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THIS WEEK'S LETTER...
... has plenty of reading material to keep you occupied. As well as the latest painting of the month - Alexandre Cabanel's full-length portrait of Napoleon III in his evening dress -, we also have a new article on Eugène Labiche's Le Voyage de Monsieur Perrichon, a particularly popular piece comedy that first saw the light one hundred and fifty years ago this week. On top of that, we also have Marie Dinelli-Graziani's thesis available online in our digital library, plus details of three recently published books: the third volume of John H. Gill's study of Napoleon's 1809 Austrian campaign, Wilfried Uitterhoeve's Koning, keizer, admiraal. 1810. De ondergang van het Koninkrijk Holland, and Gli Ultimi Viaggi di Napoleone, edited by Alberto Dati. Further down, below the news of an unsold rare Trafalgar poster, we continue to follow Maréchal Masséna's pursuit of Wellington in Portugal, and the Franco-British expedition in China, in 200 and 150 years ago respectively.
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PAINTING OF THE MONTH
Portrait of Napoleon III, by Alexandre Cabanel
Originally from Montpellier, Alexandre Cabanel's career was without blemish, beginning, in the most classic of fashions, with a schooling according to the 19th century academic curriculum. After a series of salon and exhibition medals and induction into the Légion d'honneur, he submitted his standing portrait of Napoleon III to the 1865 Salon. Despite criticism from the art world, the painting was well received by the imperial couple and hung for a couple of years in the empress's study. In both its intimacy and its urbanity, Cabanel's full-length study of the French emperor, dressed in his evening wear, is quite unlike the other official portraits of the time.
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NAPOLEON.ORG
Theatre: Le Voyage de Monsieur Perrichon, by Eugène Labiche
By 1860, Eugène Labiche was one of France's most successful dramatists. His first play, La Cuvette d'eau, was most likely written in 1837, but his first success came in 1851 with Un chapeau de paille en Italie. Le Voyage de Monsieur Perrichon was particularly popular for its portrayal of the bourgeoisie during the Second Empire. Written in collaboration with Edouard Martin in 1860, this comedy of manners was quite unlike any of Labiche's other plays. Whilst his previous works usually saw the plot unfold in domestic surroundings, Labiche's latest work saw the Perrichon family take the audience on a journey from Paris' Gare de Lyon to Savoie's glaciers.
Digital library: new thesis available online
A new thesis – Marie Dinelli-Graziani's three-volume work on Cardinal Fesch and his art collection – has recently been added to the Fondation Napoléon Digital Library.
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RECENTLY PUBLISHED
1809: Thunder on the Danube: Napoleon's Defeat of the Habsburgs Vol. III Wagram and Znaim, by John H. Gill
In this third volume, John H. Gill brings to a close his study of the 1809 war between Napoleonic France and Habsburg Austria. This final volume begins with the principal armies of both antagonists recuperating on the Danube's banks. As they prepared for the next encounter, important actions were taking place in distant theatres of war: Hungary, the Vistula, and Dalmatia. These subsidiary campaigns all set the stage for the clash that would decide the war: the titanic Battle of Wagram.
Koning, keizer, admiraal. 1810. De ondergang van het Koninkrijk Holland, by Wilfried Uitterhoeve
Two hundred years ago, the Empeor Napoleon put an end to the Kingdom of Holland by annexing it to the French Empire. Louis tried to prevent the annexation, as did the Minister Roell and Admiral VerHuell, but all to no avail. French troops overran the borders and finally occupied the last bulwark, Amsterdam. This loss of independence deeply marked the history of the Netherlands. Wilfried Uitterhoeve brings the story to life.
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Gli Ultimi Viaggi di Napoleone, edited by Alberto Dati
This book by Alberto Dati brings together for the first time in Italian two famous texts in English recounting Napoleon's last journeys. The first is Thomas Ussher's celebrated account of Napoleon's journey from Fontainebleau to Frèjus before embarking for Elba. The second is Admiral Cockburn's account Napoleon's voyage from Plymouth to St Helena. Both include useful notes and a detailed introduction.
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NAPOLEONIC NEWS
Rare Trafalgar broadsheet poster remains unsold
A very rare surviving broadsheet poster announcing the British victory at Trafalgar in 1805 remains unsold after going on sale at an auction organised by Lyon & Turnbull in Edinburgh. It is believed that the poster, originally sold for 2 pence at the time and now estimated at £10,000 - £15,000, is one of only two remaining examples. A similar 'broadside' was sold at Sotheby's Trafalgar sale (5th October 2005) for £38,400.
