by his court (next to him were only a few servants, a doctor and General Caulaincourt), Napoleon decided to commit suicide. He took poison, which he always carried with him after the battle of Maloyaroslavets, when he miraculously escaped being captured. But the poison decomposed from long storage, Napoleon survived. By decision of the allied monarchs, he received possession of the small island of Elba in the Mediterranean Sea.

A truce was declared. The Bourbons and emigrants returned to France, seeking the return of their property and privileges (“They learned nothing and forgot nothing”). This caused discontent and fear in French society and in the army.

One hundred days

Taking advantage of the favorable situation, Napoleon fled Elba on February 26, 1815 and triumphantly walked from the Bay of Juan to Paris without firing a shot, greeted by enthusiastic crowds of people. He returned to Paris without interference on March 20. Napoleon commissioned Constant to draft a new constitution, which was adopted after a plebiscite on June 1, 1815.

The war resumed, but France was no longer able to bear its burden. The "Hundred Days" ended with Napoleon's final defeat near the Belgian village of Waterloo (June 18, 1815).

Napoleon was forced to leave France and, relying on the nobility of the British government, voluntarily boarded the English battleship Bellerophon near the Isle of Aix, hoping to receive political asylum from his longtime enemies, the British.

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But the English cabinet decided differently: Napoleon became a prisoner of the British and was sent to the distant island of St. Helena in the Atlantic Ocean. There, in the village of Longwood, Napoleon spent the last six years of his life. Upon learning of this decision, he said: “This is worse than Tamerlane’s iron cage! I would prefer to be handed over to the Bourbons... I surrendered myself to the protection of your laws. The government is trampling on the sacred customs of hospitality... This is tantamount to signing a death warrant!

The British chose St. Helena because of its distance from Europe, fearing that the emperor would escape from exile again. Napoleon had no hope of a reunion with Marie-Louise and his son: even during his exile on Elba, his wife, under the influence of her father, refused to come to him.

Napoleon was allowed to choose officers to accompany him; they were Henri-Gracien Bertrand, Charles Montolon, Emmanuel de Las Cases and Gaspard Gourgo, who were with him on the English ship. In total, there were 27 people in Napoleon's retinue.

On August 9, 1815, the former emperor leaves Europe aboard the ship Northumberland, led by British Admiral George Elphinstone Keith. Nine escort ships with 3 thousand soldiers who would guard Napoleon on St. Helena accompanied his ship. On October 17, 1815, Napoleon arrived in Jamestown, the island's only port.

The habitat of Napoleon and his retinue was the vast Longwood House (the former summer residence of the governor), located on a mountain plateau 8 kilometers from Jamestown. The house and the area adjacent to it were surrounded by a six-kilometer-long stone wall. Sentinels were placed around the wall so that they could see each other. Sentinels were stationed on the tops of the surrounding hills, reporting all of Napoleon's actions with signal flags. The British did everything to make Bonaparte's escape from the island impossible.

The deposed emperor initially had high hopes for a change in European (and especially British) policy. Napoleon knew that the Crown Princess of the English throne, Charlotte (daughter of the Prince Regent, the future George IV), was a passionate admirer of his. However, the princess died in childbirth in 1817, while her father and sick grandfather were still alive, without having time to “call on” Napoleon, which he had hoped for.

The new governor of the island, Hudson Lowe, further restricts the freedom of the deposed emperor: he narrows the boundaries of his walks, requires Napoleon to show himself to the guard officer at least twice a day, and tries to reduce his contacts with the outside world. Napoleon is doomed to inactivity. His health was deteriorating, Napoleon and his retinue blamed this on the unhealthy climate of the island.

Death of Napoleon

Napoleon's health condition steadily deteriorated. From 1819 he became ill more and more often. Napoleon often complained of pain in his right side and his legs were swollen. His attending physician, François Antommarchi, diagnosed hepatitis. Napoleon suspected it was cancer, the disease from which his father died. In March 1821, Napoleon's condition deteriorated so much that he no longer doubted his imminent death. On April 13, 1821, Napoleon dictated his will. He could no longer move without outside help, the pain became sharp and painful.

Napoleon Bonaparte died on Saturday, May 5, 1821, at 17:49. He was buried near Longwood in an area called "Geranium Valley."

There is a version that Napoleon was poisoned. This hypothesis was put forward by the Swedish dentist Sten Forshuvud, who examined Napoleon's hair and found traces of arsenic in it.

In 1960, English scientists Forshafvad, Smith and Wassen analyzed the chemical composition of Napoleon's hair from a strand cut from the emperor's head the day after his death using the neutron activation method. The arsenic concentration was approximately an order of magnitude higher than normal.

Another portion of hair was handed over for examination by Clifford Frey, who inherited it from his father, and his father from Napoleon’s personal servant Abram Noverra. The length of the largest hair, 13 cm, made it possible to determine changes in the concentration of arsenic in hair over the course of a year. The analysis showed that during the 4 months of the last year before his death, Napoleon received high doses of arsenic, and the time interval of maximum arsenic accumulation coincided with one of the periods of sharp deterioration in Napoleon’s health.

However, the authors of the book “Chemistry in Forensics” L. Leistner and P. Bujtash write that “the increased content of arsenic in hair still does not give grounds to unconditionally assert the fact of deliberate poisoning, because the same data could have been obtained if Napoleon had systematically used drugs , which contain arsenic." Recent studies of Napoleon's hair have shown interesting results. Scientists examined hair not only from the period of his last exile, but also hair from 1814 and even 1804, when he was crowned. Studies have shown a multiple excess of the dose of arsenic in all samples. This gives reason to doubt that Napoleon was poisoned.

Return of remains

In 1840, Louis Philippe, yielding to pressure from the Bonapartists, sent a delegation to Saint Helena led by the Prince of Joinville to fulfill Napoleon's last wish - to be buried in France. Napoleon's remains were transported on the frigate Belle Poule under the command of Captain Charnet to France and buried in the Invalides in Paris.

A sarcophagus made of Shoksha crimson quartzite, mistakenly called red porphyry or marble, with the remains of Emperor Napoleon is located in the crypt of the cathedral. It is guarded by two bronze figures holding a scepter, an imperial crown and an orb.

The tomb is surrounded by 12 statues by Jean-Jacques Pradier, dedicated to the victories of Napoleon.

N.A. Troitsky

The 26 marshals of the First Empire (1804-1814) in France are a historical phenomenon. The appearance of such a number of military leaders became possible for the first time thanks not so much to Napoleon as to the Great French Revolution. Never before has the world seen such a bright constellation of military leaders who rose from the grassroots of the people solely according to their talents and regardless of kinship, patronage or royal whim. I.V. Goethe believed that " French marshals, as well as Blucher and Wellington, can be put on the same level"with the heroes of Ancient Greece (). After the Second World War, the English publicist Alexander Werth, wanting to emphasize the outstanding abilities of G.K. Zhukov, K.K. Rokossovsky, A.M. Vasilevsky and other Soviet commanders, noticed that the USSR had advanced" a brilliant galaxy of generals and marshals, whose equals have not been seen since the time of Napoleon’s “Great Army”" ().

In the West, not only in France, but also in England, Germany, Poland, and the USA. There is extensive literature about Napoleon’s marshals - both about all of them together (), and about each individually. In Russia, in addition to the book published in 1912 and now a bibliographic rarity, K.A. Voensky with the characteristics of the marshals who took part in Napoleon’s invasion of Russia (), as well as the even older and less accessible biography of I. Murat (), there is nothing specifically related to Napoleonic marshals. In the 1930s, Maxim Gorky tried to arouse literary interest in them, noting with reproach that we " Such figures as the son of the innkeeper Joachim Murat, later the king of Naples, the son of a cooper and an ordinary soldier - Marshal Augereau, the son of a market trader - Marshal and Duke of Ney - were also ignored by writers" (). However, neither our writers nor our historians were interested in “such figures.”

As a result, our historians and writers, even those directly involved in the study of the Napoleonic wars, confuse Napoleon's marshals. They call marshals, speaking about 1812, Y. Poniatowski, J.-A. Loriston, O. Sebastiani, A. Caulaincourt, P. Daru, A. Junot, J. Rappa (). While Poniatowski became a marshal only in 1813, Lauriston in 1823, Sebastiani in 1840, and Caulaincourt, Daru, Junot and Rapp were never marshals at all. Marshal Pierre Francois Charles

Augereau is confused with his brother, Brigadier General Jean-Pierre), and Marshal L.G. Saint-Cyr, on the contrary, is presented in two faces: the words about the capitulation in 1813 to the Russians of Dresden, where Saint-Cyr was captured, are expressed in this way: " Two marshals surrendered" () (presumably one marshal is Sen, and the other is Sire?).

Thus, it becomes obvious the need to offer our readers the first essay in Russian about all of Napoleon’s marshals.

The title of marshal in France existed as a court dignity from the beginning of the 13th century, and as the highest military rank - from 1627, when Cardinal A. J. Richelieu abolished the position of constable - commander-in-chief of the army. Louis XIV already had 20 marshals of France, among whom were the greatest commanders of their time - A. Turenne, S. Vauban, C. Villars. The title of marshal with its distinctive sign - the marshal's baton - was awarded by decree of the king. This was the case until the revolutionary Convention on February 21, 1793, abolished, along with other “old regime” titles, the military rank of marshal. Napoleon restored the title of Marshal of France as soon as France, after a 12-year regime of the First Republic, was proclaimed an empire on May 18, 1804. This act of Napoleon was one of his many steps to return - however, already in the conditions of the new bourgeois France - the old ranks and titles, which were designed to give the Napoleonic court a monarchical flavor. Along with the marshal's rank, the old procedure for assigning it was restored - at the will and signature of the monarch.

Napoleon inherited the fundamental principles of recruiting and maintaining the army from the revolution. Thanks to the success of the French economy and from the resources of the defeated states of Europe, he provided his army better than any of his opponents materially, but it was even more superior to all other armies, so to speak, socially. It was a new type of mass army. It was staffed on the basis of universal military service, decreed in 1793 and five years later somewhat narrowed in the form of the so-called conscription (). This army knew neither caste barriers between soldiers and officers, nor meaningless drills, nor cane discipline, but was strong in the consciousness of equality of civil rights and opportunities. " The last peasant son, just like a nobleman from an ancient family, could reach the highest ranks in it" (), including the rank of marshal. Napoleon liked to say that every one of his soldiers " carries a marshal's baton in his knapsack".

Almost all of Napoleon's best marshals - Lannes, Massena, Ney, Murat, Bessieres, Lefebvre, Suchet, Jourdan, Soult - came from the common people. They began their service as soldiers. But next to them were also aristocratic marshals: Davout, MacDonald, Serrurier, Marmont, Grouchy. Giving them marshal's batons. Napoleon took into account mainly their military merits. The emperor made his closest friend, General Andoche Junot, a duke - and not every marshal had a ducal title at that time - but he never promoted him to marshal, seeing that as a military leader he still did not reach the level of a marshal. In the same way, he did not give the marshal’s baton to D. Vandam, although he valued him as a general so much that he even forgave him for his official abuses, telling his accusers: “ If I had two Vandams, I would hang one of them for it!"

The first marshals of the First Empire were 18 generals to whom Napoleon awarded the rank of marshal by decree of May 19, 1804, the day after he himself took the imperial throne. Of these, the four oldest were declared honorary marshals. Perhaps the most famous name then was the almost 70-year-old Francois Etienne Christophe Kellerman- winner in historical battle at Valmy on September 20, 1792, where the French Revolution won its first victory over an external enemy. An eyewitness to this event, Goethe, said that evening: " Today a new era of history begins here". He also became an honorary marshal Jean-Mathieu Philibert Serrurier- a participant in the Seven Years' War, a hero of the Italian campaign of 1796-1797, who accepted the surrender of the famous Austrian Field Marshal S. Wurmser in Mantua, and since 1802 - vice-president of the Senate. Finally, two more far from elderly generals received the batons of honorary marshals. One of them is 50 years old Dominique Perignon, the brilliance of whose victories over the Austrians and Prussians in 1794-1795. did not even overshadow the sad fact for him that in 1799 he was captured at Novi A.V. Suvorov, - from 1802 he was, like Serrurier, vice-president of the Senate. Another, Francois Joseph Lefebvre, who was not yet 49 years old in May 1804, deserves special introduction.

If Kellerman, Serrurier and Perignon, crowned with marshal laurels for past services, did not participate in any more battles during the entire First Empire, then Lefebvre took active participation in all the wars of the Empire 1805-1814, including Napoleon's invasion of Russia, where he was the head of the famous Old Guard. A volunteer of the revolution straight from the plow, who received from Napoleon, in addition to the marshal's baton, the titles of Count and Duke of Danzig, illiterate, but strong in natural intelligence, peasant ingenuity and soldierly valor, Lefebvre advanced to the ranks of the best Napoleonic marshals ().

Among the remaining 14 marshals of the “first call,” along with the loyal Lannes, Berthier, Murat, Davout, Ney, Bessières, Soult, Moses, Mortier, Napoleon also included those who, for one reason or another, were in opposition to the regime of his personal power: Massena , Bernadotte, Jourdan, Brunet, Augereau. All of them, except Berthier and Moses, were younger than any of the honorary marshals, and half of the 14 were not even 40 years old: Davout was 34 years old, Lannes, Ney, Bessières and Soult were 35 each. Of the best generals of the Republic, they were then left without the rank of marshal only four: fronders MacDonald, Saint-Cyr (these two are temporary) and staunch republicans J.-C. Lecourbe and J.-V., who was already in prison. Moro. Subsequently, eight more generals became marshals of the Empire: in 1807 - Victor, in 1809 - MacDonald, Oudinot, Marmont, in 1811 - Suchet, in 1812 - Saint-Cyr, in 1813 - Poniatowski, in 1815 - Grushi.

Some historians, including such reputable ones as A.S. Trachevsky and E.V. Tarle, they believed that Napoleonic marshals - " these are still zeros, which amounted to a large sum only with such a unit as Napoleon himself" (), So what " without him(They) lost half of their military value" (). A reservation is needed here. The marshals may have looked like zeros in comparison with Napoleon, but not all of them. Some of them, even without him, remarkably proved their high military rank: Jourdan - in 1794 under Fleurus, Massena - in 1799 under Zurich, Davout - in 1806 under Auerstedt, Suchet - from 1809 to 1814 in Spain, Lannes - always and wherever he had to act ().

In general, of his generals, Napoleon ranked L. Deze and J.B. above all of them. Kleber (), who, however, did not live to see the establishment of marshal ranks: both of them died on the same day, June 14, 1800, in different parts of the world - Dezay in Piedmont, Kleber in Egypt. Of those who became marshals, the most outstanding were Lannes, Massena and Davout.

Son of a groom, soldier of the revolution Jean Lannes, the future Duke of Montebello (), was noticed by Napoleon as a battalion officer in the battle of Dego on April 15, 1796, and from that day he rapidly rose, ending the Italian campaign as a general. In Egypt, he became one of Napoleon's closest associates, and in the campaigns of 1805-1809. - his right hand and main hope. He not only carried out Napoleon’s plans, but also led operations himself and won battles: at Montebello on June 10, 1800, with an 8,000-strong vanguard, he dispersed the 20,000-strong corps of Austrian Field Marshal P.K. Otta, and at Tudela on November 23, 1808, at the head of a 20,000-strong corps, he defeated the 45,000-strong army of the best Spanish military leaders X. Palafox and F. Castaños. It is noteworthy that the latter, four months earlier, struck the whole of Europe, forcing the French corps of General P. Dupont to capitulate in an open field near Baylen. In February 1809, it was Lannes who stormed the legendary and previously impregnable Zaragoza, after which he wrote to Napoleon about his opposition to such a war when civilians had to be killed. The historian J. Michelet considered Lannes a “great soldier” and a “great commander” (). Napoleon himself valued Lannes for his “greatest talents,” called him “Achilles” and “Roland” of the French army and remembered him on St. Helena Island like this: “ I found him as a pygmy and lost him as a giant" ().

