Napoleon I of France

Alternate meanings: See Napoleon (disambiguation).

Napoleon Bonaparte (August 15, 1769 - May 5, 1821) functioned as effective dictator of France beginning in 1799 and as emperor of France as Napoleon I from May 18, 1804 to April 6, 1814; he also conquered and ruled over much of western and central Europe. He was the first ruler of the Bonaparte dynasty. Napoleon married Marie-Louise of Austria on February 11, 1810.

Table of contents 1 Early years and rise in the military 2 Invasion of Egypt, rise to dictatorship 3 Struggle in Europe, rise to emperor 4 Battles in Spain, Austria, and Russia 5 Defeat, Exile in Elba, Return and Waterloo 6 Exile in Saint Helena and Death

Early years and rise in the military

Napoleon Bonaparte was born in the city of Ajaccio on Corsica shortly after Corsica had been sold to France by the Republic of Genoa[?]. His family was a member of the minor Corsican nobility. His father Carlo Bonaparte[?] arranged for Napoleon's education in France and he moved there at the age of nine.

Napoleon initially considered himself a foreigner and an outsider; accusations of foreignness would dog him throughout his life. He had become an officer in the French army when the French Revolution began in 1789. Napoleon returned to Corsica, where a nationalist struggle sought separation from France. Civil war broke out, and Napoleon's family had to flee to France. Napoleon supported the revolution and quickly rose through the ranks. In 1793, he freed Toulon from the royalists and from the British troops supporting them. In 1795, when royalists marched against the National Convention in Paris, he had them shot.

Nicknamed the Little Corporal, Napoleon was a brilliant military strategist, able to absorb the substantial body of military knowledge of his time and to apply it to the real-world circumstances of his era. An artillery officer by training, he used artillery innovatively as a mobile force to support infantry attacks. When appointed commander-in-chief of the ill-equipped French army in Italy, he managed to defeat Austrian forces repeatedly. In these battles, contemporary paintings of his headquarters show that he used the world's first telecommunications system, the Chappe semaphore line, first implemented in 1792. Austrian forces, led by Archduke Charles, had to negotiate an unfavorable treaty; at the same time, Napoleon organized a coup in 1797 which removed several royalists from power in Paris.

Invasion of Egypt, rise to dictatorship

In 1798, the French government, afraid of Bonaparte's popularity, charged him to invade Egypt in order to undermine Britain's access to India. An indication of Napoleon's devotion to the principles of the Enlightenment was his decision to take scholars along on his expedition: among the other discoveries that resulted, the Rosetta Stone was translated. Napoleon's fleet in Egypt was completely destroyed by Nelson at The Battle of the Nile, so that Napoleon became land-bound.

A coalition against France formed in Europe, the royalists rose again, and Napoleon abandoned his troops and returned to Paris in 1799; in November of that year, a coup d'état made him the ruler and military dictator ("First Consul") of France. According to the French Revolutionary Calendar, the date was 18 Brumaire.

He instituted several lasting reforms in the educational, judicial, financial and administrational system. His set of civil laws, the Napoleonic Code or Civil Code, has importance to this day in many countries.

He was also a dictator and military adventurer who would cost France and her allies the lives of millions of men. In the end, all the Napoleonic Empire Wars did not gain any territory for France.

More recent analysis on behalf of the magazine Science et Vie showed that similar concentrations of arsenic can be found in Napoleon's hair in samples taken from 1805, 1814 and 1821. The lead investigator (Ivan Ricordel, head of toxicology for the Paris Police) stated that if arsenic was the cause, he should have died years earlier. Arsenic was also used in some wallpaper, as a green pigment, and even in some patent medicines, and the group suggested that the most likely source in this case was a hair tonic.

Napoleon married twice, firstly to Josephine de Beauharnais (whom he crowned as Empress Josephine, and by whom he had no heirs, leading to a divorce) and secondly to Archduchess Marie Louise of Austria, who became his second empress. He had one child by Marie-Louise: Napoleon Francis Joseph Charles Bonaparte (1812-1833), King of Rome (known as Napoleon II of France although he never ruled). Napoleon did have at least two illegitimate children: Charles, Count Léon, (1806 - 1881) (son of Catherine Eléonore Denuelle de la Plaigne [1787 - 1868]) and Alexandre Joseph Colonna, Count Walewski, (1810 - 1868) (son of Maria, Countess Walewski [1789 - 1817]).

He had asked in his will to be buried on the banks of the Seine, but when he died in 1821 he was buried on Saint Helena. In 1840 his remains were taken to France and entombed in Les Invalides, Paris.