Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte — Complete

As long as the Duke lived his name was naturally the rallying-point of the Bonapartes, and was mentioned in some of the many conspiracies against the Bourbons. In 1830 Joseph Bonaparte tried to get the sanction of the Austrians to his nephew being put forward as a claimant to the throne of France, vacant by the flight of Charles X., but they held their captive firmly. A very interesting passage is given in the 'Memoirs of Charles Greville', who says that Prince Esterhazy told him a great deal about the Duke of Reichstadt, who, if he had lived, would have probably played a great part in the world. He died of a premature decay, brought on, apparently, by over-exertion and over-excitement; his talents were very conspicuous, he was 'petri d'ambition', worshipped the memory of his father, and for that reason never liked his mother; his thoughts were incessantly turned towards France, and when he heard of the Days of July (overthrow of Charles X.) he said, "Why was I not there to take my chance? He evinced great affection and gratitude to his grandfather, who, while he scrupulously observed all his obligations towards Louis Philippe, could not help feeling a secret pride in the aspiring genius of Napoleon's son. He was well educated, and day and night pored over the history of his father's glorious career. He delighted in military exercises, and not only shone at the head of his regiment, but had already acquired the hereditary art of ingratiating himself with the soldiers." Esterhazy went on to describe how the Duke abandoned everything at a ball when he met there Marshals Marmont and Maison. "He had no eyes or ears but for them; from nine in the evening to five the next morning he devoted himself to these Marshals." There was the true Napoleonic ring in his answer to advice given by Marmont when the Duke said that he would not allow himself to be put forward by the Sovereigns of Europe. "The son of Napoleon should be too great to serve as an instrument; and in events of that nature I wish not to be an advanced guard, but a reserve,—that is, to come as a succour, recalling great memories."

His death in 1832, on the 22d of July, the anniversary of the battle of Salamanca, solved many questions. Metternich visited the Duke on his deathbed: "It was a heartrending sight. I never remember to have seen a more mournful picture of decay." When Francis was told of the death of his grandson he answered, "I look upon the Duke's death as a blessing for him. Whether it be detrimental or otherwise to the public good I do not know. As for myself, I shall ever lament the loss of my grandson."

Josephine was in her grave at Rueil when Napoleon returned. She had died on the 29th of May 1814, at Malmaison, while the Allies were exhibiting themselves in Paris. It seems hard that she should not have lived to enjoy a triumph, however brief, over her Austrian rival. "She, at least," said Napoleon truly, "would never have abandoned me."

Josephine's daughter, Hortense, separated from her husband, Louis Bonaparte, and created Duchess of St Leu by Louis XVIII., was in Paris, much suspected by the Bourbons, but really engaged in a lawsuit with her husband about the custody of her sons. She had to go into hiding when the news of the landing arrived, but her empty house, left unwatched, became very useful for receiving the Bonapartists, who wished for a place of concealment, amongst them, as we shall see, being, of all people, Fouché! Hortense was met by Napoleon with some reproaches for accepting a title from the Bourbons, but she did the honours of the Elysee for him, and it is creditable to both of them that, braving the vile slanders about their intercourse, she was with him to the end; and that one of the last persons to embrace him at Malmaison before he started for the coast was his adopted daughter, the child of his discarded wife. Hortense's presence in Paris was thought to be too dangerous by the Prussian Governor; and she was peremptorily ordered to leave. An appeal to the Emperor Francis received a favourable answer, but Francis always gave way where any act against his son-in-law was in question, and she had to start at the shortest notice on a wandering life to Aix, Baden, and Constance, till the generosity of the small but brave canton of Thurgau enabled her to get a resting-place at the Chateau of Arenenberg.

In 1831 she lost her second son, the eldest then surviving, who died from fever in a revolutionary attempt in which he and his younger brother, the future Napoleon. III., were engaged. She was able to visit France incognito, and even to see Louis Philippe and his Queen; but her presence in the country was soon thought dangerous, and she was urged to leave. In 1836 Hortense's last child, Louis Napoleon, made his attempt at an 'emeule' at Strasburg, and was shipped off to America by the Government. She went to France to plead for him, and then, worn out by grief and anxiety, returned to Arenenberg, which her son, the future Emperor, only succeeded in reaching in time to see her die in October 1837. She was laid with Josephine at Rueil.