The talent of the commander Lannes combined with the valor of the soldier. His comrades in arms considered him "the bravest in the army." He was the first to rush into enemy positions at the head of his hussars, fought alongside his soldiers on the streets of Zaragoza, and led them to storm Regensburg. When friends in the presence of the marshal once admired his courage, he exclaimed with annoyance: “ A hussar who is not killed at the age of 30 is not a hussar, but rubbish!“He was then 35 years old, and four years later, already covered with 25 wounds by that time, he was mortally wounded near Essling.

Lannes, like Chief Marshal M. Duroc, was a close friend of Napoleon and served him faithfully, but, having received from the emperor a marshal's baton, the title of duke, a huge fortune - 1 million francs at once in 1807 alone - he remained at heart an ardent republican . Before the coronation of Napoleon, Lannes, who was then the head of the consular guard, staged a stormy scene of protest for the emperor, whose life he had twice saved in Italy (). Even on his deathbed, according to the testimony of those standing behind the open door, he reproached the emperor for despotism and lust for power ().

Andre Massena, illiterate, like Lefebvre, the son of a peasant, the Duke of Rivoli and the Prince of Essling, perhaps surpassed all the marshals in the gift of military improvisation and, in general, as a military leader he was good to everyone. In 1775, Massena became a soldier in the royal army and by the beginning of the revolution he had risen to the rank of sergeant in 14 years. After the revolution, he joined the National Guard and in 1792 became a captain, and in 1793 - a general (). It was he who defeated the Russian corps of A.M. on September 26, 1799 in the battle of Zurich. Rimsky-Korsakov, forced A.V. Suvorov to leave Switzerland and thereby saved France from the Russian-Austrian invasion that threatened it. But this unique nugget" had an unfortunate tendency to steal", and " stole like a magpie, instinctively" () and most importantly - a lot. This undermined the marshal's reputation and ultimately led to collapse, ruined his career. When Napoleon scolded him: " You are the biggest robber in the world!"- Massena suddenly objected, bowing respectfully: " After you, sir...". For such insolence, he found himself in disgrace before going to Russia.

But Louis Nicolas Davout, Duke of Auerstedt and Prince of Eckmühl, was distinguished by his unselfishness, republican honesty and directness, rare for a marshal of the empire. Napoleon, already in exile, described him this way: " This is one of the most glorious and pure heroes of France" (). As a commander, Davout showed himself brilliantly on October 14, 1806 in the battle of Auerstedt, where he destroyed half of the 100,000-strong Russian army led by the king, two princes and the field marshal of Prussia, while Napoleon in another battle that took place at the same day near Jena, liquidated the other half of it. Davout’s victory at Auerstedt was all the more amazing because he had only 27 thousand soldiers against 53 thousand of the enemy. A. Jomini reasonably noted on this matter that “ none of the revolutionary wars presents such a disproportionate battle with such amazing success" ().

Multi-talented strategist, administrator, politician, " great man, not yet appreciated", as Stendhal wrote about him in 1818 (), Davout was extremely demanding of himself and others, in any conditions he maintained order and discipline with an iron fist. Therefore, one of his best biographies is called “The Iron Marshal" (). The army did not like him as an overly harsh person. Here, apparently, Leo Tolstoy saw some reasons for portraying Davout on the pages of War and Peace. Arakcheev Emperor Napoleon" (). In fact, apart from personal severity (also, however, incommensurable: Davout was extremely strict, Arakcheev was pathologically cruel) there was nothing in common between the “iron marshal” of France and the “furious tyrant” () of Russia.

By the way, the widespread legend about Davout studying together with the young Napoleon, either at Brienne or at the Paris Military School, is not based on anything: it has long been established that Davout entered the Paris School on September 29, 1785, i.e. a month after Napoleon graduated from this school (), and Davul did not study at the Brienne School at all.

Next to Davout, inferior to him as a strategist, but superior to him as a tactician, he shone in the constellation of the best Napoleonic marshals Michelle Ney, son of a cooper, Duke of Elchingen and Prince of Moscow (he was awarded the latter title for valor in the Battle of Borodino), hero of all Napoleon's campaigns, a man extremely popular in the army. " This is the god Mars, - Baron P. Denier recalled about him. - His look, look, confidence can inspire the most timid" (). A warrior of knightly character and indomitable temperament, " fire-breathing Ney“As Borodin’s hero Fyodor Glinka called him, he was the living embodiment of the fighting spirit of the “Great Army.” It was not for nothing that Napoleon, although after the death of Lannes, gave him the nickname that the army put above all his titles - “ Bravest of the Brave".

To this day, continuing interest in Ney’s personality is fueled by controversy about how this Napoleonic marshal ended his life. On December 7, during the “Hundred Days,” he, sent at the head of the royal troops against Napoleon, went over with the troops to the side of the former emperor. Now in Paris, on Observatory Square, where the French executed their “Bravest of the Brave,” there is a monument to him. In world literature, there is a romantic but dubious version that Michel Ney escaped in 1815 and left for the USA, where he lived until 1846 under the name of Peter Stewart Ney, a school teacher ().

Far from being the most talented, but the most beautiful and stately, the most popular in literature of Napoleon’s marshals - this is, of course, Joachim Murat, a tavern servant who became an imperial prince, the Grand Duke of Berg, the King of Naples and, by the way, the husband of Napoleon's sister Caroline Bonaparte, the famous commander of Napoleon's entire cavalry and generally one of the best cavalry commanders in the West.

Murat was neither a politician nor a strategist. Napoleon spoke about him not without regret: " He has so little in his head!" () But as a cavalry leader, a virtuoso of attack and pursuit, he, in Napoleon's opinion, was " the best in the world" (). A crowned daredevil, Murat was not inferior in daring and courage to Lannes and Ney. D. Byron wrote about him:

Where the enemy army is crushed,
There we met Murat

Always at the forefront, always where the greatest danger is and where the greatest courage is required. He rudely encouraged the fighters: " Nice, children! Knock this bastard over! You shoot like angels!"At the critical moment, the marshal himself led his cavalry troops into the attack - a tall blue-eyed athlete, a handsome man with shoulder-length curls (), dressed in silk, velvet, ostrich feathers, with all the regalia and with one whip in his hand. And yet he never after a saber strike near Abukir in 1799, he was not wounded.

Murat's dizzying career ended tragically. In 1813, after the Battle of Leipzig, he betrayed Napoleon in order to retain the Neapolitan throne, but during the “Hundred Days” he again took the side of the emperor, was defeated by the Austrians, captured and executed by a military court ().

Davout, Ney and Murat are well known in Russia, mainly for their participation in the War of 1812. In this regard, next to them one can only place Berthier, one of the closest associates - not friends, but precisely comrades-in-arms - of Napoleon.

Louis Alexandre Berthier, the son of a geographer, accustomed to working on maps from an early age, served as a staff officer in the wars of two revolutions - the American and the French. In 1796, he became close to Napoleon and became his indispensable assistant, Minister of War, and from 1807 to 1814, permanent chief of the General Staff.

According to Napoleon himself, Berthier " had an indecisive character, little suitable for commanding an army, but possessed all the qualities of a good chief of staff" (), namely, phenomenal memory, efficiency of thinking, efficiency, accuracy, accuracy and speed of execution. K. Marx rightly attributed to its advantages and " herculean health" (). All in all " Napoleon never had a more precise performer, a more punctual and methodical military official, or a more prudent assistant."). It is clear why the emperor trusted Berthier so much, showered him with awards - a million-dollar fortune, a marshal's baton, the titles of Duke of Valangens, Prince of Neuchâtel, Prince of Wagram - and was so sorry that Berthier was not with him at Waterloo: " If I had Berthier as my chief of staff, I would not have lost the battle"Eyewitnesses testified that at the height of the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon, seeing that the fresh corps of Marshal Grouchy was late, asked his newly appointed chief of staff N. J. Soult: " Have you sent messengers to Grushi?" Soult replied: " I sent one". "Dear Sir!- Napoleon was indignant, - Berthier would have sent five!“Indeed, before the Battle of Eylau, Berthier sent five adjutants with the same order to Marshal Bernadotte for urgent communication with him on different roads, and, it turned out, not in vain: only one of the five reached him.

If Berthier was perhaps Napoleon’s closest collaborator, Napoleon’s assistant, in some way his “shadow”, then Jean-Baptiste Bessieres, along with Lannes, Duroc, Junot, Marmont, belonged to a narrow circle of personal friends of the emperor. An ordinary soldier in 1792, who attracted the attention of Napoleon in 1796, while still a captain, from 1799 he became the head of the consular guard, and then the entire guards cavalry, marshal of the Empire and Duke of Istria, Bessieres was one of the best French commanders. He combined the energy of Murat and the restraint of Davout. Napoleon considered him " first-class cavalry commander"and emphasized it" greatest merits"in the battles of Austerlitz, Jena, Wagram (). In addition, Bessieres was distinguished by outstanding moral qualities. A citizen of the ancient mold, " true republican" With " Plutarchian touch"(), noble, humane, he was the favorite of the soldiers." How popular was he among ordinary soldiers?, - K. Marx wrote about him, - can be judged from the fact that it was considered advisable for some time not to inform the army of his death" ().

Marshal Bessieres was killed on May 1, 1813, at the end of a rearguard action near Weissenfels. Commander of the Russian battery, future Decembrist O.V. Grabe-Gorsky almost made a bet with General S.N. Lansky, as an eyewitness testified, another future Decembrist, Prince. S.G. Volkonsky fired a cannonball at a group of enemy horsemen who were watching the progress of the battle. Bessieres stood in the center of this group. Gorsky's cannonball hit him directly, killing the marshal on the spot ().

Two Napoleonic marshals were also excellent military leaders, who had the difficult fate of fighting continuously in Spain for five or six years in a row. Nicolas Jean de Dieu Soult, soldier in 1791, who became a general already in 1794, Duke of Dalmatia, whom Stendhal attributed to " highly gifted people" (), was an equally skilled strategist and tactician. He showed himself excellently in the campaigns of 1805-1807, especially under Austerlitz, and from 1808, in difficult conditions of strife between the French marshals, he resisted A. Wellington in Spain, not without success, although could have achieved more if he had been less preoccupied with the idea of becoming king of neighboring Portugal under the name of Nicholas I.

Louis Gabriel Suchet, volunteer in 1792, Duke of Albufera, as the commander of a division in Lanna's corps, until the death of the latter, he was lost in the rays of his glory, but from 1809, having received a separate corps in Spain, he immediately moved into the first rank of Napoleon's military associates. The only one of them, until 1814, he invariably gained the upper hand over the Spaniards and the British, beat the enemy in an open field at Maria, Belchite, Sagunta, took cities by storm: the same Sagunta, Tarragona, Valencia, Tortosa, Lerida; skillfully, without excessive cruelty, he established civil administration of the conquered regions. Napoleon said about him in 1814: " If I had two marshals like Suchet, I would not only conquer Spain, but also preserve it" ()

All the marshals that have been discussed so far, except Massena, were loyal to Napoleon, although Lannes could reproach him for despotism, Murat left him for a long time in 1813, Berthier in 1814." escaped from his patron"(K. Marx) to the Bourbons, and Ney temporarily opposed him in 1815. Together with them, constant opposition to his regime and even personal enemies were awarded marshal titles and served Napoleon for patriotic or careerist reasons. Among them were also outstanding military leaders : Bernadotte, Jourdan, Brun, MacDonald, Saint-Cyr.

Jean-Baptiste Jules Bernadotte, Prince of Ponte Corvo, an intelligent and treacherous Gascon, former Minister of War of the Directory, hated Napoleon, although he received everything from him: the marshal's baton, the princely title, even the Swedish throne. He himself aimed to be a “Napoleon”, and would not mind making Napoleon his “Bernadotte”. Until 1810, when Napoleon gave his consent to the Swedish parliamentarians who wished to please him to elect Bernadotte as heir to the Swedish crown, his relationship with Bernadotte was difficult. " He didn't take his eyes off Bernadotte, he didn't trust him", we read from A.Z. Manfred (). It seems that N.A. Polevoy judged more correctly. He drew attention to the fact that Bernadotte twice - before the battles of Auerstedt and Eylau - negligently, if not criminally, evaded helping Marshal Davout and Napoleon himself and both times remained unpunished, although in each case Napoleon could have brought him to a military court. Instead, the emperor, after Auerstedt, said mockingly: " The Prince of Ponte Corvo is rather punished for not voluntarily sharing in the triumph of his comrade"According to Polevoy, Napoleon turned a blind eye to Bernadotte's offenses." out of respect for Joseph", to his elder brother (), to whom Bernadotte was a brother-in-law (). Gertrude Kircheisen even believed that Napoleon forgave Bernadotte, as well as awarded him orders, ranks, titles, a life annuity of 300 thousand francs, for the sake of Desiree Clary, his ex-fiancée, for whom the emperor forever retained a feeling of sympathy ().

Be that as it may, having become the heir to the throne and the de facto ruler of Sweden, Bernadotte soon broke relations with France and entered into an alliance with Russia, and in 1813-1814. at the head of the Swedish troops he fought against his compatriots on the side of the sixth anti-Napoleonic coalition.

He confronted Napoleon, without, however, stooping to betrayal, and the count Jean-Baptiste Jourdan- one of the best generals of the Great French Revolution. On June 26, 1794, he defeated the Austrians at the famous Battle of Fleurus, thereby securing the western border of France. A staunch republican, Jourdan openly opposed the establishment of an empire, but, without being subjected to repression, but on the contrary, having received a marshal's baton from Napoleon, he honestly served France, although he did not hide his antipathy towards the emperor. However, Jourdan was always somewhat aloof from Napoleon himself: he did not participate in the emperor’s most triumphant campaigns of 1805-1807, and from 1808 he served in Spain, as if fulfilling the role of “uncle”, a military mentor for the person of King Joseph Bonaparte .

Third Oppositionist, Count Guillaume Marie-Anne Brun, in the past an active participant in the revolution, comrade-in-arms of J. Danton and great friend of C. Desmoulins, from 1792 - colonel, from 1793 - general, resourceful, fearless, very impressive in appearance - with a height of 183 cm " his facial features were full of grandeur"() - created a great name for himself with the victory on September 8, 1799 at Bergen in Holland, where he defeated the Russian-English army under the command of the Duke of York. Napoleon did not like Brun, like Massena, for theft, especially after in 1807 Mr. Brun, who was then the governor of the Hanseatic cities, was convicted of theft of state property.

Brun's fate turned out to be the most tragic of all Napoleonic marshals. On August 2, 1815, in Avignon, he was torn to pieces by a crowd of royalists.

Two more frontiers - MacDonald and Saint-Cyr - were not included in the first list of marshals of the Empire, but still earned marshal's batons later: MacDonald - for successes in the battle of Wagram on July 5-6, 1809, Saint-Cyr - for the victory over P.H. Wittgenstein in Russia, near Polotsk, August 5-6, 1812.

Jacques Etienne Joseph Alexander MacDonald, Duke of Tarentum, a scion of an ancient Scottish family, was a prominent general of the Great French Revolution, a student of C. Pichegru and a friend of J.-V. Moro. In 1799 he lost to A.V. Suvorov in a stubborn three-day battle on the river. Trebbia (), but this defeat was considered honorable and did not spoil his reputation. Subsequently, until 1813, nowhere, even in Russia in 1812, did he lose his military glory.

