Kingdom of Italy (Napoleonic)

• 1. Introduction

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  The Kingdom of Italy was born on the 17th of March 1805, not from centuries of unified rule, but from a single decision by one man who was already emperor of France. Napoleon Bonaparte, who had served as president of the Italian Republic, simply proclaimed it a kingdom and crowned himself its king. The ceremony at Milan Cathedral on the 23rd of May made it official: Napoleon wore the Iron Crown of Lombardy, and his title became "Emperor of the French and King of Italy." His 24-year-old stepson, Eugène de Beauharnais, was named viceroy to govern in his absence.

  At its height, the kingdom stretched across 84,000 square kilometers and held 6.5 million people. Yet for all its formal trappings, it was never truly independent. Its trade policy, its army, its constitution, and its borders all bent to the will of Paris. What would happen when that will collapsed?

• 2. Constitution and Power

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  Two days after the kingdom was proclaimed, on the 19th of March 1805, the Consulta issued the first of nine Constitutional Statutes that would gradually reshape the state. The old republican constitution was never formally abolished, but these statutes hollowed it out entirely.

  The third statute, proclaimed on the 5th of June, was the most consequential. It concentrated all powers of government in Napoleon as head of state. The Consulta, Legislative Council, and Speakers were merged into a Council of State, whose opinions the king was free to ignore. The old parliament, the Legislative Body, remained on paper but was never summoned after 1805. The Napoleonic Code, introduced on the 21st of March 1804, became the law of the land.

  Later statutes built out the kingdom's institutions piece by piece. The fourth statute named Eugène de Beauharnais as heir to the throne. The fifth and sixth, on the 21st of March 1808, separated the Consulta from the Council of State and renamed it the Senate. The seventh statute created a new nobility of dukes, counts, and barons. By 1812, a Court of Accounts had been added to the structure.

  Seven ministers ran the day-to-day machinery of government. The Treasury passed from Antonio Veneri to Ambrogio Birago in 1811. The War ministry moved through General Augusto Caffarelli, then General Giuseppe Danna, and finally General Achille Fontanelli. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs stayed in the hands of Ferdinando Marescalchi throughout.

• 3. Shifting Borders

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  The Treaty of Pressburg on the 26th of December 1805, following Austria's defeat in the Third Coalition, handed the kingdom a large prize: the eastern Venetian territories, including Istria and Dalmatia with Cattaro. The Duchy of Guastalla was annexed on the 24th of May of that year.

  A smaller adjustment followed through the Convention of Fontainebleau with Austria on the 10th of October 1807. Italy ceded Monfalcone to Austria and received Gradisca in return, with the Isonzo river becoming the new border line.

  Spring 1808 brought another addition. General Auguste de Marmont annexed the Republic of Ragusa. On the 2nd of April, after the Papal States dissolved, the present-day Marches came under the kingdom's control. At that point, the territory reached its greatest size: 6,700,000 inhabitants and 2,155 comunes.

  The Treaty of Schonbrunn on the 14th of October 1809, signed by Napoleon and King Maximilian I Joseph of Bavaria after Austria's defeat in the War of the Fifth Coalition, reshaped the borders again. Bavaria ceded southern Tyrol to the kingdom. In exchange, Istria, Dalmatia, and Ragusa went to France, folded into its Illyrian Provinces. Minor border changes between Italy and France in Garfagnana and Friuli came into effect on the 5th of August 1811.

• 4. Building the Army

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  When the kingdom was established, northern Italy had been largely demilitarized for a century. French and Italian administrators widely believed the Italians had no military value. Napoleon understood the scale of what he was attempting.

  The army inherited from the Republic had conscripted 31,200 civilians between 1803 and 1805. Its two Hussar regiments became Dragoons, renamed Regina and Napoleone, forming the main cavalry force in all subsequent campaigns. The Presidential Guards of the Republic became the Royal Guards, and in 1806 the regiment of Royal Velites joined them.

  By 1807, the Jager battalion Brescia had expanded to three battalions and was renamed the 3rd Light regiment. The Royal Dalmatian regiment and the Jager battalion Istria were formed that same year from recruits in the former Venetian domains. Between 1806 and 1813, excluding volunteers, the kingdom conscripted 128,316 civilians, with the peak intake coming between 1810 and 1812.

