Short answers, pulled from the story.
Joachim Murat was born on the 25th of March 1767 in La Bastide-Fortunière, a small village in southwestern France. His father Pierre Murat-Jordy worked as an innkeeper and postmaster while his mother Jeanne Loubières came from a local family.
Joachim Murat volunteered to gather cannons from the Camp des Sablons suburb outside Paris during the autumn of 1795 when royalist forces rose against the government. He successfully transported these weapons to the center of the city while avoiding rioters on the 5th of October 1795 which allowed Napoleon to suppress the uprising.
Napoleon appointed Joachim Murat as Marshal of the Empire on the 18th of May 1804 and later created him Grand Duke of Berg on the 15th of March 1806 after territorial concessions by Prussia. He held this position until the 1st of August 1808 when he became King of Naples following political maneuvering to maintain power.
Joachim Murat switched sides multiple times as the balance of power shifted across Europe because personal survival often trumped loyalty to allies. He abandoned the Grande Armée after the Battle of Leipzig in 1813 to save his own throne and later attempted to regain favor with Napoleon during his return from exile.
Joachim Murat was sentenced to death by firing squad in Pizzo Calabro on the 13th of October 1815 following a trial for treason. He had fled to Corsica after hearing about Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo on the 18th of June 1815 before attempting an impossible invasion of Calabria with only 200 men.