A man of high culture - Macdonald's father was a friend of the composer G.F. Handel, secularly educated and brought up, Macdonald was distinguished by the gift of a strategist, but he lacked tactical ingenuity and determination. Russian intelligence officer P.A. Chuykevich wrote about him to M.B. Barclay de Tolly before the war of 1812: " His conversations reveal great information about him, but it seems (he) is too inactive and likes to sleep a lot" ().

Graph Laurent Gouvion Saint-Cyr, like Macdonald, if not more, stood out among Napoleon's marshals for his education. A smart strategist and cunning tactician, " very on his own, somewhat like Bernadotte" (), perhaps the best administrator of the Grand Army after Davout, he was also a subtle, resourceful politician. Despite his republicanism and chronic opposition, Saint-Cyr got along with the revolution, during which he went from being a soldier in 1792 . to the general in 1794, both with Napoleon and with the Bourbons, who twice, in 1815 and 1817-1819, appointed him minister of war and navy. Saint-Cyr's multi-volume memoirs, as well as his military-strategic works, are considered. classic.

The number of outstanding military leaders included the only foreigner among Napoleon’s marshals, who lived as a marshal for only two days, Prince Jozef Antoni Poniatowski. Promoted to marshal after the first day of the “Battle of the Nations” near Leipzig, he died on the last, third day of the battle. He was the nephew of the last king of Poland, Stanislaw-August Poniatowski, and an associate of T. Kosciuszko, the “Polish Bayard,” as he was called in Europe. Poniatowski was distinguished by his talents as a statesman and military leader, by his personal courage and charm, by his beautiful appearance, and among the Poles he also enjoyed unprecedented popularity, which developed into a cult of his personality. " He was the idol of Poland, the army and the people", - F.V. Bulgarin () recalled about him. Napoleon, who greatly appreciated Poniatowski, spoke about him on the island of St. Helena: " Poniatowski was a noble man, full of honor and courage. I intended to make him the Polish king if my campaign in Russia had been successful" ().

It seems that the next group of marshals was somewhat lower than all those listed in terms of their military leadership level, of whom Moses and Mortier were included in the first marshal list, and Victor and Oudinot became marshals three and five years later, respectively.

Adrian Jeannot Moses, Duke of Conegliano, was considered in the French army, like Bessières, " an example of knightly nobility" (). As a military leader, he became famous in the campaigns of the Army of the Rhine in 1794-1795 and from 1808 in Spain. His name is relatively little known, since he did not participate in the campaigns of Napoleon himself in 1805-1813.

Edouard Adolphe Casimir Mortier, the Duke of Treviso, on the contrary, accompanied Napoleon on almost all of his campaigns. In 1812 he commanded the Young Guard and was the military governor of Moscow. But Mortier did not distinguish himself in anything special, although he won a victory over the Spanish troops in 1809 at Okan.

Victor-Perrin Claude Victor, Duke of Bellun, stood out mainly for his courage and was good as an executor of Napoleon's orders. He received the marshal's baton for his outstanding contribution to the victory at Friedland on June 14, 1807. He then won the Battle of Ucles in Spain in 1808, and in 1812, like MacDonald, Saint-Cyr and Oudinot, he acted unsuccessfully on the flanks of the "Great army."

Nicolas Charles Oudinot, Duke of Reggio, who received the rank of marshal along with MacDonald and Marmont for the Battle of Wagram, was also first and foremost a brave man, as evidenced by his 32 wounds. However, Russian intelligence officer A.I. Chernyshev, in his “dossier” on him before the war of 1812, clearly exaggerated this dignity of Oudinot: “ After the death of Marshal Lannes, Marshal Oudinot was noted throughout the French army as possessing the most brilliant courage and personal courage, most capable of causing impetus and enthusiasm in the troops that would be under his command" ().

So, it remains to say about three more marshals of Napoleon - Augereau, Marmont, Grouchy. It was these three who were sharply inferior to everyone else in all respects, which forces us to admit: Napoleon did not always bestow marshal ranks accurately and in a timely manner. For example, Suchet, MacDonald and Saint-Cyr were head and shoulders above any of the trio Augereau - Marmont - Grouchy, but McDonald became marshal after Augereau, and Suchet and Saint-Cyr also after Marmont.

Pierre Francois Charles Augereau, the son of a footman, who became the Duke of Castiglione, lived his youth in a fantastically adventurous way: he served as a soldier in the French, Prussian, Spanish, Portuguese, Neapolitan and even Russian troops, " throwing them when he got tired of it", and in between " supplemented himself with dancing and fencing lessons, duels, kidnapping other people's wives" (). The revolution elevated him to the heights of a general. He distinguished himself in the Italian campaign of 1796-1797, especially in the Battle of Castiglione, where, according to Stendhal, " was a great commander, which never happened to him again" (). Apparently, it was in memory of Castiglione that Napoleon made Augereau a marshal, and then a duke, after which this marshal-duke no longer showed himself in anything other than the fact that he republicanly opposed the emperor, and in 1814 . One of the first to call on his troops to swear allegiance to Louis XVIII, Napoleon on the island of St. Helena gave fair assessments: " he had no education at all and no noticeable intelligence", But " maintained order and discipline" And " fought with fearlessness" ().

Auguste Frederic Louis de Vies Marmont, Duke of Ragusa, was promoted to marshal after the Battle of Wagram, where he distinguished himself, but at the same time Napoleon somewhat sinned against objectivity by paying tribute personal feeling, for Marmont had been his close friend from a young age. Subsequently, Marmont was fully consistent with what Napoleon said about him in 1812 to A. Caulaincourt: " Talks very intelligently about war", But " turns out to be worse than mediocrity when it is necessary to act" (). In 1814, Marmont was the first of the marshals of the empire to betray Napoleon, thereby tainting himself in such a way that the word " was born from his title in the language of the Parisian outskirts " raguser" How " synonym for vile betrayal" ().

Finally, Count Emmanuel de Gruchy - "pathetic parody of Murat" (). He was awarded the rank of marshal during the "Hundred Days" already due to the lack of more worthy candidates and, as they say, for his length of service. Indeed, as a general, he was the head of the cavalry corps for a long time in good standing, but, having become a marshal, ruined his reputation by being late for the Battle of Waterloo.

By the way, Grouchy in the specialized literature about the marshals of France sometimes appears as a marshal since 1831 (), or is sometimes absent altogether (). L. Chardigny explains everything: it turns out. Grouchy, promoted to marshal by Napoleon's decree of April 15, 1815, was demoted under Louis XVIII and restored to the rank of marshal by King Louis Philippe on November 19, 1831 ()

So, in total Napoleon had 26 marshals. He understood that such a high rank should be awarded sparingly, and once said about General Sh.-E. Guden: " He would have received the marshal's baton long ago if it were possible to distribute these batons to everyone who deserved them" (). Nevertheless, it is difficult to understand why, having made Augereau and Marmont marshals, he left such outstanding generals as Antoine Lassalle, Louis-Pierre Montbrun, Auguste Caulaincourt (the brother of the diplomat and memoirist Armand Caulaincourt), Antoine Drouot without marshal's batons , the same Charles-Etienne Gudin. Napoleon in exile spoke of four generals: " These would be my new marshals" (). Of these, Maurice-Etienne Gerard and Bertrand Clausel became marshals of the July Monarchy in 1830 and 1831, respectively, and J.M. Lamarck and M. Foix remained generals.

Another one of Napoleon's military leaders, who stood on a par with his marshals in importance and even slightly higher than them in title, was not awarded the marshal's baton - the corps general, Viceroy of Italy () Eugene Beauharnais. Napoleon's stepson, i.e. the son of his first wife Josephine from her first marriage to the general of the French Revolution, Alexandre Beauharnais, Prince Eugene stood out noticeably among the emperor’s populous relatives for his military talents and nobility of character. " It was big man , - Goethe, who personally knew him, said about him after his death. - Such people are becoming less and less common. Now humanity has become poorer by one more outstanding personality" (). Eugene did not receive the marshal's baton, most likely because at the age of 23 he became viceroy and henceforth was more occupied with state rather than military affairs.

All of Napoleon's marshals - both loyal to him and oppositionists, his open friends and secret enemies - were generously awarded for their military service with domestic and foreign orders (), ranks, titles, property holdings, multi-thousand, or even millions of dollars. Glory and honors turned their heads, victories over five European coalitions in a row fed them up. After all, all these former ploughmen, grooms, coopers, footmen, former soldiers and sergeants became not just marshals, but also barons, counts, dukes, princes, princes and even kings, they themselves turned into aristocrats, like those whom they in their revolutionary youth were encouraged to hang on lanterns. Bernadotte, having become King of Sweden, could not erase his youthful tattoo from his chest." Death to kings and tyrants!", but was ashamed of her. Raised almost from the bottom of life to such dizzying heights, they considered themselves to have fought enough and longed, as they say, to rest on their laurels.

Not only the old oppositionists, but also Ney’s devotees, Murat, Soult, Marmont, grumbled louder behind the emperor’s back with each new campaign, not daring, however, while he was omnipotent, to oppose or even contradict him when he was once again deciding a sacramental issue : to be or not to be a war? But they quarreled openly among themselves and often rudely, like a soldier, sometimes even in the presence of the emperor, so that he had to pull them back like naughty brats ().

It is curious that very few were friends in their marshal circle: Bessieres and Davout, Lannes and Bessieres, Massena and Augereau. The vain Murat valued his royal title very much. So everyone who told him " your majesty", became his friend. The strict Republican marshals - Lannes, Davout, Lefevre - often ridiculed his passion for titles and outfits. Lannes under Napoleon called Murat " rooster" And " jester", and once cursed the Neapolitan king in a pithy manner: " Looks like a dog that's dancing" (). Ney was at enmity with Massena and Soult, MacDonald with Victor and Saint-Cyr, Davout and Berthier hated each other.

The fate of Napoleon's marshals turned out differently, but in general it was not as tragic as one might think when reading Lermontov's lines: " Others died in battle,
Others cheated on him
And they sold their sword".

Only Lannes, Bessieres and Poniatowski were “killed in battle.” Ney and Murat were shot according to court verdicts. Brun became a victim of royalist lynching, and Mortier - terrorist attack(). Berthier committed suicide. All the other 18 marshals died a natural death in peace and glory, because Napoleon, abdicating the throne, allowed them to go to serve the Bourbons, and Louis XVIII willingly accepted them all, except for the two most popular ones - Murat and Ney.

They managed to betray Napoleon before he finally abdicated the throne in June 1815: Bernadotte - in 1812, already being the crown prince of Sweden; Murat - in 1813, for a while; Marmont, Augereau, Perignon - in 1814; refused to join him after his return from the island of Elba in 1815. Berthier, Macdonald, Victor, Moses, Serrurier.

Many of the marshals who survived the overthrow of Napoleon left memories that were extremely interesting and immediately became widely known in Western Europe, but are still completely unknown - except for individual fragments published in pre-revolutionary magazines - here in Russia. We can only hope that the time will come when in Russian it will be possible to read exciting descriptions of the grandiose events of the Napoleonic epic, compiled by such witnesses and participants as the marshals of the First Empire in France A. Massena, L.N. Davout, L.A. Berthier, L.G. Suchet, J.B. Jourdan, L.G. Saint-Cyr, J.E. McDonald, N.J. Sult, N.Sh. Oudinot, O.F. Marmont, E. Grouchy.
. Literature and notes
1. Eckerman I.P. Conversations with Goethe in the last years of his life. M., 1986, p. 132.

Napoleon Bonaparte is the first French emperor and one of the most talented commanders of all time. He had high intelligence, a fantastic memory and was distinguished by amazing performance.

Napoleon personally developed combat strategies that allowed him to emerge victorious in most battles, both on land and at sea.

As a result, after 2 years of hostilities, the Russian army entered Paris in triumph, and Napoleon abdicated the throne and was exiled to the island of Elba in the Mediterranean Sea.

Moscow fire

However, less than a year later he escapes and returns back to Paris.

By this time, the French were concerned that the monarchical Bourbon dynasty might once again take power. That is why they enthusiastically greeted the return of Emperor Napoleon.

Ultimately, Napoleon was overthrown and captured by the British. This time he was sent into exile on the island of St. Helena, in which he remained for about 6 years.

Personal life

From his youth, Napoleon had an increased interest in girls. It is generally accepted that he was short (168 cm), but at that time such height was considered quite normal.

In addition, he had good posture and strong-willed facial features. Thanks to this, he was very popular among women.

Napoleon's first love was 16-year-old Desiree Eugenia Clara. However, their relationship did not turn out to be strong. Once in the capital, future emperor had many affairs with Parisian women, who were often older than him.

Napoleon and Josephine

7 years after the French Revolution, Napoleon first met Josephine Beauharnais. A whirlwind romance began between them, and in 1796 they began to live in a civil marriage.

It is interesting that at that time Josephine already had two children from a previous marriage. In addition, she even spent some time in prison.

The couple had a lot in common. They both grew up in the provinces, faced difficulties in life, and also had prison experience.

Napoleon and Josephine

When Napoleon participated in various military campaigns, his beloved remained in Paris. Josephine enjoyed life, and he languished with melancholy and jealousy towards her.

It was difficult to call the famous commander a monogamist, and even rather the opposite. His biographers suggest that he had about 40 favorites. From some of them he had children.

After living with Josephine for about 14 years, Napoleon decides to divorce her. One of the main reasons for the divorce was that the girl could not have children.

An interesting fact is that Bonaparte initially proposed marriage to Anna Pavlovna Romanova. He proposed to her through her brother.

However, the Russian emperor made it clear to the Frenchman that he did not want to become related to him. Some historians believe that this episode from Napoleon’s biography influenced further relations between Russia and France.

Soon the commander married the daughter of the Austrian emperor, Maria Louise. In 1811 she gave birth to his long-awaited heir.

It is worth paying attention to one more interesting fact. Fate turned out in such a way that it was Josephine’s grandson, and not Bonaparte, who in the future became emperor. His descendants still successfully reign in several European countries.

But Napoleon's pedigree soon ceased to exist. Bonaparte's son died at a young age, leaving no offspring.

After the abdication at the Palace of Fontainebleau

However, the wife, who lived with her father at that time, did not even remember her husband. Not only did she not express a desire to see him, but she did not even write him a single letter in response.

Death

After his defeat at the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon lived out his last years on the island of St. Elena. He was in a state of deep depression and suffered from pain in his right side.

He himself thought that he had cancer, from which his father died.

There is still debate about the true cause of his death. Some believe that he died from cancer, while others are convinced that there was arsenic poisoning.

The latest version is explained by the fact that after the death of the emperor, arsenic was found in his hair.

In his will, Bonaparte asked to bury his remains in France, which was done in 1840. His grave is located in the Parisian Invalides on the territory of the cathedral.

Photo of Napoleon

At the end we offer you to look at the most famous photos Napoleon. Of course, all portraits of Bonaparte were made by artists, since cameras simply did not exist at that time.

Bonaparte - First Consul

Emperor Napoleon in his office in the Tuileries

Capitulation of Madrid on December 4, 1808

Napoleon crowned King of Italy on May 26, 1805 in Milan

Napoleon Bonaparte on the Arcole Bridge

Napoleon and Josephine

Napoleon at the Saint Bernard Pass

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Italian Napoleone Buonaparte, fr. Napoleon Bonaparte

Emperor of the French in 1804-1814 and 1815, commander and statesman who laid the foundations of the modern French state; According to Encyclopedia Britannica, Napoleon is one of the most prominent figures in Western history

Brief biography

An outstanding French statesman, a brilliant commander, an emperor, was a native of Corsica. There he was born in 1769, on August 15, in the city of Ajaccio. Their noble family lived poorly and raised eight children. When Napoleon was 10 years old, he was sent to the French College of Autun, but already that same year he ended up at the Brienne Military School. In 1784 he became a student at the Paris Military Academy. Having received the rank of lieutenant upon graduation, in 1785 he began to serve in the artillery troops.

