The 'First French Empire', commonly known as the 'French Empire' or the 'Napoleonic Empire', was the regime of
Napoleon I in
France, through which he dominated much of continental
Europe. The Empire lasted from 1804 to 1814 — from the
Consulate to the
restoration of the
Bourbon monarchy — and was briefly restored during the
Hundred Days period in 1815.
The Empire began when Napoleon — already
First Consul — became
Emperor of the French on
May 18,
1804. He crowned himself on
December 2 of the same year at the
Notre Dame cathedral in
Paris. Its existence was immediately threatened by the
War of the Third Coalition, but the decisive French victory at the
Battle of Austerlitz ensured its survival.
La Grande Armée, the Empire's military machine, then all but destroyed
Prussia's armies in 1806, before swinging into
Poland and defeating the
Russians at the
Battle of Friedland in 1807. After Friedland, the
Treaty of Tilsit in July 1807 ended two years of bloodshed on the European continent.
French involvement in the
Iberian Peninsula eventually sparked the
Peninsular War, a brutal six-year conflict that severely weakened the Empire. In 1809, France and
Austria fought the
War of the Fifth Coalition; France triumphed again and imposed the
Treaty of Schönbrunn on the
Habsburgs, but diplomatic tensions with Russia led to the catastrophic
French invasion of that country in 1812. The
War of the Sixth Coalition saw the expulsion of French forces from
Germany in 1813. Napoleon
abdicated on
April 6,
1814; he returned from exile in
Elba in 1815, but the French defeat at the
Battle of Waterloo caused the ultimate downfall of the First Empire.
At its height in 1812, the French Empire had 130
départements, deployed over 600,000 troops to attack Russia,
[1] ruled over 44 million subjects, maintained extensive military presence in Germany,
Italy,
Spain, and the
Duchy of Warsaw, and could count Prussia and Austria as nominal allies.
[2] The fate of the Empire was inextricably linked to that of the army, whose early victories exported many ideological features of the
French Revolution throughout Europe.
Seigneurial dues and seigneurial justice were abolished wherever French armies went, aristocratic privileges were eliminated in all places except
Poland, and the introduction of the
Napoleonic Code throughout the continent made all people equal before the law (actually, only ''men'' -
women's rights were set back if anything
[3], established jury systems, and legalized
divorce.
[4]
Napoleon reordered the map of Europe and granted many noble titles, most of which were extinguished with the fall of the Empire. His rule was highly nepotistic; he placed relatives on the thrones of several European countries.
Origin
The ''coup'' of 18 Brumaire
Main articles: 18 Brumaire
In 1799, Napoleon Bonaparte was approached by
Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès — one of the five
Directors who constituted the executive branch of the French government — who sought his support for a ''
coup d'état'' to overthrow the
French Constitution of 1795. The plot included Bonaparte's brother
Lucien, then serving as speaker of the
Council of Five Hundred,
Roger Ducos, another Director, and
Talleyrand. On
9 November 1799 (
18 Brumaire, An VIII under the
French Republican Calendar), and the following day, troops led by Bonaparte seized control. They dispersed the legislative councils, leaving a rump legislature to name Bonaparte, Sieyès and Ducos as provisional Consuls to administer the government. Although Sieyès expected to dominate the new regime, the
Consulate, he was outmanoeuvred by Bonaparte, who drafted the
Constitution of the Year VIII and secured his own election as First Consul. This made him the most powerful person in France, a power that was increased by the
Constitution of the Year X, which made him First Consul for life.
The Consulate
The
Battle of Marengo (
June 14,
1800) inaugurated the political idea which was to continue its development until Napoleon's
Moscow campaign. Napoleon dreamed only of keeping the
Duchy of Milan, setting aside
Austria, and preparing some new enterprise in the East or in
Egypt. The
Peace of Amiens, which cost him Egypt, could only seem to him a temporary truce; while he was gradually extending his authority in Italy by the union of
Piedmont and by his tentative plans regarding
Genoa,
Parma,
Tuscany and
Naples. He wanted to make this his
Cisalpine Gaul, laying siege to the Roman state on every hand, and preparing in the
Concordat of 1801 for the moral and material servitude of the
pope. When he recognised his error in having raised the papacy from decadence by restoring its power over the churches, he tried in vain to correct it by the ''
Articles Organiques'' (1802) wanting, like
Charlemagne, to be the legal protector of the pope, and eventually master of the
Roman Catholic Church. To conceal his plan, he aroused French colonial aspirations against Britain, and also the memory of the spoliations of 1763 (
Treaty of Paris), exacerbating British jealousy of France, whose borders now extended to the
Rhine, and laying hands on
Hanover,
Hamburg and
Cuxhaven.
