Subject to Change
I talk to the world's best historians and let them tell the stories. And the stories are wonderful! (And occasionally I change the subject and talk about films, philosophy or whatever!).
Subject to Change
Napoleon III Part 1: The Lust for Power
From exiled prince to emperor, Napoleon III's rise to power reads like a political thriller too wild to be true. Edward Shawcross tells the story of Napoleon Bonaparte's nephew, a man who attempted not one but two comically failed coups before finally succeeding in becoming Emperor of France.
This episode explores Louis-Napoleon's bizarre childhood as the imperial nephew raised in Swiss exile, where his mother turned their home into a shrine to Napoleon while teaching him the arts of conspiracy and subterfuge. We cover his early revolutionary activities in Italy and his truly farcical coup attempts - including one featuring a live eagle purchased for a pound - that landed him in prison for life.
Rather than breaking him, prison became Louis-Napoleon's "university," where he turned from a figure of fun into a serious political thinker with a programme of social reform. His escape disguised as a working man complete with platform shoes to change his height reads like fiction, yet it set the stage for his triumphant return during the 1848 Revolution.
Ed explains how this seemingly delusional man understood mass politics better than any of his contemporaries, positioning himself as the people's champion against the political establishment. Through universal male suffrage, he won France's first direct presidential election before orchestrating a coup that established the Second Empire - proving that persistence, timing, and understanding the power of a name can overcome ridicule and failure.
This is part 1 of a two part series. Part 2 will deal with his time as emperor and will not shy away from the more, er, sensational aspects of his life. In particular his extraordinarily large number of mistresses!
Hello and welcome to Subject to Change with me, Russell Hogg. My guest today is Edward Shawcross. Ed is the author of The Last Emperor of Mexico, which told the story of an Austrian archduke by the name of Maximilian and his adventures as the last emperor of Mexico. And by the way, that's uh that's an absolute belter of a story, and if you haven't got the book already, I strongly, strongly recommend that you get it. Ed and I talked about that story when he was on the podcast before, but today we're moving on to talk about the man whose idea it was in the first place to send Maximilian to Mexico, and that is to say Napoleon III. Anyway, uh, welcome Ed to the podcast.
Ed:Thank you very much for having me. Delighted to be here.
Russell:So when we talked about Maximilian in Mexico, and that was quite some time ago now, uh, you said you were working on a book about Napoleon III, and I don't quite know what stage you were at then, um, but how's it going?
Ed:We're very close to completion, so I finally managed to submit the latest version of the manuscript, which is being copy-edited and uh all going well, should be hitting um shops sometime in June next year. But it has taken, as you say, a long time. It's uh as as we'll discuss. There's a lot that happens in his life.
Russell:I suspect amongst the listeners, there'll be lots of them who know exactly who Napoleon III was, and they'll just say, well, let's get on with the story. But I also think there might be a few who, I mean, they'll have known there was a first Napoleon, but they'll be amazed to hear that there was a second one, never mind a third. So I thought maybe it might be worth just giving people a bit of an orientation on what time and place we're talking about and how Napoleon III fits in.
Ed:Absolutely. Now, people often look slightly bemused when I've explained that I've been working on a biography of Napoleon III. They just assume that there wasn't one or that I've made a mistake, and what I really mean is um Napoleon I. I can I can assure listeners there is a Napoleon III. Um he becomes Emperor of the French in 1852 and creates the French Second Empire, which is actually rules France for longer than his uncle. So he's a major figure in the 19th century, but he's one of those ones who has slit through the cracks of historical memory, uh, and as I say, can often lead to amusement and puzzlement whenever he's mentioned. Um let's just establish who he was in relation to the original Napoleon, because that is absolutely crucial to understanding this story. Um he's a nephew, so he is the son of Louis, one of Napoleon's brothers, and as well as the his um his mother, who's Hortense de Behanais. So she is the daughter of Josephine, the first empress, who Napoleon I divorces, so becomes Napoleon's stepdaughter in typically bizarre Bonapartist fashion. Um Napoleon can't have children with Josephine, so he alights on the innovative solution of marrying his stepdaughter to his brother, Louis Bonaparte. They have three children, the first of which dies uh young age five. Um so Louis Napoleon, as he's as he's known. So the trouble with this story is everyone's either called Louis or Napoleon. Before he becomes Napoleon III, he's most commonly known as Louis Napoleon. That's confusing because his older brother, who does survive, so remember there are three, is called Napoleon Louis. Uh so it there's only so many combinations of Louis and Napoleon you can have. But keep it simple, we'll talk about Louis Napoleon or Napoleon III, the nephew of um the more famous Napoleon, who everyone's heard of. Uh, and so he's born as an imperial prince into the Napoleonic Empire, and in fact, an important one, because as I said, Napoleon doesn't have legitimate heir at this point when um Louis Napoleon is born, and he settles the succession, should he die, to his brother's children, first Joseph and his male heirs, but Joseph has no male heirs, uh, and then to Louis. He's disowned his other two brothers, Lucian and and um and Jerome at this point, which is something that happens quite frequently. And so Louis Napoleon, when he's born, of the next generation of Bonaparte, is second in line to the throne after his older brother. So he's he's he is important in the succession, and as an imperial prince, um, he's very important within the Bonaparte family, and grows up uh expecting to be very close to power in one of the most extraordinary and powerful states, I suppose, in in modern history. So that's his that's where he's kind of situated in the Bonaparte family.
Russell:But as you sort of intimate, he's expecting to well, initially everyone's expecting him to be in a powerful position, but he's born, I think, in 1808, and seven years later, oops, it all comes crashing down. So you're writing a biography of Napoleon III, and and I always find, you know, the bit where they talk about the childhood, that's the boring bit in a biography. Come on, can we get on to the main can we get on to the main theme? But in the case of uh Napoleon III or Louis Napoleon, I guess his childhood is quite interesting because it must have been so weird for him growing up in the shade of Napoleon I and also as a focus for all the people who want to see a Bonaparte back in power.
