Landing on March 1, Napoleon struck north with the Imperial Guardsmen he had brought with him, over mountain passes and through tiny villages, sometimes on foot when the paths were too steep and narrow to ride down. The route he took from Cannes to Grenoble—today mapped out as the Route Napoleon for tourists, hikers and cyclists—is one of the loveliest if more vertiginous trails in the country. But the commanders, Marshals Nicolas Soult and Michel Ney, and their men switched sides the moment they came into contact with the charisma of their former sovereign.
On March 20, Napoleon reached the Tuileries Palace in Paris—on the site of the Louvre today—and was acclaimed by the populace. The carriages enter, we all rush around them and we see Napoleon get out.
The Allies reacted with shocked disbelief. They were gathered at a congress in Vienna when news of his escape reached them on March 7, but initially the representatives of Austria, Russia, Britain and Prussia had no idea where he had gone. The Powers consequently declare that Napoleon Bonaparte has placed himself beyond the pale of civil and social relations, and that as an enemy and disturber of the tranquility of the world, he has delivered himself up to public vengeance.
Kraehe later put it. The Austrian chancellor, Prince Klemens von Metternich, softened the wording because Napoleon was still the son-in-law of the emperor of Austria, and the Duke of Wellington denounced the language as encouraging the assassination of monarchs.
Nonetheless, the declaration clearly foreclosed any negotiation. Thus they made the Waterloo campaign as inevitable as it was ultimately unnecessary. Napoleon well knew that after 23 years of almost constant war, the French people wanted no more of it. And so he resumed building various public works in Paris, including the elephant fountain at the Bastille, a new marketplace at St.
At a concert at the Tuileries he kindled a romance with the celebrated year-old actress and beauty Anne Hippolyte Boutet Salvetat whose stage name was Mademoiselle Mars. All that Napoleon achieved in just 12 weeks after he returned to Paris—even as he prepared for the war the Allies had declared on him.
Like the Bourbons, they were in no mood to forgive or forget. In addition to their declared distrust, they had less-public motives for moving against him.
The autocratic rulers of Russia, Prussia and Austria wanted to crush the revolutionary ideas for which Napoleon stood, including meritocracy, equality before the law, anti-feudalism and religious toleration.
Essentially, they wanted to turn the clock back to a time when Europe was safe for aristocracy. At this they succeeded—until the outbreak of the Great War a century later.
The British had long enjoyed most of the key Enlightenment values, having beheaded King Charles I years before the French guillotined Louis XVI, but they had other reasons for wanting to destroy Napoleon. More gravely, Britain and France had fought each other for no fewer than 56 years in the preceding , and Napoleon himself had posed a threat of invasion before Lord Nelson destroyed the French and Spanish fleets at Trafalgar in Additionally, with the Treaty of Amiens in , the war-weary British agreed to peace with the French although the peace would only last for a year.
Napoleon worked to restore stability to post-revolutionary France. One of his most significant accomplishments was the Napoleonic Code , which streamlined the French legal system and continues to form the foundation of French civil law to this day. In , a constitutional amendment made Napoleon first consul for life.
Two years later, in , he crowned himself emperor of France in a lavish ceremony at the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris. In , Napoleon married Josephine de Beauharnais , a stylish widow six years his senior who had two teenage children. More than a decade later, in , after Napoleon had no offspring of his own with Empress Josephine, he had their marriage annulled so he could find a new wife and produce an heir. In , he wed Marie Louise , the daughter of the emperor of Austria.
In addition to his son with Marie Louise, Napoleon had several illegitimate children. From to , France was engaged in the Napoleonic Wars, a series of major conflicts with various coalitions of European nations. However, in December of that same year, Napoleon achieved what is considered to be one of his greatest victories at the Battle of Austerlitz, in which his army defeated the Austrians and Russians.
The victory resulted in the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire and the creation of the Confederation of the Rhine. Beginning in , Napoleon sought to wage large-scale economic warfare against Britain with the establishment of the so-called Continental System of European port blockades against British trade.
In , the French defeated the Austrians at the Battle of Wagram, resulting in further gains for Napoleon. During these years, Napoleon reestablished a French aristocracy eliminated in the French Revolution and began handing out titles of nobility to his loyal friends and family as his empire continued to expand across much of western and central continental Europe. In , Russia withdrew from the Continental System. In retaliation, Napoleon led a massive army into Russia in the summer of In September, both sides suffered heavy casualties in the indecisive Battle of Borodino.
Retreating Russians set fires across the city in an effort to deprive enemy troops of supplies. After waiting a month for a surrender that never came, Napoleon, faced with the onset of the Russian winter, was forced to order his starving, exhausted army out of Moscow.
The Russian winter and lack of supplies cause the French army to retreat. Napoleon abandons his army and returns to Paris. Napoleon abdicates the throne on April 11, and is banished to the Mediterranean island of Elba. Four days later, he abdicates for the second time. October 16, Napoleon begins his exile on Saint Helena, a remote volcanic island in the south Atlantic. Even though foot cliffs rose on both sides of the port of the only town, two British Navy frigates patrol the island at all times.
I'm in the Museum. Grade Level:. Adult, College, Grades , Grades , Grades European Art. Subject Area:. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers in Napoleon's Grand Army were killed or badly wounded: Out of an original fighting force of some , men, just 10, soldiers were still fit for battle. News of the defeat reinvigorated Napoleon's enemies, both inside and outside of France. A failed coup was attempted while Napoleon led his charge against Russia, while the British began to advance through French territories.
With international pressure mounting and his government lacking the resources to fight back against his enemies, Napoleon surrendered to allied forces on March 30, On April 6, , Napoleon was forced to abdicate power and went into exile on the island of Elba in the Mediterranean sea off of Italy. His exile did not last long, as he watched France stumbled forward without him. In March , Napoleon escaped the island and quickly made his way back to Paris. But the enthusiasm that greeted Napoleon when he resumed control of the government soon gave way to old frustrations and fears about his leadership.
On June 16, , Napoleon led French troops into Belgium and defeated the Prussians; two days later he was defeated by the British, reinforced by Prussian fighters, at the Battle of Waterloo. It was a humiliating loss, and on June 22, , Napoleon abdicated his powers. In an effort to prolong his dynasty he pushed to have his young son, Napoleon II, named emperor, but the coalition rejected the offer. Helena in the southern Atlantic. For the most part Napoleon was free to do as he pleased at his new home.
He had leisurely mornings, wrote often and read a lot. But the tedious routine of life soon got to him, and he often shut himself indoors. Napoleon died on May 5, , on the island of St. Helena at the age of In early he was bedridden and growing weaker by the day. In April of that year, he dictated his last will:. I die before my time, killed by the English oligarchy and its hired assassins. Originally a royal chapel built between and , the Invalides were turned into a military pantheon under Napoleon.
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