THE NAPOLEONIC WARS
We have seen the Austrians fighting and suffering defeat from France
in the Netherlands. There was another battle ground where these two
had now to meet, and that was in the beautiful country of Northern
Italy where the Austrian Habsburgs and the Bourbons of France and
Spain had met many a time. Of all the Allies, Austria had the right
to feel most bitterly towards the French, for the queen whom the
French had beheaded was daughter of the Austrian Empress.
[Sidenote: Napoleon I]
As early as 1792 the armies of revolutionary France had swept over
Savoy--at that time an independent State with which Sardinia was
conjoined. Sardinians were now in the coalition against France, and
there was a Sardinian army co-operating with the Austrians in North
Italy. In 1796 Napoleon was put in command of the Army of Italy, and
at once he gave evidence of those qualities which made him the master
mind in war.
[Illustration: THE GREAT NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. (From an Engraving
after a Portrait by Paul Delarothe.)]
It is impossible here even to touch on his campaigns in any detail;
nor is it possible to select any one campaign or a single battle as a
type of his generalship or his tactics, because perhaps the chief
reason of all his success is that he was so very able to vary them
according to the needs of each case. It was this, that there was no
reckoning what he was likely to do, that confused his enemies so
greatly.
But in all his campaigns we find a common point, {167} that he
realised probably more fully than any of his opponents the value of
time, and had so masterly a power of organisation that he nearly
always arrived at the place where he had determined to give battle
before his enemies were ready for him.
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It was just so with this his first campaign in Italy. He was across
the Alps, with his army, and into Milan and the Austrian dominions
far quicker than he had been expected; and here he did execute one of
his most favourite manœuvres, which, at all events, might always
be foreseen if the opportunity for it were given him. He thrust his
army in between the armies of the Austrians eastward and the
Sardinians westward and so disabled the latter, and less powerful,
foe from any valuable co-operation at the very outset. Then, turning
eastward, he defeated the Austrians again and again, driving them
from Italy and pursuing them far along the road to Vienna.
He turned southward thence and seized the lands of Venice. In the
treaty which ended this campaign, in 1797, France gained the
Netherlands, the Ionian Islands, and territory along the Rhine and in
Albania. The following year the French were in Rome, which they
captured, making the Pope a prisoner and establishing what was called
the Tiberine Republic.
We have to note that in all these early battles of the French
Republic, the victors--for they were nearly always victorious--came
with the pretence, at all events, that their purpose was to relieve
the populace from their burdens, their dukes and archdukes and kings.
Accordingly they set up this Tiberine Republic along the Tiber, and
the Transpadane Republic, of the country beyond the river Po, and the
Cis-Alpine Republic on this side of the Alps, and so on. We have
already seen how they had set up the Batavian Republic in Holland.
By these fine promises and pretences they gained much favour with the
civil population in all countries. In 1798 Napoleon was no longer in
Italy: he was in Egypt, intent on extending the French power over the
East--thus quickly had events moved since France, only three or four
years before, had been fighting for her very existence among the
nations of Europe!
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It was English sea-power that foiled him in that Eastern enterprise,
and in the following years he was back again--badly needed. For
there was war again with the Austrians, who had recuperated their
forces in North Italy, and the fortunes of the war were going all
against the French. They had been forced to retire from Italy and
from a part of Switzerland which they had held. French armies,
moreover, had suffered defeat on the Rhine, and in consequence the
Directory had fallen from popular favour.
[Sidenote: The First Consul]
Rather as our Cromwell had once appeared, backed by his Ironsides, in
Parliament, so now Napoleon made a dramatic entry into the Council
Hall of the French Government. There was a cry from some of the
legislators of "No Dictator," which Napoleon's friends, doubtless
according to plan, chose to interpret as an attack on Napoleon's
person. His soldiers entered, and turned the Assembly out of the
Hall. The Assembly was dissolved, and a new constitution formed
which entrusted the Government for ten years to three consuls, of
whom Napoleon was nominated as the First Consul. The other two might
be relied on to do his dictates. Thus, by the end of 1799 he was the
virtual ruler of France.
By his diplomacy he came to terms with Russia, but Austrian armies
still held North Italy. Taking the command again of the Army of
Italy, he repeated the chief incidents of the former campaign. Again
he crossed the Alps unexpectedly; again he beat the Austrians in
Lombardy; the terms of the treaty which had ended the former battles
were reaffirmed in 1801, and before the end of 1800 French victories
on the Rhine had re-established the position there. Again there was
a breathing space.
