Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte,
President of the French Second Republic in 1851

The French coup d'état on 2 December 1851, staged by Prince Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte (at the time President of the French Second Republic), ended in the successful dissolution of the French National Assembly, as well as the subsequent re-establishment of the French Empire the next year. Louis-Napoléon, nephew of Napoléon Bonaparte, reclaimed his uncle's throne as Emperor of the French (taking the regnal name Napoléon III) and reestablished universal suffrage (previously abolished by the Assembly). His decisions and the extension of his mandate for 10 years were popularly endorsed by referendum.

Causes[link]

In 1848, Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte was elected President of France through universal suffrage, taking 74% of the vote. He did this with the support of the Parti de l'Ordre after running against Louis Eugène Cavaignac. Subsequently, he was in constant conflict with the members (députés) of the Assemblée Nationale.

Contrary to the Party's expectations that Louis-Napoleon would be easy to manipulate (Adolphe Thiers had called him a "cretin whom we will lead [by the nose]"), he proved himself an agile and cunning politician. He succeeded in imposing his choices and decisions on the Assemblée, which had once again become conservative in the aftermath of the June Days Uprising in 1848. He broke away from the control of the Parti de l'Ordre and created the Ministère des Commis, appointing General Hautpoul as its head, in 1849. On 3 January 1850, he dismissed Changarnier, a dissident in the Parti de l'Ordre, thereby provoking an open conflict within the party. He also actively encouraged the creation of numerous anti-parliament newspapers and acquired the support of 150 members of Parliament, the "Parti de l'Elysée".

The provisions of the constitutions that prohibited an incumbent president from seeking re-election appeared to force the end of Louis-Napoleon's rule in December 1852. Not one to admit defeat, Louis-Napoleon spent the first half of 1851 trying to force changes to the constitution through Parliament so he could be re-elected. Bonaparte travelled through the provinces and organised petitions to rally popular support. Two-thirds of General Council supported Louis-Napoleon's cause, but in the Assembly, supporters of the Duke of Orléans, led by Thiers, concluded an alliance with the far left to oppose Louis-Napoleon's plans. In January 1851, the Parliament voted no confidence in the Ministère des Commis. On 19 July, it refused the constitutional reform proposed by Louis-Napoleon, also scrapping universal suffrage in an effort to break popular support for Bonaparte.

Preparations for the coup[link]

The coup d'état was meticulously planned from 20 August 1851. Preparations and planning for this coup took place at Saint Cloud. Among the conspirators were Persigny, a loyal companion of Louis-Napoleon, the Duke of Morny, and General Jacques Leroy de Saint Arnaud. On 14 October, Louis-Napoleon asked the Parliament to restore universal suffrage but the request was turned down. His request for a reconsideration of the constitutional reform proposal was also turned down on 13 November. Prepared to strike, Louis-Napoleon appointed General Saint-Arnaud as the Minister of War and a circular was issued reminding soldiers of their pledge of "passive obedience". Followers of the President were appointed to various important positions: General Magnan as the Commander of the Troops of Paris, and Maupas, Prefect of Haut-Garonne as Prefect of Police of Paris. Convinced that the coup was now inevitable after the latest refusal, Louis-Napoleon fixed the anniversary of the coronation of Napoleon in 1804, and the victory of Austerlitz in 1805, as the day for the coup. The operation was christened Rubicon, alluding to Julius Caesar.

The coup of 2 December 1851[link]

D'Allonville's cavalry in the street of Paris during Napoleon III's coup.

On the morning of 2 December, troops led by Saint-Arnaud occupied strategic points in Paris, from the Champs-Élysées to the Tuileries. Top opposition leaders were arrested and six edicts promulgated to establish the rule of Louis-Napoleon. The Assemblée Nationale was dissolved, and universal suffrage restored. Louis-Napoleon declared that a new constitution was being framed and said he intended to restore a "system established by the First Consul".

Reacting to this coup, parliamentarians took refuge in the mayor's office of the 20th arrondissement of Paris and 220 of them voted to oust Louis-Napoleon from power. Most prominent among these were liberals like Remusat and moderates like Pascal Duprat, who were arrested soon after. A Parisian insurrection led by the likes of Victor Hugo and Victor Schoelcher erupted despite tight control by the Army. The insurgents were soon defeated. On 3 December, parliamentarian Alphonse Baudin was killed and on 4 December, 200 more people fell victim to the revolution. By evening, the revolt of Paris was suppressed and the city returned to normal.

Revolt in other places[link]

The coup triggered off revolts in other places across France. On 5 December, rebellions were reported in big cities in the south-west of France. The department of Basses-Alpes even declared itself administered by a "Committee of Resistance" but the army, still loyal to the President, succeeded in quelling the rebellion. A total of 32 departments were put under a state of alert from 8 December and the rebellious areas were controlled in a few days. Opponents were arrested and some were forced to flee. Victor Hugo fled to Brussels, then Jersey, and finally settled with his family on the Channel Island of Guernsey at Hauteville House, where he would live in exile until 1870. By the end of the rebellion, 26,000 people were arrested, 9,530 were sent to Algeria and 250 to the prison of Cayenne.