The French Revolution was greeted by Napoleon Bonaparte with great enthusiasm, and in 1792 he became a member of the Jacobin Club. For the capture of Toulon, occupied by the British, Bonaparte, who was appointed chief of artillery and carried out a brilliant operation, was awarded the rank of brigadier general in 1793. This event became a turning point in his biography, turning into the starting point of a brilliant military career. In 1795, Napoleon distinguished himself during the dispersal of the Parisian royalist rebellion, after which he was appointed commander of the Italian army. Undertaken under his leadership in 1796-1997. The Italian campaign demonstrated military leadership talents in all its glory and glorified it throughout the continent.

Napoleon considered his first victories sufficient grounds to declare himself as an independent person. Therefore, the Directory willingly sent him on a military expedition to distant lands - Syria and Egypt (1798-1999). It ended in defeat, but it was not regarded as Napoleon’s personal failure, because... he left the army without permission to fight Suvorov’s army in Italy.

When Napoleon Bonaparte returned to Paris in October 1799, the Directory regime was experiencing the peak of its crisis. It was not difficult for the extremely popular general, who had a loyal army, to carry out a coup d'état and proclaim the consulate regime. In 1802, Napoleon achieved that he was appointed consul for life, and in 1804 he was proclaimed emperor.

Conducted by him domestic politics was aimed at the comprehensive strengthening of personal power, which he called the guarantor of the preservation of revolutionary gains. He undertook a number of important reforms in the legal and administrative spheres. Many Napoleonic innovations formed the basis for the functioning of modern states and are still in effect today.

When Napoleon came to power, his country was at war with England and Austria. Heading out on a new Italian campaign, his army victoriously eliminated the threat to the borders of France. Moreover, as a result of military actions, almost all countries of Western Europe were subordinated to it. In those territories that were not directly part of France, Napoleon created kingdoms under his control, where the rulers were members of the imperial family. Austria, Prussia and Russia were forced to enter into an alliance with it.

During the first years of his time in power, Napoleon was perceived by the population as the savior of the homeland, a man born of the revolution; his entourage largely consisted of representatives of the lower social strata. Victories evoked a feeling of pride in the country and national uplift. However, the war, which lasted about 20 years, left the population fairly tired, and in 1810 the economic crisis began again.

The bourgeoisie was dissatisfied with the need to spend money on wars, especially since external threats were a thing of the past. It did not escape her attention that an important factor in foreign policy was Napoleon’s desire to expand the scope of his power and protect the interests of the dynasty. The Emperor even divorced Josephine, his first wife (there were no children in their marriage), and in 1810 linked his fate with Marie-Louise, the daughter of the Austrian Emperor, which displeased many fellow citizens, although an heir was born from this union.

The collapse of the empire began in 1812 after Russian troops defeated Napoleon's army. Then the anti-French coalition, which, in addition to Russia, included Prussia, Sweden, and Austria, defeated the imperial army in 1814 and, entering Paris, forced Napoleon I to abdicate the throne. While retaining the title of emperor, he found himself as an exile on a small island. Elbe in the Mediterranean Sea.

Meanwhile, French society and the army experienced discontent and fears due to the fact that the Bourbons and the emigrated nobility had returned to the country, hoping for the return of former privileges and property. Having escaped from the Elbe, on March 1, 1815, Bonaparte moved to Paris, where he was met with enthusiastic cries of the townspeople and resumed hostilities. This period of his biography remained in history under the name “One Hundred Days.” The Battle of Waterloo on June 18, 1815 led to the final and irrevocable defeat of Napoleon's troops.

The deposed emperor was sent to the Atlantic Ocean to the island of St. Helena, where he was a prisoner of the British. The last 6 years of his life passed there, filled with humiliation and suffering from cancer. It was from this disease that 51-year-old Napoleon was believed to have died on May 5, 1821. However, later French researchers came to the conclusion that the true cause of his death was arsenic poisoning.

Napoleon I Bonaparte went down in history as an outstanding, controversial personality, possessing brilliant military leadership, diplomatic and intellectual abilities, amazing performance and a phenomenal memory. The results of the revolution, consolidated by this major statesman, were beyond the power of destroying the restored Bourbon monarchy. An entire era was named after him; his fate was a real shock for his contemporaries, including people of art; military operations carried out under his leadership became the pages of military textbooks. Civil norms of democracy in Western countries are still largely based on Napoleonic law.

Biography from Wikipedia

Napoleon I Bonaparte(Italian Napoleone Buonaparte, French Napoleon Bonaparte; August 15, 1769, Ajaccio, Corsica - May 5, 1821, Longwood, St. Helena) - Emperor of the French (French Empereur des Français) in 1804-1814 and 1815, commander and statesman the figure who laid the foundations of the modern French state, one of the most prominent figures in the history of the West.

Napoleone Buonaparte (as he called himself in the Corsican manner until 1796) began his professional military service in 1785 with the rank of junior lieutenant of artillery. During the French Revolution, he reached the rank of brigadier general after the capture of Toulon on December 18, 1793. Under the Directory, he became a divisional general and commander of the military forces of the rear after playing a key role in defeating the rebellion of the 13th Vendémières in 1795. On March 2, 1796, he was appointed commander of the Italian Army. In 1798-1799 he led a military expedition to Egypt.

In November 1799 (18 Brumaire) he carried out a coup d'état and became first consul. In subsequent years, he carried out a number of political and administrative reforms and gradually achieved dictatorial power.

On May 18, 1804 he was proclaimed emperor. The victorious Napoleonic Wars, especially the Austrian campaign of 1805, the Prussian and Polish campaigns of 1806-1807, and the Austrian campaign of 1809, contributed to the transformation of France into the main power on the continent. However, Napoleon's unsuccessful rivalry with the “mistress of the seas” Great Britain did not allow this status to be fully consolidated.

The defeat of Napoleon I in the War of 1812 against Russia led to the formation of an anti-French coalition of European powers. Having lost the “Battle of the Nations” near Leipzig, Napoleon could no longer resist the united army of the Allies. After the coalition troops entered Paris, he abdicated the throne on April 6, 1814 and went into exile on the island of Elba.

Returned to the French throne in March 1815 (for a hundred days). Defeat at Waterloo forced him to abdicate the throne for a second time on June 22, 1815.

He lived his last years on the island of St. Helena as a prisoner of the British. His ashes have been kept in the Invalides in Paris since 1840.

Early years

Origin

Napoleon born in Ajaccio on the island of Corsica, which for a long time was under the control of the Genoese Republic. In 1755, Corsica freed itself from Genoese rule and from that time on virtually existed as an independent state under the leadership of the local landowner Pasquale Paoli, whose close assistant was Napoleon's father. In 1768, the Republic of Genoa transferred its rights to Corsica to the French King Louis XV for 40 million livres. In May 1769, at the Battle of Ponte Nuovo, French troops defeated the Corsican rebels. Paoli and 340 of his companions emigrated to England. Napoleon's parents remained in Corsica; he himself was born 3 months after these events. Paoli remained his idol until the 1790s.

The Buonaparte family belonged to minor aristocrats; Napoleon's ancestors came from Florence and lived in Corsica since 1529. Carlo Buonaparte, Napoleon's father, served as assessor and had an annual income of 22.5 thousand livres, which he tried to increase through litigation with neighbors over property. Napoleon's mother, Letizia Ramolino, was a very attractive and strong-willed woman; her marriage to Carlo was arranged by their parents. As the daughter of the late Inspector General of Corsican bridges and roads, Letizia brought with her a large dowry and position in society. Napoleon was the second of 13 children, five of whom died at an early age. Besides Napoleon, 4 of his brothers and 3 sisters lived to adulthood:

Joseph (1768-1844)
Lucien (1775-1840)
Eliza (1777-1820)
Louis (1778-1846)
Polina (1780-1825)
Caroline (1782-1839)
Jerome (1784-1860)

The name that Napoleon's parents gave him was quite rare: it appears in Machiavelli's book on the history of Florence; that was also the name of one of his great-uncles.

Childhood and youth

Casa Buonaparte - Napoleon's home

Little is known about Napoleon's early childhood. As a child, he suffered from a dry cough that could have been bouts of tuberculosis. According to his mother and older brother Joseph, Napoleon read a lot, especially historical literature. He found himself a small room on the third floor of the house and rarely came down from there, missing family meals. Napoleon subsequently claimed that he first read Rousseau's La Nouvelle Heloise at the age of nine. However, his childhood nickname “Balamut” (Italian: “Rabulione”) does not fit well with this image of a frail introvert.

Napoleon's native language was the Corsican dialect of Italian. He learned to read and write Italian in primary school and only began learning French when he was almost ten years old. All his life he spoke with a strong Italian accent. Thanks to cooperation with the French and the patronage of the governor of Corsica, Count de Marbeuf, Carlo Buonaparte managed to obtain royal scholarships for his two eldest sons, Joseph and Napoleon. In 1777, Carlo was elected deputy to Paris from the Corsican nobility. In December 1778, going to Versailles, he took with him both his sons and his brother-in-law Fesch, who had achieved a scholarship to the Aix seminary. The boys were placed at a college in Autun for four months, mainly for the purpose of learning French.

In May 1779, Napoleon entered the cadet school (college) in Brienne-le-Chateau. Napoleon had no friends at college, since he came from a not very rich and noble family, and besides, he was a Corsican with pronounced patriotism for his native island and hostility towards the French as the enslavers of Corsica. The bullying of some classmates forced him to withdraw into himself and devote more time to reading. He read Corneille, Racine and Voltaire, his favorite poet being Ossian. Napoleon was especially fond of mathematics and history; he was fascinated by antiquity and such historical figures as Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar. Napoleon achieved particular success in mathematics, history and geography; on the contrary, he was weak in Latin and German. In addition, he made quite a lot of mistakes when writing, but thanks to his love of reading, his style became much better. A conflict with some teachers even made him popular among his peers, and gradually he became their informal leader.

While still in Brienne, Napoleon decided to specialize in artillery. His mathematical talents were in demand in this branch of the military, and here there were the greatest opportunities for a career, regardless of origin. Having passed the final exams, in October 1784 Napoleon was admitted to the Paris Military School. There he studied mathematics, natural sciences, horse riding, military technology, tactics, including becoming acquainted with the innovative works of Guibert and Gribeauval. As before, he shocked teachers with his admiration for Paoli, Corsica, and hostility towards France. He was lonely, he had no friends, but he had enemies. Pico de Picadu, who was sitting between Napoleon and Picard de Felippo, ran away from his seat because he was constantly getting hit in their hidden fights.

In total, Napoleon was not in Corsica for almost eight years. Studying in France made him a Frenchman - he moved here at an early age and spent many years here, French cultural influence was spreading to the rest of Europe at that time and the emerging French identity was very attractive.

Military career

Start of a career

In 1782, Napoleon's father received a concession and a royal grant to create a nursery (fr. pépinière) of mulberry trees. Three years later, the Corsica parliament revoked the concession, allegedly due to non-fulfillment of its terms. At the same time, the Buonaparte family was left with large debts and an obligation to repay the grant. On February 24, 1785, his father died, and Napoleon took over the role of head of the family, although according to the rules his older brother Joseph should have done so. On September 28 of the same year, he completed his education early and on November 3 began his professional career in the de La Fère artillery regiment in Valence with the rank of sub-lieutenant of artillery (the officer's patent was dated September 1, the rank was finally confirmed on January 10, 1786 after a three-month probationary period) .

The expenses and litigation over the nursery completely upset the family's finances. In September 1786, Napoleon requested leave with pay, which was then extended twice at his request. During his vacation, Napoleon tried to settle family affairs, including traveling to Paris. In June 1788, he returned to military service and went to Osong, where his regiment was transferred. To help his mother, he had to send her part of his salary. He lived extremely poorly, ate once a day, but tried not to show his depressing financial situation. That same year, Napoleon attempted to enlist as a well-paid officer in the Russian Imperial Army, which was recruiting foreign volunteers for the war against the Ottoman Empire. However, according to the order received the day before, the recruitment of foreigners was carried out only with a reduction in rank, which Napoleon was not happy with.

In April 1789, Napoleon was sent as second-in-command to Soeur to suppress a food riot. The French Revolution, which began in July with the storming of the Bastille, forced Napoleon to choose between his devotion to Corsican freedom and his French identity. However, the problems with the nursery occupied him at that time more than the unfolding political upheavals. Although Napoleon was involved in suppressing revolts, he was one of the early supporters of the Society of Friends of the Constitution. In Ajaccio, his brother Lucien joined the Jacobin club. In August 1789, again receiving sick leave, Buonaparte went to his homeland, where he stayed for the next eighteen months and actively participated with his brothers in the local political struggle on the side of the revolutionary forces. Napoleon and Salicetti, a member of the Constituent Assembly, supported the transformation of Corsica into a department of France. Paoli, seeing this as a consolidation of the power of Paris, protested from exile. In July 1790, Paoli returned to the island and led the way for separation from France. Buonaparte, on the contrary, remained loyal to the central revolutionary authorities, approving the unpopular nationalization of church property in Corsica.

In February 1791, Napoleon returned to service, taking with him his younger brother Louis (for whose studies he paid from his salary, Louis had to sleep on the floor). On 1 June 1791 he was promoted to lieutenant (with seniority from 1 April) and transferred back to Valence. In August of the same year, he again received leave to Corsica (for four months, with the condition that if he did not return before January 10, 1792, he would be considered a deserter). Arriving in Corsica, Napoleon again plunged into politics and was elected lieutenant colonel in the emerging National Guard. He never returned to Valence. Having entered into conflict with Paoli, in May 1792 he left for Paris at the disposal of the War Ministry. In June he received the rank of captain (although Napoleon insisted that he be confirmed with the rank of lieutenant colonel received in the National Guard). From the moment he entered service in September 1785 until September 1792, Napoleon spent a total of about four years on leave. In Paris, Napoleon witnessed the events of June 20, August 10 and September 2, supported the overthrow of the king, but disapproved of his weakness and the indecisiveness of his defenders.

In October 1792, Napoleon returned to Corsica to his duties as lieutenant colonel of the National Guard. Buonaparte's first combat experience was participation in an expedition to the islands of Maddalena and Santo Stefano, which belonged to the Kingdom of Sardinia, in February 1793. The landing force landed from Corsica was quickly defeated, but Captain Buonaparte, who commanded a small artillery battery of two cannons and a mortar, distinguished himself: he made every effort to save the guns, but they still had to be abandoned on the shore.

In the same 1793, Paoli was accused before the Convention of seeking to achieve the independence of Corsica from Republican France. Napoleon's brother Lucien was involved in the accusations. As a result, there was a final break between the Buonaparte and Paoli families. Buonaparte openly opposed Paoli's course for the complete independence of Corsica and, due to the threat of political persecution, in June 1793 the whole family moved to France. That same month, Paoli recognized George III as King of Corsica.

Napoleon was assigned to the revolutionary Italian Army, then to the Army of the South. At the end of July, he wrote a pamphlet in the Jacobin spirit, “Dinner at Beaucaire” (French: “Le Souper de Beaucaire”), which was published with the help of the Convention commissioners Salichetti and the younger Robespierre and created the author’s reputation as a revolutionary-minded soldier.

In September 1793, Buonaparte arrived in the army besieging Toulon, occupied by the British and royalists, and in October received the post of battalion commander (corresponding to the rank of major). In Toulon he contracted scabies, which tormented him in subsequent years. Appointed chief of artillery, Buonaparte carried out a brilliant military operation in December. Toulon was taken, and at the age of 24 he himself received the rank of brigadier general from the commissioners of the Convention. The new rank was assigned to him on December 22, 1793, and in February 1794 it was approved by the Convention.