  By 1810-1812, the army had reached qualitative parity with regular French units in training and discipline. Between 1800 and 1812, with a population of somewhat over 6 million, the Kingdom of Italy supplied 200,000 soldiers to Napoleon's armies. Including those conscripted from Italian provinces directly annexed into the French Empire, the total reached 400,000 Italian soldiers fighting for France, not counting those who served in the army of the Kingdom of Naples. At least three-quarters of those men served outside of Italy.

• 5. War on Two Fronts

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  From 1808 to 1813, entire Italian divisions fought in the Peninsular War in Spain. Giuseppe Lechi commanded the 2nd Division in Duhesme's Observatory Corps from early 1808. A second all-Italian division under Domenico Pino followed in early 1809, attached to Saint-Cyr's VII Corps as the 5th Division.

  By May 1811, several Italian line regiments had transferred to Harispe's command for the siege of Tarragona. The units that distinguished themselves most did so under Suchet at Tarragona and Saguntum. Between 1808 and 1813, the kingdom provided 30,183 soldiers to the Spanish campaigns; only 8,958 returned. The rest fell to combat and disease.

  The Russian campaign of 1812 was larger and more catastrophic. Eugène de Beauharnais commanded the IV Corps of the Grande Armee, which included two divisions from the kingdom: the 15th (Italian) Infantry Division under General Domenico Pino and the Italian Royal Guard division under General Teodoro Lechi. In total, 27,000 troops from the kingdom marched into Russia. They fought at Smolensk, Borodino, Maloyaroslavets, and Krasnoi. At Borodino and Maloyaroslavets, the Italian contingent earned the recognition: "The Italian army had displayed qualities which entitled it evermore to take rank amongst the bravest troops of Europe." Only 1,000-2,000 Italians survived the Russian campaign, though they returned with most of their banners secured.

• 6. Administration and Currency

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  A law on the 8th of June 1805 laid out the kingdom's administrative structure. Following the French model, the state was divided into 14 departments: twelve inherited from the republican era, plus Adda centred on Sondrio and Adige centred on Verona. Each department was headed by a prefect who held all executive powers in his territory, led the police, and oversaw local authorities.

  Below the departments came districts, equivalent to French arrondissements, each led by a vice-prefect. Districts divided into cantons, then into comunes. City Councils in the comunes had fifteen, thirty, or forty members chosen by the king or the prefect depending on the comune's size. Only owners and traders could hold city offices.

  After the Venetian territories were added in 1806, seven new departments were created: six in the Venetian mainland and one in Istria. Three more departments followed on the 20th of April 1808, after the Adriatic coast was extended. The 24th and final department, Haut Adige, was created on the 10th of June 1810, when Napoleon annexed the southern Tirol up to the city of Bolzano.

  The kingdom also introduced a new currency. Napoleon's imperial decree on the 21st of March 1806 ordered the Italian lira to replace all local coins, and production began in 1807. The lira matched the French franc in size, weight, and metal content. The silver lira weighed 5 grams. Gold coins of £20 contained 6.45 grams of gold; the £40 coin held 12.9 grams.

• 7. Collapse and Occupation

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  Napoleon abdicated both his French and Italian thrones on the 11th of April 1814. Eugène de Beauharnais was positioned on the Mincio river with his army and attempted to be crowned king in his own right. The Senate was summoned on the 17th of April, but the senators could not reach a decision in the chaos.

  The second session on the 20th of April ended the attempt. A Milan insurrection broke out, and in the riots the finance minister Count Giuseppe Prina was killed by the crowd. The Great Electors disbanded the Senate and called in Austrian forces to restore order. A Provisional Regency Government under Carlo Verri's presidency took charge.

  Eugène surrendered on the 23rd of April and was exiled to Bavaria. Austrian forces occupied Milan on the 28th of April. On the 26th of April, the empire appointed Annibale Sommariva as Imperial Commissioner of Lombardy. Count Heinrich von Bellegarde took full powers in Lombardy on the 25th of May, while the former monarchies in Modena, Romagna, and Piedmont were gradually re-established. The Treaty of Paris was signed on the 30th of May.

  The last units of the kingdom's army, the divisions Palombini and Zucchi, had been disbanded on the 11th of February 1814, after a final engagement on the Mincio. What remained of the kingdom's territory was absorbed into the Austrian Empire as the Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia, announced by Count Bellegarde on the 12th of June.