Beyond question we have to look on Napoleon as one of the most
extraordinary of all the actors in our story. His intellectual
powers, whether for the {170} organization of war or of peace, must
have been almost more than human: his absence of any love for his
fellows and of any kindness of heart must appear almost equally below
the human mark. He had no regard for truth or for morality or
religion in any form. Christian worship, abolished in France by the
earlier revolutionary Governments, had been re-established. Napoleon
was as ready to profess himself a good Catholic in France, as to
pretend a leaning towards Mahommedanism in the East, in order to gain
favour with the Orientals.
In spite of his lack of sympathy with mankind, he was a subtle judge
of human nature. He observed men's weaknesses with a coldly critical
eye. He knew that men--and Frenchmen more than most men, and perhaps
women even more than men--are attracted and fascinated by show and
splendour. Therefore, as First Consul, he caused all the ceremonies
in connection with Government to be splendid; he encouraged or
commanded his officers and civil servants to be richly dressed, and
their wives and daughters to wear gorgeous gowns.
So, in this breathing space, all was triumph and splendour in Paris;
but Napoleon had already, as we have seen, been thwarted in his great
designs upon the East by the naval defeat which he suffered from the
English in Egypt. He realised very clearly that England was the foe
whom it was most essential that he should remove out of his way if he
were to achieve all his ambitions for world power. As a first step
he renewed that Armed Neutrality against her which had been formed by
the Northern Powers when she was at war with the United States, and
insisted on searching neutral vessels to see whether they were
carrying what is called "contraband of war."
He forced Denmark, contrary to her will, into the compact. Against
the unfortunate Denmark, then, {171} England declared war, in order
to drive her to withdraw from the compact into which she had been
forced so unwillingly; and compelled that withdrawal by a
bombardment, under Nelson, of Copenhagen. It was here that Nelson,
who was then only second in command, is recorded to have put up his
telescope to his blind eye in order not to see the signal to break
off the engagement which had been hoisted by the superior admiral.
Another special effort against England had been made by the French in
1797, who landed a force in Ireland; but it was not supported as had
been expected by the native Irish and was broken to pieces the year
following by the English troops. Ireland was then no part of the
United Kingdom; but in 1801 was passed the Act of Union, whereby the
two did become incorporated.
By 1803 there was again a state of active war between Great Britain
and France, and Napoleon was threatening an invasion. He now had the
navy of Spain to aid his own; but against him was a coalition of
Russia, Austria, and Sweden. From the idea of invading England, he
was called eastward and southward by the pressure of Austria and
Russia, and there the French gained a great victory over the
Austrians in the autumn of 1805.
[Sidenote: Trafalgar]
Four days later the united fleets of France and Spain met the British
at Trafalgar, where Nelson destroyed them as a fighting force, but at
the grievous cost to Britain of his own life.
Six weeks later again Napoleon fought the crowning land battle of
that campaign at Austerlitz, when the Russian and Austrian armies
suffered a crushing defeat which, for a time, ended the fighting and
gave Europe another short spell of peace.
A principal result of this victory was the dissolution of that
so-called Holy Roman Empire which had {172} existed since the days of
Charlemagne. The title of German Emperor was no longer known. The
electors were abolished. Kings were appointed by Napoleon to govern
Wurtemberg and Bavaria, Hanover was given to Prussia, and other
German States were formed into the Confederation of the Rhine. The
ruler of Austria retained the title of Emperor of that country.
Eighteen months earlier in the story a new emperor altogether had
been created--Napoleon himself, as Emperor of the French.
[Illustration: H.M.S. "VICTORY" AFTER TRAFALGAR.]
The cession of Hanover to Prussia cost France nothing, for Hanover
was a kingdom under the Hanoverian King of England, to whom it was
restored at the end of the wars. It was separated, as we have
noticed already, from England when Queen Victoria came to the throne,
because the Hanoverian succession was governed by the Salic Law which
allows no female to succeed or to transmit the succession.
By this period in his career Napoleon was no longer posing as a
republican come to free peoples from their kings. On the contrary,
he became himself a {173} king-maker on the most extensive scale.
Naples and Holland each had a brother of Napoleon's imposed on it as
ruler. A little later it was the turn of Spain. One of his Marshals
was named as successor to the throne of Sweden.
[Sidenote: The "Continental System"]
And now Prussia engaged his attentions. She had been a doubtful
friend of both sides, for she had received Hanover from the hand of
the victor and yet she professed to be the friend of England. In a
single day Napoleon utterly smashed the elaborate Prussian fighting
machine; and it was actually from Berlin that he proclaimed that
state of blockade against England sometimes called the Continental
system--as we should now say "boycotting England"--declaring her as
an outlaw, outside the protection of the law of nations, and
commanding that no Continental port should receive her ships.
This was in 1806. In 1807 came Russia's turn to receive
chastisement. We may observe, however, that neither of the Eastern
Empires, Russia or Austria, seems to have been disabled from further
fighting by defeat. They had vast territories to retreat to and
recuperate.