Having received an appointment to the post of chief artilleryman of the Italian army on February 7, Napoleon participated in a five-week campaign against the kingdom of Piedmont, became acquainted with the command of the Italian army and the theater of operations, and sent proposals to the War Ministry for organizing an offensive in Italy. At the beginning of May, Napoleon returned to Nice and Antibes to prepare a military expedition to Corsica. At the same time, he began to court Desiree Clary, the sixteen-year-old daughter of the late millionaire, a fabric and soap merchant. In August 1794, Désiré's older sister married Joseph Buonaparte, bringing with her a dowry of 400 thousand livres (which finally put an end to the financial problems of the Buonaparte family).

After the Thermidorian coup, Buonaparte was arrested due to his connections with the younger Robespierre (August 9, 1794, for two weeks). After liberation, he continued preparations for the reconquest of Corsica from Paoli and the British. On March 3 (according to other sources, 11), 1795, Napoleon, as part of an expedition of 15 ships and 16,900 soldiers, sailed from Marseille, but this flotilla was soon dispersed by the British squadron.

In the spring of the same year, he was assigned to the Vendée to pacify the rebels. Arriving in Paris on May 25, Napoleon learned that he had been appointed to command the infantry, while he was an artilleryman. Buonaparte refused to accept the appointment, citing health reasons. In June, Desiree ended her relationship with him, according to E. Roberts, under the influence of her mother, who believed that one Buonaparte in the family was enough. Being on half pay, Napoleon continues to write letters to War Minister Carnot regarding the actions of the Italian army. In the absence of any prospects, he even considered the possibility of entering the service of the East India Company. Having a lot of free time, he visited the Café de la Régence, where he enthusiastically played chess. In August 1795, the War Department required him to undergo a medical examination to confirm the illness. Turning to his political connections, Napoleon received a position in the topographical department of the Committee of Public Safety, which at that time played the role of the headquarters of the French army. On September 15, he was removed from the list of active generals for refusing to go to the Vendée, but was almost immediately reinstated.

At a critical moment for the Thermidorians, Napoleon was appointed by Barras as his assistant and distinguished himself during the dispersal of the royalist rebellion in Paris on October 5, 1795 (Napoleon used cannons against the rebels on the streets of the capital), was promoted to the rank of division general and appointed commander of the rear forces. Released in 1785 from the Paris Military School into the army with the rank of junior lieutenant, Buonaparte in 10 years went through the entire hierarchy of ranks in the army of what was then France.

At 10 pm on March 9, 1796, Buonaparte had a civil marriage with the widow of General Count Beauharnais, executed during the Jacobin Terror, Josephine, the former mistress of one of the then rulers of France, Barras. The witnesses at the wedding were Barras, Napoleon's adjutant Lemarois, husband and wife Tallien and the bride's children - Eugene and Hortensia. The groom was two hours late for the wedding, being very busy with a new appointment. Some consider Barras's wedding gift to the young general to be the commander of the Italian Army of the Republic (appointment took place on March 2, 1796), but Carnot suggested Buonaparte for this position. On March 11, Napoleon left for the army. In a letter to Josephine, written on the road, he omitted the “u” from his last name, deliberately emphasizing that he preferred French over Italian and Corsican.

Italian campaign

Having taken command of the army, Bonaparte found it in a difficult financial situation. Salaries were not paid, ammunition and supplies were almost never delivered. Napoleon managed to partially solve these problems, including at the cost of a real war with unscrupulous army suppliers, but he understood that he needed to move to enemy territory and organize supplies for the army at its expense.

Bonaparte based his operational plan on the speed of action and on the concentration of forces against enemies who adhered to a cordon strategy and disproportionately stretched their troops. He himself, on the contrary, adhered to the "central position" strategy, in which his divisions were within a day's march of each other. Being inferior to the allies in numbers, he concentrated his troops for decisive battles and gained a numerical superiority in them. With a quick offensive during the Montenotte campaign in April 1796, he managed to separate the troops of the Sardinian General Colli and the Austrian General Beaulieu and defeat them.

From the moment of his departure from Paris, Napoleon bombarded Josephine with letters, asking her to come to him. However, at this time in Paris, Josephine became interested in the young officer Hippolyte Charles. In her letters, Josephine explained the delay by pregnancy; at the end of May, she completely stopped responding to Napoleon’s pleas, leading him to despair. Finally, in June, Josephine left for Italy, accompanied by the same Hippolyte Charles, Joseph and Junot. However, these events did not prevent Napoleon from leading the army, since one of his talents was the ability to completely separate his personal problems from his professional sphere of activity: “I close one drawer and open another,” he said.

Only the fortress of Mantua and the citadel of Milan remained in the hands of the Austrians. Mantua was besieged on June 3. On June 29, the Milan Citadel fell. Wurmser's new Austrian army, which arrived from Tyrol, could not improve the situation; after a series of failures, Wurmser himself, with part of his forces, was forced to lock himself in Mantua, which he had previously tried in vain to liberate from the siege. In November, new troops were sent to Italy under the command of Alvintsi and Davidovich. As a result of the battles at Arcola on November 15-17, Alvintsi was forced to retreat. Napoleon showed personal heroism by leading one of the attacks on the Arcole Bridge with a banner in his hands. His adjutant Muiron died, shielding him with his body from enemy bullets.

After the Battle of Rivoli on January 14-15, 1797, the Austrians were finally driven out of Italy, suffering huge losses. The situation in Mantua, where widespread disease and famine were raging, became desperate; on February 2, Wurmser capitulated. On February 17, Bonaparte marched on Vienna. The weakened and frustrated Austrian troops could no longer offer him stubborn resistance. By the beginning of April, the French were only 100 kilometers from the Austrian capital, but the forces of the Italian army were also running out. On April 7, a truce was concluded, and on April 18, peace negotiations began in Leoben.

While peace negotiations were ongoing, Bonaparte pursued his own military and administrative line, regardless of the instructions sent to him by the Directory. Using the uprising that began on April 17 in Verona as a pretext, on May 2 he declared war on Venice, and on May 15 he occupied it with troops. On June 29, he declared the independence of the Cisalpine Republic, composed of Lombardy, Mantua, Modena and some other adjacent possessions; at the same time, Genoa was occupied, called the Ligurian Republic. Showing his genius for his deep understanding of the mechanisms of propaganda, Napoleon methodically used the victories of the army to create political capital. On July 17, the Courier of the Italian Army began publication, followed by France through the Eyes of the Italian Army and the Journal of Bonaparte and Virtuous Men. These newspapers were widely distributed not only in the army, but also in France itself.

As a result of his victories, Napoleon received significant military booty, which he generously distributed among his soldiers, without forgetting himself and his family members. Part of the funds was sent to the Directory, which was in desperate financial straits. Napoleon provided the Directory with direct military support on the eve and during the events of Fructidor 18 (September 3-4), revealing the betrayal of Pichegru and sending Augereau to Paris. On October 18, peace was concluded with Austria in Campo Formio, ending the War of the First Coalition, from which France emerged victorious. When signing the peace, Napoleon completely ignored the position of the Directory, forcing it to ratify the treaty in the form he needed. On December 5, Napoleon returned to France and settled in a house on Victory Street (fr. rue Victoire), renamed in his honor. Napoleon bought the house for 52.4 thousand francs, and Josephine spent another 300 thousand francs on its decoration.

Egyptian campaign

As a result of the Italian campaign, Napoleon gained great popularity in France. On December 25, 1797, he was elected a member of the National Institute of Sciences and Arts in the class of physics and mathematics, section of mechanics. On January 10, 1798, the Directory appointed him commander of the English army. It was planned that Napoleon would organize an expeditionary force to land on the British Isles. However, after several weeks of inspecting the invasion force and analyzing the situation, Napoleon recognized the landing as impracticable and put forward a plan to conquer Egypt, which he saw as an important outpost in the attack on British positions in India. On March 5, Napoleon received carte blanche to organize the expedition and actively began preparing it. Remembering that Alexander the Great was accompanied by scientists on his eastern campaigns, Napoleon took with him 167 geographers, botanists, chemists and representatives of other sciences (31 of them were members of the Institute).

On August 1, the British squadron under the command of Nelson, after two months of searching in the vastness of the Mediterranean Sea, finally overtook the French fleet in the Gulf of Abukir. As a result of the battle, the French lost almost all of their ships (including the flagship Orient, which carried 60 million francs of Maltese indemnity), the survivors had to return to France. Napoleon found himself cut off in Egypt, and the British gained control of the Mediterranean Sea.

After the capture of Cairo, Napoleon sent a detachment of 3 thousand people under the leadership of Dese and Davout to conquer Upper Egypt, and in the meantime he began active and largely successful measures to subjugate the country and attract the sympathy of influential sections of the local population. Napoleon tried to find mutual understanding with the Islamic clergy, but nevertheless, on the night of October 21, an uprising broke out against the French in Cairo: about 300 French were killed, more than 2,500 rebels were killed during the suppression of the uprising and executed after its completion. By the end of November, calm had established itself in Cairo; opening a pleasure garden on November 30, Napoleon met Pauline Fouret, the twenty-year-old wife of an officer, whom Napoleon immediately sent on an errand to France.

Incited by the British, the Porte began to prepare an attack on the French positions in Egypt. Based on his principle of “attack is the best defense,” in February 1799 Napoleon began his campaign against Syria. He took Gaza and Jaffa by storm, but was unable to capture Acre, which was supplied by the British fleet from the sea and strengthened on land by Picard de Felippo. On May 20, 1799, the retreat began. Napoleon was still able to defeat the Turks, who were stationed near Abukir (July 25), but realized that he was trapped. On August 23, he secretly sailed to France on the frigate Muiron, accompanied by Berthier, Lannes, Murat, Monge and Berthollet, throwing an army at General Kleber. Having happily avoided encounters with British ships, Napoleon returned to France in the aura of the conqueror of the East.

Arriving in Paris on October 16, Napoleon discovered that during his absence Josephine had bought the Malmaison estate for 325 thousand (borrowed by her) francs. After the scandal over Josephine's infidelity (according to E. Roberts, partly staged by Napoleon), reconciliation followed. In her later family life, Josephine remained faithful to her husband, which cannot be said about him.

Consulate

Coup of the 18th Brumaire and temporary consulate

While Bonaparte was with his troops in Egypt, the French government found itself in a crisis situation. The European monarchies formed a second coalition against Republican France. The Directory could not ensure the stability of the republic within the framework of the current constitution and relied increasingly on the army. In Italy, Russian-Austrian troops under the command of Suvorov liquidated all of Napoleon's acquisitions, and there was even a threat of their invasion of France. In conditions of crisis, emergency measures were taken, reminiscent of the times of terror of 1793. To prevent the “Jacobin” threat and give greater stability to the regime, a conspiracy was formed, which even included the directors Sieyès and Ducos themselves. The conspirators were looking for a “saber” and turned to Bonaparte as a person who suited them in terms of his popularity and military reputation. Napoleon, on the one hand, did not want to be compromised (contrary to his custom, he wrote almost no letters these days); on the other hand, he actively participated in the preparation of the coup.

The conspirators managed to win over most of the generals to their side. 18 Brumaire (November 9, 1799) The Council of Elders, in which the conspirators had a majority, adopted decrees transferring the meetings of the two chambers to Saint-Cloud and appointing Bonaparte commander of the Seine department. Sieyès and Ducos immediately resigned, and Barras did the same, thereby ending the powers of the Directory and creating a vacuum of executive power. However, the Council of Five Hundred, which met on November 10, in which there was a strong influence of the Jacobins, refused to approve the required decree. Its members attacked Bonaparte with threats, who entered the meeting room with weapons and without an invitation. Then, at the call of Lucien, who was the chairman of the Council of Five Hundred, soldiers under the command of Murat burst into the hall and dispersed the meeting. That same evening, it was possible to gather the remnants of the Council (approximately 50 people) and “adopt” the necessary decrees on the establishment of a temporary consulate and a commission to develop a new constitution.

Three temporary consuls were appointed (Bonaparte, Sieyès and Ducos). Ducos offered the presidency to Bonaparte "by right of conquest", but he refused in favor of daily rotation. The task of the temporary consulate was to develop and adopt a new constitution. Under pressure from Bonaparte, her project was developed in five weeks. In these few weeks, he was able to attract many of those who had previously supported Sieyès and introduce fundamental amendments to his draft constitution. Sieyès, having received 350 thousand francs and real estate in Versailles and Paris, did not object. According to the project, legislative power was divided between the State Council, the Tribunate, the Legislative Corps and the Senate, which made it helpless and clumsy. The executive power, on the contrary, was gathered into one fist by the first consul, that is, Bonaparte, appointed for ten years. The second and third consuls (Cambaceres and Lebrun) had only advisory votes. The formal elections of the three consuls took place on December 12.

Ten-year consulate

At the time Napoleon came to power, France was at war with Great Britain and Austria, which in 1799, as a result of Suvorov’s Italian campaign, regained Northern Italy. Napoleon's new Italian campaign resembled the first. In May 1800, having crossed the Alps in ten days, the French army unexpectedly appeared in Northern Italy. At the Battle of Marengo on June 14, 1800, Napoleon initially succumbed to pressure from the Austrians under the command of Melas, but a counterattack by Dese, who arrived in time, corrected the situation (Dese himself was killed). The victory at Marengo made it possible to begin negotiations for peace in Leoben, but it took Moreau's victory at Hohenlinden on December 3, 1800 for the threat to the French borders to be finally eliminated.

The Peace of Luneville, concluded on February 9, 1801, marked the beginning of French dominance not only in Italy, but also in Germany. A year later (March 27, 1802), the Peace of Amiens was concluded with Great Britain, ending the War of the Second Coalition. However, the Peace of Amiens did not eliminate the deep-seated contradictions between France and Great Britain and was therefore fragile. The terms of peace provided for the return to France of its colonies occupied by England. In an effort to restore and expand the colonial empire, under the terms of the Treaty of San Ildefonso, Napoleon acquired Louisiana from Spain. In March 1802, he sent an expedition of 25 thousand soldiers under the command of his son-in-law Leclerc to recapture Saint-Domingue from the rebel slaves led by Toussaint Louverture.

Napoleon's administrative and legal innovations laid the foundation for the modern state, many of which are still in effect today. Having become first consul, Napoleon radically changed the country's government; in 1800 he carried out an administrative reform, establishing the institution of department prefects and district sub-prefects accountable to the government. Mayors were appointed to cities and villages. Administrative reform made it possible to resolve those issues for which local authorities were responsible, and which the Directory had previously been unable to resolve - tax collection and recruitment.

In 1800, the Bank of France was established to store gold reserves and issue money (this function was transferred to it in 1803). The bank was initially governed by 15 elected board members from among the shareholders, but in 1806 the government appointed a governor (Crete) and two deputies, and the 15 board members included three general tax collectors.

Well aware of the importance of influencing public opinion, Napoleon closed 60 of the 73 Parisian newspapers and placed the rest under government control. A powerful police force was created, led by Fouche, and an extensive secret service, headed by Savary.

In March 1802, Napoleon removed many supporters of the republican opposition from the legislature. There was a gradual return to monarchical forms of government. The “you” address, adopted during the years of the revolution, has disappeared from everyday life. Napoleon allowed some of the emigrants to return, subject to taking an oath of allegiance to the constitution. Liveries, official ceremonies, palace hunting, and masses in Saint-Cloud returned to everyday life. Instead of the registered weapons awarded during the years of the revolution, despite the objections of the State Council, Napoleon introduced a hierarchically organized Order of the Legion of Honor (May 19, 1802). But while attacking the “left” opposition, Bonaparte, at the same time, sought to preserve the gains of the revolution.