Ed:Yeah, you're right. And I I agree with you. I mean, having um written a couple of biographies, probably shouldn't say this, but I also find that childhood period fairly tedious where you have to go through what they studied and what their life was like. Uh, and actually with Maximilian, I kept it I kept it short for that very reason. Um Louis Napoleon, though, has a fascinating childhood and early adulthood. And in fact, we'll get into what happens later, but he doesn't come to power as president of the Second Republic, which explain later, until he's 40. And he dies um in his mid-sixties. So actually, it's only a third of his life that he's empowered. Two-thirds that that kind of make him the man that he is are fascinating. So, yes, he's born into imperial splendor, but uh I as you as you put it, um, things don't go quite uh as Bonaparte's hoped, let us say. Um in 1814, of course, Napoleon is exiled, and then he comes back with the Hundred Days, which is really important um for the Napoleonic myth, and indeed Louis Napoleon's understanding of the Napoleonic myth. That also doesn't go well. Um the Battle of Waterloo, of course, uh famously ends any prospect of that regime continuing. And so then Louis Napoleon he grows up in exile, and in fact, there's something that's called the White Terror. So the Bourbon kings are imposed by the Allies uh for the second time after Waterloo, and this time they'd been fairly lenient, um, you know, and there's of course this rather bizarre historical um joke of exiling Napoleon to Elbert. I mean, that couldn't have gone worse, right? So Napoleon is sent to San Helena and his supporters in France are persecuted. So there's, I mean, there's a there's an official terror where leading generals, and these are the ones who have joined him during the 100 days and are seen as the most egregious um Bonapartists, they're rounded up, put in prison, many of them are shot famously. But there's also um perhaps even more terrifying, bands of royalists are roaming in various parts of France who are just lynching anyone associated with the imperial regime. Louis Napoleon with his older brother is in Paris. He's actually most of the Bonapartes aren't in Paris but a hundred days because they've fled to exile in Italy and various other places. But his mother, Hortense, who was incredibly close to Napoleon, um, one of his preferred um family members, and he didn't have many that he genuinely liked. And she was devoted to him completely. I mean, she he's his he transformed her life. Um, you know, she's she's the daughter of Josephine. Napoleon acts as protector. If you know your Napoleon history, Josephine is about to be executed uh during the terror. Um and she has two young children and things are looking pretty bleak until Napoleon comes into their lives, and then they're suddenly raised in her brother Eugene becomes viceroy of Italy. Uh, and she is loyal to the last, and she keeps the flame burning for Napoleon, um, which she teaches to her son, Louis Napoleon. Now, in an extraordinary approach to parenting, um, Louis Napoleon's father, Louis Bonaparte, is, I think, fair to say, an odd man, suffering from various uh mental and physical complaints. He sees the Napoleonic Empire that his brother created, not as raising France to incredible heights of glory and prosperity and grandeur, but actually as a massive imposition on his own life. He thought he should have been a man of letters, he wrote an appalling novel. Uh, Napoleon kept doing things that kept him um from his hobbies, like making him King of Holland, for example, uh, which he abdicates in in 1810 because Napoleon wants to turn it essentially into a French colony, and Louis Bonaparte's got all kinds of bizarre ideas that he should be an actual king ruling independently. So Napoleon gets rid of that. He flees to Bohemia, so um to into exile, leaving his his his two sons in the care of their mother. Uh after 1815, he decides that he wants a son back, but only one. So he takes the elder brother into custody, uh, and they grew up in exile in Italy. So that's Napoleon Louis. Louis Napoleon stays with the mother. Now, Hortense is distraught to lose her eldest, and Louis Bonaparte's response to that is well, you're lucky that I don't want the youngest. And so I suppose on one level, this it's quite fair if you've got two children and you separate, right? You hit you one one, you get one each. Um, but uh it's as I say, I think it's a fairly unusual approach. But Louis Napoleon has by far the better part of it. So he grows up in exile, they wandered to various places, the allies uh uh uh um have secret police intercepting Hortense's correspondence. Long story short, they eventually settle in Switzerland and she buys this wonderful chateau overlooking Lake Constance on the Swiss-German border as it is today. Louis Napoleon grows up there, um, and in his in his teens, there's a revolving cast of sort of um degenerate, uh wasteful bonapartist adventurers who are sort of hangers-on. And as he grows up, he's told his extraordinary tales of Napoleonic daring do and boys' own stories um from these kind of veterans who've been cashiered and put on half pay by the Bourbons. So there's this hatred of the Borderlands, this love of empire and Napoleon. And the house he grows up in, Autorance, is has turns it into a museum, a shrine almost to Napoleon. So there's you can go and visit the museum today, it's fantastic. And uh on the on the globe, in the in, you know, in this in the living room, um, you can see where Louis Napoleon has marked Saint Helena on the map to remind her where his uncle is in exile. Um, but what's interesting about that is that he's growing up very much outside of the corridors of power and outside of the French elite, right? Who most of the French elite, you know, royalists, Bourbon supporters, legitimacy as they're called, they hate the Bonaparte as parvenous for destroying France, as the political rivals. Uh so he's growing, he's growing up very much outside of the kind of norms and customs of society, which he would do. But he's also growing up um with his mother, who delights in conspiracy and secrecy, because when she's being constantly surveilled, she's seen as a potential kind of center of Bonapartist resistance, should it ever rise again. Uh, and so she's always sprinkling in misinformation into her letters to confuse the the allies and make it look like there is some kind of conspiracy going. And she's in a hilarious game for her. And so she teaches her son that duplicity, um, uh modacity, lies, if you will, are sort of path of the course and in fact what one needs to do in order to succeed. And of course, that's something that Napoleon himself, anyone with even a cursory um knowledge of history, will know that his um relationship with the truth was um well, interesting, shall we say. So he's got this belief that he's destined to greatness because of the name, but he's growing up um in you know, a miss conspiracy, misinformation, and he's got this mother who he absolutely adores, and she adores him, in this sort of secluded Swiss um hermitage where they spend nearly all of their time together. So he's he's got this really interesting mix of in his younger years. And then as he comes into adulthood, he gets mixed up in revolutionary politics in Italy because his father decides that he does want to see a little bit of his younger son, not too much, but that that what they should do is winter in Italy. It's very cold in Switzerland in the winter. So Hortense and Louis Napoleon will come to Italy in the winter and spend time, he'll spend time with his father. Hortense won't spend time with Louis Bonaparte, by the way, but the two absolutely loathe each other. Um, and in fact, Louis Bonaparte said that his uh his entire life was ruined by marrying her. Um, I think Hortense's life was probably ruined much more. He was he's a rather rather horrible nasty piece of work, Louis Bonaparte. But anyway, in Italy, he gets swept up in Italian nationalism. As I say, the Bonaparte are on the outside and they're a ridiculous bunch, the male Bonaparte. Um, you've got Jerome there as well, Lucian um as uh two, and they're pompous and they're vain and they're venal and they're constantly complaining they don't have any money, but living in these magnificent palaces that they've managed to squirrel away riches from from from the empire. But Horton's, as I say, she's she's she's um she's more interesting in a way, and she's more liberal, and she has these famous salons in Rome, and they attract people who are disaffected with the order imposed after 1815. And in Italy, especially, they've they've restored as as much as they possibly can the kind of um patchwork kingdoms and autocracies, most of them related to the Habsburgs. Northern Italy is controlled by the Austrian Empire as well, and that's seeing that's a great kind of um bugbear of Italian nationalism. And Louis Napoleon, um particularly through his brother, in fact, gets drawn into the world of the carbonari, when this is a what we today would call a terrorist organization. Um, and probably a lot of the people in power would have considered it that too. It's it's revolutionary, it's radical, it wants to bring in elements of democracy, and crucially in Italy, it wants to have a uh united Italian nation state. So Louis Napoleon spends a lot of his time in smoke field taverns plotting and conspiring about how to bring this up. So they have so many interesting influences because you've got that radical revolutionary politics. There is that legacy within Bonaparte itself of that as the safeguarders of the revolution. But of course, you've got all the kind of the militarism and the glory and the and the authoritarian nature. Uh, and then you've got these various different mixes from his mother. Um, he gets his tutor is actually the son of a revolutionary hero, Philippe Le Barc, who was thought that life after Robespierre would be so terrible that he committed suicide. Uh, and he's his he's Louis Napoleon's tutor for for seven years. So you've just got this incredibly eclectic combination of influences on his early life, and all kinds of escapades and adventures ensue from that.
Russell:I want to move on a little bit because not only does he get involved in Italian revolutionary politics, quite young, he's 28 when he decides what France really, really wants is the Bonaparte's back in power. And he he launches some sort of a farcical coup in 1836. I mean, and and there's another one in 1840. So do you want to just sort of move us on to the coups and and and what on earth he was thinking?
