Alan Forrest

Waterloo was the last battle fought by Napoleon and the one which finally ended his imperial dreams. It involved the deployment of huge armies and incurred heavy losses on both sides; for those who fought in it, Dutch and Belgians, Prussians and Hanoverians as well as British and French troops, it was a murderous struggle. It was a battle that would be remembered very differently across Europe. In Britain it would be seen as an iconic battle whose memory would be enmeshed in British national identity across the following century. In London news of the victory unleashed an outburst of patriotic celebration and captured the imagination of the public. The Duke of Wellington would go on to build his political career on it, and towns and cities across Britain and the Empire raised statues and memorials to the victor. But it was only in Britain that Waterloo acquired this iconic status. In Prussia and Holland its memory was muted - in Prussia overshadowed by the Battle of the Nations at Leipzig, in Holland a simple appendage to the prestige of the House of Orange. And in France it would be portrayed as the very epitome of heroic defeat. Encapsulated in the bravery of General Cambronne and the last stand of the Old Guard, remembered movingly in the lines of Stendhal and Victor Hugo, the memory of Waterloo served to sustain the romantic legend of the Napoleonic Wars - and contributed to the growing cult of Napoleon himself.

Great Battles

Waterloo

The Death of the French Atlantic examines the sudden and irreversible decline of France's Atlantic empire in the Age of Revolution, and shows how three major forces undermined the country's competitive position as an Atlantic commercial power.The first was war, especially war at sea against France's most consistent enemy and commercial rival in the eighteenth century, Great Britain. A series of colonial wars, from the Seven Years' War and the War of American Independence to the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars did much to drive Franceout of the North Atlantic.The second was anti-slavery and the rise of a new moral conscience which challenged the right of Europeans to own slaves or to sacrifice the freedom of others to pursue national economic advantage.The third was the French Revolution itself, which not only raised French hopes of achieving the Rights of Man for its own citizens but also sowed the seeds of insurrection in the slave societies of the New World, leading to the loss of Saint-Domingue and the creation of the first black republic inHaiti at the beginning of the nineteenth century. This proved critical to the economy of the French Caribbean, driving both colons and slaves from Saint-Domingue to seek shelter across the Atlantic world, and leaving a bitter legacy in the French Caribbean. It has also created an uneasy memory ofthe slave trade in French ports like Nantes, La Rochelle, and Bordeaux, and has left an indelible mark on race relations in France today.

Trade, War, and Slavery in the Age of Revolution

The Death of the French Atlantic

The Death of the French Atlantic examines the sudden and irreversible decline of France's Atlantic empire in the Age of Revolution, and shows how three major forces undermined the country's competitive position as an Atlantic commercial power. The first was war, especially war at sea against France's most consistent enemy and commercial rival in the eighteenth century, Great Britain. A series of colonial wars, from the Seven Years' War and the War of American Independence to the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars did much to drive France out of the North Atlantic. The second was anti-slavery and the rise of a new moral conscience which challenged the right of Europeans to own slaves or to sacrifice the freedom of others to pursue national economic advantage. The third was the French Revolution itself, which not only raised French hopes of achieving the Rights of Man for its own citizens but also sowed the seeds of insurrection in the slave societies of the New World, leading to the loss of Saint-Domingue and the creation of the first black republic in Haiti at the beginning of the nineteenth century. This proved critical to the economy of the French Caribbean, driving both colons and slaves from Saint-Domingue to seek shelter across the Atlantic world, and leaving a bitter legacy in the French Caribbean. It has also created an uneasy memory of the slave trade in French ports like Nantes, La Rochelle, and Bordeaux, and has left an indelible mark on race relations in France today.

Alan Forrest fortæller den bemærkelsesværdige historie om, hvordan en korsikansk advokatsøn blev den mest magtfulde mand i Europa, en mand, hvis politiske eftermæle kom til at leve længe efter hans ensomme død i eksil tusinder af kilometer fra Frankrig på Atlanterhavsøen Sankt Helena. Forrest skærer igennem lagene af myter og modmyter, der er vokset op omkring Napoleon og tegner et nuanceret portræt af et magtmenneske, der gjorde alt for at skabe sig selv som legende. Napoleon omgav sig med journalister og ’spin-doktorer’, længe før det blev en politisk tradition, og havde en stærk bevidsthed om den offentlige menings magt, som han udnyttede til fulde i sin selviscenesættelse.

Napoleon

Rafe Blaufarb

Karen Hagemann

War, Culture and Society, 1750-1850

Étienne François

The memory of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars was so powerful across Europe because they constituted a crucial turning point in European history. The military expansion of France ensured that scarcely a corner of Europe remained untouched by the wars and by the political, economic and social changes that accompanied them. This interdisciplinary volume brings together an international team of experts who study how experiences and memories were transmitted to future generations in European culture and explore the various media through which they passed. This focus allows the authors to examine the intersection between experience and memory, between the private and the public, history and fiction, literature and art, and, most significantly of all, between the memories of the individual, groups, regions, nations, and the continent of Europe.

The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars in Modern European Culture

War Memories

Peter H. Wilson

This volume's juxtaposition of the empires of Germany and France in 1806, at the dissolution of The Holy Roman Empire, allows a comparison of their transition towards modernity, explored through the themes of Empire, monarchy, political cultures, feudalism, war and military institutions, nationalism and identity, and everyday experience.