In 1801, Napoleon concluded a concordat with the Pope. Rome recognized the new French government, and Catholicism was declared the religion of the majority of the French. At the same time, freedom of religion was preserved. The appointment of bishops and the activities of the church were made dependent on the government.

These and other measures forced Napoleon’s opponents “on the left” to declare him a traitor to the Revolution, although he considered himself a faithful successor of its ideas. Napoleon feared the Jacobins more than the royalist conspirators because of their ideology, knowledge of the mechanisms of power and excellent organization. When the “infernal machine” exploded on December 24, 1800, on the Rue Saint-Nicèse, along which Napoleon was traveling to the Opera, he used this assassination attempt as a pretext for reprisals against the Jacobins, although Fouché provided him with evidence of the royalists’ guilt.

Napoleon managed to consolidate the main revolutionary gains (the right to property, equality before the law, equality of opportunity), ending revolutionary anarchy. In the minds of the French, prosperity and stability were increasingly linked to his presence at the helm of state, which contributed to Bonaparte's next step to strengthen personal power - the transition to a lifelong consulate.

Lifetime Consulate

Bonaparte - First Consul. Ingres (1803-1804)

On April 7, 1803, paper money was abolished; The main monetary unit was the silver franc, divided into 100 centimes; At the same time, gold coins of 20 and 40 francs were introduced. The metal franc established by Napoleon was in circulation until 1928.

Having taken over a state with a deplorable financial condition, Napoleon and his financial advisers completely rebuilt the system of collecting taxes and spending funds. The normal functioning of the financial system was ensured by the creation of two opposing and at the same time cooperating ministries: finance and treasury, headed by Gaudin and Barbe-Marbois, respectively. The Minister of Finance was responsible for budget revenues, the Minister of Treasury was responsible for spending funds; expenditures had to be approved by law or ministerial decree and were closely monitored.

Napoleon's foreign policy was to ensure the primacy of the French industrial and financial bourgeoisie in the European market. This was hampered by English capital, the predominance of which was due to the industrial revolution that had already taken place in Great Britain. Competition between the two countries resulted in their violation of the terms of the Treaty of Amiens. The British refused to evacuate their troops from Malta, as provided for in the treaty. Napoleon, in turn, occupied Elba, Piedmont and Parma, and also signed an Act of Mediation and a Treaty of Military Alliance with the Swiss cantons. In preparation for the inevitable war, Napoleon sold Louisiana to the United States. Like Leclerc's expedition to Haiti, Napoleon's colonial projects were generally a fiasco.

20 gold francs 1803 - Napoleon as First Consul

By May 1803, relations between Britain and France had become so strained that the British recalled their ambassador; On May 16, an order was issued to seize French ships in British ports and on the high seas, and on May 18, Great Britain declared war on France. Napoleon moved the French army to the Duchy of Hanover, which belonged to the British king. On July 4, the Hanoverian army capitulated. Napoleon began to create a large military camp on the Pas de Calais coast near Boulogne. On December 2, 1803, these troops received the name "English Army"; by 1804, more than 1,700 ships had been assembled in and around Boulogne to transport troops to England.

After the discovery of the Cadoudal-Pichegru plot (the so-called “conspiracy of the year XII”), in which the princes of the royal house of Bourbon outside France were supposed to participate, Napoleon ordered the capture of one of them, the Duke of Enghien in Ettenheim, not far from the French border. The Duke was taken to Paris and executed by military court on March 21, 1804. Cadoudal was executed, Pichegru was found dead in a prison cell, Moreau, who met with them, was expelled from France. The XII conspiracy caused indignation in French society and was used by the official press to instill in readers the idea of the need for the hereditary power of the First Consul.

First Empire

Proclamation of the Empire

On the same day, five of the six highest dignitaries (the High Elector, the Arch-Chancellor of the Empire, the Arch-Treasurer, the Grand Constable and the Grand Admiral) were appointed. The highest dignitaries formed a large imperial council. On May 19, 1804, eighteen popular generals were appointed marshals of France, four of them being considered honorary and the rest valid.

Another stumbling block between Napoleon and his brothers was the question of who should be king of Italy and who would inherit imperial power in France. The result of their disputes was a decision according to which Napoleon received both crowns, and in the event of his death the crowns were divided between his relatives. On March 17, 1805, the Kingdom of Italy was created from the “daughter” Italian Republic, in which Napoleon was president. In the newly formed kingdom, Napoleon received the title of king, and his stepson Eugene Beauharnais received the title of viceroy. The decision to crown Napoleon with the Iron Crown did a disservice to French diplomacy, as it aroused the hostility of Austria and contributed to its joining the newly formed anti-French coalition. In May 1805, the Ligurian Republic became one of the departments of France.

Rise of an Empire

In April 1805, Russia and Great Britain signed the St. Petersburg Union Treaty, which laid the foundation for the third coalition. That same year, Great Britain, Austria, Russia, the Kingdom of Naples and Sweden formed the Third Coalition against France and its allied Spain. An important factor British subsidies played a role in the formation of the coalition (the British allocated 5 million pounds sterling to the allies). French diplomacy managed to achieve Prussia's neutrality in the impending war (Talleyrand, on Napoleon's instructions, promised Frederick William III that Hanover would be taken from the British).

Napoleon planned a landing on the British Isles, but, having received information about the actions of the coalition, he moved troops from the Boulogne camp to Germany. The Austrian army capitulated at the Battle of Ulm on October 20, 1805. On October 21, the British fleet under the command of Nelson defeated the Spanish-French fleet at Trafalgar. As a result of this defeat, Napoleon ceded supremacy of the sea to the British. Despite the enormous efforts and resources that Napoleon expended in subsequent years, he was never able to shake British naval rule; landing on the British Isles became impossible. On November 13, Vienna was declared an open city and French troops occupied it without serious resistance.

Russian Emperor Alexander I and Holy Roman Emperor Francis II arrived to join the army. At the insistence of Alexander I, the Russian army stopped retreating and, together with the Austrians, on December 2, 1805, entered the battle with the French at Austerlitz, in which the allies fell into a tactical trap set by Napoleon, suffered a heavy defeat and retreated in disarray. On December 26, Austria concluded the Peace of Presburg with France. More than 65 million francs came from the Austrian states to the Office of Extraordinary Estates: the war fed the war. News of military operations and victories, which reached the French public through the bulletins of the Grande Armée, served to unite the nation.

On December 27, 1805, Napoleon announced that “the Bourbon dynasty has ceased to reign in Naples” because the Kingdom of Naples, contrary to the previous agreement, joined the anti-French coalition. The movement of the French army towards Naples forced King Ferdinand I to flee to Sicily, and Napoleon made his brother Joseph Bonaparte king of Naples. By decree of March 30, 1806, Napoleon introduced princely titles for members of the imperial family. Polina and her husband received the Duchy of Guastalla, Murat and his wife received the Grand Duchy of Berg. Berthier received Neuchâtel. The principalities of Benevento and Pontecorvo were given to Talleyrand and Bernadotte. Napoleon's sister Elisa received Lucca even earlier, and in 1809 Napoleon made Elisa ruler of all Tuscany. In June 1806, the Kingdom of Holland replaced the puppet Batavian Republic. Napoleon placed his younger brother, Louis Bonaparte, on the throne of Holland.

On July 12, 1806, an agreement was concluded between Napoleon and many rulers of the German states, by virtue of which these rulers entered into an alliance with each other, called the Rhineland, under the protectorate of Napoleon and with the obligation to maintain a sixty-thousandth army for him. The formation of the union was accompanied by mediatization (the subordination of small immediate (immediat) rulers to the supreme power of large sovereigns). On August 6, 1806, Emperor Francis II announced his abdication of the title and powers of Holy Roman Emperor and, thus, this centuries-old entity ceased to exist.

Alarmed by the strengthening of French positions in Germany, having not received the Hanover promised to it, Prussia opposed Napoleon. On August 26, she issued an ultimatum demanding the withdrawal of the Grand Army beyond the Rhine. Napoleon rejected this ultimatum and attacked the Prussian troops. In the first major battle of Saalfeld, on October 10, 1806, the Prussians were defeated. This was followed on October 14 by their complete defeat at Jena and Auerstedt. Two weeks after the Jena victory, Napoleon entered Berlin, and soon after Stetin, Prenzlau, and Magdeburg surrendered. An indemnity of 159 million francs was imposed on Prussia.

From Königsberg, where the Prussian king Frederick William III had fled, he begged Napoleon to end the war, agreeing to join the Confederation of the Rhine. However, Napoleon became more and more demanding, and the Prussian king was forced to continue hostilities. Russia came to his aid, sending two armies to prevent the French from crossing the Vistula. Napoleon addressed the Poles with an appeal inviting them to fight for independence and on December 19, 1806, he entered Warsaw for the first time. Fierce battles near Charnov, Pultusk and Golymin in December 1806 did not reveal any winners.

On December 13, Charles Leon, Napoleon's son from Eleanor Denuelle, was born in Paris. Napoleon learned about this on December 31 in Pułtusk. The birth of his son confirmed that Napoleon could have founded a dynasty if he had divorced Josephine. Returning to Warsaw from Pułtusk, on January 1, 1807, at the post station in Błon, Napoleon first met twenty-one-year-old Maria Walewska, the wife of an elderly Polish count, with whom he had a long affair.

The main battle of the winter campaign took place at Eylau on February 8, 1807. In the bloody battle between the main forces of the French and Russian armies under the command of General Bennigsen, there were no winners; for the first time in many years, Napoleon did not win a decisive victory.

The victories won in two Italian and other campaigns gave Napoleon a reputation as an invincible commander. His sovereignty was finally established within the empire; he now did not take into account at all the opinions of his ministers, legislators, relatives and friends. On August 9, 1807, Talleyrand was dismissed from his post as Minister of Foreign Affairs. On August 19, the Tribunate was dissolved. The emperor's dissatisfaction was caused by his crowned relatives and friends, who sought to defend the interests of their possessions despite the unity of the empire. Napoleon was distinguished by contempt for people and nervousness, which sometimes led to fits of rage similar to epilepsy. In an effort to make decisions individually and control their implementation, Napoleon created a system of so-called administrative councils, which considered, among other things, issues that were within the competence of municipalities, and to control the costs of maintaining a cumbersome administrative apparatus in 1807, he established the Court of Accounts headed by Barbe-Marbois.

As emperor, Napoleon got up at 7 o'clock in the morning and went about his business. At 10 o'clock - breakfast, accompanied by diluted chambertin (a habit since pre-revolutionary times). After breakfast, he again worked in his office until one o'clock in the afternoon, after which he attended council meetings. He had lunch at 5 and sometimes at 7 o’clock in the afternoon, after lunch he talked with the Empress, got acquainted with the latest books, and then returned to his office. I went to bed at midnight, woke up at three in the morning to take a hot bath, and went to bed again at five in the morning.

Continental blockade

40 gold francs 1807 - Napoleon as Emperor

On May 18, 1806, the British government ordered a blockade of the French coast, allowing the inspection of neutral (mainly American) ships heading to France. Having won victory over Prussia, on November 21, 1806 in Berlin, Napoleon signed a decree on the continental blockade. From that moment on, France and its allies ceased trade relations with England. Europe was the main market for British goods, as well as colonial goods imported by England - the largest maritime power. The Continental blockade damaged the British economy: as European countries joined the blockade, British cloth and cotton exports to the continent fell, while the prices of raw materials that Britain imported from the continent rose. The situation deteriorated significantly for Britain after Russia joined the continental blockade in July 1807 in accordance with the terms of the Peace of Tilsit. European countries, which initially tolerated British smuggling, were forced, under pressure from Napoleon, to begin a serious fight against it. In the second half of 1807, about 40 British ships were arrested in Dutch ports, and Denmark closed its waters to the British. By mid-1808, rising costs and falling incomes caused popular unrest in Lancashire and the pound sterling fell.

The blockade also hit the continent. French industry was not able to replace English industry on the European market. In response, in November 1807, London announced a blockade of European ports. The loss of their own and the disruption of trade ties with the English colonies led to the decline of French port cities: La Rochelle, Bordeaux, Marseille, Toulon. The population (and the emperor himself, as a big coffee lover) suffered from a lack of familiar colonial goods (coffee, sugar, tea) and their high cost. In 1811, Delessert, following the example of German inventors, began making high-quality sugar from sugar beets, for which he received the Order of the Legion of Honor from Napoleon, who came to him, but new technologies spread very slowly.

From the Pyrenees to Wagram

In 1807, with the support of Spain, which had been allied with France since 1796, Napoleon demanded that Portugal join the continental system. When Portugal refused to comply with this demand, on October 27, a secret agreement was concluded between Napoleon and Spain on the conquest and division of Portugal, while the southern part of the country was to go to the all-powerful first minister of Spain, Godoy. On November 13, 1807, the government "Le Moniteur" sardonically announced that "the House of Braganza has ceased to rule - a new proof of the inevitable death of all who associate themselves with England." Napoleon sent Junot's 25,000-strong corps to Lisbon. After a grueling two-month march through Spanish territory, Junot arrived in Lisbon on November 30 with 2 thousand soldiers. The Portuguese Prince Regent João, hearing of the approach of the French, abandoned his capital and fled with his relatives and court to Rio de Janeiro. Napoleon, enraged that the royal family and Portuguese ships had eluded him, on December 28 ordered an indemnity of 100 million francs to be imposed on Portugal.

Expecting to become a sovereign prince under the terms of a secret treaty, Godoy allowed a large number of French troops to be stationed on Spanish territory. On March 13, 1808, Murat was in Burgos with 100 thousand soldiers and was moving towards Madrid. To calm the Spaniards, Napoleon ordered the rumor to be spread that he intended to besiege Gibraltar. Realizing that with the death of the dynasty he would also die, Godoy began to convince the Spanish king Charles IV of the need to flee from Spain to South America. However, on the night of March 18, 1807, he was overthrown during the rebellion in Aranjuez by the so-called “Fernandists,” who achieved his resignation, the abdication of Charles IV and the transfer of power to the king’s son, Ferdinand VII. On March 23, Murat entered Madrid. In May 1808, Napoleon summoned both Spanish kings - father and son - to Bayonne for explanations. Finding themselves captured by Napoleon, both monarchs renounced the crown, and the emperor placed his brother Joseph, who had previously been the King of Naples, on the Spanish throne. Now Murat became the king of Naples.

In France itself, by decrees of March 1, 1808, Napoleon restored noble titles and noble coats of arms as a sign of recognition of services to the empire. The difference from the old nobility was that the grant of a title did not give rights to land holdings and the title was not automatically inherited. However, along with the title, new nobles often received high salaries. If a nobleman acquired primogeniture (capital or permanent income), then the title was inherited. 59 percent of the new nobility were military. On March 17, a decree was issued establishing the Imperial University. The university was divided into academies and was designed to provide higher education (bachelor). By creating the University, Napoleon sought to bring the formation of the national elite under his control.

Napoleon's intervention in the internal affairs of Spain caused outrage - on May 2 in Madrid, and then throughout the country. Local authorities (juntas) organized resistance to the French, who had to face a new form of combat for them - guerrilla warfare. On July 22, Dupont with 18 thousand soldiers surrendered to the Spaniards in a field near Baylen, causing swipe by the reputation of the previously invincible Grand Army. The British landed in Portugal with the support of local authorities and the population and forced Junot to evacuate the country after the defeat at Vimeiro.

