Decline and Fall of Napoleon's Empire

Decline and Fall of Napoleon's Empire PDF Author: Digby Smith
Publisher: Pen and Sword
ISBN: 178438027X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 317

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Book Description
Until now, there has been no study of the significant errors that Napoleon made himself which, though apparently trivial at the time, proved to be major factors in his downfall. Digby Smith tracks his rise to power, his stewardship of France from 180415, and his exile. He highlights his military mistakes, such as his unwillingness to appoint an effective overall supremo in the Iberian Peninsula, and the decision to invade Russia while the Spanish situation was spiralling out of control.

Decline and Fall of Napoleon's Empire

Decline and Fall of Napoleon's Empire PDF Author: Digby Smith
Publisher: Pen and Sword
ISBN: 178438027X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 317

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Book Description
Until now, there has been no study of the significant errors that Napoleon made himself which, though apparently trivial at the time, proved to be major factors in his downfall. Digby Smith tracks his rise to power, his stewardship of France from 180415, and his exile. He highlights his military mistakes, such as his unwillingness to appoint an effective overall supremo in the Iberian Peninsula, and the decision to invade Russia while the Spanish situation was spiralling out of control.

In the Words of Napoleon

In the Words of Napoleon PDF Author: R.M. Johnston
Publisher: Casemate Publishers
ISBN: 1473882796
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 573

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Book Description
A powerful portrait of a complex individual. It uses Napoleons own words to show his genius, arrogance, insecurities, and frustrations. The reader will be amazed by Napoleons attention to detail, from those of pressing national interests to the mundane (such as the problem of heartbroken soldiers in his guard.) . . . This makes it an invaluable reference book that should be on the bookshelf of anyone interested in the period. Rob Burnham, Editor, Napoleon SeriesIn the words of Napoleon is a startling insight into the life and deeds of Napoleon I. Derived from Napoleons extensive correspondence and his other writings and recorded speech, this valuable compilation acts as a diary or journal, encompassing the whole of the emperors life. Napoleons words as recorded on a particular day are set down as entries, and these offer a unique glimpse into the major events of the Napoleonic period.The diary reveals Napoleons thoughts and actions as his great life unfolded and throws light on his attitudes to war, politics and the many varied personalities who surrounded or opposed him. As entries appear on an almost daily basis, the reader has the opportunity to trace the surging course of events as they happened, and to witness the emperors response to the rise and fall of his fortunes.Philip Haythornthwaite provides a fascinating introduction which analyses Napoleons words, and includes biographical sketches of the key personalities of the era.

Life in Napoleon's Army

Life in Napoleon's Army PDF Author: Philip Haythornthwaite
Publisher: Pen and Sword
ISBN: 1784380245
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 216

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Book Description
The Napoleonic Library is an outstanding collection of seminal works on the Napoleonic Wars. It features evocative contemporary memoirs and makes available once again the classic works on the subject by military historians.

Napoleon's Shield and Guardian

Napoleon's Shield and Guardian PDF Author: Edward Ryann
Publisher: Frontline Books
ISBN: 9781848328419
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
This outstanding biography is a story of courage. It charts the career of a superbly brave cavalryman against the rise and fall of his imperial master. Pierre Daumesnil was a loyal follower of Napoleon throughout his astonishing career. Enlisting as a private soldier in 1793, he was caught up in the tumult of the Napoleonic Wars, surviving campaign after campaign to emerge as a much-decorated general and Baron of the French Empire. Daumesnil served in Egypt in 1798, charged at Marengo in 1800, fought at Austerlitz and Eylau, campaigned in Spain and saw action in Wagram. Terribly wounded at that battle, losing a leg, Daumesnil became governor of the fortress of Vincennes. It was here that he played his most celebrated role in the wars of Napoleon by refusing to surrender the fortress to the Allies in 1814 and again in 1815. Daumesnil's life was an adventure and one which typifies the dash, color and verve of this astonishing period. This biography, by a leading author, will appeal to Napoleonic enthusiasts and those interested in the life and times of Napoleon's elite cavalrymen.

Intervale

Intervale PDF Author: Betty Adcock
Publisher: LSU Press
ISBN: 9780807126653
Category : Poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 196

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Book Description
With a penetrating eye and a deep and spiritual intelligence, Betty Adcock writes poems that range from elegy to dark humor as they confront both loss and possibility. Intervale, selections from her first four books plus a new collection, traces the continuity of her vision and shows that lyric intensity can bring light to even the most obdurate darkness.Moving from the original loss of a world at her mother's death during the poet's sixth year to the world's loss of the arboreal leopards of Cambodia and Vietnam; from vanishing farmland to the endangered Sacred Harp music that once flourished in backwoods churches; from the difficult history of a little-known rural place to the weighted ruins of Greece -- these poems frame lessenings, divestations, and devastations in the midst of plenty. A wilderness disappears into cozy myth, farming into industry, tiger and elephant into zoos; the very ground underfoot, with its attendant necessities and contingencies, can seem to fade into fabrications we take for reality. The seam where such themes touch Adcock's personal history is the path these poems travel toward a harsh but luminous transcendence.