By the "Recess" of 1803, which brought to his side
Bavaria,
Württemberg and
Baden, he followed up the overwhelming tide of revolutionary ideas in Germany.
William Pitt the Younger, back in power in Britain, appealed once more to an Anglo-Austro-Russian
coalition against Napoleon, who by mastering France, Italy and Germany, hoped to revive the empire of Charlemagne.
The Empire begins
.jpg)
"Napoleon's coronation balloon". Collecting card with vignettes of Napoleon's military victories.
On
May 18,
1804, Napoleon was given the title of emperor by the
Senate; finally, on
December 2,
1804, he placed the imperial
crown upon his own head, after receiving the
Iron Crown of the
Lombard kings, and made
Pope Pius VII consecrate him in
Notre-Dame de Paris.
After this, in four campaigns, the Emperor transformed his "
Carolingian"
feudal and
federal empire into one modelled on the
Roman Empire. The memories of imperial Rome were for a third time, after
Julius Caesar,
Trajan and
Charlemagne, to modify the historical evolution of France. Though the vague plan for an invasion of Britain was never executed, the
Battle of Ulm and the
Battle of Austerlitz obliterated the defeat of
Trafalgar, and the camp at
Boulogne put at Napoleon's disposal the best military resources he had ever commanded, in the form of ''
La Grande Armée''
Early victories
In the first of these campaigns, Bonaparte swept away the remnants of the old
Holy Roman Empire and, out of its shattered fragments, created in southern Germany the vassal states of
Bavaria,
Baden,
Württemberg,
Hesse-Darmstadt and
Saxony, which he attached to France under the name of the
Confederation of the Rhine. The
Treaty of Pressburg, however, signed on
26 December 1805, gave France nothing but the danger of a more centralised and less docile Germany. On the other hand, Napoleon's creation of the
Kingdom of Italy, his annexation of
Venetia and her ancient
Adriatic Empire — wiping out the humiliation of 1797 — and the occupation of
Ancona, marked a new stage in his progress towards his Roman Empire.
To create satellite states, Napoleon installed his close relatives as rulers of many European nations. The clan of the
Bonapartes began to mingle with European monarchies, wedding with princesses of blood-royal, and adding kingdom to kingdom.
Joseph Bonaparte replaced the dispossessed
Bourbons at Naples;
Louis Bonaparte was installed on the throne of the newly formed
kingdom of Holland carved out of the Dutch
Batavian Republic;
Joachim Murat became grand-duke of
Berg,
Jerome Bonaparte son-in-law to the King of Württemberg, and Eugène de Beauharnais to the King of Bavaria while
Stéphanie de Beauharnais married the son of the Grand Duke of Baden.
Meeting with more resistance, Napoleon went further and would tolerate no neutral power. On
August 6,
1806 he forced the
Habsburgs, left with only the crown of Austria, to abdicate their title of
Holy Roman Emperor.
Prussia alone remained outside the Confederation of the Rhine, of which Napoleon was Protector, and to further her decision he offered her British
Hanover. In a second campaign he destroyed at
Jena both the army and the state of
Frederick William III of Prussia. The butchery at
Eylau and the vengeance taken against the Russians at
Friedland (
14 June 1807) finally ruined
Frederick the Great's work, and obliged Russia, the ally of Britain and Prussia, to allow the latter to be despoiled, and to join Napoleon against the maritime supremacy of the former.
At the crossroads
The the July 1807
Treaties of Tilsit ended war between
Imperial Russia and the French Empire and began an alliance between the two empires which rendered the rest of Europe almost powerless. The two empires secretly agreed to aid each other in disputes — France pledged to aid Russia against
Ottoman Turkey, while Prussia agreed to join the
Continental System against the
British Empire. Napoleon also convinced Alexander to enter into the
Anglo-Russian War and to instigate the
Finnish War against
Sweden in order to force Sweden to join the Continental System.
More specifically, the tsar agreed to evacuate
Wallachia and
Moldavia, which had been occupied by Russian forces as part of the
Russo-Turkish War, 1806-1812. The
Ionian Islands and
Cattaro, which had been captured by Russian admirals
Ushakov and
Senyavin, were to be handed over to the French. In recompense, Napoleon guaranteed the sovereignty of the
Duchy of Oldenburg and several other small states ruled by the tsar's German relatives.