Hortense's brother, Prince Eugène, the Viceroy of Italy, was at Vienna when Napoleon returned, and fell under the suspicion of the Allies of having informed the Emperor of the intention of removing him from Elba. He was detained in Bavaria by his father-in-law the King, to whose Court he retired, and who in 1817 created him Duke of Leuchtenberg and Prince of Eichstadt. With the protection of Bavaria he actually succeeded in wringing from the Bourbons some 700,000 francs of the property of his mother. A first attack of apoplexy struck him in 1823, and he died from a second in February 1824 at Munich. His descendants have intermarried into the Royal Families of Portugal, Sweden, Brazil, Russia, 'and Wartemberg; his grandson now (1884) holds the title of Leuchtenberg.

Except Louis, an invalid, all the brothers of the Emperor were around him in the Cent Jours, the supreme effort of their family. Joseph had left Spain after Vittoria, and had remained in an uncomfortable and unrecognised state near Paris until in 1814 he was again employed, and when, rightly or not, he urged the retreat of the Regency from Paris to Blois. He then took refuge at his chateau of Prangins in the canton Vaud in Switzerland, closely watched by the Bourbonists, who dreaded danger from every side except the real point, and who preferred trying to hunt the Bonapartists from place to place, instead of making their life bearable by carrying out the engagements with them.

In 1816, escaping from the arrest with which he was threatened, after having written to urge Murat to action with fatal effect, Joseph joined Napoleon in Paris, and appeared at the Champ de Mai, sitting also in the Chamber of Peers, but, as before, putting forward ridiculous pretensions as to his inherent right to the peerage, and claiming a special seat. In fact, he never could realise how entirely he owed any position to the brother he wished to treat as an equal.

He remained in Paris during the brief campaign, and after Waterloo was concealed in the house of the Swedish Ambassador, where his sister-in-law, the Crown Princess of Sweden, the wife of Bernadotte, was living. Muffling, the Prussian Governor of Paris, wished to arrest him, but as the Governor could not violate the domicile of an Ambassador, he had to apply to the Czar, who arranged for the escape of the ex-King before the Governor could seize him Joseph went to the coast, pretty much following the route of Napoleon. He was arrested once at Saintes, but was allowed to proceed, and he met his brother on the 4th of July, at Rochefort.

It is significant as to the possibility of the escape of Napoleon that Joseph succeeded in getting on the brig Commerce as "M. Bouchard," and, though the ship was thrice searched by the English, he got to New York on the 28th of August, where he was mistaken for Carnot. He was well received, and, taking the title of Comte de Survilliers, he first lived at Lansdowne, Fairmount Park, Philadelphia, where he afterwards always passed part of the year while he was in America. He also bought the property of Point Breeze, at Bordentown, on the Delaware, where he built a house with a fine view of the river. This first house was burnt down, but he erected another, where he lived in some state and in great comfort, displaying his jewels and pictures to his admiring neighbours, and showing kindness to impecunious nephews.

The news of the Revolution of July in 1830, which drove Charles X. from the throne, excited Joseph's hopes for the family of which he considered himself the Regent, and he applied to Metternich to get the Austrian Government to allow or assist in the placing his nephew, the Duke of Reichstadt, on the throne of France. Austria would not even answer.

In July 1832 Joseph crossed to England, where he met Lucien, just arrived from Italy, bringing the news of the death of his nephew. Disappointed, he stayed in England for some time, but returned to America in 1836. In he finally left America, and again came to England, where he had a paralytic stroke, and in 1843 he went to Florence, where he met his wife after a long separation.

Joseph lived long enough to see the two attempts of another nephew, Louis Napoleon, at Strasburg in 1836, and at Boulogne in 1840, which seem to have been undertaken without his knowledge, and to have much surprised him. He died in Florence in 1844; his body was buried first in Santa Croce, Florence, but was removed to the Invalides in 1864. His wife the ex-Queen, had retired in 1815 to Frankfort and to Brussels, where she was well received by the King, William, and where she stayed till 1823, when she went to Florence, dying there in 1845. Her monument is in the Cappella Riccardi, Santa Croce, Florence.

Lucien had retired to Rome in 1804, on the creation of the Empire, and had continued embroiled with his brother, partly from his so-called Republican principles, but chiefly from his adhering to his marriage, his second one, with Madame Jouberthon,—a union which Napoleon steadily refused to acknowledge, offering Lucien anything, a kingdom or the hand of a queen (if we take Lucien's account), if he would only consent to the annulment of the contract.

In August 1810, affecting uneasiness as Napoleon stretched his power over Rome, Lucien embarked for America, but he was captured by the English and taken, first to Malta and then to England, where he passed the years till 1814 in a sort of honourable captivity, first at Ludlow and then at Thorngrove, not far from that town.

