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THE NAPOLEON.ORG BULLETIN n° 701, 14-20 FEBRUARY, 2014
A BEAUTIFUL FRENCH CAMPAIGN
Exactly 200 years ago, Napoleon led what some called "his most beautiful campaign". This bicentenary is currently taking place on the French territory (alas!) and, there are events everywhere commemorating it: in Champagne, of course, soon in Ile-de-France around Paris, but also in South-West France and around Lyon - everywhere the Imperial armies fought to defend the “national sanctuary”. And, it is true that, even though the “French Campaign” as a whole ended with a defeat and with the Emperor's abdication, it was marked by a series of events: often glorious, sometimes sad, sometimes even moving. This Bulletin gives you a weekly account of the programme of commemorations.
French publisher Armand Colin has chosen this time to publish Jacques-Olivier Boudon's latest book: Napoléon et la campagne de France, which is the account of these events we had all been waiting for, more than 120 years after the Henry Houssaye's “classic” on the subject, a book which in many places has not aged well. Taking advantage of ‘modernised' sources, and even some totally new ones, Jacques-Olivier Boudon gives an analysis and a narrative which will become a classic in its own right; indeed from my point of view it already looks pretty indispensable. Context, military operations, political and strategic issues, but also soldiers' lives, battles, smell of gunpowder… there's nothing left out. It's a book that will leave its mark - it's a “must buy”!
What better way to get into the bicentenary spirit – perhaps even while going to one of the commemorative events (just don't read at the wheel!)…
An excellent week and happy reading to all.
Thierry Lentz,
Director of the Fondation Napoléon
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PAINTING OF THE MONTH > MEISSONIER, 1814, THE FRENCH CAMPAIGN
Ernest Meissonier is famous for his military paintings, and he soon attracted a following fascinated by his care for detail and the realism of his uniforms. And one of his most famous paintings, 1814, the French Campaign, singlehandedly revolutionised the genre of war painting. For there he concentrates not on the action and the fighting but rather on the figures depicted and the emotion. Painted for the fiftieth anniversary of the battle it commemorates, this work was immediately exhibited at the Salon of French artists in 1864. It was so successful that it was then put on show at the Great Exhibition in Paris in 1867.
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BICENTENARY OF THE FRENCH CAMPAIGN
> A Close-Up On 1814: The French Campaign: find here our dossier on the French Campaign, with a series of documents, images, a bibliography, an agenda of the commemorative events, and a detailed timeline, which you can also follow from week to week in the "200 years ago" section of our Bulletins.
> French Campaign Reading List: As part of our series encouraging you to relive the bicentenary of the French Campaign through digital books, here we offer you the chance to dig into an eyewitness account from Russian Headquarters and two publications dating from the first centenary, the first a translation of the French classic account by Henry Houssaye (now superceded by Jacques-Olivier Boudon – but he's not translated yet) and the other by the excellent F. Lorraine Petre. Enjoy!
- A. Mikhailofsky-Danilefsky, History of the Campaign in France in the year 1815, London: Smith Elder and Co., 1839
- F. Loraine Petre, Napoleon at Bay 1814, London: John Lane, 1914
- Henry Houssaye, Napoleon and the Campaign of 1814, London: Hugh Rees Ltd, 1914
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BACKSTAGE AT THE "NAPOLEON IN BIVOUAC" EXHIBITION IN AJACCIO, CORSICA
The Fondation Napoléon is lending objects and works of art to this exhibition, and, just back from the Palais Fesch in Ajaccio, our Capital and Collection Section Head Pierre Branda is giving us his first impressions on the exhibition, and on the incident regarding one of Napoleon's folding campaign chairs...
CONSORTIUM ON REVOLUTIONARY EUROPE
As every year the Consortium on Revolutionary Europe will bring together historians from all over the US and Europe to discuss the history of our period. This year it is being held in at the University of Mississippi, Oxford (US), from 20 to 22 February.
The Fondation Napoléon panel, featuring Thierry Lentz, Peter Hicks and Alexander Mikaberidze and the Prince d'Essling as president, is on the subject of diplomacy in the Napoleonic period.
At the same time, the Masséna Society, a society which encourages the study of the military history of our period, will be holding its annual dinner and meeting.
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NAPOLEONIC HERITAGE
The French "Fondation du Patrimoine" is going to fund the restoration of the Empress' yellow drawing-room in the Château of Fontainebleau. It has already given 200,000€ to the project. The wall hangings will be the first to be restored and returned to their First Empire colours and prestige. Read more about it on the Fondation du Patrimoine website (in French).