Napoleonic France and the End of the Holy Roman Empire, 1806

The Bee and the Eagle

From Alan Forrest, a preeminent British scholar, comes an exceedingly readable account of the man and his legend On a cold December day in 1840 Parisians turned out in force to watch as the body of Napoleon was solemnly carried on a riverboat from Courbevoie on its final journey to the Invalides. The return of their long-dead emperor’s corpse from the island of St. Helena was a moment that Paris had eagerly awaited, though many feared that the memories stirred would serve to further destabilize a country that had struggled for order and direction since he had been sent into exile. In this book Alan Forrest tells the remarkable story of how the son of a Corsican attorney became the most powerful man in Europe, a man whose charisma and legacy endured after his lonely death many thousands of miles from the country whose fate had become so entwined with his own. Along the way, Forrest also cuts away the many layers of myth and counter myth that have grown up around Napoleon, a man who mixed history and legend promiscuously. Drawing on original research and his own distinguished background in French history, Forrest demonstrates that Napoleon was as much a product of his times as their creator.

Napoleon: Life, Legacy, and Image: A Biography

This is an original piece of research into the Napoleonic wars from the perspective of the ordinary soldier, available in paperback for the first time. >

The Soldiers of the Revolution and Empire

Napoleon's Men

Biografia sugerează, în chip aproape inevitabil, prin relatarea cronologică a faptelor vieţii acelui individ, începând de la naştere şi continuând cu experienţele trăite pe parcursul anilor, că evenimentele respective au avut o importanţă mai largă, mai cuprinzătoare decât cele ale unui om oarecare, că au contribuit, într-un fel sau altul, la scrierea istoriei acelor vremuri. În cazul lui Napoleon Bonaparte, merită să ne aplecăm şi asupra mitologiei, adăugând-o impresiei generale, create de-a lungul deceniilor de nenumăraţi istorici şi biografi, conform căreia ceea ce a contat în principal a fost omul însuşi, viziunile şi ambiţiile sale, şi nu vremurile în care a trăit ori circumstanţele întâlnite în cale. Puţine personaje istorice s-au bucurat de atâta notorietate şi de atâtea scrieri dedicate şi puţine au fost descrise într-o manieră atât de subiectivă, prezentând întrega istorie a epocii de parcă ar fi fost o reflectare a voinţei şi a dorinţei de putere şi de glorie a unui singur om. Din acest motiv poate că ar fi mai înţelept ca, înainte de orice, să ne oprim un pic şi să începem această carte cu un soi de avertisment.

Napoleon. Viață, moștenire, imagine: o biografie

On a cold December day in 1840 Parisians turned out in force to watch as Napoleon's coffin was solemnly borne down the Champs-Elysées on its final journey to the Invalides. The return of the Emperor's body from the island of St Helena, nearly twenty years after his death, was a moment they had eagerly awaited, though there were many who feared that the memories stirred would only further destabilize a country that had struggled for order and direction since 'the little corporal' was sent into exile after Waterloo. Alan Forrest tells the remarkable story of how the son of a Corsican attorney became the most powerful man in Europe, a man whose political legacy endured long after his lonely death many thousands of miles from France. Along the way, he cuts away the layers of myth and counter-myth that have grown up around Napoleon, a man who mixed history and legend promiscuously, and shows how he was as much a product of his times as he was their creator. The convulsive effect of the Revolution on French society, and the new meritocracy it ushered in, afforded men of this generation opportunities that were unimaginable under the Ancien Régime. Napoleon seized every chance that was offered him, making full use of his undoubted abilities and charismatic presence. But the Empire he created, stretching across most of the European continent, was not the work of one man. It was a collective enterprise that depended on the work and vision of thousands of administrators, army officers, jurists and educators, and The Age of Napoleon is as much their story as his. In a book that takes in everything from Napoleon's ill-fated expedition to Egypt to the festivals that punctuated the Imperial calendar, Alan Forrest draws on original research and recent scholarship to draw a fresh and compelling picture of one of the most dramatic periods in the history of Europe.

Matthias Middell

The Routledge Companion to the French Revolution in World History engages with some of the most recent trends in French revolutionary scholarship by considering the Revolution in its global context. Across seventeen chapters an international team of contributors examine the impact of the Revolution not only on its European neighbours but on Latin America, North America and Africa, assess how far events there impacted on the Revolution in France, and suggest something of the Revolution’s enduring legacy in the modern world. The Companion views the French Revolution through a deliberately wide lens. The first section deals with its global repercussions from the Mediterranean to the Caribbean and includes a discussion of major insurrections such as those in Haiti and Venezuela. Three chapters then dissect the often complex and entangled relations with other revolutionary movements, in seventeenth-century Britain, the American colonies and Meiji Japan. The focus then switches to international involvement in the events of 1789 and the circulation of ideas, people, goods and capital. In a final section contributors throw light on how the Revolution was and is still remembered across the globe, with chapters on Russia, China and Australasia. An introduction by the editors places the Revolution in its political, historical and historiographical context. The Routledge Companion to the French Revolution in World History is a timely and important contribution to scholarship of the French Revolution.

Alan Forrest

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