200 YEARS AGO
Portugal: bad roads slow French advance
After two weeks spent gathering supplies for his army, Maréchal Masséna gave the order to move out from Almeida and advance on the British forces on 15 September. An estimated 65,000 French troops invaded Portugal. On 18 September, Ney's corps reached Mangualde (near Vizeu), on the Mondego river. Junot's men, having taken a mountainous path clearly unsuited to artillery movement, eventually made it to Vizeu on 20 September. The rest of the artillery and Montbrun's reserve cavalry eventually arrived in Vizeu on 21 and 22 September. Wellington, clearly delighting in Masséna's disrupted advance, noted to Charles Stuart in a letter dated 18 September:
"There are certainly many bad roads in Portugal but the enemy has taken decidedly the worst in the whole kingdom."
150 YEARS AGO
The Chinese expedition: a trap is set
On 14 September, with the allied army en route once again, new peace talks were requested by the Chinese negotiators: refusing to be taken in this time, the offer was accepted by the allied ambassadors, but the location for these discussions was set as Tongzhou (now a district of Beijing), just 25 km from Peking (Beijing), and the note of acceptance was tempered with the warning that the allied military action had not been suspended. It was, however, agreed that the allied troops would not cross a designated point 8 km to the south of Tongzhou and for any ratification that might take place in Peking, a limited escort of 2,000 men (and importantly, no artillery) would accompany the allied negotiators. By 17 September, however, it became clear to Montauban that the negotiating party had been ambushed by Chinese forces and taken prisoner.
Theatre: Labiche's Voyage de Monsieur Perrichon premieres
On 10 September, 1860, the premiere of Eugène Labiche's Le Voyage de Monsieur Perrichon, a comedy in four acts, was held at the Théâtre du Gymnase in Paris. The play, considered by many to be representative of the bourgeoisie during the Second Empire, ran until 15 September and featured the well-known actor, Geoffroy, in the role of Monsieur Perrichon.
Wishing you an excellent "Napoleonic" week,
Peter Hicks & Hamish Davey Wright
Historians and web-editors
THE NAPOLEON.ORG BULLETIN, N° 552, 10 - 16 September, 2010
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© This Napoleon.org weekly bulletin is published by the Fondation Napoléon. Reproduction or all or part of this bulletin is forbidden, without prior agreement of the Fondation Napoléon.
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FONDATION NAPOLEON ON THE WEB
Each week we offer you a "mystery" link to somewhere on napoleon.org. Click on the link to discover a part of the website you might not have visited before...
Statistic of the week:
In the first six months of 2010, 4.7 million new books were sold over the internet, including 7% in metropolitan France. The sale of social science and science-based works represents a not inconsequential slice of this total (one in five).
(IPSOS study, June 2010, for the Centre National du Livre)
MAGAZINE
Just published
- Koning, keizer, admiraal. 1810. De ondergang van het Koninkrijk Holland, by Wilfried Uitterhoeve
- 1809: Thunder on the Danube: Napoleon's Defeat of the Habsburgs Vol. III Wagram and Znaim, by John H. Gill
Gli Ultimi Viaggi di Napoleone, edited by Alberto Dati
Press review
- Rare Trafalgar broadsheet poster remains unsold
EVENTS
On now and coming up
A selection of events taking place now or in the coming weeks, taken from our What's on listings.
Open days
- English Heritage Open Days 2010, England, UK [09/09/2010 - 12/09/2010]
Full details
Visits
- Souvenir Napoléonien, "Napoleone e l'Impero della Moda" North Italian delegation: exhibition visit, Milan, Italy [11/09/2010]
Full details
- Souvenir Napoléonien Louis Bonaparte trip to the Netherlands, Amsterdam, The Netherlands [20/09/2010 - 24/09/2010]
- Souvenir Napoléonien St Helena trip, Jamestown, St Helena [30/05/2011 - 19/06/2011]
NAPOLEON.ORG
The best of the month:
- Book of the month
- Painting of the month
- Objet d'Art of the month
- Article of the month
NAPOLEONICA.LA REVUE
Available free on Cairn.info
NAPOLEONICA ARCHIVES ONLINE
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