The treaty with
Prussia stripped the country of about half its territory:
Kottbus passed to
Saxony, the left bank of the
Elbe was awarded to the newly-created
Kingdom of Westphalia,
Belostok was given Russia, and the rest of Polish lands in the Prussian possession was set up as the quasi-independent
Duchy of Warsaw. Prussia was to reduce the army to 40,000 and to pay the indemnity of 100,000,000 francs.
Many observers in Prussia and Russia viewed the treaty as unequal and as a national humiliation.
Talleyrand had advised Napoleon to pursue milder terms; the treaties marked an important stage in his estrangement from the emperor. After the Treaties of Tilsit, instead of trying to reconcile Europe to his grandeur (as Talleyrand advised), Napoleon had but one thought: to make use of his success to destroy Britain and complete his Italian dominion. It was from
Berlin, on
21 November 1806, that he had dated the first decree of a continental
blockade, a conception intended to paralyze his inveterate rival, but which on the contrary contributed to his own fall by its immoderate extension of the Empire. To the coalition of the northern powers he added the league of the
Baltic and
Mediterranean ports, and to the bombardment of
Copenhagen by a
Royal Navy fleet he responded by a second decree of blockade, dated from Milan on
17 December 1807.
But the application of the Concordat and the taking of Naples led to the first of those struggles with the pope in which were formulated two antagonistic doctrines: Napoleon declaring himself Roman Emperor, and
Pius VII renewing the theocratic affirmations of
Pope Gregory VII. The Emperor's Roman ambition was made more and more plainly visible by the occupation of the Kingdom of Naples and of the
Marches, and by the entry of Miollis into Rome; while
Junot invaded
Portugal, Radet laid hands on the Pope himself, and
Joachim Murat took possession of formerly Roman
Spain, whither Joseph Bonaparte transferred afterwards;.
(''See main article on the
Peninsular War'')
But Napoleon little knew the flame he was kindling. No more far-seeing than the
Directory, he thought that with energy and execution he might succeed in the
Iberian Peninsula as he had done in Italy, in Egypt and in Hesse. The Spanish began effective guerilla resistance, however; and the trap of
Bayonne, together with the enthroning of Joseph Bonaparte, made the contemptible
Prince of Asturias the elect of popular sentiment, the representative of religion and country.
Napoleon thought he had Spain within his grasp, and now suddenly the Iberian Peninsula started slipping from him. The Peninsula became the grave of whole armies and a battlefield against Britain.
Dupont capitulated at
Bailen into the hands of
Francisco Javier Castaños, 1st Duke of Bailén, and
Andoche Junot, Duke of Abrantes at the
Cintra, Portugal to
Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington; while Europe trembled at this first check to the hitherto invincible imperial armies. To reduce Spanish resistance Napoleon had in his turn to come to terms with the
Tsar Alexander I of Russia at
Erfurt; so that, abandoning his designs in the East, he could make the
Grand Army return in force to
Madrid.
Thus Spain swallowed up the soldiers who were wanted for Napoleon's other fields of battle, and they had to be replaced by forced levies. Europe had only to wait, and he would eventually wear himself out; but Spanish heroism infected Austria, and showed the force of national resistance. The provocations of Talleyrand and Britain strengthened the illusion: Why should not the Austrians emulate the Spaniards? The campaign of 1809, however, was but a pale copy of the Spanish
insurrection. After a short and decisive action in Bavaria, Napoleon opened up the road to
Vienna for a second time; and after the two days' battle at
Essling, the victory at
Wagram, the failure of a patriotic insurrection in northern Germany and of the British expedition against
Antwerp, the
Treaty of Vienna (
14 December 1809), with the annexation of the
Illyrian provinces, completed the colossal Empire. Napoleon profited, in fact, by this campaign which had been planned for his overthrow.
The pope was deported to
Savona beneath the eyes of an indifferent Europe, and his domains were incorporated in the Empire; the senate's decision on
17 February 1810 created the title of king of Rome, and made Rome the capital of Italy. The pope banished, it was now desirable to send away those to whom Italy had been more or less promised. Eugene de Beauharnais, Napoleon's stepson, was transferred to
Frankfurt, and Murat carefully watched until the time should come to take him to Russia and install him as King of
Poland. Between 1810 and 1812 Napoleon's divorce of
Josephine, and his marriage with
Archduchess Marie Louise of Austria, followed by the birth of the
king of Rome, shed a brilliant light upon his future policy. He renounced a
federation in which his brothers were not sufficiently docile; he gradually withdrew
power from them; he concentrated all his affection and ambition on the son who was the guarantee of the continuance of his
dynasty. This was the of his reign.
