Joseph Bonaparte

"At times, however, sad regrets and recollections of what he had done, contrasted with what he might have done, presented themselves. He talked of the past with perfect frankness, persuaded that, on the whole, he had done what he was required to do, and not sharing the strange and contradictory opinions which we hear expressed every day on events which are not understood by the speakers. If the conversation took a melancholy turn, he soon changed it. He loved to talk of Corsica, of his old uncle Lucien, of his youth, of you, and of all the rest of the family.

"Toward the middle of March fever came on. From that time he scarcely left his bed except for about half an hour in the day. He seldom had the strength to shave. He now for the first time became extremely thin. The fits of vomiting became more frequent. He then questioned the physicians upon the conformation of the stomach, and about a fortnight before his death he had pretty nearly guessed that he was dying of cancer. He was read to almost every day, and dictated a few days before his decease. He often talked naturally as to the probable mode of his death, but when he became aware that it was approaching he left off speaking on the subject. He thought much about you and your children.

"To his last moments he was kind and affectionate to us all. He did not appear to suffer so much as might have been expected from the cause of his death. When we questioned him he said that he suffered a little, but that he could bear it. His memory declined during the last five or six days. His deep sighs, and his exclamations from time to time, made us think that he was in great pain. He looked at us with the penetrating glance which you know so well. We tried to dissimulate, but he was so used to reading our faces that no doubt he frequently discovered our anxiety. He felt too clearly the gradual decline of his faculties not to be aware of his state.

"For the last two hours he neither spoke nor moved. The only sound was his difficult breathing, which gradually but regularly decreased. His pulse ceased. And so died, surrounded by only a few servants, the man who had dictated laws to the world, and whose life should have been preserved for the sake of the happiness and glory of our sorrowing country.

"Forgive, prince, a hurried letter, which tells you so little when you wish to know so much; but I should never end if I attempted to tell all. I must not omit to say that the Emperor was most anxious that his correspondence with the different sovereigns of Europe should be printed. He repeated this to us several times.29 In his will the Emperor expressed his wish that his remains should be buried in France; however, in the last days of his life, he ordered me, if there was any difficulty about it, to lay him by the side of the fountain whose waters he had so long drunk."

Joseph loved his brother tenderly, and he never could speak without emotion of the indignities and cruelties Napoleon suffered from that ungenerous Government to whose mercy he had so fatally confided himself. Anxious to do every thing which he thought might gratify the departed spirit of his brother, he implored permission of Austria to visit Napoleon's son, the Duke of Reichstadt, that he might sympathize with him in these hours of affliction. The Court of Austria refused his request.

Marriage of Princess Charlotte.

In 1824, Joseph's youngest daughter, the Princess Charlotte, left Point Breeze to join her mother in Europe, where she was to be married to Charles Napoleon Louis Bonaparte, the son of Louis and Hortense, and the elder brother of the present Emperor of the French. The tastes of Joseph inclined him to the country, and to its peaceful pursuits. He had, however, a city residence in Philadelphia, where he usually passed the winters. While thus residing on the banks of the Delaware, sadly retracing the memorable events of the past and recording its scenes, he received a proposition which surprised and gratified him. A deputation of Mexicans waited upon him at Point Breeze, and urged him to accept the crown of Mexico. The former King of Naples and of Spain in the following terms responded to the invitation:

The Crown of Mexico.

"I have worn two crowns. I would not take a single step to obtain a third. Nothing could be more flattering to me than to see the men who, when I was at Madrid, were unwilling to recognize my authority, come to-day to seek me, in exile, to place the crown upon my head. But I do not think that the throne which you wish to erect anew can promote your happiness. Every day I spend upon the hospitable soil of the United States demonstrates to me more fully the excellence of republican institutions for America. Guard them, then, as a precious gift of Providence; cease your intestine quarrels; imitate the United States and seek from the midst of your fellow-citizens a man more capable than I am to act the grand part of Washington."30

Visit of La Fayette.