In 1814 Lucien was released, when he went to Rome, where he was welcomed by the kindly old Pope, who remembered the benefits conferred by Napoleon on the Church, while he forgot the injuries personal to himself; and the stiff-necked Republican, the one-time "Brutus" Bonaparte, accepted the title of Duke of Musignano and Prince of Canino.

In 1815 Lucien joined his brother, whom he wished to abdicate at the Champ de Mai in favour of the King of Rome, placing his sword only at the disposal of France. This step was seriously debated, but, though it might have placed the Allies in a more difficult position, it would certainly have been disregarded by them, at least unless some great victory had given the dynasty firmer footing. After Waterloo he was in favour of a dissolution of the Chambers, but Napoleon had become hopeless and almost apathetic, while Lucien himself, from his former connection with the 18th and 19th Brumaire, was looked on with great distrust by the Chambers, as indeed he was by his brother. Advantage was taken of his Roman title to taunt him with not being a Frenchman; and all his efforts failed. At the end he fled, and failing to cross to England or to get to Rochefort, he reached Turin on the 12th of July only to find himself arrested. He remained there till the 15th of September, when he was allowed to go to Rome. There he was interned and carefully watched; indeed in 1817 the Pope had to intervene to prevent his removal to the north of Germany, so anxious were the Allies as to the safety of the puppet they had put on the throne of France.

The death of Napoleon in 1821 released Lucien and the Bonaparte family from the constant surveillance exercised over them till then. In 1830 he bought a property, the Croce del Biacco, near Bologna. The flight of the elder branch of the Bourbons from France in 1830 raised his hopes, and, as already said, he went to England in 1832 to meet Joseph and to plan some step for raising Napoleon II. to the throne. The news of the death of his nephew dashed all the hopes of the family, and after staying in England for some time he returned to Italy, dying at Viterbo in 1840, and being buried at Canino, where also his second wife lies. Lucien had a taste for literature, and was the author of several works, which a kindly posterity will allow to die.

Louis Bonaparte had fled from his Kingdom of Holland in 1810, after a short reign of four years, disgusted with being expected to study the interests of the brother to whom he owed his throne, and with being required to treat his wife Hortense with ordinary consideration. He had taken refuge in Austria, putting that Court in great anxiety how to pay him the amount of attention to be expected by the brother of the Emperor, and at the same time the proper coldness Napoleon might wish shown to a royal deserter. Thanks to the suggestions of Metternich, they seem to have been successful in this task. Taking the title of Comte de, St. Len from an estate in France; Louis went first to Toplitz, then to Gratz, and in 1813 he took refuge in Switzerland. In 1814 he went to Rome; and then to Florence, where the Grand-Duke Ferdinand received any of the family who came there with great kindness.

Louis was the least interesting of the family, and it is difficult to excuse his absence from France in 1815. After all, the present of a kingdom is not such an unpardonable offence as to separate brothers for ever, and Napoleon seems to have felt deeply the way in which he was treated by a brother to whom he had acted as a father; still ill-health and the natural selfishness of invalids may account for much. While his son Louis Napoleon was flying about making his attempts on France, Louis remained in the Roman Palace of the French Academy, sunk in anxiety about his religious state. He disclaimed his son's proceedings, but this may have been due to the Pope, who sheltered him. Anyhow, it is strange to mark the difference between the father and his two sons who came of age, and who took to revolution so kindly.

In 1846 Louis was ill at Leghorn when his son escaped from Ham, where he had been imprisoned after his Boulogne attempt. Passports were refused to the son to go from Italy to his father, and Louis died alone on the 25th of July 1846. He was buried at Santa Croce, Florence, but the body was afterwards removed to the village church of St. Leu Taverny, rebuilt by his son Napoleon III.

Jerome, the youngest of the whole family, the "middy," as Napoleon liked to call him, had been placed in the navy, in which profession he passed as having distinguished himself, after leaving his admiral in rather a peculiar manner, by attacking an English convoy, and eventually escaping the English by running into the port of Concarneau, believed to be inaccessible. At that time it was an event for a French man-of-war to reach home.

Jerome had incurred the anger of Napoleon by marrying a beautiful young lady of Baltimore, a Mica Paterson, but, more obedient than Lucien, he submitted to have this marriage annulled by his all-powerful brother, and in reward he received the brand-new Kingdom of Westphalia, and the hand of a daughter of the King of Wartemberg, "the cleverest King in Europe," according to Napoleon. Jerome is said to have ruled rather more as a Heliogabalus than a Solomon, but the new Kingdom had the advantage of starting with good administrators, and with the example of "the Code."