Ed:No, I will do. I'm afraid I'm gonna have to take you back very quickly to 1831 though, because and 1832, because these are the these are really formative moments. So he joins a revolution that aims at Italian nationalism and United Italy. It's a disaster. He joins it with his brother, it's a typical rich kid thing. He runs away from his parents, they are completely aghast when they discover he says we're fine, send us loads of money, it's going to be glorious. It's not, it's a complete disaster of a few thousand people, if that rise up uh and are swiftly crushed by the Austrians. Now, the great tragedy for Louis Napoleon in this is that while on the run, his brother catches measles and dies. Uh, and so his brother, although they had been separated, they're incredibly close, probably the person he was closest to after his mother. So it affects him enormously. And it's his father is absolutely outraged, blames him for the death of his older brother, uh, even though his older brother probably was leading him on rather than the other way around. There's, I won't go into it, but it's brilliant. Um, they have to, um, the Austrians are after them. Hortense goes to rescue him, they go to Ancona, they hide out in a villa. That villa is sort of sequestered by the Austrians, then Louis Napoleon has to dress up as his mother's servant and escape through a garrison of troops. Anyway, the next year um is important because Napoleon II, who we probably should just clarify, is the legitimate heir of Napoleon. He never, in fact, reigned as Napoleon II, but he was known as Napoleon II. Um he never reigns, but the politicians get Napoleon out of Paris in 1850 and say, sure, sure, sure, you abdicate, we'll put your son in power. And they never do. He dies in 1832. So his brother and his cousin, the two people ahead of him in a succession, die. And when we talk about these these coup d'etat in his later life, there is this, he is obsessed with his destiny. He believes he will live what he calls a providential life. But it's important to remember that until 1832, he is a facilitator to the restoration. Right. But with the death of these two people, he he he becomes of the next generation of Bonaparte's next in line. Now, he's not actually next in line because Joseph is still alive, indeed, his father is still alive, and they are the designated heirs. And remember, this is an imaginary kingdom, um, an imaginary empire, right? And in it's it is ridiculous. So he he that he thinks he can restore his uncle's empire without the permission of his family, who are completely against the idea. All they want is to get a bit of money from the French government and be allowed to return to France because they've been banished in perpetuity, on pain of death, in fact, after 1815. So there Joseph is especially really annoyed as head of the Bonaparte family that he's got this young nephew who's sort of writing pamphlets about how the empire will be restored. And it is absurd. I mean, it's it's almost like in the 19th century if someone in Britain said, Well, I'm going to recreate the Commonwealth of Um Cromwell. Right? I mean, it's it's it's closer in time, of course, so it's not a perfect analogy, but it's not it's been crushed not once but twice, the Napoleonic Empire. There's no Napoleonic party, there's incredible nostalgia for Napoleon that is growing in popular culture, in songs, in literature, but there's no political programme. There are no Bonapartist politicians in Paris, uh, for example. And so Louis Napoleon takes it upon himself to restore his uncle's empire. And he decides in 1836 that the way to do this is to do what his uncle did in 1815, which is to present himself before the French army. Remember the famous moment on the flight of the eagle up from the south of France where Napoleon presents himself before the troops and says, Look at me, I'm your emperor, shoot me if you will, and there's a loud chance of Long live the Emperor, and he's carried in tribe to Paris. Now, there is, listeners will be aware, there's there's a bit of a difference between the Napoleon doing that, having been emperor and one of the greatest generals that history has ever seen, and an unknown nephew doing that, who has done literally done nothing apart from take part in a failed revolt and written a few pamphlets. Anyway, Louis Napoleon has got complete belief that the name Napoleon, he managed to procure uh an eagle standard as well. So he's got that, and he thinks once the soldiers see that that work, um, uh he's got a man on the inside as well, uh, in the garrison. So this is at Strasbourg in 1836, in October. The plan is to, as I say, present himself before a garrison, they'll acclaim an emperor, they'll march on Paris, and people will flock to the Napoleonic manner. Now it doesn't go, the first one doesn't go terribly to begin with. It starts off quite well. One of the regiments does rally, they're marching through Strasbourg, they're singing Bonaparte's song, shouting Long Live the Emperor. But the problem is it's not been perfectly planned, and Louis Napoleon gets lost on the way to the next barracks where he wants to win over the regiment. So instead of approaching it from the ramparts where they could have looked down on the courtyard and sort of intimidated the garrison there into joining the revolt, he goes through a sort of side door into the courtyard. He can't bring many of his men in because it's a small entrance. Uh and the soldier's incredibly confused and when an officer and turns to another officer and says, What's going on? And the officer says, Oh, they're they're proclaiming an emperor. And then the officer says, But the the emperor is dead. And he said, Well, it's the emperor's son. And he said, No, the emperor's son is also dead. And he says, Well, it's a nephew, a grand, it's so it's an emperor. Uh, so people are getting a bit suspicious. Um, a slightly low trick is then pulled by one of the other officers who's saying, That's not the nephew of the emperor at all. It's an imposter who's been put up by one of the sort of local officers as you know, as the trick, and all the soldiers are aghast. There's a scuffle, there's shouts of Long Live the King, Long Live the Emperor. Um, Louis Napoleon is is is eventually um sort of um bayoneted, not bayoneted, but sort of pushed by bayonets back against the wall and ends up surrendering um and is taken prisoner. He's locked up in the kitchen. So it's it's it's um it really does not go well for him. Now, this should have disabused him of any romantic notions that there was, you know, that the army remains loyal to the memory of Bonaparte because um, of course, he it is demonstrated itself to be loyal to the king, um, despite winning over a few converts. But Louis Napoleon doesn't come to that conclusion. He comes to the conclusion that it went wrong because he took a wrong turn. So actually, in 1840, the plan um, you know, it plan B is to play a plan A better. Now he's been living as an exile in London. So he was in Switzerland. Um the French government say you're conspiring against us, you have to leave. Um, he'd actually been sent to the United States of America, but his mother's dying, he comes home. Um, the French government don't give him permission to travel, but remember this Louis Napoleon is not a man to be troubled troubled by that kind of thing. He just gets a fake passport. He's great at disguise, he sneaks into Switzerland. When the French government find out they expel him, he goes to London, where he becomes a very fashionable dandy. He's hanging out with uh a sort of uh a rather disreputable set in a place called Gore House, which is um in then very unfashionable Kensington with people like Charles Dickens. Uh uh and having a wonderful time. And all of the British people who meet him, like Disraeli, Benjamin Disraeli for future prime minister, for example, they all say, Well, he's you know, he's he's perfectly pleasant, very charming, very polite, um, doesn't have any of the genius of his uncle, but he's also slightly mad because in the conversation he's always dropping in what he will do when he's emperor. So he'll be how he'll be talking, they'll you know, talking about the weather or about traffic in London, and then he'll say, Well, when I'm in Paris, of course, what I'll do is I'll open wide boulevards. And at that point, people think, hmm, okay, there's something wrong here. Now, in 1840, Napoleon I, his remains are being brought back to France from Saint Helena. So, what better way to welcome the corpse of the Emperor than a restored empire? So, despite the fact that very few people are interested in a restored empire, Louis Napoleon attempts uh an even more farcical uh seizure of power. This takes place by sea, so a a pleasure steamship is chartered ostensibly for a pleasure cruise to Germany, but men and horses and weapons are loaded on board um at London Bridge without the captive motorcycle. As they get out to sea, the captain is surprised uh to find Louis Napoleon burst