When La Fayette in 1824 made his triumphal tour through the United States, he visited Point Breeze to pay his respects to the brother of the Emperor. Upon that occasion the marquis expressed deep regret in view of the course he had pursued at the time of the abdication of Napoleon.

"The dynasty of the Bourbons," said he, "can not maintain itself. It too manifestly wounds the national sentiment. We are all persuaded in France that the son of the Emperor alone can represent the interests of the Revolution. Place two million francs at the disposal of our committee, and I promise you that in two years Napoleon II.31 will be upon the throne of France."32

Joseph, however, did not think it best to embark at that time in any new enterprise for the restoration of popular rights to France. The Bourbon throne seemed to be for a time firmly established. Joseph was getting to be advanced in years. The storms of his life had been so severe that he longed only for repose.

General Lamarque.

The following extracts from the correspondence of Joseph, while he was an exile in America, throw interesting light upon his political principles and upon his social character. General Lamarque was one of the veteran generals of the Empire. After the restoration of the Bourbons, he was highly distinguished for his eloquence in the Tribune as the antagonist of aristocratic privilege. Napoleon, when on his death-bed at Saint Helena, in view of his earnest support of popular rights, both on the battle-field and in the Chamber of Deputies, recommended him for a marshal of France. Those friends of the Empire who had been prosecuted for the part they took in the Hundred Days, had found in him a zealous friend. His devotion to the interests of Poland had secured for him the homage of that chivalrous people. The liberal party in France, with great unanimity, regarded him as their leader. Upon the occasion of his funeral, in June, 1832, the Liberals in Paris made a desperate endeavor to overthrow the government of Louis Philippe. The insurgents numbered over one hundred thousand. The attempt was bloodily repulsed by the royalist troops. On the 27th of March, 1824, General Lamarque wrote a letter from Paris to Joseph, from which we make the following extracts:

Letter from General Lamarque.

"Monsieur le Comte, – The memory of your kindnesses lives as vividly in my heart as on the day in which I received them, and I ever seek occasions to prove this to you. Already I have refuted, in many articles of the journals, the atrocious calumnies which have been published against you, and I ever avow myself to the world as your admirer and grateful friend. Be assured that your reputation is honorable and glorious. Truth has already dispelled many clouds; soon it will shine forth in all its brilliance.

"You do well to consecrate a portion of your time to writing your memoirs. It seems to me that the part most interesting will be your reign in Naples. You were there truly the philosopher upon the throne, which Plato desired for the interests of humanity. I recall your journeys in which you urged upon the nobles love for the people; upon the priests tolerance; upon the military, order and moderation. Not being able to establish political liberty, you wished to confer upon your subjects all the benefits of municipal régime, which you regarded as the foundation of all institutions.

"Under your reign – too short for a nation which has so deeply regretted you – feudalism was destroyed, brigandage disappeared, the system of imposts was changed, order was established in the finances, administration created, the nobles and the people reconciled, new routes opened in all directions, the capital embellished, the army and marine reorganized, the English driven out of the whole realm, and Gaëta, Scylla, Reggio, Manthea, and Amanthea taken.

"Your memoirs will be a lesson for kings. But that they may be received with the religious respect due to a great misfortune, it seems to me that you ought to efface yourself from the scene of the world, that your writings should be like a voice coming from the depths of the tomb, and that you should only ask of your contemporaries not to calumniate and hate the memory of a man who, having attained the height of all dignities, has descended from it with serenity, with resignation, and almost with pleasure. As to Spain, were I in your place, I should say but one word; that word would be regret in not having been able to accomplish for Spain the good which was accomplished for Naples.

"Like you, I have been proscribed. Like you, I have wandered in foreign lands, breathing always wishes for my country. I know how irritable and sensitive one thus is, and how keenly one feels the attacks of his enemies. But upon my return I perceived that in exile we exaggerate the importance of such attacks. Let not the calumnies which reach you, after having traversed the seas, disturb for a moment your domestic happiness, and the calm of your situation. They are the last gusts of the tempest, the last noise of the expiring waves."

In a letter to Francis Leiber, dated July 1, 1829, Joseph writes:

Letter to Francis Leiber.