For the final conquest of Spain and Portugal, Napoleon needed to transfer the main forces of the Grand Army from Germany here, but this was prevented by the threat of war from rearmed Austria. The only counterweight to Austria could be Russia, allied with Napoleon. On September 27, Napoleon met with Alexander I in Erfurt to gain his support. Napoleon entrusted the negotiations to Talleyrand, who by this time was in secret relations with the Austrian and Russian courts. Alexander proposed dividing Turkey and handing over Constantinople to Russia. Without receiving Napoleon's consent, Alexander limited himself to general words about an alliance against Austria. Napoleon also asked through Talleyrand for the hand of Grand Duchess Catherine Pavlovna, but here, too, he achieved nothing.

Hoping to solve the Spanish problem before Austria entered the war, Napoleon set out on a campaign on October 29 at the head of an army of 160 thousand people arriving from Germany. On December 4, French troops entered Madrid. On January 16, the British, having repelled Soult's attack near La Coruña, boarded ships and left Spain. On January 1, 1809, in Astorga, Napoleon received dispatches about the military preparations of Austria and about the intrigues in his government on the part of the close friends Talleyrand and Fouche (who agreed in the event of Napoleon's death in Spain to replace him with Murat). On January 17, he left Valladolid for Paris. Despite the successes achieved, the conquest of the Pyrenees was not completed: the Spaniards continued the guerrilla war, the English contingent covered Lisbon, and three months later the British under the command of Wellesley again landed on the peninsula. The fall of the Portuguese and Spanish dynasties led to the opening of both colonial empires to British trade and broke the continental blockade. For the first time, the war did not bring income to Napoleon, but only required more and more expenses and soldiers. To cover expenses, indirect taxes (on salt, food products) were increased, which caused discontent among the population. At St. Helena, Napoleon said: “the ill-fated Spanish war was the root cause of misfortune.”

In the time since the signing of the Peace of Presburg, deep military reforms were carried out in the Austrian army under the leadership of Archduke Charles. Hoping to take advantage of the anti-French sentiment that was gaining strength in Germany, on April 3, 1809, the Austrian Emperor Franz I declared war on France. After the outbreak of hostilities, Austria received more than £1 million in subsidies from Great Britain. Napoleon, stuck in Spain, tried to avoid war, but could not do this without support from Russia. However, thanks to energetic efforts, within three months from January 1809, he was able to form a new army in France. Archduke Charles simultaneously sent eight corps to Napoleon's allied Bavaria, two corps to Italy and one to the Duchy of Warsaw. Russian troops concentrated on the eastern borders of the Austrian Empire, but practically did not take part in the hostilities, allowing Austria to wage a war on one front (which angered Napoleon).

Napoleon, reinforced by the troops of the Confederation of the Rhine, repelled the attack on Bavaria with the forces of ten corps and captured Vienna on May 13. The Austrians crossed to the northern bank of the flooded Danube and destroyed the bridges behind them. Napoleon decided to cross the river relying on the island of Lobau. However, after part of the French troops crossed to the island, and part to the northern shore, the pontoon bridge broke, and Archduke Charles attacked those who crossed. In the subsequent battle of Aspern and Essling on May 21-22, Napoleon was defeated and retreated. The failure of the emperor himself inspired all anti-Napoleonic forces in Europe. After six weeks of extensive preparation, French troops crossed the Danube and won the general battle of Wagram on July 5-6, followed by the Armistice of Znaim on July 12, and the Peace of Schönbrunn on October 14. Under this treaty, Austria lost access to the Adriatic Sea, transferring to France territories from which Napoleon later formed the Illyrian provinces. Galicia was transferred to the Grand Duchy of Warsaw, and the Tarnopol district to Russia. The Austrian campaign showed that Napoleon's army no longer had the previous advantage over the enemy on the battlefield.

Crisis of the Empire

Napoleon's policies in the first years of his reign enjoyed the support of the population - not only property owners, but also the poor (workers, farm laborers): the revival of the economy led to an increase in wages, which was also facilitated by constant recruitment into the army. Napoleon looked like the savior of the fatherland, wars caused national uplift, and victories caused a sense of pride. Napoleon Bonaparte was a man of the revolution, and the marshals around him, brilliant military leaders, sometimes came from the very bottom. But gradually the people began to get tired of the war, and recruitment into the army began to cause discontent. In 1810, an economic crisis broke out again, which did not stop until 1815. Wars in the vastness of Europe were losing their meaning, the costs of them began to irritate the bourgeoisie. The new nobility that Napoleon created never became the support of his throne. It seemed that nothing threatened the security of France, and in foreign policy an increasingly important role was played by the emperor’s desire to strengthen and ensure the interests of the dynasty, preventing, in the event of his death, both anarchy and the restoration of the Bourbons.

First Empire, 1812 Napoleonic France Dependent States

In the name of dynastic interests, on January 12, 1810, Napoleon divorced Josephine, with whom he had no children, and asked Alexander I for the hand of his younger sister, 15-year-old Grand Duchess Anna Pavlovna. Anticipating a refusal, he also approached Franz I with a proposal for marriage with his daughter, Marie-Louise. On April 1, 1810, Napoleon married the Austrian princess, the great-niece of Marie Antoinette. The heir was born on March 20, 1811, but the emperor's Austrian marriage was extremely unpopular in France.

In February 1808, French troops occupied Rome. By decree of May 17, 1809, Napoleon declared the papal possessions annexed to the French Empire and abolished the power of the Pope. In response to this, Pope Pius VII excommunicated the “robbers of the inheritance of St. Peter" from the church. The papal bull was nailed to the doors of the four main churches of Rome and sent to all ambassadors of foreign powers at the papal court. Napoleon ordered the Pope's arrest and held him prisoner until January 1814. On July 5, 1809, the French military authorities took him to Savona and then to Fontainebleau near Paris. Napoleon's excommunication had a negative impact on the authority of his government, especially in traditionally Catholic countries.

The Continental System, although it caused damage to Great Britain, could not lead to victory over it. On June 3, 1810, Napoleon dismissed Fouche for secret negotiations with the British about peace, which he allegedly conducted on behalf of the emperor. The allies and vassals of the First Empire, who accepted the continental blockade against their interests, did not strive to strictly observe it, and tensions grew between them and France. On July 3 of the same year, Napoleon deprived his brother Louis of the Dutch crown for non-compliance with the continental blockade and the requirements for recruiting, Holland was annexed to France. Recognizing that the continental system did not allow achieving its goals, the emperor did not abandon it, but introduced the so-called “new system”, under which special licenses were issued for trade with Great Britain, and French enterprises had priority in obtaining licenses. This measure caused even greater hostility among the continental bourgeoisie.

The contradictions between France and Russia became increasingly obvious. Patriotic movements expanded in Germany, and guerrilla violence continued unabated in Spain.

March to Russia and the collapse of the empire

Having broken off relations with Alexander I, Napoleon decided to go to war with Russia. 450 thousand soldiers, gathered into the Great Army from various European countries, crossed the Russian border in June 1812; they were opposed by 193 thousand soldiers in two Russian Western armies. Napoleon tried to force a general battle on the Russian troops; Dodging the superior enemy and trying to unite, the two Russian armies retreated inland, leaving devastated territory behind them. The Grand Army suffered from hunger, heat, dirt, overcrowding and the diseases they caused; By mid-July, entire detachments had deserted from it. Having united near Smolensk, the Russian armies tried to defend the city, but to no avail; On August 18, they had to resume their retreat towards Moscow. The general battle, fought on September 7 near the village of Borodino in front of Moscow, did not bring Napoleon a decisive victory. Russian troops again had to retreat; on September 14, the Great Army entered Moscow.

The fire that immediately spread after this destroyed most of the city. Counting on concluding peace with Alexander, Napoleon remained in Moscow for an unjustifiably long time; finally, on October 19, he left the city in a southwestern direction. Having failed to overcome the defenses of the Russian army on October 24 at Maloyaroslavets, the Grand Army was forced to retreat through the already devastated terrain in the direction of Smolensk. The Russian army followed a parallel march, inflicting damage on the enemy both in battles and through partisan actions. Suffering from hunger, the soldiers of the Grand Army turned into robbers and rapists; the angry population responded with no less cruelty, burying the captured marauders alive. In mid-November, Napoleon entered Smolensk and did not find food supplies here. In this regard, he was forced to retreat further towards the Russian border. With great difficulty he managed to avoid complete defeat when crossing the Berezina on November 27-28. Napoleon's huge, multi-tribal army did not carry the same revolutionary spirit; far from its homeland in the fields of Russia, it quickly melted away. Having received reports of a coup attempt in Paris and wanting to raise more troops, Napoleon left for Paris on December 5th. In his last bulletin he acknowledged the disaster, but attributed it solely to the severity of the Russian winter. Only 25 thousand soldiers returned from Russia out of those 450 thousand who were part of the central part of the Great Army. Napoleon lost almost all his horses in Russia; he was never able to compensate for this loss.

The defeat in the Russian campaign put an end to the legend of Bonaparte's invincibility. Despite the fatigue of the Russian army and the reluctance of Russian military leaders to continue the war outside Russia, Alexander I decided to transfer the fighting to German territory. Prussia joined the new anti-Napoleonic coalition. In a few months, Napoleon assembled a new 300,000-strong army of young men and old men and trained it on the march to Germany. In May 1813, at the battles of Lützen and Bautzen, Napoleon managed to defeat the allies, despite the lack of cavalry. On June 4, a truce was concluded, Austria acted as a mediator between the warring parties. Austrian Foreign Minister Metternich, at meetings with Napoleon in Dresden, proposed concluding peace on the terms of the restoration of Prussia, the division of Poland between Russia, Prussia and Austria and the return of Illyria to the Austrians; but Napoleon, considering military conquests to be the basis of his power, refused.

Experiencing an acute financial crisis and tempted by British subsidies, at the end of the armistice on August 10, Austria joined the sixth coalition. Sweden did the same. In accordance with the Trachenberg Plan, the Allies formed three armies under the command of Bernadotte, Blücher and Schwarzenberg. Napoleon also divided his forces. At the major battle of Dresden, Napoleon gained the upper hand over the allies; however, his marshals, acting independently, suffered a series of painful defeats at Kulm, Katzbach, Grosberen and Dennewitz. In the face of threatening encirclement, Napoleon with an army of 160 thousand gave a general battle near Leipzig to the combined Russian, Austrian, Prussian and Swedish troops with a total number of 320 thousand people (October 16 - 19, 1813). On the third day of this “Battle of the Nations,” the Saxons from Rainier’s corps, and then the Württemberg cavalry, went over to the side of the allies.

Defeat in the Battle of the Nations led to the fall of Germany and Holland, the collapse of the Swiss Confederation, the Confederation of the Rhine and the Kingdom of Italy. In Spain, where the French were defeated, Napoleon had to restore the power of the Spanish Bourbons (November 1813). To gain the support of the deputies, Napoleon convened a meeting of the Legislative Corps in December 1813, but dissolved the chamber after it adopted a disloyal resolution. At the end of 1813, the Allied armies crossed the Rhine, invaded Belgium and marched on Paris. Napoleon could oppose an army of 250 thousand with only 80 thousand recruits. In a series of battles, he won victories over individual Allied formations. However, on March 31, 1814, coalition troops led by the Russian Tsar and the King of Prussia entered Paris.

Elba Island and the Hundred Days

First renunciation and first exile

Napoleon was ready to continue the fight, but on April 3 the Senate proclaimed his removal from power and formed a provisional government led by Talleyrand. The marshals (Ney, Berthier, Lefebvre) convinced him to abdicate in favor of his son. On April 6, 1814, at the Fontainebleau Palace near Paris, Napoleon abdicated the throne. On the night of April 12-13, 1814 in Fontainebleau, experiencing defeat, abandoned by his court (next to him were only a few servants, a doctor and General Caulaincourt), Napoleon decided to commit suicide. He took poison, which he always carried with him after the battle of Maloyaroslavets, when he miraculously escaped being captured. But the poison decomposed from long storage, Napoleon survived. According to the Treaty of Fontainebleau, which Napoleon signed with the allied monarchs, he received possession of the small island of Elba in the Mediterranean Sea. On April 20, 1814, Napoleon left Fontainebleau and went into exile.

On Elba, Napoleon was actively involved in developing the island's economy. According to the terms of the Treaty of Fontainebleau, he was promised an annual annuity of 2 million francs from the French Treasury. However, he never received the money and by the beginning of 1815 he found himself in a difficult financial situation. Marie-Louise and her son, being under the influence of Franz I, refused to come to him. Josephine died in Malmaison on May 29, 1814, as the doctor who treated her later told Napoleon, “from grief and anxiety for him.” Of Napoleon's relatives, only his mother and sister Pauline came to visit him on Elba. Napoleon closely monitored what was happening in France, received guests and exchanged secret messages with his supporters.

On April 24, 1814, Louis XVIII, who arrived from England, landed in Calais. Along with the Bourbons, emigrants also returned, seeking the return of their property and privileges (“they learned nothing and forgot nothing”). In June, the king granted France a new constitution. The Constitution of 1814 preserved much of the imperial heritage, but concentrated power in the hands of the king and his entourage. The royalists demanded a complete return to the old order. The new owners of lands that had once been confiscated from emigrants and the church feared for their property. The military was unhappy with the sharp reduction in the army. At the Congress of Vienna, which met in September 1814, the Allied powers split over the division of the conquered territories.

One hundred days and second renunciation

Taking advantage of the favorable political situation, Napoleon fled Elba on February 26, 1815. On March 1, he landed in the Gulf of Juan near Cannes with 1 thousand soldiers and headed to Paris along the road through Grenoble, bypassing pro-royalist Provence. On March 7, before Grenoble, the 5th Line Regiment went over to Napoleon's side after his passionate speech: “You can shoot your emperor if you want!” Napoleon walked from Grenoble to Paris, greeted by enthusiastic crowds of people. On March 18, at Auxerre, Ney joined him, promising Louis XVIII to “bring Bonaparte in a cage.” On March 20, Napoleon entered the Tuileries.

At the Congress of Vienna, the powers settled their differences by the time Napoleon boarded the ships. Having received news that Napoleon was in France, on March 13 they declared him an outlaw. On March 25, the powers united into a new, seventh coalition, and agreed to field 600 thousand soldiers. In vain did Napoleon convince them of his peacefulness. In France, revolutionary federations began to spontaneously form to defend the homeland and order. On May 15, the Vendée revolted again, and the big bourgeoisie boycotted the new government. However, Napoleon did not take advantage of the revolutionary sentiments of the people to fight external and internal enemies (“I don’t want to be King of the Jacquerie”). In an effort to gain support from the liberal bourgeoisie, he commissioned Constant to draft a new constitution, which was approved in a plebiscite (with a low turnout) and ratified during a ceremony on June 1, 1815 on the Field of May. Under the new constitution, a House of Peers and a House of Representatives were formed.

The war resumed, but France was no longer able to bear its burden. On June 15, Napoleon with an army of 125 thousand people marched to Belgium to meet the British (90 thousand under the command of Wellington) and Prussian (120 thousand under the command of Blucher) troops, intending to defeat the allies piecemeal before the arrival of Russian and Austrian forces. At the battles of Quatre Bras and Ligny, he pushed back the British and Prussians. However, in a general battle near the Belgian village of Waterloo on June 18, 1815, he suffered a final defeat. Leaving the army, he returned to Paris on June 21.

On June 22, the House of Representatives formed a provisional government led by Fouche and demanded Napoleon's abdication. On the same day, Napoleon abdicated for the second time. He was forced to leave France and, relying on the nobility of the British government, on July 15, near the island of Aix, he voluntarily boarded the English battleship Bellerophon, hoping to receive political asylum from his longtime enemies, the British.