Intrigues, unrest and corruption
But undermining forces already impinged: the faults inherent in his unwieldy achievement. Britain, protected by the English Channel and her navy, was persistently active; and rebellion both of the governing and of the governed broke out everywhere. Napoleon felt his failure in coping with the Spanish Uprising, which he underrated, while yet unable to suppress it altogether. Men like
Stein,
Hardenberg and
Scharnhorst had secretly started preparing Prussia's retaliation.
Napoleon's formidable material power could not stand against the moral force of the pope, now a prisoner at
Fontainebleau; and this he did not realise. The alliance arranged at Tilsit was seriously shaken by the Austrian marriage, the threat of a Polish restoration, and the unfriendly policy of Napoleon at
Constantinople. The very persons whom he had placed in power were counteracting his plans: after four years' experience Napoleon found himself obliged to treat his Corsican dynasties like those of the ''ancien régime'', and all his relations were betraying him.
Caroline Bonaparte conspired against her brother and against her husband Murat; the hypochondriac Louis, now
Dutch in his sympathies, found the supervision of the blockade taken from him, and also the defence of the
Scheldt, which he had refused to ensure;
Jerome Bonaparte, idling in his , lost that of the
North Sea shores; and Joseph, who was attempting the moral conquest of Spain, was continually insulted at Madrid. The very nature of things was against the new dynasties, as it had been against the old.
After national insurrections and family recriminations came treachery from Napoleon's ministers. Talleyrand betrayed his designs to
Metternich and suffered dismissal;
Joseph Fouché corresponded with Austria in 1809 and 1810, entered into an understanding with Louis, and also with Britain; while
Bourrienne was convicted of
speculation. By a natural consequence of the spirit of conquest Napoleon had aroused, all these ''parvenus'', having tasted victory, dreamed of sovereign power:
Bernadotte, who had helped him to the
Consulate, played Napoleon false to win the crown of
Sweden;
Soult, like Murat, coveted the Spanish throne after that of Portugal, thus anticipating the treason of 1813 and the defection of 1814; many persons hoped for "an accident" which might resemble the tragic ends of
Alexander the Great and of Julius Caesar.
The country itself, besides, though flattered by conquests, was tired of self-sacrifice. It had become satiated; "the cry of the mothers rose threateningly" against "the Ogre" and his intolerable imposition of wholesale
conscription. The soldiers themselves, discontented after Austerlitz, cried out for peace after Eylau. Finally, amidst profound silence from the
press and the Assemblies, a protest was raised against imperial despotism by the literary world, against the excommunicated sovereign by
Catholicism, and against the author of the continental blockade by the discontented
bourgeoisie, ruined by the crisis of 1811.
Even as he lost his military principles, he maintained his gift for brilliance. His
six days campaign, which took place at the very end of the
Sixth Coalition, is regarded as his greatest display of leadership. But by then it was the end, and it was during the years before when, instead of the armies and governments of the old system, which had hitherto reigned supreme, the nations of Europe conspired against France. And while the Emperor and his holdings idled and worsened the rest of Europe agreed to avenge the events of 1792. The three campaigns of two years (1812–14) would bring total catastrophe.
The endgame
Main articles: Napoleon's Invasion of Russia,
Sixth Coalition
Napoleon had hardly succeeded in putting down the revolt in Germany when the Czar of Russia himself headed a European insurrection against Napoleon. To put a stop to this, to ensure his own access to the Mediterranean and exclude his chief rival, Napoleon made an effort in 1812 against Russia. Despite his victorious advance, the taking of
Smolensk, the victory on the
Moskva, and the entry into
Moscow, he was vanquished by Russian
patriotism and religious fervour, by the country and the climate, and by Alexander's refusal to make terms. After this came the lamentable retreat, while all Europe was concentrating against him. Pushed back, as he had been in Spain, from bastion to bastion, after the action on the
Berezina, Napoleon had to fall back upon the frontiers of 1809, and then — having refused the peace offered him by Austria at the Congress of Prague, from a dread of losing Italy, where each of his victories had marked a stage in the accomplishment of his dream — on those of 1805, despite
Lützen and
Bautzen, and on those of 1802 after his defeat at
Leipzig, when
Bernadotte (now Crown Prince of Sweden) turned upon him,
Jean Victor Moreau also joined the Allies, and the Saxons and Bavarians forsook him as well.
