Napoleonic Wars

The causes

Since 1792, revolutionary France had been at war with European monarchies that feared the spread of its ideas. After the brief Peace of Amiens (1802) with the United Kingdom, hostilities resumed in 1803. Napoleon, who became emperor in 1804, wanted to dominate continental Europe, while the United Kingdom, protected by its fleet, financed his enemies.

Revolutionary France had upset the European balance. Conscription, introduced in 1798 by the Jourdan Law, provided mass armies, and conquered territories, such as Belgium and the left bank of the Rhine, were annexed. The monarchies saw this expansion as a threat to their social order. After the Peace of Amiens, the United Kingdom refused to hand over Malta, which France demanded, and mistrust grew. In 1804, the abduction of the Duke of Enghien, a member of the House of Bourbon, on the territory of the Duchy of Baden, then his execution at Vincennes, caused a major scandal in Europe. Alexander I of Russia protested and drew closer to London.

The course of the war

Napoleon beat Austria and Russia at Austerlitz in December 1805, then Prussia in 1806 and Russia in 1807. But his fleet was destroyed at Trafalgar in October 1805 by the British admiral Nelson, which ruled out an invasion of the United Kingdom. Napoleon then tried to strangle the British economy with the Continental System.

Two mistakes proved costly: the intervention in Spain, from 1808, which provoked an exhausting guerrilla war, and the Russian campaign of 1812, in which the Grande Armée, which had crossed the Neman with about 600,000 men, was destroyed by cold, hunger and distance. The allies crushed the French at Leipzig in 1813. Napoleon abdicated in 1814, returned from Elba in 1815 and was finally beaten at Waterloo on 18 June.

In 1805, Napoleon encircled the Austrian army of General Mack at Ulm, which capitulated, before entering Vienna. On 14 October 1806, he crushed the Prussians at Jena, while Marshal Davout faced the bulk of the Prussian army at Auerstedt on the same day. After the victory at Friedland, in June 1807, Tsar Alexander I signed with Napoleon the Peace of Tilsit: Prussia lost a large part of its territory, and Russia agreed to take part in the blockade against the United Kingdom.

In Spain, the French occupation provoked an uprising in Madrid in May 1808, which spread across the whole country and gave its name to guerrilla warfare. In July 1808, at Bailén, a French army corps capitulated, one of the first major setbacks of the Grande Armée. Napoleon himself intervened in Spain at the end of 1808 and retook Madrid, but Austria took advantage of his absence to take up arms again in 1809. The United Kingdom then sent troops to Portugal under the command of Arthur Wellesley, future Duke of Wellington. In 1810 and 1811, the Lines of Torres Vedras protected Lisbon, and Masséna failed to break through the British defenses.

In 1812, the Grande Armée reached Moscow after the battle of the Moskva, fought near Borodino on 7 September, very bloody on both sides. The Russians, who practiced scorched earth, abandoned the city, which the French occupied from 14 September without obtaining peace. The retreat began in October, under the cold, hunger and attacks by Cossacks, and in November, the crossing of the Berezina cost the French dearly. These troops also included Polish, German and Italian soldiers, many of whom never returned.

The consequences

The Congress of Vienna (1814-1815) redrew the map of Europe and restored kings, in the spirit of a balance between great powers. Louis XVIII regained the throne of France. But the ideas born of the Revolution, such as equality before the law, and reforms such as the Civil Code of 1804, had spread across much of Europe. Napoleon, exiled to Saint Helena, died there in 1821.

The Mémorial de Sainte-Hélène, published in 1823 by Las Cases, the emperor's companion in exile, helped forge the Napoleonic legend, which was taken up under the Second Empire. The German wars of liberation, from 1813 to 1815, and Spanish resistance fed a new nationalism, which would mark the 19th century. In 1815, the Holy Alliance, uniting Russia, Austria and Prussia, sought to defend the monarchical order in Europe. Historians still debate Napoleon: some see a conqueror whose ambition destabilized Europe, others the heir of a Revolution that imposed civil equality across much of the continent.

Timeline

1. 1805Victory at Austerlitz and naval defeat at Trafalgar
2. 1807Treaties of Tilsit with Russia and Prussia
3. 1812Disastrous Russian campaign
4. 1813French defeat at Leipzig, the Battle of the Nations
5. 1815Napoleon's final defeat at Waterloo

Key figures

• Napoleon I, emperor of the French from 1804 to 1814, then in 1815
• Horatio Nelson, British admiral, victor at Trafalgar
• Alexander I, tsar of Russia, Napoleon's opponent and later victor
• Wellington, British general, victor at Waterloo