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THIS WEEK IN THE BULLETIN
We bring you a fascinating re-publication, Wheeler and Broadley's monograph of the invasion threat, printed by Nonsuch Publishing, Napoleon and the invasion of England: the story of the Great Terror. Then there's Oman's Meisterwerk, A History of the Peninsular War, in Napoleonic Pages. After that, in ‘200 years ago', we read of the deepening Franco-Russian ‘special relationship' and Napoleon micro-managing Junot on the invasion of Portugal, not to mention the obituary of an ancien régime minister. In ‘150 years ago', there is a Second Empire ‘rave' and the death of two public figures, one legal from the Kingdom of Piedmont Sardinia and the other academic spanning both the First and Second Empires. In the Press review, there's news of articles of interest in both French History and First Empire magazine, and in Just published, we bring you news of Charles Esdaile's massive book, Napoleon's wars. Finally, there's a bicentenary conference in Portugal for the beginning of the Pensinsular War. Enjoy.
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THIS MONTH'S BOOK
Napoleon and the invasion of England: the story of the Great Terror, by H. F. B. Wheeler and A. M. Broadley
Whilst this book was first published in 1908, it remains one of the most detailed studies of the ‘Great Terror', the threat of French invasion in the period 1797-1805. It includes many reprints of caricatures (Broadley had a huge collection and was a specialist on the subject) and many period documents relating to the times. All in all a useful (and reasonably priced) inclusion for any Napoleonic library.
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NAPOLEONIC PAGES
Sir Charles Oman: A History of the Peninsular War
Although much work has been done on the Peninsular war since the date of Oman's last volume (1930), this magnum opus still stands as the starting point for all those interested in the subject.
To discover all the books featured in our Napoleonic pages series, click here.
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200 YEARS AGO
Russian relations
Napoleon received the Count Tolstoy, Tsar Alexander I's ambassador, at Fontainebleau on 6 November, 1807, and described the interview to his Savary, his agent in Russia: “We agreed that he would write to Prince de Kurakin, and that I would submit to him a version of a note designed to make the court of Vienna declare war on Britain (…). I explained to him that anything which would draw us closer together was good for me; that the world was big enough for our two powers (…)” (Correspondence n°13,339, 7 November, 1807)
Portugal (the continuing story)
Napoleon criticised Junot's arrangements for the march to Portugal. “You are marching with sixteen columns, in other words your first column left Bayonne on 19 October and your sixteenth will not start out until 5 November. I do not approve of this march at all. You ought to have marched in three columns, in other words by division. In this way my army would have reached Salamanca by 10 or 12 November. You should direct your first division immediately towards Alcantara […] It is my wish that the whole of the first division with its artillery should have reached Alcantara by the 26th at the latest; at the same time the second division will be marching towards Alcantara and the third will already have passed Ciudad-Rodrigo; and that the whole of my army should be gathered [réunie] at Alcantara by 1 December. If the Portuguese offer no defence, and you can march without hindrance, you should even enter Portugal at this time and gather the whole of your army at Abrantès. From Alcantara to Abrantès is twenty-five leagues, or four days march. […] From Bayonne to Salamanca is only one hundred leagues. At the time of year we are in now, this takes twenty-six days. You could do it in sixteen or seventeen. From Salamanca to Alcantara is fifty leagues; this could be done in nine days. […] From Alcantara to Lisbon is fifty leagues; according to this calculation, my first division would be in Lisbon on 1 December, and all the rest would follow.” As a further encouragement to haste, he reminded Junot that: "the British are massively evacuating their troops from Copenhagen; it must not happen that you allow yourself to be overtaken because you have moved to slowly.” (Correspondence n°13,314, 31 October, 1807)
Obituary
Louis Auguste Le Tonnellier de Breteuil, diplomat and minister under Louis XVI, died in Paris on 2 November, 1807. “M. de Breteuil, minister in Paris before the Revolution, has just died in Paris at an advanced age, following a painful illness. It has by no means been forgotten that it is to him that we owe Paris's great embellishments with the demolition of the houses which were weighing down the Pont-au-Change bridge and obstructing the Quai de Gèvres” (Courrier de l'Europe et des spectacles, 6 November, 1807). Following the amnesty of 1802 he had returned to France after the thirteen years of exile and was to elected honorary member of the Académie des Sciences and of the Académie des inscriptions et belles lettres.
150 YEARS AGO
Death of Piedmont jurist and politician, Giuseppe Siccardi
Giuseppe Siccardi was born in Verzuolo (Piedmont) in 1802. He was a jurist and politician (he was member of the Court of Cassation), and he served as Justice and Ecclesiastical Affairs minister (1848-51), and in September 1849 he was sent on an special mission to negotiate modifications to existing concordats between the Kingdom Piedmont Sardinia and the Vatican, the so-called “Siccardi laws” limiting clergy privileges. On the failure of the talks, he returned to the court of Cassation in 1851 as president. He was to die of paralysis in Turin on 2 November, 1857. A day of national mourning was proclaimed in the kingdom. (Moniteur Universel, 3 November, 1857).
Saturday Night Fever…
The Moniteur Universel for Saturday 7 November reported that there was to be an “allnighter” of music and dance at the Concerts de Paris dance hall. With Monsieur Arban wielding the baton, the orchestra was to play the new quadrille, ‘Etoile du Nord', at midnight, the ‘Quadrille des Lanciers' at 1am and Musard père's ‘Le Danois' at 2am…
Death of the French Hellenist Jean-François Boissonade de Fontarabie
The Moniteur Universel (dated 8 November, 1857) published an obituary of the journalist and Hellenist Boissonade who died in Passy on 8 September, 1857. He was particularly renowned for his writings in the First Empire journals, the Moniteur, the Journal de Paris, the Mercure de France and above all the Journal des Débats. He specialised in Greek works of late antiquity and the Mediaeval period, and the highest point of his career was marked by his promotion to the Collège de France in 1828. His best known work is probably his edition of Babrius' fables and his collaboration on the catalogue of manuscripts at the Paris Bibliothèque Nationale.
Wishing you an excellent, Napoleonic, week.
Peter Hicks
Historian and Web editor
THE NAPOLEON.ORG BULLETIN, No 432, 2 - 8 November, 2007
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Got a problem with a link in the Bulletin? Go to the homepage: http://www.napoleon.org
THIS WEEK in the MAGAZINE
Press review
- First Empire, November /December 2007
- French History, vol. 21, No. 3, September 2007
Just published
- Napoleon's Wars: An International History, 1803-1815, by Charles J. Esdaile
WHAT'S ON
Conferences:
- International Conference in commemoration of the Peninsular War, Lisbon, Portugal
- Monarchy and Exile, London, UK
Cinema
- Centro Romano di Studi Napoleonici: Napoleonic film week, Rome, Italy
Exhibitions
- The Treasures of the Fondation Napoléon, Lorient, France
- Indispensable nécessaires, Reuil-Malmaisons, France
- Désiré's photographs of the Suez canal at the Musée de la Marine, Paris, France
- Gustave Courbet's works, Grand Palais, Paris, France
- Empress Josephine's Malmaison Collection, Somerset House, London, UK
- At the court of Louis Napoleon, first King of Holland (1806-1810), Paris, France
- 1807-2007: 200 years of economic life and consular justice, Paris, France
- "The trace of the eagle", the Invalides dome, Paris, France
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