in to uh to his cabin and say that the ship has been commandeered for events that will change the course of history. Uh proclamations are read out, lots of drinking, um, there's huge amounts of alcohol on board. And the plan is to descend on Boulogne, close to um close to obviously to Britain. So we're not going to Germany. They disembark. Crowds of cheering Bonaparte is noticeable by their absence. But that doesn't deter Louis Napoleon's um band of brothers, as it were, although it's worth pointing out that he couldn't get enough men for it to look impressive, and he actually had to use an agency that um hired out domestic servants to bulk up numbers. It's a rather motley crew of disillusioned um former Bonapartist officers and literally hired help. Uh again, the plan is to present himself before a garrison. Again, he's got a man on the inside, but this time it's even more disastrous than the previous attempt because none of the garrison rally. The officers are all loyal, the troops chase them out of the barracks. Then there's a sort of um rather um comical sort of um game of hide and seek around the town as the National Guard and the army are called out. Uh, and at at Bologna, there's uh a column to the Grande Armee that was that was never actually finished. They haven't got a statue on top of it, but celebrating Napoleon's attempt to invade England, which never transpired. And there's sort of Bonaparte's home instinct kicks in. The the rebels run to the column, Louis Napoleon's gripping onto the iron rails that um around it, saying, I will stand here and die. Uh the supporters say, No, no, no, no, we'll, you know, you know, my prince, we need to save you. So they imagine they manhattled him down to the beach, they get into a rowing boat, they think they can get back out to the ship, are turn up, shot fired, boat cap size, which probably saves his life. The bullets smash into the hole of the ship. He's a very general swimmer, grew up near Lake Constance, used to swim across it all the time. Uh, but eventually he's fished out of the harbour. Um, and the uh there's only two Napoleonic things about this, really, is that someone takes pity on him and puts a great coat over him, because although it's August, it's he's freezing cold from having had an early morning swim in the channel. The second thing is that they discover on the steam or the arsenal, amongst all kinds of bizarre things like poetry that he's written, a live eagle. And it turned out that one of his supporters, while they'd been waiting for Louis Napoleon to board the steamer in the Thames, had spotted a boy with a live eagle uh chained up and had gone up and asked him how much it was and secured it for a pound, so it'd have been tied to the mainmast of the ship because it would be wonderful to have an eagle for the restoration of the empire. The eagle actually becomes a minor celebrity in France because it's so it's so absurd and so ridiculous. Um then all of these wonderful details are reported in the press. Uh and the the eagle was the eagle manages to escape and it's it's living up right until 1849, as I say. It has it takes on a whole life of its own. But uh the eagle is not our story. Our story is Louis Napoleon, who um, you know, it's that classic thing, isn't it? It's sort of it's um what is it? I always get it wrong. It's once what is it? It's once shame on on you, twice shame on me. Right. The French government, the first time they had said it was so ridiculous, we're not gonna put you on trial, we're not gonna execute you because it will give you a public platform if we give you a trial, and if we execute you'll make you a martyr. Just go away. The second time, they say, Well, you know, you've got form. So they lock him up in a in a fortress.
Russell:But why don't they execute him? Because it's high treason. He's done. I mean, is it because it's so absurd with eagles flapping around?
Ed:I mean, yeah, no, it's absolutely it's you it's the absurdity of he does take away from the fact he's committed high treason. If not, in fact, not once, of course, but twice. And in fact, this is the third time that King Louis-Philippe, we should tell listeners there's been a revolution in France as another monarchy, the July monarchy, junior branch of the Bourbons, they've been put in power in 1830. So in 1831, remember when he took part in that failed revolt, he actually escaped to France, where he had been banished on pain of death. The king pardons him. In 1836, he high treason, the king pardons him, sends him into exile. In 1840, you think, right, so this is the third time, so you know, three strikes and you're out. Uh but remember, the the remains of Napoleon are coming back in 1840, and the July monarchy has got this fantastic, I mean it's an absolutely wonderful um kind of pageantry that they've organized for him. Hundreds of thousands of people come from across France to see the funeral procession of Napoleon before he's interred in the Envelite, where he is now. Uh, and to execute the nephew at the same time as you're bringing back the remains of Napoleon is something that would just be a public relations misstep. So there's only one. So he's tried in the French Criminal at the House of Lords, there's only one peer who votes for execution. Everyone else says we, you know, he probably deserves pity rather than that kind of um um bloody punishment. We shall just lock him up for life. And so he's put in prison for life. And he does, he has, he's always got good aphorisms and good quips. He supposedly says, because he's been banished and exiled from France, at least I will die in France.
Russell:So he's in prison, he's in prison for life. How does he take to it? As I understand it, he sort of develops a slightly serious streak and starts writing more than just pamphlets. He's you know, he starts writing something a bit more, a bit more meaty.
Ed:He does, yes. So he's he's uh he's ideally suited to prison, as far as anyone can be. Um, because he grew up, as I say, in semi-seclusion in Switzerland anyway. He had a very austere tutor who made him study on long hours uh on his own. And he's very happy as an autodide that reading, noting, writing, he's a great pamphleteer, and he's got a huge belief in the power of the written word to shift public opinion. And later he referred it to as to university. It was the you know, it was where he came of age intellectually. And what he does is he sets about transforming his reputation and the reputation of Bonapartism from a kind of a you know a ridiculous figure of fun into a serious political programme. And he does this by um writing articles for the press. The most famous one he writes is it's called The Extinction of Pauperism. Um if you have to write it now, it would probably be make poverty history. Now, it's it's part of a kind of uh a genre that's popular at the time amongst the middle classes in France of sort of utopian socialist literature literature. Socialism is just beginning to develop and catch the attention uh of people in France and in Europe and and the United States to some extent. Um but he says and he writes to a friend, he says, you know, I'm going to do something that that will that will do enormous good for the working people of France, but so enormous good for myself. Because what he's doing is he is branching out um the kind of political manifesto of bonapartism, if you will, to appeal to a wider spectrum than the July monarchy, for example, and even some Republicans, um, the July monarchy is in power, it's a liberal bourgeois government or caricatured as one. It's got an incredibly restrictive franchise. What Louis Napoleon is arguing for is is social reform, he's arguing for universal male suffrage, so to be franchised from 200,000, 200,200 just over to nine million. You know, anyone over over 21 years old French male can vote. So you've got that radical element that he brings in, uh, and that people begin to take him seriously as a political thinker, uh, much more so than they had in 1840 while he's in prison, he's he corresponds with. Julessant, the famous um novelist who's a sort, you know, who's very much a sort of uh middle class left, and uh Louis Blanc, who becomes uh who is a socialist and becomes very important in the 1848 revolution, they're all intrigued by this imperial pretender with a social conscience um and an eclectic range of political ideas. So that time in prison is incredibly important to him because it allows him to develop a political program, which, if he can harness the popular nostalgia for Napoleon, we mentioned 1840 and the return of his remains. As I say, hundreds of thousands of people turn out in Paris to watch this. Uh, it's a huge event. I mean, it's probably, you know, it's the event of 1840, if not the event of you know the 1840s until we get into the revolution. If he can harness that nostalgia behind a political program and present himself as a serious political figure, there is an enormous constituency. Should politics take a democratic turn in France?