So far then has gone the tide of Napoleon's success, ever mounting.
But now, in 1808, we begin to see it turn towards the ebb, and again
it is England, though on land this time, that is chief in so turning
it, for now begins the story of what we call the Peninsular War,
waged in Spain and Portugal.
At first it is a story of England, of Wellington, on the defensive.
Napoleon in person is in command of the French. He is once more
called away eastward, to deal with Austria, and again he deals with
her drastically. Once more he crushes her armies and extorts from
her a peace which gives a large slice of her territories to France.
And something more it now pleased him to take {174} from Austria, a
daughter of the great house of Habsburg as his wife--for he had
obtained a divorce from his first wife. The daughter of the oldest,
proudest family in the whole Western world was thus married to the
Corsican adventurer, become Emperor of the French!
It appeared indeed as if there was nothing in Europe which he might
not take, if he so pleased. He treated spiritual power when it was
opposed to him precisely as he dealt with kings, for the Pope's reply
to his annexation of the papal dominions in Italy was to
excommunicate him; and that excommunication Napoleon countered by
sending soldiers to climb the walls of the Vatican, the Pope's palace
in Rome, and bring out the Pope a prisoner.
Still Wellington stood firmly against his troops on a line near the
boundary between Spain and Portugal, holding back the tide. Russia,
despite Napoleon, had opened her ports to British ships, wherefore
once more he declared war upon her. And now, marching into the heart
of Russia in the autumn days, which constantly grew shorter, of 1812,
he came to Moscow to find it in flames and its inhabitants gone.
Destroy the enemy's army in the field had always been Napoleon's
maxim, but now he found no enemy to destroy. That enemy had all the
East on which he might fall back. To pursue farther would be
madness. Through the snows of winter, with the Cossacks hanging on
their flanks and rear and taking every opportunity to attack, began
that return of the French Grand Army from Russia which is one of the
most pathetic scenes in all the story.
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[Illustration: THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON.]
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That tragedy was his ruin. The powers of Europe gathered about him
again in the spring of 1813. He fought brilliantly on the defensive
beyond the Rhine, but against increasing odds, and in the autumn of
that year suffered the defeat that finally broke him, at {176}
Leipsic. Already, earlier in the year, Wellington had taken the
offensive triumphantly in the Peninsula, had pushed the French back,
had driven and pursued them across the Pyrenees and was on their
heels in the South of France.
For two months longer, after the blow at Leipsic, Napoleon fought on,
till he made a fatal error in turning upon the rear of the allies to
cut off their communications. Their effective reply was to disregard
that threat, and to march straight upon the defenceless Paris which
they occupied on the last day of March, 1814. He was formally
deposed by a vote of his own Senate, and on April 4th he abdicated.
He was taken by a British ship to Elba and imprisoned there. The
Bourbon monarch was brought back to the throne of France. A congress
of the Powers sat at Vienna to restore and regulate the affairs of
Europe. Then in February of 1815 came the appalling news that
Napoleon had escaped, was back in the South of France, the old
soldiers, fascinated by his name and his victories, flocking to
him--so he marched to Paris with an army that ever grew as he went.
Louis XVIII. fled. The Emperor was on his throne again.
Once more the Powers gathered; but for Napoleon the only two that
mattered were the British and the Prussians, close upon the French
boundary, in Belgium. As ever of old, he sought to break these up
before others should come to strengthen them. The Prussians had to
meet the French armies first, and had to admit defeat, had to
retreat. Napoleon marched on to meet the British at Waterloo; and
all through the long June day his soldiers charged again and again,
only to break upon the steadfast red line.
Towards evening the Prussians, far less shattered by their defeat of
two days before than Napoleon had supposed, appeared upon the French
right flank. {177} That apparition was the beginning of the end.
Wellington ordered an advance of his whole army. The French defeat
became a rout. The Emperor preceded the remnants of his broken force
to Paris, where, yet again, he signed his abdication. He had an idea
of escaping to America, but the British ships were on the look-out,
and, foiled in this, he voluntarily gave himself up to one of them.
[Sidenote: The Code Napoleon]
His final destiny was the Island of St. Helena, where he lived in
failing health till his death six years later. One good work at
least he did, in directing his lawyers to draw up into a code, called
the Code Napoleon, the laws of France, which also were the laws which
he imposed on a large part of conquered Europe. Based on the
existing system of laws, it embodied many wise and liberal changes
and is widely accepted even to-day. He was twenty-six years of age
when he won his first victories in Italy in 1796. He had become
virtual ruler of France by 1799, was acclaimed Emperor in 1804, and
set kings, chiefly of his own family, on the thrones of Europe from
1806 onward, was prisoner in Elba in 1814, and finally in St. Helena
in 1815--surely the most amazing chapter in the whole of this
Greatest Story!
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