Peace returns[link]

The Bonapartists were finally assured of a victory. Generals Vaillant and Harispe became Marshal of France on 11 December. A new constitution was being drafted. A referendum was organised to ratify the new order and the coup was portrayed as a security operation.

On 20 and 21 December, the French voted for the acceptance of the new regime by an overwhelming majority of 7,145,000 to 600,000. Louis-Napoléon now had the power to draft a new constitution.

Consequences[link]

The Constitution of France underwent a modification. The new constitution bestowed executive power on a President, elected for a period of 10 years. He was also vested with the power of legislative initiative, thereby reducing the scope of the Parliament. This succeeded in concentrating power in the hands of an authoritarian executive.

In less than a year, the Second Republic transformed into the Second Empire, established by a referendum on 7 November 1852. President Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte, elected by the French people, officially became Napoleon III, Emperor of the French, from the symbolic and historic date of 2 December 1852.

Further reading[link]

• John Burt Halsted, ed. (1972). December 2, 1851: contemporary writings on the coup d'etat of Louis Napoleon. Anchor Books. 
• Hugo, Victor (1852). Napoléon le Petit. 
• Marx, Karl (1852). The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon. 

External links[link]

• Coup d'État du 2 décembre 1851 sur Herodote.net
• Autour de Décembre 1851, Revue d'histoire du XIX^e siècle (n° 22)
• L'année 1851 sur www.19e.org
• La résistance au coup d'état du 2 décembre 1851 dans les départements et à Paris
• Wikisource:Coup d'État du 2 décembre 1851 for complete texts (6 Décrets, « Appel au peuple », et « Appel à l'Armée »)

Napoleon III
Emperor of the French
Reign	2 December 1852– 4 September 1870
Predecessor	Second French Republic Himself as President of the French Republic Louis Philippe III, Duke of Orléans was previous monarch as King of the French
Successor	Monarchy abolished Third French Republic Louis Jules Trochu as Chairman of the Government of National Defense
1st President of France
Term	20 December 1848– 2 December 1852
Predecessor	Louis-Eugène Cavaignac as Head of the State and of the Government
Spouse	Eugénie de Montijo
Issue
Louis Napoléon, Prince Imperial
Full name
Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte
House	House of Bonaparte
Father	Louis I of Holland
Mother	Hortense de Beauharnais
Born	(1808-04-20)20 April 1808 Paris, French Empire
Died	9 January 1873(1873-01-09) (aged 64) Chislehurst, Kent, England, UK
Religion	Roman Catholic

Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte (20 April 1808 – 9 January 1873) was the President of the French Second Republic and as Napoleon III, the emperor of the Second French Empire. He was the nephew and heir of Napoleon I, christened as Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte. Elected President by popular vote in 1848, he initiated a coup d'état in 1851, before ascending the throne as Napoleon III on 2 December 1852, the forty-eighth anniversary of Napoleon I's coronation. He ruled as Emperor of the French until 4 September 1870. He holds the unusual distinction of being both the first titular president and the last monarch of France.

Napoleon III is primarily remembered for an energetic foreign policy which aimed to jettison the limitations imposed on France since 1815 by the Concert of Europe and reassert French influence in Europe and abroad. A brief war against Austria in 1859 largely brought an end to the process of Italian unification. In the Near East, Napoleon III spearheaded allied action against Russia in the Crimean War and restored French presence in the Levant, claiming for France the role of protector of the Maronite Christians. A French garrison in Rome likewise secured the Papal States against annexation by Italy, defeating the Italians at Mentana and winning the support of French Catholics for Napoleon's regime.

In the Far East, Napoleon III established French rule in Cochinchina and New Caledonia. French interests in China were upheld in the Second Opium War and the Taiping Rebellion; an abortive campaign against Korea was launched in 1866 while a military mission to Japan failed to prevent the restoration of Imperial rule. French intervention in Mexico was also unsuccessful and was terminated in 1867 due to mounting Mexican resistance and American diplomatic pressure.