Russell:Yeah, but the problem for Napoleon III or Louis Napoleon, um, I don't know if we can call him Napoleon III yet. Um but the problem for him is you know, he can have all the brilliant programs he likes. He's in jail for life. So do they make the mistake of letting him go? I mean, how does he have to? No, no.
Ed:Uh yes, so he's just I mean, it's typically um picaresque, I suppose, for for him. So in 1845, he gets a letter. So his father's completely disowned him. Uh he's he blames him for the death of his son. The first time he attempts coup d'etat, he thinks that is um a betrayal. The second time, that's it. He it's he he cuts off all contact. He writes to him in 1845 and saying that he's dying. And he his final wish would be for his sole remaining son to be at his bedside when he dies. Obviously, the problem is he's in prison. So Louis Napoleon writes to the to the French king and says, Could I have a you know a week off? And promise to come back. And the French king understandably um does the denies that request, but he says you can actually, even better, you can have complete freedom. All you have to do is ask for a pardon. Louis Napoleon refuses to ask for a pardon because, of course, to ask for a pardon, you have to admit that you've done something wrong. And he doesn't believe he has done anything wrong. So does he get out of prison? Uh well, in 1846 they're doing work on it. Now I should have said he's in a fairly salubrious accommodation. It's a medieval fortress, but he's got two rooms on the first floor, uh, which he's done up rather nicely. But um, there is a problem with the damp, as there often is in these medieval dungeons. Um, and so they're doing work. Workers come in, um, and they're checked rigorously, um, you know, lined up and inspected, and they're lined up and inspected on the way out. But what Louis Napoleon notices as they're working is that during the day, workers can come and go freely. They need to go and pick pick up uh deliveries, whatever it is, and there's hardly any checks on them at all as they come in and out during the day. So he thinks, aha, I've already shown my talent for disguise escaping from the Austrians. Here is another chance. And so he gets his loyal valet, who's come to prison with him, to procure the pictures signify a French working class, a working working blouse, postume, clogs, everything, specially designed clogs. Louis Napoleon is short, five foot four. These clogs give him an extra four inches, so they're gonna um change his height. The other distinctive thing about him is his facial hair, which we know really from early adulthood, he always has a moustache and a goatee beard. Um and he shaves that off, although he shaves it off at the last moment because he thinks it's so distinctive. If the workers don't come in the morning that morning and the commandant of the prison sees him without his moustache and beard, he'll know, ah, you're trying to escape. So he sees the workers come in, he shaves, he rubs dirt into his face, he puts on a wig, he puts on a blue blue brows. He's really got into the role. He's got his he's got his clogs on with extra height. He he'd made bookshelves for himself in his rooms. He takes down one of the bookshelves as a plank, puts it across his shoulder, walks down the stairs, and as soon as he comes out, he's one of the guards is outside his room. The guard stares straight at him, no recognition. Walks across the courtyard. He's also got a dog with him as well, which helps distract the firm favourite of the um of the of the prison guards there. So that's distracting them. He's walking out and he's got a cheap clay pipe, the kind of smoked by a French worker. But so unused is he to smoking it that as he's walking along, he drops it and it smashes on the floor. Everyone turns to look at him. But cool as you like, he picks it, picks up the pieces, carries on walking, gets to the front door, they open the front door and out he goes. Um he's he's done it. He's free. His valet, who's out running errands, comes with a carriage, picks him up, takes him to a train station, and they get the train to Belgium and then from there to London. Yeah, London, the place where all the all the dregs of the earth congregate. Absolutely right. Yeah, and it's it's the second time that he's in exile there. And he picks up where he left off with his literary set of gore house, uh living the life of a of a of a dandy, essentially.
Russell:But okay, so so he's in London, he's had well, well, two failed coup attempts, one of which is absolutely ludicrous, you know, the uh being chased around Boulogne. Um and yet three years later, he is head of the government. So Yes. So what?
Ed:Yeah, so I mean it's it it's it's he has incredible belief, uh, self-belief. Um he believes that the spirit of Napoleon watches over him. And I think that he that is not a metaphor, that he genuinely believes that Napoleon is looking down and saying that you know, you are you are doing a good job. I I I think if the actual Napoleon had looked down at what he did in 1840, I suspect he would have been, um, you know, he wasn't a man who suffered fools fools gladly. So, but anyway, that's what he believes. And when he's in prison, he has it writes this astonishing account of his life, saying that it's been tremendously successful because he's resuscitated the Bonaparte's party and France knows there's an heir, uh, and that now he's within, you know, about um 50 miles of Paris. So but the geographically, uh because he's in prison close to Paris. So he has that belief. Uh, and he believes that were the if politics to become democratic, there would be a huge constituency for him, and he's done the you know the work with his political political writings. But the July monarchy has survived for 18 years by 1848. There have been numerous attempts to overthrow it, um, some much more serious than Louis Napoleon's ones. But in February 1848, revolution comes again, um, and then of course sweeps across all of Europe. Uh, and um, and and but it's it's I mean it's not the first revolution in France, but it's the first one in a major country. And of course, France is, with its history of revolution, it's is kind of sets the tone for Europe. Um, long story short, it's over reform. Remember, the July monarchy, the franchise is about uh 200,000, just over 200,000. And there's been a campaign to extend reform. There's been awful harvests in the previous winter, so there's terrible uh malnutrition, near starvation in the countryside, there's political discontent. Louis-Philippe is a very sort of jowly old, uninspiring figure by now, uh, famously compared to a rotting pear. And so there's not much leadership at the top. Uh and workers in Paris um uh rise up, overthrow the king, and a republic is proclaimed. And that republic will be based on what Louis Napoleon has long argued for, universal male suffrage. That will be the basis of the elections, and then later in December 1848, the presidential election. So when Louis Napoleon hears, he said, This is my moment, and he's he writes to a cousin, a republic has been proclaimed, and I must be its master, to which his cousin replies, You are dreaming, as usual. He turns up in Paris, a huge moment for him, of course, because he's been exiled from France, uh, and he writes to the provisional government it's wonderfully grandiose letters saying, I put myself at your service. And they immediately reply saying the best way you could serve France is by leaving. Now he's good, he's got an acolyte, guy called Persigny, who's a wonderful, um, even more Bonapartist than Louis Napoleon and more deluded. Uh, and he says, you know, you should wait for them to drag you out and deport you, because that will be a you know good country, good optics, as it were. But Louis Napoleon says, no, I'll I'll I will go back, I'll pretend, I will uh appear to be a loyal citizen of the Republic, and I will then choose my return at the opposite moment. Now, the the the the second the Second Republic, as it's known, the first one, of course, during the uh first French Revolution after 1879, well, after Louis XVI was executed. Um Second Republic, it's tumultuous. Um, street politics, much more important than what goes on in a National Assembly. Louis Napoleon doesn't stand um for the constituent assembly, sorry, as it is uh initially, as uh he could have done. He's is the terrible public speaker um with no experience of parliamentary politics. Whereas the you're gonna have the great names of of French politics in this in this chamber. So he just he doesn't want to stand. But by June, there's by-elections to this to this assembly, and his name is put forward. He he doesn't campaign, there are no national newspapers, there's no organization whatsoever. But the name Napoleon resonates with voters and he is elected. This