Napoleon

Michael Rapport describes the last days of the old Revolutionary regime and the circumstances leading to the young general’s triumph at the coup of 18-19 Brumaire.

D.G. Chandler offers his examination of Napoleonic strategy during the “golden years” of the First Empire.

The Treaty of Fontainebleau saw Napoleon exiled to Elba. Why was he treated so lightly?

“It is time that the abuse of his enemies should be appreciated in its true light, and not accepted as impartial history merely because they happened to be distinguished men.” By Theodore Zeldin.

“Treat the Pope as though he had an army of 200,000 men"—Napoleon. By E.E.Y. Hales.

General and trooper alike, Napoleon's cavalry brought a superb panache to the drab business of war. James Lunt describes how, for fifteen years, there was “hardly a village in Europe between Moscow and Madrid” through which these dashing horsemen did not ride.

Napoleon’s attempt to form a second and more liberal empire was, like Waterloo, a close-run thing and “came nearer to success than is usually allowed.”

Dorothy Carrington describes how two citizens of Corsica, both of whom, in the Corsican tradition, aspired to political advancement, conducted a lengthy vendetta that had a decisive effect on the history of Europe.

The news of Waterloo shocked American readers, writes Donald D. Horward, and most writers and editors refused to believe Wellington’s famous dispatch of June 19th, 1815.

David G. Chandler describes how the trouble Napoleon took over the interpretation of events at Marengo shows how deeply they had disturbed him.