Domestically, Napoleon's reign was a major period of industrialization for the French economy. He also oversaw a major renovation of Paris that created the outline of the modern city. The Second French Empire was overthrown three days after Napoleon's disastrous surrender at the Battle of Sedan in 1870, which resulted in both the proclamation of the French Third Republic and the cession of the territory of Alsace-Lorraine to the newly formed German Empire.^[1]

Early life[link]

Napoleon III, known as "Louis-Napoléon" prior to becoming Emperor, was the nephew of Napoleon I by his brother Louis Bonaparte, who married Hortense de Beauharnais, the daughter by the first marriage of Napoleon's wife Joséphine de Beauharnais. The Empress Joséphine proposed the marriage as a way to produce an heir for the Emperor, who agreed, as Joséphine was by then infertile.^[2] Louis-Napoléon's paternity has been brought into question (see Ancestry). Louis-Napoléon also harboured a lifelong suspicion about his legitimacy, although most historians have concluded that he was conceived by Louis Bonaparte and Hortense.^[3]

During Napoleon I's reign, Louis-Napoléon's parents had been made king and queen of a French puppet state, the Kingdom of Holland. After Napoleon I's military defeats and deposition in 1815 and the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy in France, all members of the Bonaparte dynasty were forced into exile. Louis-Napoléon was brought up in Switzerland, living with his mother in Arenenberg Castle in the canton of Thurgau, and in Germany, receiving his education at the gymnasium school at Augsburg, Bavaria. As a young man, he settled in Italy, where he and his elder brother Napoléon Louis espoused liberal politics and became involved with the Carbonari, an organization fighting Austria's domination of northern Italy. On 17 March 1831, while fleeing Italy due to a crackdown on revolutionary activity by Papal and Austrian troops, Louis-Napoléon's brother, suffering from measles, died in his arms.^[4] His experiences in Italy later had a profound effect on his foreign policy. Louis-Napoléon travelled on to France where he was quickly arrested and quietly sent to England.

The Four Napoleons (Collage, about 1858)

Meanwhile, France had again become a monarchy, both under the Bourbon Restoration and the July Monarchy. Under the latter emerged a Bonapartist movement that wanted to restore a Bonaparte to the throne. According to the law of succession established by Napoleon I when he was Emperor, the claim passed first to his son, who, at birth, had been given the title "King of Rome" by his father. Known by Bonapartists as Napoleon II, he was living under virtual imprisonment at the court of Vienna under the name Duke of Reichstadt. Next in line was Napoleon I's eldest brother Joseph Bonaparte, followed by Louis Bonaparte and his sons. Since Joseph had no male children, and because Louis-Napoléon's own elder brother had died in 1831, the death of the Duke of Reichstadt in 1832 made Louis-Napoléon the Bonaparte heir in the next generation. His uncle and his father, relatively old men by then, left to him the active leadership of the Bonapartist cause.

Louis-Philippe had established the July Monarchy in 1830, and was confronted with opposition from the Legitimists, the Independents, and the Bonapartists (he had especially angered the Bonapartists by confiscating all the remaining family assets in France)^[5]. Louis-Napoléon returned to France in October 1836, trying to emulate the start of the Hundred Days by initiating a Bonapartist coup at Strasbourg, calling on the local garrison to join him in restoring the Empire. The local troops instead arrested him and Louis-Napoléon returned to exile in Switzerland. When Louis-Philippe demanded his extradition, the Swiss refused to hand over a man who was a citizen and a member of their armed forces. In order to avoid a war, Louis-Napoléon left Switzerland of his own accord.

Between 1838 and 1839, Louis-Napoléon stayed at No. 6 Clarendon Square, Royal Leamington Spa. The building is now called "Napoleon House" and has a 'Blue plaque'. He secretly returned to France and attempted yet another coup in August 1840, sailing with some fifty hired soldiers to Boulogne-sur-Mer, taking the train to Lille and repeating the failure of the Strasbourg coup. This time, he was not exiled but sentenced to emprisonnement perpétuel, albeit in relative comfort, in the fortress of the town of Ham in the Somme département.

While in the Ham fortress, his eyesight reportedly became poor. During his years of imprisonment, he wrote essays and pamphlets that combined his claim to be emperor with progressive, mildly socialist economic proposals, published as L'extinction du paupérisme, which he came to define as Bonapartism. In 1844, his uncle Joseph died, making him the heir apparent to the Bonaparte claim. He finally escaped in May 1846 by exchanging clothes with a mason working at the fortress. His enemies would later derisively nickname him "Badinguet", the name of the mason whose identity he assumed. He eventually made it to Southport, England. A month later, his father Louis died, making Louis-Napoléon the clear heir to the Bonaparte legacy in France.

