Napoleon III

• 1. Exile And The Prisoner Of Ham

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  Charles-Louis Napoleon Bonaparte was born in Paris on the night of 19 to the 20th of April 1808. His father Louis ruled Holland from 1806 until 1810. His mother Hortense de Beauharnais was the daughter of Empress Josephine. He spent his youth moving between Switzerland and Germany after his family fled France following the Battle of Waterloo. At age seven he visited his uncle at the Tuileries Palace and saw soldiers parading below. The young prince last saw his uncle before the Emperor departed for Waterloo. After the defeat all members of the House of Bonaparte were forced into exile. They moved from Aix-les-Bains to Bern then Baden-Baden and finally to a lakeside house at Arenenberg in Switzerland. He received education at a gymnasium school in Augsburg Bavaria. This training gave him a slight but noticeable German accent that remained for life. His tutor Philippe Le Bas taught him radical politics and French history. When he was fifteen his mother moved to Rome where he learned Italian and explored ancient ruins. He became friends with François-René de Chateaubriand who introduced him to romantic literature. In 1831 he joined secret revolutionary societies fighting Austria's domination of Northern Italy. During their flight his brother Napoléon-Louis contracted measles and died on the 17th of March 1831. They reached Paris on the 23rd of April 1831 under the name Hamilton. A public demonstration of mourning took place on Place Vendôme. They were ordered to leave Paris on the 5th of May. Louis Napoleon traveled to Britain then returned to exile in Switzerland. He planned a coup against King Louis-Philippe beginning in Strasbourg on the 29th of October 1836. The mutineers surrendered and he fled back to Switzerland. He later traveled to London Brazil and New York City. He met Benjamin Disraeli and Michael Faraday while living in London. On the 6th of August 1840 he sailed across the Channel to Boulogne with about sixty armed men. The attempt failed and he was arrested. He received life imprisonment in the fortress of Ham in northern France. While incarcerated he wrote poems political essays and articles for regional newspapers. His most famous book L'extinction du pauperisme studied poverty among the French working class. He escaped from prison on the 25th of May 1846 disguised as a laborer named Badinguet. He resumed his place in British society and lived on King Street in St James's.

• 2. The Vote And The Coup

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  In February 1848 Louis Napoleon learned that the French Revolution had broken out. He set out for Paris on the 27th of February departing England the same day Louis-Philippe left for exile. The Second Republic had been declared led by a Provisional Government headed by Alphonse de Lamartine. He returned to London on the 2nd of March 1848 watching events from there. In the elections held on the 4th of June 1848 he was elected in four different departments. He received 110,000 votes in Paris out of 247,000 cast. This made him the highest vote-getter in the capital. He returned to Paris on the 24th of September 1848 taking his seat in the National Assembly. Elections were scheduled for 10, the 11th of December 1848 for president. He won 5,572,834 votes representing 74.2 percent of votes cast. His opponent General Cavaignac received 1,469,156 votes. The socialist Ledru-Rollin received 376,834 votes. He won support from peasants workers small businessmen and intellectuals like Victor Hugo. He moved his residence to the Élysée Palace at the end of December 1848. He chose the title Prince-President and wore the uniform of the General-in-Chief of the National Guard. Elections for the National Assembly were held on 13, the 14th of May 1849. A coalition called Party of Order led by Thiers won a clear majority. On the 11th of June 1849 socialists attempted to seize power but Louis Napoleon acted swiftly. The uprising was short-lived and leaders fled or were arrested. The National Assembly passed a new election law in May 1850 excluding 3.5 million voters. This placed the Assembly on a direct collision course with the Prince-President. In July 1851 a vote to amend the constitution failed 446 to 278. On the night of 1, the 2nd of December soldiers quietly occupied strategic points in Paris. Posters announced the dissolution of the National Assembly. Sixteen members were arrested in their homes. Writer Victor Hugo tried to organize opposition on the 3rd of December. About 1,000 insurgents came out in the streets but the army crushed them killing an estimated 300 to 400 opponents. About 26,000 people were arrested including 4,000 in Paris alone. A national plebiscite was held on 20, the 21st of December asking if voters agreed to the coup. 7,439,216 voters said yes while 641,737 voted no. Following the returns many challenged the validity of such results. Victor Hugo departed for Brussels on the 11th of December 1851 becoming the most bitter critic.