In 1812 Jerome was given the command of the right wing of the Grand Army in its advance against Russia, but he did not fulfil the expectations of his brother, and Davoust took the command instead. Every king feels himself a born general: whatever else they cannot do, war is an art which comes with the crown, and Jerome, unwilling to serve under a mere Marshal, withdrew in disgust. In 1813 he had the good feeling and the good sense to refuse the treacherous offer of the Allies to allow him to retain his kingdom if he joined them against his brother, a snare his sister Caroline fell into at Naples.

On the downfall of Napoleon, Jerome, as the Count of Gratz, went to Switzerland, and then to Gratz and Trieste.

His wife, the ex-Queen Catherine, fell into the hands of Maubreuil, the officer sent on a mysterious mission, believed to be intended for the murder of Napoleon, but which only resulted in the robbery of the Queen's jewels and of some 80,000 francs. The jewels were for the most part recovered, being fished up from the bed of the Seine, but not the cash.

In 1815 Jerome joined his brother, and appeared at the Champ de Mai. A true Bonaparte, his vanity was much hurt, however, by having—he, a real king—to sit on the back seat of the carriage, while his elder brother Lucien; a mere Roman-prince, occupied a seat of honour by the side of Napoleon. In the Waterloo campaign he was given the 6th division, forming part of Reille's corps, General Guilleminot being sent with him to prevent any of the awkwardnesses of 1812. His division was engaged with the Prussians on the 15th of June, and at Quatre Bras he was severely wounded. At Waterloo his division formed the extreme left of the French infantry, opposite Hougomont, and was engaged in the struggle for that post. Whatever his failings may have been, he is acknowledged to have fought gallantly. After the battle he was given the command of the army by his brother, and was told to cover the retreat to Laon, which he reached on the 21st of June, with 18,000 infantry, 3000 cavalry and two batteries which he had rallied. This, be it observed, is a larger force than Ney told the Chambers even Grouchy (none of whose men are included) could have, and Jerome's strength had swollen to 25,000 infantry and 6000 cavalry when he handed over the army to Soult at Laon. Napoleon had intended to leave Jerome with the command of the army, but he eventually took him to Paris.

When Napoleon left the country Jerome was assured by the ambassador of Wurtemberg that he would find a refuge in the dominions of his father-in-law; but when he arrived there he was informed that if he did not wish to be, according to the original intentions of the Allies, handed over to the Prussians, and separated from his wife, he must sign an engagement to remain in Wurtemberg under strict surveillance. He was then imprisoned at Guppingen, and afterwards at Ellwangen, where he was not even allowed to write or receive letters except through the captain of the chateau.

Part of Jerome's troubles came from the conduct of his wife Catherine, who had the idea that, as she had been given in marriage by her father to Jerome, as she had lived for seven years as his wife, and as she had borne a child to him, she was really his wife, and bound to remain with him in his misfortunes! The royal family of Wurtemberg, however, following the illustrious example of that of Austria, looked on her past life as a mere state of concubinage, useful to the family, and to be respected while her husband could retain his kingdom, but which should end the moment there was nothing more to be gained from Napoleon or his brother. It was all proper and decorous to retain the title of King of Wurtemberg, which the former Duke and then Elector had owed to the exile of St. Helena, but King Frederick, and still less his son William, who succeeded him in 1816, could not comprehend Catherine's clinging to her husband when he had lost his kingdom. "I was a Queen; I am still a wife and mother," wrote the Princess to her disgusted father. Another complaint against this extraordinary Princess was that she actually saw Las Cases on his return from St. Helena, and thus obtained news of the exile.

After constant ill treatment Jerome and his wife, as the Count and Countess of Montfort, a rank the King of Wurtemberg afterwards raised to Prince, were allowed to proceed to Hainburg near Vienna, then to Florence, and, later to Trieste, where Jerome was when his sister Elisa died. In 1823 they were permitted to go to Rome, and in 1835 they went to Lausanne, where his true-hearted wife died the same year. Jerome went to Florence, and lived to see the revival of the Empire, and to once more enjoy the rank of a French Prince. He died in 1860 at the chateau of Villegenis in France, and was buried in the Invalides.