Return to France[link]

Louis-Napoléon lived in Great Britain until the revolution of February 1848 in France deposed Louis-Philippe and established a Republic. He was now free to return to France, which he immediately did. The provisional government, however, judged him an unnecessary distraction and requested his departure.^[6] Back in England, he volunteered to be a special constable in the event of Chartist rioting.^[7][8] In the same month, April, he ran for, and won a seat in the French Constituent Assembly elected to draft a new constitution. He did not make a great contribution and, as a mediocre public orator, failed to impress his fellow members. Some even thought that, having lived outside of France almost all his life, he spoke French with a slight German accent.^[9] His temporary exile in 1848 proved to be a blessing in disguise for the December presidential election, as it meant he played no part in the June Days, and was able to enhance his image as "all things to all men" against his main opponent, Louis-Eugène Cavaignac, who had led the repression against the working-class of Paris.^[10]

President of the French Republic[link]

Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte

When the constitution of the Second Republic was finally promulgated and direct elections for the presidency were held on 10 December 1848, Louis-Napoléon won a surprising landslide victory, with 5.6 million votes (75%) to 1.5 million for his closest rival, Cavaignac. His platform was based on the restoration of order, strong government, social consolidation, and national greatness. The Monarchist right (supporters of either the Bourbon or Orléanist royal households) and much of the aristocracy supported him as the "least bad" candidate, as a man who would restore order, end the instability in France which had continued since the overthrow of the monarchy in February and prevent a proto-communist revolution. A good portion of the industrial class, on the other hand, were won over by Louis-Napoléon's vague indications of progressive economic views. Despite this support among sectors of the upper classes, his overwhelming victory was above all due to the support of the biggest class in France: the peasants. To these non-politicized rural masses, the name of Bonaparte meant something, as opposed to the other little-known contenders. He appealed with all the credit of his name, that of France's national hero: Napoleon I, who in popular memory was credited with raising the nation to its pinnacle of military greatness and establishing social stability after the turmoil of the French Revolution. During his term as President, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte styled himself the Prince-President (Le Prince-Président).

Despite his landslide victory, Louis-Napoléon was faced with a Parliament dominated by monarchists, who saw his government only as a temporary bridge to a restoration of either the House of Bourbon or of Orléans. Louis-Napoléon governed cautiously during his first years in office, choosing his ministers from among the more "centre-right" Orleanist Parti de l'Ordre monarchists, and generally avoiding conflict with the conservative assembly. He courted Catholic support by assisting in the restoration of the Pope's temporal rule in Rome, although he tried to please secularist conservative opinion at the same time by combining this with peremptory demands that the Pope introduce liberal changes to the government of the Papal States, including appointing a liberal government and establishing the Code Napoleon there, which angered the Catholic majority in the assembly. He soon made another attempt to gain Catholic support, however, by approving the Loi Falloux in 1851, which restored a greater role for the Catholic Church in the French educational system.^[11]

By the constitution of 1848 said he had to step down at the end of his term, so he sought a constitutional amendment to allow him to succeed himself, arguing that four years were not enough to fully implement his political and economic program. The National Assembly, dominated by monarchists who wished to restore the Bourbon dynasty, refused to amend the Constitution.^[12]

D'Allonville's cavalry in Paris during Napoleon III's 1851 coup.

The National Assembly passed a new election law in 1850 that placed restrictions on universal male suffrage, imposing a three-year residency requirement. It prevented a large proportion of the lower class, which was itinerant, from voting.^[13] Louis-Napoléon was able to seize the opportunity and break with the Assembly and the conservative ministers opposing his projects in favour of the dispossessed. He surrounded himself with lieutenants completely loyal to him, such as Morny and Persigny, secured the support of the army, and toured the country making populist speeches condemning the assembly and presenting himself as the protector of universal male suffrage.

After months of stalemate, and using the money of his mistress, Harriet Howard, he staged a coup d'état and seized dictatorial powers on 2 December 1851, the 47th anniversary of Napoleon I's crowning as Emperor (hence another of Louis-Napoléon's nicknames: "The Man of December", "l'homme de décembre"). The coup was approved by the French people in a national referendum, the fairness and legality of which has been questioned by Napoleon III's detractors ever since.^[14] The coup of 1851 alienated the reactionary and careerist elements in the Assembly. Victor Hugo, who had hitherto shown support for Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, decided to go into exile after the coup, and became one of the harshest critics of Napoleon III, despite the amnesty of political opponents in 1859.^[15] Recognizing the reactionary classes in society as being the gravest threat to his position, Louis Bonaparte moved on 22 January 1852 to confiscate all the property of the House of Orleans.

Emperor of the French[link]

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French Monarchy -
Bonaparte Dynasty

Napoleon I Children    Napoleon II Siblings    Joseph, King of Spain    Lucien, Prince of Canino    Elisa, Grand Duchess of Tuscany    Louis, King of Holland    Pauline, Princess of Guastalla    Caroline, Queen of Naples    Jérôme, King of Westphalia Nephews and nieces    Princess Zénaïde    Princess Charlotte    Prince Charles    Prince Louis    Prince Pierre    Prince Napoleon Charles    Prince Napoleon Louis    Napoleon III    Prince Jérôme    Prince Napoleon Joseph    Princess Mathilde Grandnephews and -nieces    Prince Joseph    Prince Lucien-Louis    Prince Roland    Princess Jeanne    Prince Charles    Prince Jerome    Napoleon (V) Victor    Maria Letizia, Duchess of Aosta Great Grandnephews and -nieces    Princess Marie    Princess Marie Clotilde    Napoleon (VI) Louis Great Great Grandnephews and -nieces    Napoleon (VII) Charles    Princess Catherine    Princess Laure    Prince Jerome Great Great Great Grandnephews and -nieces    Princess Caroline    Prince Jean-Christophe Napoleon II Napoleon III Children    Napoleon (IV), Prince Imperial

Authoritarian empire[link]

Imperial Standard of Napoleon III.