"Walter Scott wrote for the English Government, and from information furnished him by the Government which succeeded that of the Emperor Napoleon. Napoleon found France in delirium. He wished to rescue it from the anarchy of 1793, and from a counter-revolution. That he well understood the national will, his miraculous return from the isle of Elba will prove sufficiently to posterity. The English Cabinet always prevented the surrender of his dictatorship by perpetuating the war. Napoleon was thus under the necessity of assuming the forms of the other governments of Continental Europe, to reconcile them with France. All that which Napoleon did, his nobility (which was not feudal), his family relations, his Legion of Honor, his new realms, etc., he was under the necessity of doing. The English ever forced him to these acts, that he might put himself in apparent harmony with all those governments which he had conquered, and which he wished to withdraw from the seduction of England. Napoleon often said to me, 'Ten years more are necessary in order to give entire liberty. I can not do what I wish, but only what I can. These English compel me to live day by day.'"

As the tidings reached the ears of Joseph of the great Revolution of 1830 in France, in which the throne of Charles X. was demolished, he wrote to La Fayette under date of Sept. 7, 1830:

Letter to La Fayette.

"My dear General, – General Lallemand, who will hand you this letter, will recall me to your memory. He will tell you with what enthusiasm the population of this country, American and French, have received the news of the glorious events of which Paris has been the theatre. If I had not seen at the head of affairs a name33 with which mine can never be in accord, I should be with you immediately with General Lallemand. You will recall our interview in this hospitable and free land. My sentiments are as invariable as yours and those of my family. Every thing for the French people.

"Doubtless I can not forget that my nephew, Napoleon II.,34 was proclaimed by the Chamber which, in 1815, was dissolved by the bayonets of foreigners. Faithful to the motto of my family, Every thing by France and for France, I wish to discharge my duties to her. You know my opinions, long ago proclaimed. Individuals and families can have only duties to fulfill in their relation to nations. The nations have rights to exercise. If the French nation should call to the head of affairs the most obscure family, I think that we ought to submit to its will entirely. The nation alone has the right to destroy its work.

"I ask for the abolition of that tyrannic law which has shut out from France a family which had opened the kingdom to all those Frenchmen whom the Revolution had expelled. I protest against any election made by private corporations, or by bodies not having obtained from the nation the powers which the nation alone has the right to confer.

"Adieu, my dear general. My letter proves to you the justice I render to the sentiments you expressed to me during the triumphal journey you made among this people, where I have seen, for fifteen years, that liberty is not a chimera, that it is a blessing which a nation, moderate and wise, can enjoy when it wishes."

To Maria Louisa, daughter of the Emperor of Austria, and mother of the Duke of Reichstadt, Joseph wrote the next day, September 10, as follows:

Letter to Maria Louisa.

"Madame my Sister, – The events which transpired in Paris at the close of July, and of which we have received intelligence, through the English journals, to the 1st of August, remove the principal difficulties in the way of the return of Napoleon II. to the throne of his father. If the Emperor, his grandfather,35 lends him the least support, if he will permit that, under my guidance, he may show himself to the French people, his presence alone will re-establish him upon the throne. The Duke of Orleans can rally around him partisans, only in consequence of the absence of the son of your Majesty. It is his re-establishment in France which alone can reunite all parties, stifle the germs of a new revolution, and thus secure the tranquillity of Europe.

"If I were in a position to unfold to your august father the reasons which render this step indispensable on his part at this moment, he could have no doubt of its imperious necessity. His ministry would perceive that the happiness of his grandson, that of France, the tranquillity of Italy, and perhaps of the rest of Europe, depend upon the re-establishment of the throne of Napoleon II. He is the only one chosen by the voice of the nation. He alone can prevent a new revolution the results of which no mortal can foresee. I hope that the many misfortunes which we have encountered have not effaced from the heart of your Majesty the affection she has manifested for me under diverse circumstances. I can only offer to her myself for her son. For a long time I have been disabused of the illusions of human grandeur; but I am more than ever the slave of that which I deem to be my duty."

