Napoleon - Part 3

On November 9, 1799, Napoleon launched his coup. At first it went well, but then, on November 10, Napoleon entered the government’s council chambers to announce his intentions. The council didn’t agree. When the council realized what Napoleon was proposing, they couldn’t hide their anger. “Traitor!” “Outlaw!” “Down with the Dictator!” they cried. Then things turned violent. Politicians lept from their benches to confront Napoleon; they slapped him, grabbed at him, and screamed in his face.

Napoleon quickly fled in some distress. 

After being expelled from the council chambers, Napoleon and his brother Lucien turned to the council guards for their support. If they could win over the 400 soldiers and their commander, they could still win the day.

Convincing the guards didn’t call for a carefully crafted argument. It needed something to stir their passion. So Lucien lept on a horse, and loudly and forcibly denounced the council members as fanatics paid for by the British. Then in a grand gesture, he drew his sword and pointed it at his brother's chest. If he thought for one minute – he told the soldiers – that Napoleon was acting against the interests of the country, he’d stab his brother right in the heart.

The dramatic speech worked; the guards forcibly removed the council members from their chambers. Napoleon and his co-conspirators assembled and drew up a new constitution known as the Consulate. Napoleon was given the most powerful position: First Consul. 

From his new position at the head of the government, Napoleon issued a series of radical reforms. He centralized the government, gave greater rights and protections to the people, and pushed measures to reinvigorate French business, all while cutting taxes. The economy soared. The First Consul’s rule was off to a strong start. That is, until April 1800. 

That spring, Austrians laid siege to a French fort in the northern Italian city of Genoa. So Napoleon gathered his army and set out to meet them. He trooped across the Alps once again, this time in the company of 51,000 men, thousands of horses, and an armory’s worth of cannons. The epic mountain crossing took 11 days. 

The march ended in the Battle of Marengo. Once again, Napoleon’s bold tactics won the day. The Austrian forces were defeated, and Austria was forced back to the negotiation table.

The following peace treaty gave France all of Piedmont and Genoa, and most of the Lombardy region. Northern Italy would remain securely within Napoleon’s empire for 14 years.

More peace treaties followed in the next few years. The final agreement – the Treaty of Amiens – brought peace between France and its longtime enemy, Great Britain.

The Treaty of Amiens was considered a political triumph for Napoleon, as he had temporarily made peace across all of Europe. This unprecedented move made the French ruler wildly popular. He was subsequently declared France’s First Consul for life. Then, on December 2, 1804, a coronation led by Pope Pius VII officially anointed Napoleon and Josephine Emperor and Empress of France.

Napoleon used his new powers to make big moves at home. He created the Code Napoleon, a political project that would radically change French society. These codes eliminated the privileges of royalty, further separated the church from the state, and standardized education. 

But the peace couldn’t last. 

In 1805, Britain joined forces with Sweden, Russia, and Austria to form the Third Coalition. They then declared war on Napoleon’s French Empire. 

As the war began, Austria mobilized its troops, which crossed the border with Bavaria and captured the city of Ulm. Responding to this act of aggression, Napoleon rounded up 170,000 soldiers from northern France and marched to meet them. 

Napoleon quickly recaptured Ulm, and then he marched eastward to face two more enemies, the Russian Tsar Alexander and the Prussian King Frederick William.

Tsar Alexander was the first to fall at the battle of Austerlitz. The fighting began on December 2, 1805. As the misty morning gave way to sunny skies, Napoleon launched a decisive attack. By one o’clock in the afternoon, he’d divided the Russian army in two, forcing it to retreat.

From there, Napoleon turned his attention to King Frederick William of Prussia. He met this foe outside the city of Jena on the morning of October 14, 1806. The following hours saw some of the most brutal warfare of the campaign. But, in the end, Napoleon’s forces won out and pushed the Prussians backward. Another victory.

Through the winter of 1806, Napoleon followed the retreating Russian army east. Conditions on this march were extremely harsh. The days shortened, the temperature dropped, icy winds blew across the steppes of Eastern Europe. The French soldiers trudged through thick snow with mud up to their knees, all while suffering from hunger, cold, and exhaustion. 

On February 7, 1807, the French finally caught up to their enemies. A series of grisly battles followed, with massive losses on both sides. At the two-day battle of Eylau, more than 150,000 soldiers met on the battlefield. The French lost as many as 5,000 men within the battle’s first 15 seconds. 

Napoleon was moved to tears by the immense loss of life. Yet he regrouped and steadied his resolve. Over the next weeks, he led a series of devastating cavalry charges, finally pushing the defending force beyond their limits. In the end, the Russians lost more than 40 percent of their troops and sued for peace.

But, with the fighting done, Napoleon was still not satisfied. Truthfully, he didn’t care much about Prussia, Russia, or Austria. His true enemy was Britain. After all, the British were the ones financing the Austrian, Prussian, and Russian military campaigns against France. 

So, when Napoleon met his former enemies, he presented them with the Tilsit Peace Treaty. This treaty pushed a series of trade agreements known as the Continental System. The idea behind the system was to cut Britain off from the rest of Europe, which would slowly subdue Napoleon’s final foe with an economic stranglehold. 

But things didn’t quite go as planned.