causes outrage in the assembly because the provisional government and many other politicians um see him as a criminal who's try to try to overthrow the government of France, even if they don't necessarily recognize the legitimate of that government, they know his ambitions are not Republican, shall we say? So they try and they try and exclude him. That just makes him more famous. Um, and he he he does have an brilliant political instincts often. And um, there's sort of protests in the street, people shouting for Louis Napoleon to be allowed to enter into the the assembly. And when he hears about this in London, he writes a letter saying, I stand for order and I see against my wishes, I seem to be the cause of disorder. I resign my seat, I won't take it. Now the government point out that given that he never took his seat, he can't resign it. But that doesn't matter. What what what what people what people that what people see is this this you know this grand sort of gesture that this theatrics, which he's been which he's been very good at actually, despite the absurdity of his attempt to take over power. And then you have June days in in Paris, which is a week of um, well, it's an attempted second, well, it could potentially even potential third revolution. The government has closed down the national workshops, which have been set up after February 1848 and provided employment for the sort of floating mass of impoverished people in Paris. They're expensive, they're inefficient, the government thinks we we can't afford them, we have to close them down. People in Paris see this as a as a reaction, the revolution is being stolen. And this is bloody, much bloodier than the February Revolution itself. Barricades, uh, I think it's something like 3,000 Parisians um off the top of my head are gunned down by the National Guard, by the army, restoring order. Gosh. Yeah. So this is this is a huge moment. And it makes, of course, some people uh very pleased that the you know, the sort of uh revolutionary scum of Paris have finally been taught a lesson. But it's hugely controversial. And Louis Napoleon, where is he? He's in London completely untainted by any involvement in it. Uh so it turns out to be a master stroke, not just because of the theatricality of his resignation, but he's out of politics during this bloody massacre of Parisians, which means that he can present himself um as someone who is defending order. Um bizarrely, he enrolled as a special constable um in London during the charters demonstration or um protest in April. But he could also present himself as a radical, someone who's long argued for universal suffrage, someone who's interested in social reform. And because he's not been leading the charge to crush the artisans and workers in Paris, that's believable in a way that it for a lot of people in the provisional government who would have said they were on the left, um, it's not because they have been responsible for crushing that particular insurrection. So he's perfectly positioned in September to sweep in another bio-election, and this time he takes his seat in the assembly. Uh, it's a massive anticlimax because, as I said, he's an awful public speaker. He grew up, um, he's incredibly nervous for his um his uh maiden speech. He's written it out on a piece of paper, and it's incredibly banal. He just says, I'm loyal to the republic. And anyone who's been to Paris uh and tried to speak French there will sympathize with this. What is picked up is not the content but the way he says it. He's got Swiss German accented French, and this is a source of much ridicule in the newspapers um who say we um we, you know, we unfortunately we have to translate the speech of Louis Napoleon uh because it wasn't said in it in French, even though it even though it is French and it is his first language. You know, as I said, that's something that the visitors today might sympathize with. Uh and he's ridiculed. And um it's for those who feared an imperial restoration, this is a huge relief because remember, they try to keep him out of the parliament, they hear him speak, and they say, oh, phew. This man is a joke. He's not a serious guy. There's there's no threat. Of course, what the these people don't realize is that mass democratic politics is far more than parliamentary speeches. They may be fine rhetoricians, you know, there's people like Adolf Thiers, who was um important politician in July monarchy, becomes the uh important politician later. He does three hours speeches, which are wonderful and full of sarcasm um and wit um and erudition, but no one's reading these in the countryside and the workshops of Paris. No one's interested in this grandstanding by Republicans or monarchists. What they know about Louis Napoleon is that he's got the name Napoleon. What they know about Louis Napoleon is that he wrote a pamphlet saying that he was going to end poverty. Um what they know about Louis Napoleon is that he's long argued for universal suffrage, and they also know that he is not part of the French elite. Even though he is born an imperial prince and he'd lived an incredible uh luxury while many people in France were starving, the life of an English dandy, he's seen as the anti-establishment candidate. The government's very unpopular because they've imposed a tax tax increase which affects the countryside. And so Louis Napoleon is all things to all men, and it is all men voting. And he's untainted by association, not only just with the government, but with French politics stretching back to Waterloo. He's got a wonderful turn of phrase, um, not a great speaker, good writer. And he's he's obsessed with Waterloo and how it's a defeat and a humiliation. His message is simple, it's one that um that uh will be familiar to to people listening today. He's going to make France great again.
Russell:But at this stage, he's just an assemblyman. So how how does he sort of take over the government?
Ed:Right. So the president is yet to be elected, remember. The the the constitution has just been um drepped up. They're gonna have a directly elected president. So the assembly is a constituent one. It's to it's to agree on the constitution. The constitution is agreed, there's gonna be a directly elected president. The elections take place in December 1848. And Louis Napoleon, I mean, there is the government candidate, but he's the man who's responsible for the for the repression of Edward in the June Day, he's the man who's responsible for is seen as responsible for the for the tax rises, closing down the national workshops, even though he's not in in power for some of those decisions. And he's he's very uninspiring, a very DA Republican figure, a moderate Republican as well. So none of the sort of dash and the radicalism that you get from the the more colourful members of the Republican movement. And Louis Napoleon is, as I say, he's he when when it could it the ballot paper goes out, he is seen as the man who will restore France to glory, he's will you know end the sort of misery of the of the of the economic downturn that they had in previous years, and appeals across the political spectrum from radical left to to to you know authoritarian right. So he wins by an absolute landslide. Uh, he gets 5.5 million votes, uh becoming France's first ever directly elected president. And the nearest candidate in second place gets 1.5 million. Um Lamartine, the great poet and hero of the February Revolution, gets 17,000, which is you know, it's insulting. But he had been, you know, he's if the famous base of 1848, you see him waving the tricular flag in front of crowds of people. Um, so it just shows show how fortunes can change so quickly. So he's swept into power. It is a landslide victory and an extraordinary moment. I mean, this is the largest sort of experiment in direct democracy thus far in human history. Uh, you know, if you take into account the United States of America, where of course they are electing presidents, but it's still through electoral colleges, and there's still a lot of restrictions based on property or of course race. This is in France, you have 9.5 million voters uh who can vote, and their vote is direct for the president. And when given the choice, everyone who had laughed at Louis Napoleon um in London, in Switzerland, in Italy, when he said that uh he what he would do when he was in power is in is in shock. He was right. He was right all along. The name resonates, the programme resonates, the manifesto resonates, and he becomes president, much to the horror of the French political elite who think he is an idiot.
Russell:Perhaps they're right to be horrified because it doesn't take him too long before he thinks, well, being president is great, but being emperor would be even better. Why does he need to do that? And and how does he fool it off?