• 3. Railways And The Suez Canal

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  One of the first priorities of Napoleon III was modernizing the French economy which had fallen behind that of the United Kingdom. He wanted the government to play an active role in building infrastructure. In 1839 he wrote that government is a benevolent motor for the whole social organism. Beginning in 1852 he encouraged the creation of new banks like Crédit Mobilier. Crédit Lyonnais was founded in 1863 and Société Générale in 1864. These banks provided funding for major projects from railways to canals. In 1851 France had only 3,500 kilometers of railway compared with 10,000 kilometers in England. Within days of the coup d'état of 1851 his Minister of Public Works launched a project to build a railway line around Paris. There were 18 railway companies in 1848 but six at the end of the Empire. By 1870 France had 20,000 kilometers of railway linked to ports and neighboring countries. Over 100 million passengers traveled annually on these lines. New shipping lines were created and ports rebuilt in Marseille and Le Havre. During the Empire the number of steamships tripled. By 1870 France possessed the second-largest maritime fleet in the world after England. Napoleon III backed the construction of the Suez Canal between 1859 and 1869. The canal project was funded by shares on the Paris stock market and led by Ferdinand de Lesseps. It was opened by Empress Eugénie with a performance of Verdi's opera Aida. He also reclaimed farmland and reforested 10,000 square kilometers creating the Landes forest. This became the largest maritime pine forest in Europe.

• 4. Haussmann And The New Boulevards

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  Napoleon III began his regime by launching enormous public works projects in Paris hiring tens of thousands of workers. He named Georges-Eugène Haussmann as prefect of the Seine department giving him extraordinary powers. He installed a large map of Paris in his office and planned the new city with Haussmann. In 1842 he declared I want to be a second Augustus because Augustus made Rome a city of marble. The population of Paris had doubled since 1815 without an increase in area or structure. To accommodate growth he issued a decree in 1860 to annex eleven communes increasing arrondissements from twelve to twenty. Most of Paris was an enormous construction site for decades. His hydraulic chief engineer Eugène Belgrand built a new aqueduct bringing water from the Vanne River. These works increased daily water supply from 87,000 to 400,000 cubic meters. Hundreds of kilometers of pipes distributed water throughout the city. A second network washed streets and watered new parks. He completely rebuilt the Paris sewers and installed miles of gas pipes for streetlights. Beginning in 1854 Haussmann's workers tore down hundreds of old buildings. They constructed new avenues connecting central points requiring cream-colored stone facades. The emperor built two new railway stations: Gare de Lyon in 1855 and Gare du Nord in 1865. He completed Les Halles the great cast iron pavilioned produce market. The signature architectural landmark was the Paris Opera designed by Charles Garnier. Napoleon also planned four major parks at cardinal points around the city. He transformed the Bois de Boulogne into a park to the west. To the east he created the Bois de Vincennes. To the north lay Parc des Buttes-Chaumont and to the south Parc Montsouris. Thousands of workers dug lakes built cascades planted lawns and flowerbeds. The intention was one park in each of eighty quartiers so no one walked more than ten minutes.

• 5. The Crimean War And Italian Campaign

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  In foreign policy Napoleon III aimed to reassert French influence as a supporter of popular sovereignty. In Europe he allied with Britain and defeated Russia in the Crimean War from 1853 to 1856. Tsar Nicholas I put pressure on the Ottoman government demanding control over Constantinople. A joint British-French fleet supported the Ottomans against Russian demands. On the 27th of March 1854 Britain and France declared war. An Anglo-French fleet landed thirty thousand French and twenty thousand British soldiers in Crimea on the 14th of September. They laid siege to Sevastopol for 332 days. During the siege the French lost 95,000 soldiers including 75,000 due to disease. Alexander II sought a political solution after his father died on the 2nd of March 1855. Negotiations were held in Paris from the 25th of February to the 8th of April 1856. The war added three place names to Paris: Alma Sevastopol and Malakoff. It marked a breakdown of the alliance system maintaining peace since Waterloo. In early January 1858 an assassination attempt occurred when conspirators threw bombs at the imperial carriage. Eight members of the escort and bystanders were killed. Felice Orsini was executed on the 13th of March 1858. This focused attention on Italian nationalism. Napoleon III arranged a secret visit by Count Cavour in July 1858. They agreed to join forces and drive Austrians from Italy. In exchange France received Savoy and Nice provided populations agreed in referendum. On the 27th of April 1859 the Austrian army invaded Piedmont. War began with the Battle of Magenta on the 4th of June 1859. Four thousand French men were killed while seven thousand Austrians died. He ended the war soon after the battle due to horror over casualties.

• 6. Sedan And The Fall Of Empire

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  From 1866 Napoleon had to face mounting power of Prussia as Otto von Bismarck sought German unification. In July 1870 he reluctantly declared war on Prussia after pressure from the general public. The French Army was rapidly defeated and captured at Sedan. He was dethroned swiftly and the Third Republic proclaimed in Paris. After release from German custody he went into exile in England where he died on the 9th of January 1873. His reign lasted twenty-two years making him the longest-reigning French head of state since the end of the ancien régime. He created the Second French Empire in 1852 which saw rapid industrialization and infrastructure expansion. Social reforms gave workers the right to strike and organize. Women gained admission to universities. He negotiated the 1860 Cobden, Chevalier Treaty with Britain. The intervention in Mexico aimed to create a Second Mexican Empire under French protection but ended in total failure. The defeat at Sedan marked the end of his rule and the beginning of the Third Republic.