On the 18th of September, 1830, Joseph wrote a letter to the Emperor of Austria, which he inclosed in a letter of the same date to Prince Metternich. In his letter to Metternich, Joseph wrote:

Letter to Prince Metternich.

"I do not doubt, sir, that you desire the welfare of the grandson of the Emperor whom you have so long served, the welfare of Austria, the tranquillity of Europe, and even of France, if these are all reconcilable. I am convinced that they are to-day perfectly reconcilable, and that Napoleon II. restored to the wishes of the French people can alone secure all these results. I offer myself to serve him as a guide. The happiness of my country, the peace of the world, will be the noble ends of my ambition.

"Napoleon II. arriving in France under the national colors, conducted by a man whose sentiments and patriotic affections are well known, can alone prevent the usurpation of the Duke of Orleans, who, being neither called to the throne by the rights of succession nor by the national will, clearly and legitimately expressed, can maintain himself in power only by caressing all parties, and finally becoming subordinate to the one which offers him the best chances of success, whatever may be the means to be employed for that end."

Letter to the Emperor of Austria.

Joseph's letter to the Emperor of Austria contained the following expressions: "The particular esteem with which the virtues of your Majesty inspire me, embolden me to recall myself to his recollection under circumstances in which the general welfare appears to me to be in accord with the sentiments of his heart, that he may restore to the wishes of the French people a prince who alone can confer upon them internal peace, and assure the tranquillity of Europe. This peace and tranquillity would be disturbed by the efforts which must be made to sustain in France a government of usurpation like that of the Duke of Orleans, or even a republic, if the absence of the son of Napoleon, the grandson of your Majesty, should constrain the nation, thus abandoned by the prince of its choice, to surrender itself to another form of government. Sire, if you will entrust to me the son of my brother, that son whom he enjoined, upon his death-bed, to follow my advice in returning to France, I guarantee the success of the enterprise. Alone, with a tri-color scarf, will Napoleon II. be proclaimed.

"Will it be necessary for me to speak of myself to your Majesty to give him confidence in my character? Must I recall to his remembrance that, after the treaty of Luneville, he communicated to me, through an autograph letter to Count Cobentzl, that the opinion he had formed of my moderation was such that he would with pleasure see me placed upon the throne of Lombardy? I refused that throne. I preferred to remain in France. Since then, at Naples, in Spain, has that character been falsified?

"To-day, as then, I am guided by the single sentiment of duty. My ambition limits itself to doing what I ought for France, for the memory of my brother, and to die upon my native soil a witness of the happiness of the grandson of your Majesty, which is inseparable from that of France and from the tranquillity of Europe. I can only contribute to that to-day by my wishes. May your Majesty second them by his powerful influence, and thus consolidate the peace of the world and the eternal glory of his name."

Appeal to the Chamber of Deputies.

On the same day, September 18, Joseph wrote an earnest appeal to the French Chamber of Deputies.36 The following extracts will show its character. "It is impossible that a house, reigning through the principle of divine right, should maintain itself upon a throne from which it has been expelled by the nation. The divorce between the House of Bourbon and the French people has been pronounced, and nothing can destroy the souvenirs of the past. In vain the Duke of Orleans abjures his house in the moment of its misfortunes. A Bourbon himself, returning to France, sword in hand, with the Bourbons, in the train of foreign armies, what matter is it that his father voted for the death of the King, his cousin, that he might take his place? What matter is it that the brother of Louis XVI. named him lieutenant-general of the realm, and regent of his grandson? Is he the less a Bourbon? Has he the less pretension of being entitled to the throne by the right of birth? Is it through the choice of the people, or the right of birth, that he claims to sit upon the throne of his ancestors?