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200 YEARS AGO > MANEUVRES IN CHAMPAGNE AND NEGOTIATIONS IN CHÂTILLON
On the evening of the victory at Vauchamp (14 February, see previous Bulletin), Napoleon decided to stop pursuing Blücher and turned instead towards the Bohemian army which was threatening Paris. Once he had joined with Victor and Oudinot's men, Napoleon was able to launch his offensive towards Montereau, which he retook on 18 February. There Napoleon was told, on 20 February, the official news about the King of Naples' defection (see Bulletin n° 696). At the same time, the Congress of Châtillon was taking place (it had started on 5 February). Caulaincourt had been given carte blanche to negotiate peace with the allies. The conditions the latter were now demanding were far harsher than those proposed in Frankfurt. It was no longer a question of preserving France's natural borders; now they demanded that France return to the frontiers of 1792. After the defeat in La Rothière, Caulaincourt had hardly any room for manoeuvre in the negotiations; and even that was curtailed by the fact that Razumovsky (following the Tsar's instructions) was secretly trying to overturn the negotiations. In fact, Razumovsky was successful in that he caused the talks to stop on 10 February - the period of Napoleon's first victories. Napoleon withdrew the full powers from Caulaincourt on 12 February. On 19 February, the French Emperor received a peace proposal from the Allies, which he officially and categorically rejected: “I am ready to cease hostilities and to let the enemies go safely back home, provided they sign the preliminaries based on the Frankfurt propositions”. The month of March was to prove that this attempt to find a diplomatic solution was in vain. Despite the disagreements, the Coalition – which included Austria, the dynastic links between the two empires being in the end of little importance – had already moved on: all it intended to put in place now was a Napoleon-free Europe.
150 YEARS AGO > CORRESPONDENCE OF NAPOLEON I
150 years on, the Fondation Napoléon finds itself following in the footsteps of Napoleon III. After a note from his cousin Plonplon (Prince Napoléon) written in November 1863 outlining his ideas regarding the contemporary ongoing project to publish the letters of Napoleon, the Second Emperor replied (on 16 December, 1863) that he had decided to downsize the commission for the publication of the correspondence, replacing it with a steering committee of four, including Marshal Vaillant, M. de Flahaut and General Frossard; all of these however were finally to be replaced by Count Walewski, Amédée Thierry, Count de Laborde, Sainte-Beuve and Colonel Favé, as per a decree of 3 February, 1864. Plonplon was to be president of the commission, allowing him to operate on the published letters as he saw fit. In his November note to the Emperor, Plonplon had described his programme to “erect[…] a monument for the glorification of the Emperor, which should endeavour to make him known under his most favourable aspects […and] to suppress every document which in the opinion of the Emperor was not written to be made public, but was written by him for some special and personal purpose, and not to serve the general ends of history […and also] to suppress all documents possessing no interest, and which can only render this publication long and diffuse”. Plonplon also criticized the previous work on the correspondence, saying that “as chronological order by itself is not enough, it is often tiresome and long […]; in making a study of it one has the feeling that no clear principles have the guided the choice of the documents; we feel it is possible to discern that this work has not been done in a sufficiently profound sentiment of admiration and devotion.” The year 1864 was to witness the publication of two volumes of Napoleon's correspondence (volumes 15 and 16), for the years 1807-1808, the former before the change in the editorial committee. From volume 16 on, then, Napoleon's published letters and writings were significantly censored and bowdlerised. Given that Napoleon III's project had already lasted six years, the Fondation Napoléon is therefore not doing too badly today in publishing in ten years Napoleon I's (unexpurgated) correspondence up to 1810 (including a great many more letters than Napoleon III since our volumes also contain Napoleon's personal correspondence and other material left out). Our Volume 10 (1810-1811) is coming out in the autumn of this year.
Wishing you an excellent "Napoleonic" week,
Peter Hicks and Lucie Louvrier
THE NAPOLEON.ORG BULLETIN, N° 701, 14-20 FEBRUARY, 2014
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OPERATION ST HELENA
The Fondation Napoléon and the Souvenir Napoléonien, in association with the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, have announced the prolongation of its international fund-raising campaign to restore and save Napoleon I's residence on the island of St Helena. All the details regarding the campaign as well as donation forms and advice for donating from outside France, can be found on napoleon. org.
You can still donate online to the project via the Friends of the Fondation de France in the US here.
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