New constitutional statutes were passed which officially maintained an elected Parliament and re-established universal male suffrage. However, the Parliament now became irrelevant as real power was completely concentrated in the hands of Louis-Napoléon and his bureaucracy. Exactly one year after the coup, on 2 December 1852, after approval by another referendum, the Second Republic was officially ended and the Empire restored, ushering in the Second French Empire. President Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte became Emperor Napoleon III. The numbering of Napoleon's reign treats Napoleon II, who never actually ruled, as a true Emperor (he had been briefly recognized as emperor from 22 June to 7 July 1814). That same year, Napoleon III began shipping political prisoners and criminals to penal colonies such as Devil's Island or (in milder cases) New Caledonia.

Napoleon III in 1863

The emperor, hitherto a bachelor, began quickly to look for a wife to produce a legitimate heir-apparent. Most of the royal families of Europe were unwilling to marry into the parvenu Bonaparte family, and after rebuffs from Princess Carola of Sweden and from Queen Victoria's German niece Princess Adelheid of Hohenlohe-Langenburg, Napoleon decided to lower his sights somewhat and "marry for love", choosing the Countess of Teba, Eugénie de Montijo, a Spanish noblewoman of partial Scottish ancestry who had been brought up in Paris. In 1856, Eugénie gave birth to a legitimate son and heir-apparent, Louis Napoléon, the Prince Impérial.

Two assassination attempts were orchestrated against Napoleon III, one in April 1855 and the other in January 1858.

Until about 1861, Napoleon's regime exhibited decidedly authoritarian characteristics, using press censorship to prevent the spread of opposition, manipulating elections, and depriving the Parliament of the right to free debate or any real power.

Liberal empire[link]

Extension of the powers of the legislature[link]

In 1860–61, Napoleon III made more concessions to placate his liberal opponents. He allowed free debates in Parliament to be held and published, relaxed press censorship, and appointed the Liberal Émile Ollivier as Prime Minister in 1869. This later period is described by historians as the "Liberal Empire". Napoleon acted because his popularity had declined in the face of the Italian war and a commercial treaty with Britain. He hoped to revive parliamentary life, foster the creation of political parties, and exercise his power indirectly, by working through the parliament. Both major parties seized upon Napoleon's concessions as an opportunity to demand wider powers, and the revival of parliamentary institutions. Napoleon's large-scale program of public works, and his extravagantly expensive foreign policy, had created rapidly mounting government debts; the annual deficit was about fr.100 million, and the cumulative debt had reached nearly fr.1 billion. The Emperor had full control of the budget, but was managing it poorly. He needed to restore the confidence of the business world, and to involve the legislature and sharing responsibility. Therefore, he renounced his right to borrow money when the legislature was not in session, and agreed the budget should be voted on item by item. Nevertheless, he retained the right to change the budget estimates section by section, thereby defeating parliamentary control and angering the parliamentarians. The opposition formed an increasingly powerful coalition, ranging from Catholics outraged by the Papal policies to Legitimists, Orleanists, protectionists and even some republicans. Napoleon's position was further undermined during the 1860s by his failures in foreign policy.^[16]

Eugénie, Empress of the French

Ten centimes coin, 1855

Economic and social policy[link]

The French economy was rapidly modernized under Napoleon III, who desired a legacy as a reform-minded social engineer.^{[citation needed]} The industrialization of France during this period, in general, appealed to members of both the business and working classes. The centre of Paris was renovated by clearing out slums, widening streets, and constructing parks according to Baron Haussmann's plan. Working class neighbourhoods were moved to the outskirts of Paris, where factories utilized their labour. Some of his main backers were Saint-Simonians, and these supporters described Napoleon III as the "socialist emperor." Saint-Simonians at this time founded a new type of banking institution, the Crédit Mobilier, which sold stock to the public and then used the money raised to invest in industrial enterprises in France. This sparked a period of rapid economic development.

