Today I noticed iantoday's post regarding the Redhead status of Winston Churchill and was inspired to write a Red History on another military giant.

Over the course of little more than a decade, the armies of France under his command fought almost every European power and acquired control of most of continental Europe by conquest or alliance. His campaigns are studied at military academies all over the world and he is widely regarded as one of the greatest commanders ever to have lived. His Name is Napoleon Bonaparte and he had hair.

Napoleon was a gifted military leader. He first won fame in Paris, 1795 when he put down an armed protest of royalists and counter-revolutionaries. He implemented a brilliant use of newly seized artillery to repel the attack. he later boasted that he had cleared the streets with "a whiff of grapeshot." Other successful campaigns in Italy and Egypt put "the little general" in a good power-position for his coup d'etat on 18 Brumaire Year VIII (for those of you not familiar with the French Republican Calandar, that's November 9th, 1799). This was the day that Napoleon and his troops swept into Paris and seized control of the legislative council, outmanoeuved his co-conspirators and was voted in as Fist Counsul, thus making him the most powerful person in France. Following the discovery of an assasination plot Napoleon crowned himself Emperor on December 2nd, 1804 (by this time Napoleon had abolished the rediculous French Republican Calandar) at Notre Dame Cathedral.

Things seemed to be going well for Napoleon, he was Emperor of France, was undefeated in battle, and by 1811 he controled most of continental Eupope. So what went wrong? Why isn't the entire world speaking French?br]
The disastrous invasion of Russia in 1812 marked a turning point. Napoleon and Le Grand Armee invaded Russia, but instead of meeting Napoleon's forces along the border, the Russian forces lured Napoleon deeper and deeper into Russian territory. The Russians were then able to cut of the French supply routes and caught in a savage Russian Winter, the French starved and died of disease. The Russians retreated past Moscow allowing Napoleon to occupy the Russian Capital. The French Emperor expected this to force the Russians into peace talks, but the joke was on him; Czar Alexander I had Moscow burned to the ground. With no prize, Napoleon and his troops retreated in humiliation. A force of 650,000 returned to France with fewer than 40,000.

Following the Russian campaign and and further defeat at Leipzig in October 1813, the Sixth Coalition consisting of the allied forces of United Kingdom, Russia, Prussia, Sweden, Austria and a number of German States (The allied forces of Europe were unable to defeat Napoleon the first five times they tried) invaded France, forcing Napoleon to abdicate the Imperial Throne of France in April 1814. Louis XVIII was restored as King and Napoleon Bonaparte was exiled to the island of Elba (a small Island off the Tuscan coast of Italy).

Wikipedia says: "Napoleon escaped from Elba on 26 February 1815 and returned to the mainland on 1 March 1815. Louis XVIII sent the 5th Regiment of the Line, led by Marshal Ney who had formerly served under Napoleon in Russia, to meet him at Grenoble on 7 March 1815. Napoleon approached the regiment alone, dismounted his horse and, when he was within earshot of Ney's forces, shouted 'Soldiers of the Fifth, you recognize me. If any man would shoot his emperor, he may do so now'. Following a brief silence, the soldiers shouted 'Vive L'Empereur!' and marched with Napoleon to Paris. He arrived on 20 March, quickly raising a regular army of 140,000 and a volunteer force of around 200,000 and governed for a Hundred Days."


He was finally defeated by the Duke of Wellington at Waterloo (off the coast of Belgium) on 18 June 1815. He spent the remaining six years of his life banished on the island of St. Helena in the Atlantic Ocean under British supervision. Sick for much of his time on Saint Helena, Napoleon died on 5 May 1821. His last words were: "Tête d'Armée!" His body currently lies in a tomb at Les Invadides, Paris.