Ed:So there's there's a there is a lot of discussion when the constitution of the Second Republic they are worried about because history looms so large in them in the minds of these politicians. Uh, and of course, if you know your French history, you know you go from republic to empire, and you have the nephew of the emperor very likely to become president. So this it's not just republics go to empires, but it's a very much a case of history repeating itself, it seems to be, or seems to be, to politically and historically minded politicians. So, constitution of the Second Republic, the president cannot stand for re-election. How do we stop uh a military dictatorship style, you know, 18th Brumaire, Napoleon Takeover? I think ironically, they they they allies on the one measure that's guaranteed to make it happen, because he can't stand for re-election. What does he do? Now he can have the constitution revised, but you need a three-quarters majority in what becomes the National Assembly. And in the summer of 1851, Alexis de Tocqueville, you know, the great political thinker who had been instrumental in coming up with the constitution, he's part of committee to advise the assembly on whether they should revise the constitution. He says they should revise it to allow Louis Napoleon to stand again. And he manages to get a majority in favor of revising the constitution, but not the three-quarters majority. And petitions are flooding in, two million signatures. There is a there's quite an active, how shall we say this, Bonaparteist movement um that tends to um have robust electioneering strategy of beating up political opponents, uh, which probably helps. But he's he retains his popularity. He's his as president, he's he, you know, he had thought much longer and harder about mass democratic politics than any of the major rivals. So you've got monarchists who want to restore the monarchy, you've got Republicans who want to keep the republic going. It ends up being a very conservative republic because the majority in this assembly are actually monarchists and they repress Republicans. But Louis Napoleon is somehow able to sort of stand up above all of this and retain his popularity, and it's very divisive, tumultuous politics. And he's brilliant at provincial tours, he uses the train to go go across France. He's sort of he's he's one of the first to to get the banal local speech done. He'll praise the area, throw in a vignette about Napoleon being here and say how wonderful it is to see everyone. And I think for the time that was quite novel. So people um reacted very positively to it, lots of cheering. Uh and so he he retains his popularity, he though hated by the political elite, right and left. And so once the assembly votes against revision, Louis Napoleon is able to do what he's been to do throughout his whole presidency, which is say, I represent the people, my mandate comes directly from them. There is an elite stitcher in the assembly, which is trying to stop me standing from running for for power again. Worse than that, the assembly passed a law which restricted universal suffrage. So about three million people have struck off the register. And that politician I mentioned, Adolf Thiers, he called them the vile multitude. Um, so you've it it it's not only is he spinning this brilliant narrative that it is me, the president, representing the people against the elites in the assembly, the politicians in the assembly are elites who are trying to stitch up the president, right? So it's it's not it's a it's it it's not a conspiracy. He's right to some extent. And you know, had he stood for re-election in 1852, he almost undoubtedly would have won. So, um Piff, he can't. So he launches a coup d'etat. Third time lucky. Turns out the way to launch a successful coup d'etat is to do it once you're already in power. The army are broadly on board, um, the uh and enough politicians also, what people are terrified of, at least the bourgeois, well-to-do property classes, and indeed much of the peasantry in in France, is the rise of socialism, the rise of the left. They're worried about a radical left republic being um returned in 1852, either through revolution, either through the election of a president, or in in national elections for the for the next round of the assembly. So what is a conspiracy is that Louis Napoleon drip feeds into discourse that he needs to save society because in 1852 will be a year in French history that is up there with the with the Jackeries, with the revolutions, with the terror, um, unless he maintains power and restores order. So that is the justification for the coup d'etat. That's how it's sold to the French people, that he's saving society, he's shutting down the assembly, which is and which is full of elites trying to throw at the will of the people. And I suppose where the genius lies is that there will be a vote. So he's not he's not going, he's he's he's gonna put this to the French people. Once he's dealt with the assembly, locked up the necessary left and right politicians, and the people of Paris love it when he locks up the politicians from the right. I mean, they think this is brilliant. I mean, he puts people like Totfield is in prison, they don't mind Totfield so much, but people at Adolf Thiers a general called Changarnier, these are very right-wing figures who are clearly trying to restore the monarchy. And when they're famously when they're driven through sort of um in police escort to prison through the radical area of Paris, when they find out who's inside, they say, Oh, that's fantastic, well done. I'm glad those people have been locked up. You know, they they see the president as a as a as a as a man of the people who is going against the establishment. This is a lot of people think it's terrific. There is resistance, nothing like you get in June 1848 with the June days, but there's there is resistance. Barricades go up, but it's ruthlessly crushed this time, and um far fewer people died, probably about 400 than the 3,000 odd that you got previously. Uh, and of course, for Republicans, this is an illegal act that is never forgiven to use the cliche, the regime is baptized in blood, he's illegally seized power. What Louis Napoleon says is, well, I there was no need to rise up against me because he puts it to the French people. Right. There's a plebiscite plebiscite. He says, the French people delegate the necessary powers to Louis Napoleon to draw up a new constitution and agree, essentially agree with what he's done. And over seven million French people vote yes. And he he says, This absolves me. I went outside of the law only to return to it, and this absolves me. Now, of course, um any self-respecting Republican commentator says, Well, to for absolution, you need to have sinned. They they don't see it as as legitimate, but um, that's what confuses a lot of people, I think, in Paris is when the posters go up, so in what president's done, he says, Well, you know, and if you don't like it, you can vote. And you it's not a free and fair election. That much is true. He shuts down freedom of the press, uh, political opposition banned. Obviously, the leading political opponents are in prison. So if this is a if this is you know a referendum, there is no no campaign, if that makes sense. But equally, uh, it's a secret ballot, and you can you can nothing's gonna happen to you if you vote no. So it for again for Republicans, I think Victor Hugo is a great enemy, and it begun early adoption of Louis Napoleon as president becomes like a visceral um hatred that it could really sort of deeply psychological, and a lot of his sort of illiterate output in the 1850s is vitriol against Louis Napoleon. He says this is equivalent of someone robbing someone and then puts a gun to their head and says, I need you to sign a piece of paper saying that I agree that what you took was indeed yours. But the the numbers are not falsified, you can go and count them today. There's over seven million people, um, and none of them are forced to vote, yes. So, and it's I think what Ugo is doing is he's missing the point. The point is not to falsify or rigged the election, it's not rigged. Under Napoleon, there have been plebiscits and elections, they were rigged, and there was a huge amount of apathy, in fact, people just didn't vote. There's lots of abstentions, but uh off the top of my head, I think it's over two million or so, but but 1.5 perhaps. The thing is for the system, which we can talk about a little bit in a minute, is the idea is that Louis Napoleon does represent the indivisible will of the people. So the repression is not to falsify or rig the election, but to show that the numbers are so overwhelming as to be uncontestable. So that's that's what that's where that that comes in. If it's a free vote in 1852, it's counterfactual, but he will win that, he will win that election. Uh, I think we can almost certainly say that. But he's not going to win by seven million votes.
Russell:Okay, I want to sort of do a couple of maybe slight diversion away from the politics. There's a few things I wanted to talk about. I'm very interested in Roman history, and uh and uh I think everyone can agree that Napoleon III is an ambitious man, and it's Julius Caesar who is perhaps absolutely famous for being an ambitious man. So, as I understand it, he has a bit of an obsession with Julius Caesar. And and is this an antiquarian interest? Is he just interested in the history, or does he see himself as is he trying to model himself on Caesar in some way?