Napoleon's Empire has been said to be the first regime in France to give "distinct priority to economic objectives".^{[citation needed]} Napoleon sought to advance his belief in free trade, cheap credit, and the need to develop infrastructure as ways of ensuring progress and prosperity through government policy. Napoleon, like Haussmann and Persigny, believed that the budget deficits that the state incurred due to its high contributions would be offset by subsequent high profits.^[17] His regime has also been cited as one of the few in French history to make a concerted effort towards breaking down trade barriers.^[18]

As it turned out, this time period was favourable for industrial expansion. The gold rushes in both California and Australia increased the European money supply. In the early years of the Empire, the economy also benefited from the coming of age of those born during the baby boom of the Restoration period.^[19] The steady rise of prices caused by the increase of the money supply encouraged company promotion and investment of capital. Rail mileage in France increased from 3,000 to 16,000 km during the 1850s, and this growth allowed mines and factories to operate at higher production rates. The fifty-five small rail lines of France were merged into six major lines, while new iron steamships replaced wooden ships. Between 1859 and 1869, under the direction of Ferdinand de Lesseps, the Compagnie universelle du canal maritime de Suez, a French company, built the Suez Canal, opening a new chapter in global transportation and trade.

Algeria[link]

Algeria had been under French rule since 1830. Compared to previous administrations, Napoleon III was far more sympathetic to the native Algerians.^[20] He halted European migration inland, restricting them to the coastal zone; moreover, he freed the Algerian rebel leader Abd al Qadir (who had been promised freedom on surrender but was imprisoned by the previous administration) and gave him a stipend of 150,000 francs. He also allowed Muslims to serve in the military and civil service on theoretically equal terms and allowed them to migrate to France. In addition, he gave the option of citizenship; however, for Muslims to take this option they had to accept all of the French civil code, including parts governing inheritance and marriage which might conflict with Muslim tradition, and they had to reject the competence of religious courts. This was interpreted by some Muslims as requiring them to give up parts of their religion to obtain citizenship and was resented.

One of the most influential decisions Louis Napoleon made in Algeria was to change its system of land tenure. While ostensibly well-intentioned, in effect this move destroyed the traditional system of land management and deprived many Algerians of land. While Napoleon did renounce state claims to tribal lands, he also began a process of dismantling tribal land ownership in favour of individual land ownership over the course of three generations, though this process was accelerated by later administrations. This process was corrupted by French officials sympathetic to the French in Algeria who took much of the land they surveyed into public domain. In addition, many tribal leaders, chosen for loyalty to the French rather than influence in their tribe, immediately sold communal land for cash.^[21]

Foreign policy[link]

In a speech at Bordeaux in 1852, Napoleon III famously proclaimed that "The Empire means peace" ("L'Empire, c'est la paix"), reassuring foreign governments that the new Emperor Napoleon would not attack other European powers in order to extend the French Empire. He was, however, thoroughly determined to follow a strong foreign policy to extend France's power and glory, and warned that he would not stand by and allow another European power to threaten its neighbour. He was also a partisan of a "policy of nationalities" (principe des nationalités) re-casting the map of Europe, sweeping away small principalities to create unified nation-states, even when this seemed to have little relevance to France's material interests. In this he remained influenced by the themes of his uncle's policy, as related in the Mémorial de Sainte-Hélène, such as Italian unification and a united Europe. These two factors led Napoleon to a certain adventurism in foreign policy, in the opinion of some contemporaries, although this was tempered by pragmatism.^[22]

The Crimean War[link]

The final French assault brought about the capture of Sevastopol in September 1855, leading to the end of the Crimean War.

Napoleon's challenge to Russia's efforts to influence in the Ottoman Empire led to France's successful participation in the Crimean War (1854–1856).^[23] During this war, Napoleon established a French alliance with Britain, which continued after the war's close. The defeat of Russia and the alliance with Britain gave France increased authority in Europe. This was the first war between European powers since the close of the Napoleonic Wars and the Congress of Vienna, marking a breakdown of the alliance system that had maintained peace for nearly half a century. The war also effectively ended the Concert of Europe and the Quadruple Alliance, or "Waterloo Coalition" that the other four powers had established. The Paris Peace Conference of 1856 represented a high-water mark for the regime in foreign affairs, when Napoleon had followed through with his ideas set out in Des idées napoléoniennes.^[24] A lasting result was the encouragement of Napolean et al. to discuss (and his enemies to fear) the redrawing of the map of Europe in an ambitious and revolutionary manner along nationalist lines.^[25]

Asia[link]

In 1857, Napoleon III provided his assistance in negotiations to end the Anglo-Persian War, leading to the March 1857 Treaty of Paris.^[26]

Napoleon III receiving the Siamese embassy at the palace of Fontainebleau in 1864

In East Asia, Napoleon took the first steps to establishing a French colonial influence in Indochina. He approved the launching of a naval expedition under Charles Rigault de Genouilly in 1858 to punish the Vietnamese for their mistreatment of French Catholic missionaries and force the court to accept a French presence in the country. An important factor in his decision was the belief that France risked becoming a second-rate power by not expanding its influence in East Asia. Deeper down was the sense that France owed the world a civilizing mission.^[27]

Capture of Saigon by Charles Rigault de Genouilly on 18 February 1859, painted by Antoine Morel-Fatio.