Memoirs of a Napoleonic Officer

Memoirs of a Napoleonic Officer PDF Author: Jean-Baptiste Barrès
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : France
Languages : en
Pages : 326

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Book Description


Letters of Napoleon

Letters of Napoleon PDF Author: J. M. Thompson
Publisher: Read Books Ltd
ISBN: 1444659758
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 400

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Book Description
Not that all Napoleons letters, or even many of them, are of a selfrevealing kind. In youth he had few confidants in middle age he had little to confide. la the stress of business and war he soon shed the idealism of the patriot, the fatalism of the f evolutionary, and the romanticism of the lover. Any sense he may once have had of the beauty, the pathos, or even the humour of life was coarsened by flattery and success. He can still declare, exhort, abuse, persuade, even charm but always in the interest of a policy, and to gain an end. He is wise, clearsighted, eloquent, heroic but hardly ever a human being in repose. Nevertheless, Napo leons letters remain, beyond anything written about him, or anything else he wrote or said about himself, by far his finest portrait. When he was a young man, Napoleon wrote in the rapid and already confused hand of the relatively rare letters signed Buonaparte or Bonaparte. With growing age and work, his handwriting became so slovenly as to be wellnigh illegible whilst his signature shortened from Napoleon to Napol., Nap., Np., and N. Though he still wrote some private letters, and the more important military and diplomatic despatches, he habitually employed secretaries, and carried on the bulk of his correspondence by dictation. Napoleon had three principal secretaries Bourrienne 1797-1802, Meneval 1802-13, and Fain 1806-14. All of them wrote Memoirs, and there is no lack of evidence as to how their work was done. In a rather unkind conversation at St. Helena, Napoleon said that Bourrienne wrote a good hand, and was active, tireless, and patriotic, but that he was a gambler, whose face lit up when his master dictated any thing dealing with big figures: he was in fact dismissed for becoming involved in financial speculation. His work was done partly at the Luxembourg, and partly at the Tuileries. In his Memoirs he describes Napoleons appear ance, dress, and habits in minute detail. From breakfast at 10 to dinner at 5 every hour was taken up with reading petitions, correcting letters, giving interviews, or attending meetings.

Napoleon's Campaign in Poland, 1806-7

Napoleon's Campaign in Poland, 1806-7 PDF Author: Francis Loraine Petre
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : France
Languages : en
Pages : 418

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Book Description


Napoleon's Family

Napoleon's Family PDF Author: Desmond Seward
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781910670309
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 380

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Book Description
'With precision, wit and remarkable clarity, the author chronicles the intertwined lives of these half-savage squireens, scarcely more than peasants with coats of arms through an all but unbelievable saga of vanity, stupidity and mindless greed.' Washington Post 'The rise and fall of Napoleon Bonaparte retold - and retold most engagingly - with emphasis on the greatest of all his many burdens.' The New Yorker In Napoleon's Family, Desmond Seward recounts the saga of these arriviste emigres. The back-biting and bickering for honours among the Emperor's siblings was often vicious, always entertaining, and an embarrassment to their brother. They showed no aptitude for governing or courage on the battlefield, only for self-indulgence. One brother was a drunken wastrel, another a venal womaniser, a third a paranoid depressive. The sisters had an insatiable appetite for lovers, among whom were Metternich and the violinist Paganani. The book is more than a scandalous family chronicle, however. It offers a penetrating view of Napoleon - a military genius who brought France to the height of glory, a far-sighted ruler who initiated social and economic reforms, but a man who could not escape from his background or to control his own family."

Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia (Historical Novel)

Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia (Historical Novel) PDF Author: L. Mühlbach
Publisher: e-artnow
ISBN:
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 529

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Book Description
"Napoleon and The Queen of Prussia" is a historical novel representing one of the most fascinating and famous oppositions in the times of Napoleonic wars: the political battle between Napoleon Buonaparte and Queen Elizabeth of Prussia. Napoleon called her "my beautiful enemy" and tried to ruin her reputation in Prussia by spreading gossip. Yet, his intentions failed since the people of Prussia loved their wise and kind queen, who enchanted everyone with her irresistible charm and beauty. When Napoleon first met her in person, he said: "I heard you are the most beautiful of Queens, but I did not know that you are the most beautiful of women." Yet, her charm didn't help her stop the Napoleonic invasion of Prussia. The novel "Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia" lets the reader dive into the atmosphere of the epoch. You learn about the battles, victories, and defeats of the two of the most influential leaders of Europe through the detailed and picturesque scenes of their personal lives.