Page 85 - All About History - Issue 72-18

NAPOLEON ESCAPED TO THE US
Napoleon could
have influenced the
Mexican-American War
Is there any scenario where he
returns to France?
He likely would have tried to undermine
the Bourbon regime in some fashion,
and try to drum up support to return to
France, or for his young son to be placed
on the French throne. But with the allies
occupying France, I think the chances of
that were quite slim.
He’d already had two kicks of the
can, and the French people were tired
of war and Napoleon at that point. The
allied governments would have done
everything in their power to stop him
from coming back.
What would Napoleon’s involvement
have meant for the Americas?
If Napoleon had embarked on a military
adventure in the Americas, it could have
led to an attempt by Spain or France to
intervene directly in the Americas. Or, if
Napoleon had fiddled around in Texas,
it could have provided the US with an
excuse to take Texas earlier than it
actually did [from Mexico in 1845]. And
Russia had posts on the west coast of
North America at the time, and it might
have taken advantage of the opportunity
to take its toehold on the continent. Or
Cuba could have wound up in French or
British or American hands. So there are
possibilities for how Napoleon could have
had a lasting impact.
PRUSSIA ON THE RISE
Victory at Waterloo was as much a victory for the Kingdom
of Prussia, as it was for Great Britain, and the Prussian
commander Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher had agitated for
Napoleon’s execution rather than exile.
If the Emperor had continued to make trouble and flee his
isolated island internment, Prussia’s hardline stance might
have been vindicated and Britain would have been left
humiliated on the world stage.
In response, Europe’s great powers may have looked to
Berlin for an answer to the ‘Napoleon problem’, rather than
London, perhaps resulting in a more punative occupation of
France and a Prussian-led Eighth Coalition. Finding allies in a
Spain smarting from the loss of their American possessions,
a new balance of power may have emerged on the continent,
viewing France as a rogue state, and Britain as the weak link
in the international order.
Blücher gives
Napoleon
a beating
in this 1814
satirical
cartoon by
James Gillray
Is there a particular path for
Napoleon that was most likely?
I like to think that the most likely
might have been that he would have
still undertaken a military venture. But
speaking more as a historian, he would
have lived peacefully, fretting about it,
and possibly thinking more in terms
of how to influence events in France
or in Europe that would favour his son
attaining the French throne at some
point. His health at that stage of his life
was not great, and he didn’t have a large
core of supporters around him. I don’t
think he would have had a large enough
following to make a bit difference.
WATERLOO VETERANS:
Would Napoleon going to America
change the story of his life at all? “WE TRIED OUR BEST”
It was during that period [on St Helena]
that Napoleon really built his reputation
A march
in a favourable fashion. He was dictating
organised by
his memoirs there, he had sympathetic Help for Hussars
followers, and he was able to craft a real will be passing
propaganda effort in his favour. Even through London
within Britain, people began to refer to on Sunday to
him much more sympathetically once he raise awareness
was on St Helena. of the wounded
veterans of
So if that St Helena period had not
the Battle of
happened, his reputation may not have
Waterloo, many
been the same today as it currently is.
of whom feel
That could have cemented his reputation
ignored by the
more as kind of a loser rather than as a government.
great man in world history.
85