This eventually led to a full-out invasion in 1861. By 1862, the war was over and Vietnam conceded three provinces in the south, called by the French Cochin-China, opened three ports to French trade, allowed free passage of French warships to Cambodia (which led to a French protectorate over Cambodia in 1863), allowed freedom of action for French missionaries and gave France a large indemnity for the cost of the war. France did not intervene, however, in the Christian-supported Vietnamese rebellion in Bac Bo, despite the urging of missionaries, or in the subsequent slaughter of thousands of Christians after the rebellion.

Looting of the Yuan Ming Yuan by Anglo-French forces in the Second Opium War in 1860.

In China, France took part in the Second Opium War along with Britain, and in 1860 French troops entered Peking. China was forced to concede more trading rights, allow freedom of navigation of the Yangtze, give full civil rights and freedom of religion to Christians, and give France and Britain a huge indemnity. This combined with the intervention in Vietnam set the stage for further French influence in China leading up to a sphere of influence over parts of southern China.^[28]

The French military mission to Japan (1867–1868) before its departure in 1866.

In 1866, French naval troops attacked Korea in response to the execution of French missionaries there. Though the campaign against Korea was primarily the work of the ranking French diplomat in China and not formally authorized by the French government, its failure nevertheless resulted in the decline of French influence in the region. In 1867, a military mission to Japan played a key role in modernizing the troops of the Shogun Tokugawa Yoshinobu, and even participated on his side against Imperial troops during the Boshin war.^[29]

Italy[link]

As President of the Republic, Louis-Napoléon sent French troops to help restore Pope Pius IX as ruler of the Papal States in 1849 after his rule had been overthrown by the revolutionaries led by Giuseppe Mazzini and Giuseppe Garibaldi who had proclaimed the Roman Republic (although as a Carbonaro he had been involved in plotting a similar revolt in the Papal States during his youth in Italy). This won him support of Catholics in France. However, the Constituent Assembly saw the unilateral intervention by Bonaparte in Italy as a violation of Section V of the Constitution and on 11 June 1849, Alexandre Ledru-Rollin introduced a bill of impeachment against President Bonaparte and his ministers.^[30] Although many Catholics supported the Italian intervention, they nonetheless remained supporters of the Bourbon monarchy at heart and tended to support anything that would weaken Bonaparte's polictial position. Still Bonaparte's growing popularity in France meant that the bill of impeachment was defeated on 12 June 1849.^[31]

Napoleon III at the Battle of Solferino in 1859.

Despite the incursion of troops into Italy on behalf of the reactionary forces, Louis Bonaparte remained attached to ideal of Italian nationalism which he had embraced in his youth. Accordingly, he sent an emissary to negotiate with the revolutionary Italian nationalist Mazzini. The Catholic Encyclopedia observes: "In this way the difficulties of the future emperor reveal themselves from the beginning; he wished to spare the religious susceptibilities of French Catholics" and yet to support "the national susceptibilities of the Italian revolutionists—a double aim which explains many an inconsistency" in his policy.^[32] Pragmatically, Louis Bonaparte supported Italian nationalist aspirations because he wished particularly to end Austrian rule in Lombardy and Venice (he always nursed a dislike for Austria as the incarnation of reactionary, legitimist monarchy, and the great barrier to the reconstruction of Europe on nationalist lines. As Emperor, Napoleon dreamed of doing this, and thus satisfying his own inclinations and winning over liberal and left-wing opinion in France (which was passionately in favour of Italian unification) while at the same time supporting the Pope in Rome and thus maintaining conservative and Catholic support in France. These contradictory desires were evident in his policy in Italy.

In April–July 1859 Napoleon made a secret deal with Cavour, Prime Minister of Piedmont, for France to assist in expelling Austria from the Italian peninsula and bringing about a united Italy, or at least a united northern Italy, in exchange for Piedmont ceding to France Savoy and the Nice region (which was destined to become the so-called French Riviera). He went to war with Austria in 1859 and won victories at Magenta and Solferino, which resulted in the ceding of Lombardy to Piedmont by Austria (and in return received Savoy and Nice from Piedmont as promised in 1860). After this had been done, however, Napoleon decided to end French involvement in the war. This early withdrawal, however, failed to prevent central Italy, including most of the Papal states, being incorporated into the new Italian state.^[33] This led Catholics in France to turn against Napoleon. Napoleon tried to redress the damage by maintaining French troops in the city of Rome itself, which prevented the new Italian government seizing it from the Pope. However, Napoleon on the whole failed to win back Catholic support at home (and made moves to appeal instead to the anti-Catholic left in his domestic policy in the 1860s, most notably by appointing the anti-clerical Victor Duruy Minister for Education, who further secularized the schooling system).^[34] French troops remained in Rome to protect the Pope until the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870.

