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THIS MONTH'S BOOK
Napoleonic Europe, by Clive Emsley
As the back jacket of the book notes, "keeping one's bearings geograhpically, militarily, politically and chronologically in the prevailing turmoil [of 1799-1815] is no easy matter. This short reference book is the perfect vademecum for the Napoleonic enthusiast.
Period Glossary
Read all about the Bogeyman!
TWO HUNDRED YEARS AGO
26 Brumaire, An XII (18 November, 1803), Rochambeau defeat at "Vertières", Santo Domingo
Vicomte Donatien de Rochambeau (son of the commander of the French expeditionary force during the American War of Independence) had been sent to Santo Domingo with 10.000 further reinforcements. However, the results were less than spectaular. His exhausted troops were defeated on 18 November, 1803, at a place called Vertières and on the same day he surrendered to Toussaint Louverture's successor, General Jacques Dessalines.
The French garrisons on the island capitulated one after the other, and the colony became an ex-colony with the proclamation of independence, 1 January, 1804. Furthermore, the new citizens baptised their island 'Haiti', the name given to it by the first Amerindian inhabitants.
In total in the 1800-1803 period, the First Consul sent 70,000 men to the island, of which 55,000 were never to return, most victims of the tropical scourge, yellow fever.
Wishing you an excellent, Napoleonic, week!
Peter Hicks
Historian and Web editor
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THIS WEEK:
What's on
- Re-enactment: Austerlitz 2003
- Conference: Joint Annual Conference - Napoleonic Society of America / Napoleonic Alliance
- Exhibition: Art booty in the Napoleonic period. The "French gift" to Mainz, 1803
Just published
- Josephine: Napoleon incomparable empress, by Eleanor P. Delorme
- Gendarmes and the State in Nineteenth-Century Europe, by Clive Emsley
The monthly titles
- This month's book: Napoleonic Europe, by Clive Emsley
- This month's painting: The Colossus, by Goya
- This month's article: The History of Lord Seaton's Regiment, (The 52nd Light Infantry) at the Battle of Waterloo, Chapter Three, by William Leake
- In the Collectors Corner, a Mamluk's harness
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