Ed:Yeah, he's he is he is obsessed with Julius Caesar, and he's one of the few emperors to write a serious uh scholarly biography of Julius Caesar, um, which is meant to be three volumes, but he only writes the the first two, he doesn't get around to the third. So it's a very serious interest, and he does a huge amount for the classics in in France when he's in power. But in beforehand, it's it's something that he of course, because in some respects the French Revolution, the Empire, is is sort of ancient history cosplay, you know, writ large. Um, and everyone is comparing themselves to to but you know, to Brutus or to Caesar or whoever, you know, depending on your political allegiance. Caesar is a very important individual in the kind of Bonaparte's theory, such as it is, of history, up there with Alexander and Charlemagne. So it's fits it fits the imperial mode. But he is no, he's fascinated by Julius Caesar. Um he there's a point in when he's going backwards and forwards in the 1820s from Switzerland to Italy, where he stops at the Rubicon and fills up a small flask with its water. Um showing a complete lack of understanding of what a code name should be. The file uh we're planning his coup d'etat, 2nd of December, 1851, um, is called Rubicon. So, you know, you wouldn't have to be a great detective to have uncovered what's going on with there. Um, but he's it's a genuine obsession. Um, and and when he comes saying when he comes to Emperor, he writes a biography which is incredibly detailed. You know, he was sort of co-authored with various assistants and so on and so forth. But it's the sort of thing that's leveled against people nowadays. He's really obsessed with it, with ancient history, the archaeologies, battle battle sites of Caesar um in Gaul, he visits them, and he he buys up land in Rome to sponsor archaeological digs. Um, he goes, he gets his sponsors collection of inscriptions of Roman inscriptions and so on and so forth. So it's a real, yeah, it's a real genuine interest, but of course it perfectly fits the his imperial, the his imperial ambitions, and Caesar as a man of action is someone that he that he's trying to emulate in the same way he's trying to emulate Napoleon, who Napoleon, of course, in the same way as some trying to emulate Caesar, right? So it's a sort of virtuous feedback loop. In the preface to the biography, he writes of Julius Caesar, which is probably the most interesting thing from a political point of view. He compares um the death of Christ, the death of Caesar, to Bonapartism and the death of Napoleon. So this is how he's thinking. Uh, and the point being that you can you can kill Caesar, it doesn't stop Augustus. You can kill Christ, that doesn't stop Christianity. You can still kill Napoleon, that doesn't stop Bonapartism. So you can see, you know, that's where he's positioning himself in in the stars, as it were. So yeah, not short of ambition. You know, Caesar, Augustus, Napoleon, Jesus, Napoleon III.
Russell:And then the next thing I wanted to talk about, I always have this image of France as being, you know, in the 1800s, as being fantastically glamorous. And uh, I don't know if that was true uh in you know in 1848 or in the 1850s, but there was a woman that supposedly Napoleon III should have married, and that's Princess Matilda. And she ends up being you know super famous for having one of the great salons of Paris. Do you want to just say a little bit about salon life in Paris and the intellectual glamour of the time? I mean, is my image correct?
Ed:Well, yes, and obviously this is just for a very small number of elite figures, but it is a great time of the salon, and Matilda becomes one of the kind of leading um lights of that scene. And she's really the first lady of France unofficially, because, well, for for reasons we'll get into, he's got a very unsuitable uh partner who definitely can't be the first lady of France. So Matilda is the one who is uh hosting her balls and so on and so forth. But salon life is is integral to French culture and politics amongst elites, and it goes, you know, it stretches it stretches right back. But you this is definitely a sort of a golden age of it. And in fact, Louis Napoleon's mother, Hortense, have been famous for her salons during during the empire. They'd been the most glamorous, the you know, the party that everyone wanted to be at, partially because you know, of the kind of the luxury and her charm and her manners, but also because she's right next to Napoleon. And um Matilda that the itch Bonaparte's like to marry within themselves, as we know, right? We have the stepdaughter marrying Louis Bonaparte, the brother. And Louis Napoleon, um, he's incredibly apart when he's not writing pamphlets to launch the couple. guitars in when he's growing up in Switzerland he's incredibly bored and he thinks something that might alleviate his boredom is marriage. The problem is he um and I don't you know listeners can decide for themselves whether that's true or not. The problem with him is that um he sees himself and his family see himself as absolutely in the upper echelons of the European elite. The European aristocracy see Bonaparte as outrageous parvenus uh wastrals uh and and gamblers so they there's no there's no match that there's never going to be a match so eventually they said we'll just have to marry your cousin um is in fact his older brother had married a cousin a daughter of Joseph uh and his father um louis napoleon's father bizarre wrote a letter saying um that she reminds that his his brother's wife reminded the father of Louis Napoleon said they looked they looked alike which is a strange I think it's a very strange thing to write that your brother is marrying somebody anyway um I digress but but um so it's a fair she's only 15 they have a they have a um a pretty chaste romance uh Louis Napoleon I should have said he's a great romantic he grows up in the age of romantic literature and in fact it's German romantic literature as much as French or more than French he's fluent in German and Italian um from his youth and so he sort of plays up to the troats of the time. What you have to remember about all this though is that it's he's exactly at the time he's plotting his first coup d'etat. So I think how serious that relationship was is questionable whether it was just uh it was a useful way of distracting his family while he's planning to take over France. She was very glad not to marry although she had an absolutely terrible marriage uh which does have the the knock-on effect of making her independently wealthy and helps her to set up this the you know her fantastic salon and and um her but she's good he's she has her father Jerome and her brother uh who becomes known as Plomplan because he can't pronounce Napoleon uh these are fantastically debauched uh selfish creatures who are constantly leeching off of their off their daughter and sister but yeah so salon life uh uh does the is set is central it's central to France and of course um you know it's also where a lot of the political intrigue is going on in that period where while he's president that's where the sort of the plots either republican or monarchist um or Bonapartist although Bonaparte tend to be a bit on the outside of society because they've been excluded for so long. But so but Matilda does become an important and she's one of the more reasonable members of his family. There's a very few there's an incredibly shallow pool of talent in the Bonaparte family by this point. And she is probably the only one um who is vaguely reasonable and helpful to him.
Russell:So he doesn't end end up marrying Matilda he ends up marrying well the much more beautiful Eugenie and maybe we can talk a bit more about her later she ends up as well so as Empress Eugenie and and there was a great anecdote because I was speaking to Justin Marozzi the other day about Islamic slavery and I learned that Eugenie made a great impression on I think it was Sultan Abdulaziz who was you know then the ruler of the Ottoman Empire when he visits Paris in 1867 and then she does a return visit to go back to visit the Suez Canal and she she drops in on the Sultan and there was some terrible contratomp in the in the harem and I just wondered if you wanted to tell that anecdote.
Ed:Yes that's a great story so it's um she he's walking through the she's Eugene's walking through the the palace with the with the Sultan um uh and I think it's it must it seems evening by this point he's just showing her around very innocent but passes his mother who was absolutely shocked to see he has a European woman on his arm and assumes that it's some kind of you know woman of questionable morals perhaps shall we say and she punches Eugenie in the stomach in in outrage and then a furious argument in Turkish ensues um before the Sultan has to apologize profusely to Eugenie and say I'm terribly sorry my mother thought that something something s slightly uh um disres disrespectful was was uh unreah was was going on um so that's a fantastic story which um in Eugenie told to none other than Queen Victoria because they were again great friends um and that yeah they very much enjoyed um enjoyed laughing about it to me it's quite interesting that uh Eugenie is introduced to the to the Turkish harem because Napoleon III famously well maybe he would have been better off if he would have had a harem but he kind of has the European equivalent which is that he has numerous mistresses.
Russell:And I sort of feel like the details of his mistresses, you know, they're so outrageous that you know it would almost be an X-rated podcast if we were to discuss them in detail. But I do want to discuss them in detail. So my thought was let's leave this episode here and move on to part two the sort of the X-rated episode in the next podcast episode if that's okay with you. So what do you think to that?
Ed:I think that's an excellent idea. Yes we should we should warn listeners um that they're getting into a world of lechery and debauchery um that's shocking even to the French at the time.
Russell:Okay so uh let's leave it there and for those very few listeners who enjoy sex scandals on a on a truly massive scale we look forward to you joining us in part two but until then uh thank you very much uh Edward Shawcross thank you very much I've enjoyed it too much