The mother of the Emperor, Letitia, in 1814, had retained her title of Imperatrice Mere, and had retired to Rome. She then went to Elba in June, and stayed there with her daughter Pauline until Napoleon had sailed for France. On 2d March 1814 she went from Elba to San Vicenzo near Leghorn, and then to Rome. Her son sent a frigate for her, the 'Melpomene', which was captured by the English 'Rivoli'; another vessel, the 'Dryade', brought her to France, and she joined Napoleon in Paris. We must have a regard for this simple old lady, who was always careful and saving, only half believing in the stability of the Empire; and, like a true mother, always most attentive to the most unfortunate of her children. Her life had been full of startling changes; and it must have been strange for the woman who had been hunted out of Corsica, flying from her house just in time to save her life from the adherents of Paoli, to find herself in grandeur in Paris. She saw her son just before he left, as she thought, for America, and then retired to the Rinuccini—now the Bonaparte-Palace at Rome, where she died in 1836. She had been anxious to join Napoleon at St. Helena, and had refused, as long as Napoleon was alive, to forgive her daughter Caroline, the wife of Murat, for her abandonment of her brother. She was buried at Albano.

Letitia's youngest daughter, the beautiful but frail Pauline, Duchess of Guastalla, married first to General Leclerc, and then to Prince Camille Borgelle, was at Nice when her brother abdicated in 1814. She retired with her mother to Rome, and in October 1814 went to Elba, staying there till Napoleon left, except when she was sent to Naples with a message of forgiveness for Murat. There was a characteristic scene between her and Colonel Campbell when the English Commissioner arrived to find Napoleon gone. Pauline professed ignorance till the last of her brother's intentions, and pressed the Colonel's hand to her heart that he might feel how agitated she was. "She did not appear to be so," says the battered old Colonel, who seems to have been proof against her charms. She then went to Rome, and later to Pisa. Her health was failing, and, unable to join her brother in France, she sent him her only means of assistance, her jewels, which were captured at Waterloo. Her offer to go to St. Helena, repeated several times, was never accepted by Napoleon. She died in 1825 at Florence, from consumption, reconciled to her husband, from whom she had been separated since 1807. She was buried at Sta Maria Maggiore, Rome.

Elisa, the eldest sister of Napoleon, the former Grand Duchess of Tuscany, which Duchy she had ruled well, being a woman of considerable talent, was the first of all to die. In 1814 she had been forced to fly from her Government, and, accompanied by her husband, she had attempted to reach France. Finding herself cut off by the Austrians; she took shelter with Augereau's army, and then returned to Italy. She took the title of Comtesse de Campignana, and retired to Trieste, near which town, at the Chateau of Sant Andrea, under a wearisome surveillance, she expired in 1820, watched by her husband, Felix Baeciocchi, and her sister Caroline. Her monument is in the Bacciocchi Chapel in San Petronio, Bologna.

Caroline, the wife of Murat, was the only one of the family untrue to Napoleon. Very ambitious, and forgetting how completely she owed her Kingdom of Naples to her brother, she had urged Murat in 1814 to separate from Napoleon, and, still worse, to attack Eugène, who held the north of Italy against the Austrians. She relied on the formal treaty with Austria that Murat should retain his Kingdom of Naples, and she may also have trusted to the good offices of her former admirer Metternich. When the Congress of Vienna met, the French Minister, Talleyrand, at once began to press for the removal of Murat. A trifling treaty was not considered an obstacle to the Heaven-sent deliverers of Europe, and Murat, believing his fate sealed, hearing of Napoleon's landing, and urged on by a misleading letter from Joseph Bonaparte, at once marched to attack the Austrians. He was easily routed by the Austrians under Neipperg, the future husband of Maria Louisa. Murat fled to France, and Caroline first took refuge in an English man-of-war, the 'Tremendous', being, promised a free passage to England. She was, however, handed over to the Austrians; who kept her in confinement at Hainburg near Vienna. In October 1815 Murat landed in Calabria in a last wild attempt to recover his throne. He was arrested and immediately shot. After his murder Caroline, taking the title of Countess of Lipona (an anagram of Napoli), was permitted to retire to Trieste with Elisa, Jerome, and his wife. Caroline was almost without means of existence, the Neapolitan Bourbons refusing even to give up the property she had brought there. She married a General Macdonald. When Hortense was buried at Rueil Caroline obtained permission to attend the sad ceremony. In 1838 she went to France to try to obtain a pension, and succeeded in getting one of 100,000 francs. She died from cancer in the stomach in 1839, and was buried in the Campo Santo, Bologna.