Napoleon I
INDIVIDUAL
Napoleon I is one of the most important figures in modern European history. He rose
to great prominence in France during the 1790s as a brilliant general, and in 1799, he
overthrew the republican regime established by the French Revolutionary Wars. He
then ruled France as a virtual dictator and proclaimed himself emperor in 1804. At the
height of his power, he controlled most of continental Europe, and even though he was
eventually defeated and exiled in 1815 by the allied powers (led by Great Britain,
Russia, Austria, and Prussia), he has remained one of the most popular heroes in the
history of France.
Napoleon Bonaparte was born at Ajaccio, a town on the island of Corsica off the coast
of France, on August 15, 1769. His father was a prominent lawyer of Italian descent—
Corsica was populated by many Italians and had only become a part of France months earlier—and the
family included five sons and three daughters. Napoleon was sent to France at the age of nine in order to
attend school, as he had received a royal scholarship for his father's loyalty to the new French regime.
Napoleon attended the military school at Brienne-le-Chateau and began to prepare for a career in the
army. An awkward and shy boy with an Italian accent, he suffered the taunts of his classmates and made
few friends, but he was a brilliant student of math and read incessantly in history, philosophy, literature,
and military topics. His record gained him admittance to the École Militaire in Paris, and he was
commissioned a second lieutenant in an artillery regiment on September 1, 1785.
After the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789, Napoleon soon became an ardent supporter of the
new regime. As many aristocratic officers left France to escape the revolution, Napoleon began to earn
rapid promotions in the revolutionary army, an army that was constantly at war after 1792. After holding a
number of positions in various units, he directed the artillery at the siege of Toulon, a French city that had
rebelled against the revolutionary government, in late 1793. For his performance at that victorious
operation, he was made brigadier general on December 22, 1793. However, his career suffered a
setback when the radical revolutionary regime of Maximilien Robespierre, with whom Napoleon had
become associated, fell in July 1794.
Nevertheless, Napoleon was soon able to work his way back into command, and he was called on by the
government to disperse a royalist uprising in Paris in October 1795. The young general quelled the
demonstration by firing his guns into the crowd, an event known thereafter as the "whiff of grapeshot."
That decisive action brought him back into favor, and on March 2, 1796, he was given command of a
French army then fighting in Italy. On March 9, the dashing young general (he was only 26 years old and
had developed into a handsome, if somewhat small man) married the beautiful Josephine de
Beauharnais, and two days later, he left for the front.
When Napoleon arrived in Italy to take command, he found the army ragged, poorly equipped and
supplied, and in low spirits. Moreover, the older generals over whom he had authority were suspicious of
the brash young man. In a famous order, Napoleon promised his new ragtag soldiers "honor, glory, and
riches" for serving him faithfully, and he immediately set off on the offensive. He delivered on that promise
in a series of brilliant battles against the Austrian Army over the next year; he drove his enemies
completely out of Italy and even closed within 25 miles of the Austrian capital of Vienna. The Treaty of
Campo Formio, signed on October 17, 1797 and negotiated by Napoleon himself with the Austrians, gave
France a number of new territories and brought Napoleon enormous fame among his fellow French
citizens.
Napoleon's next campaign was in Egypt, where he confronted the ruling Mamluks, the Turks, and the
British. The French Army landed in Egypt in July 1798 and won a series of crushing victories on land,
including the Battle of the Pyramids, but the campaign bogged down in Syria. Meanwhile, at the Battle of
the Nile on August 1, the British Royal Navy completely destroyed the French fleet that provided
Napoleon's army with supplies and support, so the army was stranded. In France, the government was
threatened by discontent and unrest from both royalists and radical revolutionaries, and the allied powers
of Europe seemed poised to invade. Napoleon saw an opportunity to offer his services to France in its
hour of need, so he decided to cut his losses, left Egypt, and arrived in France on October 9, 1799. The
fact that his Egyptian expedition was largely a failure did not prevent him from being hailed as a hero
once again, and the leaders of the republic saw in him an answer to their problems. With their
cooperation, Napoleon engineered a coup d'état on November 9.
That period of Napoleon's rule is known as the consulate; he ruled France with the title of consul, and the
republic was still ostensibly in place. He concentrated sole authority in his hands, however, and the
majority of French citizens accepted the rule of a strong leader as a small price to pay after 10 years of
revolutionary turmoil and instability. His main accomplishments during that period were in both the
political and military spheres. On the battlefield, he delivered a crushing blow to the Austrians and the
allied nations that they led at the Battle of Marengo on June 14, 1800. The Austrians made a separate
peace with France in February 1801, and Great Britain with the rest of Europe followed suit with the
Treaty of Amiens on March 25, 1802. France was finally at peace after 10 years of continuous warfare,
and Napoleon's popularity soared.
Within France, Napoleon took important steps to consolidate the gains of the revolution while also
repairing some of the damage it had done. He negotiated the Concordat (1801), which restored good
relations with the Roman Catholic Church, as it had been attacked mercilessly
during the revolution. Catholicism was recognized as the "religion of the greater
majority of Frenchmen," but freedom of religion, divorce, and civil marriage were
all retained. In addition, the land confiscated from the Catholic Church during the
revolution was not returned. Napoleon also put the nation's finances in order,
made administrative reforms, guaranteed law and order with a new police force,
and organized French laws into the famous Napoleonic Code, one of his most
enduring achievements.