Following his retreat from Russia came Napoleon's retreat from Germany. After the loss of Spain, reconquered by Wellington, the rising in the Netherlands preliminary to the invasion and the manifesto of Frankfurt which proclaimed it, he had to fall back upon the frontiers of 1795; and then later was driven yet farther back upon those of 1792 — despite the wonderful campaign of 1814 against the invaders, in which the old Bonaparte of 1796 seemed to have returned. Paris capitulated on
30 March 1814, and the
''Delenda Carthago'', pronounced against Britain, was spoken of Napoleon. The great empire of East and West fell in ruins with the Emperor's abdication at
Fontainebleau. Only the
Hundred Days revived the flame for a final flicker: France returned to a restored Bourbon monarchy in the person of
Louis XVIII.
The nature of Bonaparte's rule
From the time he became First Consul, Napoleon gained most of his support by appealing to common desires of the French people at the time. These consisted of abhorrence for the emigrant
nobility who escaped persecution, fear of a restoration of the ''
ancien régime'', a general dislike and suspicion of foreigners in general (other countries having tried to reverse the Revolution) and of
Great Britain in particular, and the wish to extend France's ''revolutionary ideals''.
Bonaparte attracted more
power and gravitated towards imperial status, gathering support on the way for his internal rebuilding of France and its institutions. He gradually dampened opposition and
Republican enthusiasm, using
exile, systematic bureaucratic oppression, and
constitutional means.
Bonaparte, though an emperor, was in a relatively dangerous position compared to other authoritarian European monarchs of the time. Aware that if the French people could overthrow one monarch, they could overthrow another, Bonaparte used propaganda to align the opinions of the French people with his foreign policy. He had no particular ideology, and did not claim to be an absolute monarch (theoretically, his regime was constitutional). Although he was an autocrat, he was far less autocratic than most other authoritarian monarchs of the time, and had less power than such modern dictators as
Adolf Hitler. He was in the tradition of the
enlightened despot, embracing certain aspects of
liberalism — for example, public education, a generally liberal restructuring of the French legal system, and the emancipation of the
Jews — while rejecting electoral democracy and freedom of the press.
See also
★
Napoleonic Era
★
Napoleonic Wars
★
Empire silhouette
Notes
1. Todd Fisher & Gregory Fremont-Barnes, ''The Napoleonic Wars: The Rise and Fall of an Empire.'' p. 146. Additionally, with 300,000 troops in Spain and 200,000 scattered throughout Central Europe, the Empire had an army whose numbers exceeded a million.
2. Martyn Lyons, ''Napoleon Bonaparte and the Legacy of the French Revolution.'' p. 232
3. http://ernie.stuy.edu/~bgarcia/women_and_the_napoleonic_code.htm
4. Martyn Lyons p. 234-236
References
★ Chandler, David G. ''The Campaigns of Napoleon.'' New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995. ISBN 0-02-523660-1
★ Colton, Joel and
Palmer, R.R. ''A History of the Modern World.'' New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc., 1992. ISBN 0-07-040826-2
★ Elting, John R. ''Swords Around a Throne: Napoleon's Grande Armée.'' New York: Da Capo Press Inc., 1988. ISBN 0-306-80757-2
★ Fisher, Todd & Fremont-Barnes, Gregory. ''The Napoleonic Wars: The Rise and Fall of an Empire.'' Oxford: Osprey Publishing Ltd., 2004. ISBN 1-84176-831-6
★
Tolstoy, Leo. ''War and Peace.'' London: Penguin Group, 1982. ISBN 0-14-044417-3
★ Lyons, Martyn. ''Napoleon Bonaparte and the Legacy of the French Revolution.'' New York: St. Martin's Press, Inc., 1994. ISBN 0-312-12123-7
★ McLynn, Frank. ''Napoleon: A Biography.'' New York: Arcade Publishing Inc., 1997. ISBN 1-55970-631-7
★
Roberts, J.M. ''History of the World.'' New York: Penguin Group, 1992. ISBN 0-19-521043-3
★ Schom, Alan. ''Napoleon Bonaparte.'' New York: HarperCollins, 1997. ISBN 0-06-092958-8
★ Uffindell, Andrew. ''Great Generals of the Napoleonic Wars.'' Kent: Spellmount, 2003. ISBN 1-86227-177-1
External links
★
Napoleon, His Armies and Battles
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