Saint Helena

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But the British cabinet decided differently: Napoleon became a prisoner and was sent to the distant island of St. Helena in the Atlantic Ocean. The British chose St. Helena because of its distance from Europe, fearing Napoleon's escape from exile again. Upon learning of this decision, he said: “This is worse than Tamerlane’s iron cage! I would prefer to be handed over to the Bourbons." Napoleon was allowed to choose officers to accompany him, he chose Bertrand, Montolon, Las Casas and Gourgaud; in total there were 26 people in Napoleon's retinue. On August 9, 1815, the former emperor left Europe aboard the ship Northumberland. Nine escort ships with 1 thousand soldiers accompanied his ship. On October 17, 1815, Napoleon arrived in Jamestown.

The habitat of Napoleon and his retinue was Longwood House (the former residence of the lieutenant governor), located on a mountain plateau with a damp and unhealthy climate. The house was surrounded by sentries, and sentinels reported with signal flags all of Napoleon's actions. The new governor Low, who arrived on April 14, 1816, further limited the freedom of the deposed emperor. In fact, Napoleon did not make plans to escape. Upon his arrival at St. Helena, he befriended Betsy, the active 14-year-old daughter of East India Company superintendent Balcombe, and played childish fools with her. In subsequent years, he occasionally received visitors staying on the island. In June 1816 he began dictating a memoir, published two years after his death by Las Cases in four volumes under the title Memorial of Saint Helena; Memorial became the most widely read book of the 19th century.

Death

From October 1816, Napoleon's health began to deteriorate - due to the fact that he began to lead a sedentary lifestyle (a conflict with Lowe led to him giving up walking) and because of his constantly depressed mood. In October 1817, Napoleon O'Meara's physician diagnosed him with hepatitis. Initially, he hoped for changes in European politics, for Princess Charlotte, known for her sympathies towards him, to come to power in Great Britain, but the princess died in November 1817. In 1818, the Balcombes left the island and Lowe sent O'Meara away.

In 1818, Napoleon fell into depression, became increasingly ill, and complained of pain in his right side. He suspected it was cancer - the disease from which his father died. In September 1819, the Antommarchi doctor, sent by Napoleon’s mother and Cardinal Fesch, came to the island, but he could no longer help the patient. In March 1821, Napoleon's condition deteriorated so much that he no longer doubted his imminent death. On April 15, 1821, he dictated his will. Napoleon died on Saturday, May 5, 1821, at 17:49. His last words, spoken in delirium, were “Head of the army!” (French: La tête de l'armée!) He was buried near Longwood near the Torbet spring, overgrown with willows.

There is a version that Napoleon was poisoned. In 1960, Sten Vorshufvud and his colleagues examined Napoleon's hair and found arsenic in it at a concentration that was approximately an order of magnitude higher than normal. However, numerous analyzes conducted in the 1990s and 2000s show that the arsenic levels in Napoleon's hair varied from day to day, and sometimes even within a single day. An explanation may be that Napoleon used hair powder that contained arsenic; or the fact that Napoleon’s hair, which he gave to his admirers, was, according to the customs of those years, preserved in powder containing arsenic. The version of poisoning currently has no confirmation. However, gastroenterologists in a 2007 study prove that the death of the emperor is explained by the first known official version - stomach cancer (according to the autopsy, the emperor had two stomach ulcers, one of which turned out to be through and reached the liver).

Return of remains

In 1840, Louis Philippe sent a delegation to Saint Helena led by the Prince of Joinville, with the participation of Bertrand and Gourgaud, to fulfill Napoleon's last wish - to be buried in France. Napoleon's remains were transported on the frigate Belle Poule under the command of Captain Charnet to France. On a frosty day on December 15, the motorcade drove through the streets of Paris in front of a million French people. The remains were buried in the Invalides in the presence of Napoleonic marshals.

A red porphyry sarcophagus by Visconti containing the remains of Emperor Napoleon is located in the crypt of the cathedral. The entrance to the crypt is guarded by two bronze figures holding a scepter, an imperial crown and an orb. The tomb is surrounded by 10 marble bas-reliefs about Napoleon's statesmanship and 12 statues by Pradier dedicated to his military campaigns.

Heritage

Public administration

Napoleon's achievements in government, rather than military victories and conquests, constitute his main legacy. Moreover, the main of these achievements occurred during the relatively peaceful years of the Consulate. According to J. Ellis, this is confirmed by their simple listing: the founding of the Bank of France (January 6, 1800), prefects (February 17, 1800), Concordat (signed July 16, 1801), lyceums (May 1, 1802), Legion of Honor (May 19, 1802) ), the Franc Germinal bimetallic standard (March 28, 1803), and finally the Civil Code (March 21, 1804). These achievements largely characterize our modern world; Napoleon is often seen as the father of modern Europe. As E. Roberts says:

The ideas that underlie our modern world—meritocracy, equality before the law, property rights, religious tolerance, modern secular education, sound finance, and so on—were championed, consolidated, codified, and spread geographically by Napoleon. To these he added rational and efficient local administration, an end to village banditry, encouragement of the arts and sciences, the abolition of feudalism, and the largest codification of laws since the fall of the Roman Empire.

Another element of the legacy that survived the fall of Napoleon was the system of government of the French state that he created and fine-tuned - centralized authoritarian rule through a unified bureaucratic ladder. Some elements of this system still exist today, even in the parliamentary democracy of the Fifth Republic.

Political movements

In politics, Napoleon I left behind Bonapartism. The word was first used by his opponents in 1814 in a pejorative sense, but by 1848 supporters of Napoleon III gave it its current meaning. Unlike republicanism, which is based on an impersonal elected government, and unlike monarchism, which denies the power of the nation, Bonapartism focuses the nation on one person (the military dictator) as its sole representative. As a political movement, Bonapartism has its roots (“legitimacy”) more in the widespread support that Napoleon received from the so-called federations(French fédérés) during the Hundred Days than in Napoleonic plebiscites. The Memorial of Saint Helena became the bible of Bonapartism; its political culmination was the election of Napoleon III, son of Louis and Hortense, as president of the second French republic in 1848. By the beginning of the 20th century, Bonapartism had disappeared from the political scene.

The conquest of Europe has always been seen as a central part of Napoleonic legacy, which is not surprising when one looks at the irreversible changes he caused in the political geography of the continent. On the eve of the French Revolution, Germany was little more than a conglomerate of 300 states. The acts of Napoleon, such as the formation of the Confederation of the Rhine and the Kingdom of Westphalia, mediatization, secularization, the introduction of the Civil Code, and French culture brought at bayonets, caused political changes, which eventually led to the formation of a unified German state. Likewise, in Italy, Napoleon's abolition of internal borders, the introduction of uniform legislation and universal conscription paved the way for the Risorgimento.

Military art

Napoleon is best known for his outstanding military successes. Having inherited a capable army from the French Revolution, he introduced a few fundamental improvements that allowed this army to win campaigns. Studying extensive military literature helped him develop his own approach, based on agility and flexibility. He successfully used a mixed battle formation (a combination of a column and a line), first proposed by Guibert, and mobile artillery created by Gribeauval. Based on the ideas of Carnot, Moreau and Brun, Napoleon reorganized the French army as a system of army corps, each of which included infantry, cavalry and artillery and was capable of operating independently. The main imperial apartment, led by Berthier and Duroc, ensured unified control of the army, collected and systematized intelligence data, helped Napoleon prepare plans and sent orders to the troops. Giving preference to the offensive over the defensive, Napoleon crushed the enemy by quickly concentrating his forces in the direction of the main attack.

When analyzing Napoleonic strategy, “Napoleon's Dictionary” quotes his own words: “If it seems that I am always prepared for everything, this is explained by the fact that before doing anything, I thought for a long time before; I foresaw what might happen. It is not a genius who suddenly and mysteriously reveals to me what exactly I should say and do under circumstances that seem unexpected to others - but it is my reasoning and reflection that reveals this to me.”

Napoleon's military achievements left their mark on the military and social thought of the subsequent century. As C. Easdale shows, in 1866, 1870, 1914, peoples went into battle with the memory of Napoleon and the idea that the outcome of the war would be determined by victory in one general battle. The Schlieffen plan was just a pompous implementation of Napoleon's outflanking maneuver (French manoeuvre sur les derrières). Behind the ceremonial side of the war, which began to be associated with shiny uniforms and bravura marches, the suffering associated with it was gradually forgotten. Meanwhile, given the state of medicine at that time, battle-related injuries and illnesses caused enormous disasters. At least 5 million people - military and civilians - became victims of the Napoleonic wars.

Offspring

As E. Roberts notes, the irony of fate is that although Napoleon divorced Josephine to give birth to a legitimate heir to his throne, it was her grandson who later became Emperor of France. Josephine's descendants reign in Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Luxembourg. Napoleon's descendants do not reign anywhere. Napoleon's only legitimate son, also Napoleon, died young, leaving no children. Of Bonaparte’s illegitimate offspring, Napoleon’s Dictionary mentions only two - Alexander Walewski and Charles Leon, but there is evidence of others. The Colonna-Walewski family continues to this day.

Essays

Napoleon's pen includes several early works of various genres, imbued with youthful maximalism and revolutionary sentiments ("Letter to Matteo Buttafuoco", "History of Corsica", "Dialogue about Love", "Dinner at Beaucaire", "Clisson and Eugenie" and others). He also wrote and dictated a huge number of letters (of which more than 33 thousand have survived).

In his later years, in exile on St. Helena, trying to create a positive legend about his intentions and their implementation, Napoleon dictated memories of the siege of Toulon, the Vendémières rebellion, the Italian campaign and the Egyptian campaign, the battle of Marengo, the exile on the island of Elba, the period of the Hundred Days, and also descriptions of the campaigns of Caesar, Turenne and Frederick.

His letters and later works were published in 32 volumes in 1858-1869 by order of Napoleon III. Some of the letters were not published then, some were edited for various reasons. A new complete edition of Napoleon's letters in 15 volumes has been carried out by the Napoleon Foundation since 2004; as of the beginning of 2017, 13 volumes have been published; publication is scheduled to be completed in 2017. The publication of a complete critical edition of Napoleon's letters has allowed historians to take a fresh look at him and his era.

The novel “Clisson and Eugenia”, “Dinner in Beaucaire”, some of his later works and some letters were published in Russian.

Legend

The Napoleonic legend was not born in St. Helena. Bonaparte consistently created it through newspapers (first the combat leaflets of the Italian army, and then official Parisian publications), commemorative medals, bulletins of the Grand Army, paintings of David and Gro, the Arc de Triomphe and the Column of Victories. Throughout his career, Napoleon showed an amazing ability to spin bad news as good and good news as triumph. “If you need to characterize Napoleon’s genius in one word, then that word is “propaganda.” In this respect, Napoleon was a man of the 20th century. He created the image for himself - a double-cornered hat, a gray frock coat, a hand between the buttons.” However, the decisive role in the emergence of the “golden legend” of Napoleon was played by his soldiers, who remained idle after the end of the Napoleonic wars and remembered with longing the First Empire and their “little corporal.”

However, as J. Tulard showed, not only Napoleon worked to create his legend, but also his opponents. The golden legend was opposed by the black one. For English caricaturists (Cruikshank, Gillray, Woodward, Rowlandson), Napoleon was a favorite character - in his early years he was skinny (English Boney), and in his later years he was fat (English Fleshy), a short upstart. In 1813, the French, who began conscripting 16-year-old sons into the army, called Napoleon a cannibal. In Russia and Spain, the clergy presented Napoleon as the incarnation of the Antichrist.

Reflection in culture, science and art

In historiography

The number of historical studies about Napoleon Bonaparte amounts to tens and hundreds of thousands. At the same time, as Peter Gale noted, each generation writes about its own Napoleon. Before the Second World War, Napoleonic historiography was characterized by three points of view, replacing each other. The earliest authors sought to emphasize in Bonaparte his “superhuman” abilities and unusual energy, uniqueness for human history, often taking an extremely apologetic or very critical position (Las Cases, Bignon, de Stael, Arndt, Genz, Hazlitt, Scott, etc.). Representatives of the second point of view tried to adapt conclusions about Napoleon to the current situation, to draw “historical lessons” from his actions, turning the image of Bonaparte into a weapon of political struggle (d'Haussonville, Mignet, Michelet, Thiers, Quinet, Lanfrey, Taine, Housset, Vandal and etc.). Finally, “third wave” researchers were looking for a “big idea” in Napoleon’s goals and achievements, on the basis of which it would be possible to understand him and his era (Sorel, Masson, Bourgeois, Driot, Dunant, etc.).

Post-war researchers pay more attention not to the personality of Napoleon and his actions, but to the study of a wider range of topics related to his time, including the features of his regime.

In other sciences

In 1804, the genus of trees Napoleonaea P.Beauv., part of the Lecitis family, was named in honor of Napoleon. The peculiarity of these African trees is that their flowers are devoid of petals, but have three circles of sterile stamens forming a corolla-like structure.

In art

The image of Napoleon was widely reflected in various types of art - painting, literature, music, cinema, monumental art. In music, works by Beethoven (he crossed out the dedication to the Third Symphony after the coronation of Napoleon), Berlioz, Schoenberg, and Schumann were dedicated to him. Many famous writers turned to the personality and deeds of Napoleon (Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, Hardy, Conan Doyle, Kipling, Emerson and others). Filmmakers of various ideologies and trends paid tribute to Napoleonic themes: “Napoleon” (France, 1927), “May Field” (Italy, 1935), “Kolberg” (Germany, 1944), “Kutuzov” (USSR, 1943), “Ashes” "(Poland, 1968), "Waterloo" (Italy - USSR, 1970); Kubrick's project remained unrealized, but to this day arouses keen interest.

In popular culture

Thanks to distinctive features In appearance and demeanor, Napoleon is a recognizable cultural character. In particular, popular culture has developed an idea of Napoleon's short stature. However, according to various sources, his height ranged from 167 to 169 cm, which for France at that time was above average height. According to Napoleon's Dictionary, the idea of his short stature may have been due to the fact that Napoleon, unlike his entourage, who wore tall caps with plumes, wore a small, modest hat. Based on this misconception, the German psychologist Alfred Adler coined the term “Napoleon complex,” according to which short people strive to compensate for their feelings of inferiority through excessive aggressiveness and the desire for power.

In philately

Napoleonic themes are very popular in the philatelic world. Many collectors include in Napoleonics stamps not only with the image of the French emperor himself and monuments to him, but also postage marks, as well as other philatelic materials directly or indirectly dedicated to the military biography, government activities and Napoleon’s personal life, members of his family, beloved women, comrades and opponents, memorial sites associated with his name, exile on the island of St. Helena.

First successes and glory

Board of the First Consul

Napoleon on the defensive

Glorious defeat and exile

Italian campaign

Egyptian campaign

Consulate

First Empire

War of the Third Coalition

War of the Fourth Coalition

Continental blockade

Iberian Wars

War of the Fifth Coalition

Crisis of the Empire

Trek to Russia

War of the Sixth Coalition

First renunciation and first exile

One hundred days

Link

Death of Napoleon

Return of remains

Personal life

Napoleon and Josephine

Death

Photo of Napoleon

Brief biography

Biography from Wikipedia

Early years

Origin

Childhood and youth

Military career

Start of a career

Italian campaign

Egyptian campaign

Consulate

Coup of the 18th Brumaire and temporary consulate

Ten-year consulate

Lifetime Consulate

First Empire

Proclamation of the Empire

Rise of an Empire

Continental blockade

From the Pyrenees to Wagram

Crisis of the Empire

March to Russia and the collapse of the empire

Elba Island and the Hundred Days

First renunciation and first exile

One hundred days and second renunciation

Saint Helena

Link

Death

Return of remains

Heritage

Public administration

Political movements

Military art

Offspring

Essays

Legend

Reflection in culture, science and art

In historiography

In other sciences

In art

In popular culture

In philately

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