With full popular support behind him, Napoleon proclaimed himself emperor of
the French in May 1804. On December 2, 1804, in a coronation ceremony, he
himself placed the imperial crown on his head, a dramatic gesture demonstrating
his self-reliance and independence. However, he had not yet reached his zenith,
which was still three years away.
The peace Napoleon had negotiated in 1801 and 1802 did not last long, and
France was once again at war with Great Britain in May 1803. Soon thereafter,
Austria and Russia also entered on the side of the British. In the summer of
1805, Napoleon broke off preparations for an invasion of Great Britain and
marched his army with great speed across Europe. They met the Austrians first
at Ulm (October 17) and then at Austerlitz (December 2, the anniversary of his
coronation as emperor). Both battles were spectacular French victories, and Napoleon's performance at
the Battle of Austerlitz was and is widely considered to be his finest hour as a commander. The whole
campaign was a masterpiece, and he followed up those victories with another at the Battle of Jena, where
he crushed the Prussian Army (which had only recently joined the coalition against France) on October
14, 1806.
Napoleon still had to deal with Russia, and he fought the forces of Czar Alexander I at the inconclusive
Battle of Eylau on February 8, 1807. He followed that battle with a victory at the Battle of Friedland on
June 14. On July 7, 1807, Napoleon settled the Treaty of Tilsit with the Russians, which made him the
undisputed master of continental Europe. He sought to consolidate his power both militarily and
dynastically; his wife Josephine Bonaparte could not provide him with an heir, so he divorced her at the
end of 1809 and married Austrian princess Marie-Louise in March 1810. She bore him one son.
Only the British remained undefeated after 1807 largely because of their naval invincibility. Unable to
challenge his hated enemy on the seas, Napoleon sought to wage economic war against Great Britain.
He enforced what became known as the Continental System, which forbade any of the nations of Europe
to trade with the British. The embargo caused dissatisfaction among the other European nations, and
French demands began to erode the power that Napoleon had won between 1805 and 1807. He also
encountered difficulties in Spain, which he invaded in 1807; there, guerrillas, with British aid, involved the
French in the long, wasting Peninsular War that they ultimately lost.
By 1812, Napoleon's Continental System was in shambles, and he undertook the Russian invasion to
enforce his will on the then uncooperative czar. That campaign proved to be Napoleon's great undoing.
As he penetrated deep into Russia, he won victories over Russian armies in the field but reached
Moscow without forcing the czar to surrender. The Russians burned Moscow rather than let the French
find shelter there, and when the brutal Russian winter set in, Napoleon had little choice but to retreat.
The retreat was a disaster, and of his army of more than 600,000 men, only 40,000 returned. That loss
broke the back of French military power, especially as the country had been considerably bled by the
constant warfare over the last 20 years. A loss of such magnitude could not be kept from the public.
Napoleon's popularity and the French people's willingness to send their sons off to fight in his campaigns
had always depended on his ability to deliver victories, and the first really serious murmurs of discontent
began to be heard in Paris. Still, the emperor
immediately raised another army, but the allied powers
defeated his inexperienced troops decisively at the
Battle of Leipzig (also known as the Battle of the
Nations) in October 1813. The French were forced to
retreat, and they were defeated outside Paris.
Napoleon's enemies had finally caught up with him,
and he abdicated his throne on April 6, 1814.
The victorious allies exiled the emperor to the island of
Elba, restored the monarchy in the form of King Louis
XVIII, and set about working out the details of the
peace. Napoleon secretly left his exile on Elba and
returned to France in March 1815. As soon as he
landed in southern France, the army, which had always
remained loyal to him, rallied to his side. Even before
he fell from power, he had grown old and fat and bore
little resemblance to the dashing young officer he once
was, but he was still able to inspire those around him
with visions of the glory of France. His journey to Paris turned into a triumphant march, and more and
more people came out to acclaim him along the way.
Louis fled the country. Although the allies were caught off guard, they would not tolerate a reconstituted
French Empire under Napoleon, so they prepared to meet him in battle once again. After a few minor
victories, Napoleon met the British at the Battle of Waterloo on June 18; he caught them without their
Prussian ally and expected to win a decisive victory. The British held fast, however, and the Prussians
arrived just in time to turn the battle into a rout of the French forces. Thus ended Napoleon's brief attempt
to return to power, a period known as the Hundred Days campaign.
The British gained custody of Napoleon, and they exiled him to Saint Helena, a remote island in the
Atlantic Ocean. There, Napoleon suffered a lonely existence, as he pined for his days of glory and wrote
his memoirs. He died on May 5, 1821. His remains were returned to France in 1840 and interred in a
monumental tomb in Paris. Even today, his name still inspires deep admiration in France.
CITATION: MLA STYLE
"Napoleon I." World History: The Modern Era. ABC-CLIO, 2010. Web. 10 Jan. 2010. <http://www.worldhistory.abcclio.com>.