"The family of Napoleon has been elected by three million five hundred thousand votes. If the nation deem it for its interest to make another choice, it has the power and the right to do so; but the nation alone. Napoleon II. was proclaimed king by the Chamber of Deputies in 1815, which recognized in him a right conferred by the nation. That he may be the legitimate sovereign, in the true acceptation of the word, that is to say, legally and voluntarily chosen by the people, there is no need of a new election so long as the nation has not adopted any other form of government. Still the nation is supreme to confirm or reject the titles it has given according to its pleasure. Till then, gentlemen, you are bound to recognize Napoleon II. And until Austria shall restore him to the wishes of France, I offer myself to share your perils, your efforts, your labors, and, upon his arrival, to transmit to him the will, the examples, the last dispositions of his father, dying a victim of the enemies of France upon the rock of Saint Helena. These words the Emperor addressed to me through General Bertrand:

"'Say to my son that he should remember, first of all, that he is a Frenchman. Let him give the nation as much liberty as I have given it equality. Foreign wars did not permit me to do that which I should have done at the general peace. I was perpetually in dictatorship. But I ever had, as the motive in all my actions, the love and the grandeur of the great nation. Let him take my device, Every thing for the French people. It is to that people we are indebted for all that we have been.

"'The liberty of the press is the triumph of truth. It is that which should diffuse general intelligence. Let it speak, and let the will of the great mass of the people be accomplished.'"

Letter to General Lamarque.

Again, on the 26th of September, Joseph wrote to General Lamarque: "The Duke of Orleans, by his birth, by his connection with the reigning branches of the family of Bourbon, which he in vain attempts to ignore, will soon be suspected by the patriots of France, and by the liberals of Italy and of Spain. The act which places him upon the throne, not emanating from the nation, can not constitute him king of the French. A few capitalists in Paris are not France. He can not therefore have the cordial assent of the liberals of any country. He can not have the support of those who believe in the legitimacy of the elder branch of his house. He can not have the assent of those who have not lost the memory of the votes which the nation gave to Napoleon, and to Napoleon II., whom the Chamber of Deputies proclaimed in 1815.

"The Duke of Orleans, was he not a pupil of Dumourier? Did he not, like Dumourier, desert the cause of the nation? Did he not, in London, in the presence of all the emigrant French nobility, ask pardon and make the amende honorable for having, for one instant, borne the national colors? Did he not go to Cadiz, sent by the English, to fight the French troops who did not then wear the white cockade of the Bourbons? Did he not enter France in the train of the Allies, sword in hand, with his cousins? Was he not rescued with them, and did he not owe to the disaster at Waterloo his return to France?

"The thirty-two individuals who called him first to the lieutenant-generalship of the realm would have called some one else if they had not been greatly influenced by his rights of birth. Was there no other man in France more worthy to take temporarily the helm of state? General La Fayette, who was at the head of the provisory government, would he not have given to the nation, and to the friends of liberty and of order in the two worlds, stronger guaranties than a prince of the House of Bourbon? The enthronement of the Duke of Orleans can be approved only by the enemies of France. His illegitimacy, both in view of the sovereignty of the people and of the partisans of divine right, is so evident that he can only govern by being submissive to the will of the factions, whom he will be compelled to obey, now one, and now another. The time for representative governments has arrived. Liberty, equality, public order can not exist where those governing are of a different species from those who are governed."

Letter to General Bernard.

In a letter to General Bernard, on the 29th of September, Joseph uttered the following prophetic sentiment: "You were deceived by your informants when you said that the name of Napoleon was not pronounced by the combatants. It was pronounced by them. It was pronounced by the Army of Algiers. It is to-day pronounced by the people in the departments and will soon be by entire France. The artifices of intrigue and deception are temporary. The national will, sooner or later, must triumph."

La Fayette had been mainly instrumental in placing the Duke of Orleans upon the throne of France. He wrote to Joseph Bonaparte explaining his reasons for this. In allusion to the fact that he was compelled to yield to the pressure of circumstances, he said, "You know that in home affairs, as in foreign affairs, no one can do just what he wishes to have done. Your incomparable brother, with his power, his character, his genius, experienced this himself." He also expressed his strong disapproval of the dictatorship of Napoleon, and of the aristocracy which he introduced. Joseph replied from Point Breeze, under date of January 15, 1831: