Tea at Trianon: Death of Napoleon on Saint Helena in 1821

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Thursday, January 18, 2007

Death of Napoleon on Saint Helena in 1821

Here is an article about the death of Napoleon from Lew Rockwell.com. They now think he died of cancer and not of arsenic poisoning as was once thought.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=RDG3EDXOUVSBLQFIQMFSFGGAVCBQ0IV0?xml=/news/2007/01/17/nbony17.xml

Anonymous said...: Hello! Thanks for the link on Napoleon. I am watching a series on Napoleon life on a cultural TV channel here in Mexico on Tuesdays, this week was the fourth chapter. The star is French actor Christian Clavier (Excellent, superb actor, he is a most delicious Napoleon, but I like him best as Thenardier in Les Miserables). The next chapter will be his failed invasion to Russia, which my father told me once, that even when it was the beginning of the end, the sole retreat (fighting day and night for weeks while withdrawing) was a most amazing exploit.- Elena, do you know what was the fate of the sons of Napoleon? Especially the one born by Archduchess Marie Louise. Are there any descendants alive today? Thanks.; January 19, 2007 at 11:15:00 AM EST
elena maria vidal said...: Thanks, maru! Napoleon's son died in Vienna in exile when he was only about 18 years old. Napoleon may have had other descendants through the Thierry family and I know that some of them went to Mexico.

His brothers have descendants who are alive today. His brother Jerome married an American woman from Baltimore,Maryland named Elizabeth Patterson. Hence there was a line of American Bonapartes for awhile, but I think they died out.....; January 19, 2007 at 11:38:00 AM EST