Grand Scheme for the Americas[link]

Napoleon III envisioned a "Grand Scheme for the Americas", which would consist of three general points. The first involved recognition of the Confederate States of America and a military alliance with them. The second involved reintroducing monarchical rule to Latin America, in the form of Maximillian I in Mexico, and increasing French trade throughout Latin America. The third point involved control over Mexico with the creation of a large buffer state from the Rio Grande to the Baja California peninsula.^[35]

Mexico[link]

Battle of Puebla, Mexico.

Another example of Napoleon's adventurism in foreign policy was the French intervention in Mexico (January 1862 – March 1867). Napoleon, using as a pretext the Mexican Republic's refusal to pay its foreign debts, planned to establish a French sphere of influence in North America by creating a French-backed monarchy in Mexico, a project that was supported by Mexican conservatives who resented the Mexican Republic's laicism. The United States was unable to prevent this contravention of the Monroe Doctrine because of the American Civil War; Napoleon hoped that the Confederates would be victorious in that conflict, believing they would accept the new regime in Mexico.

But his imperial dreams would not be so easy to achieve. In Mexico, the French army suffered its first military defeat in 50 years,^[36][37] on the Fifth of May, 1862 in Puebla when the Mexican army under the leadership of General Ignacio Zaragoza defeated a much better-equipped French army. The defeat not only surprised the world, but served to revitalize the national spirit of Mexicans, helping to sustain a guerrilla warfare that lasted 5 years. In the end, it remained the Second Mexican Empire.

With the support of Mexican conservatives and French troops, in 1863 Napoleon installed Maximilian I of Mexico, a Habsburg prince, as emperor. Ruling President Benito Juárez and his Republican forces retreated to the countryside and fought against the French troops and the Mexican monarchists.

The combined Mexican monarchist and French forces won victories up until 1865, but then the tide began to turn against them, in part because the American Civil War had ended. The U.S. government was now able to give practical support to the Republicans, supplying them with arms and establishing a naval blockade to prevent French reinforcements arriving from Europe. Due to continued losses inflicted by the Mexican guerrillas loyal to the Republic and the threat of an American military intervention, Napoleon withdrew French troops from Mexico in 1866, which left Maximilian and the Mexican monarchists doomed to defeat in 1867. Despite Napoleon's pleas that he abdicate and leave Mexico, Maximilian refused to abandon the Mexican conservatives who had supported him, and remained alongside them until the bitter end, when he was captured by the Republicans and then shot on 19 June 1867. The complete failure of the Mexican intervention was a humiliation for Napoleon, and he was widely blamed across Europe for Maximilian's death. However, letters have since shown that Napoleon III and Leopold of Belgium both warned Maximilian not to depend on European support. Empress Eugénie has also been largely blamed for the fiasco, the implication being that she tried to meddle in affairs of state in order to get over her husband's affairs of the heart.^[38]

Empress Carlota of Mexico visited Napoleon III and Empress Eugénie at Les Tuileries to request financial and military aid to rescue the agonizing empire, but her petitions were rejected. Carlota in turn insulted the Emperor and his wife by mocking their humble origins. She subsequently declined into mental illness.

United States of America[link]

The Confederacy's last ironclad, Stonewall, was provided by France.

In the beginning of the 1860s, the objectives of the Emperor in foreign policy had been met: France scored several military victories in Europe and abroad, the defeat at Waterloo had been exorcised, and France was once again a significant continental military power.

During 1861 to 1862, Napoleon III positioned France to intervene in the American Civil War on the side of the Confederacy. The United States repeatedly warned that this meant war but the emperor inched steadily toward officially recognizing the Confederacy, especially after the crash of France's cotton textile industry and his successes in Mexico. Through 1862, Napoleon III met unofficially with Confederate diplomats, raising their hopes that he would unilaterally recognize the Confederacy.^[39][40] The emperor, however, could do little without the support of Britain, which refused to recognize the Confederacy. In 1863 the Confederacy realized there was no longer any chance of intervention, and expelled the French and British consuls, who were advising their citizens not to enlist in the Confederate Army.^[41]

Prussia[link]

A far more dangerous threat to Napoleon III, however, was looming. France saw its dominance on the continent of Europe eroded by Prussia's crushing victory over Austria in the Austro-Prussian War in June–August 1866. Due in part to his Carbonaro past, Napoleon was unable to ally himself with Austria, despite the obvious threat that a victorious Prussia would pose to France. Napoleon felt secure in the presumption that the war with Austria would be drawn out, or would result in Austrian victory, when he agreed not to intervene in 1864.^[42] Yet, having decided not to prevent the Prussian rise to power by allying against her, Napoleon also failed to take the opportunity to demand Prussian consent to French territorial expansion in return for France's neutrality. Napoleon only requested that Prussia agree to French annexation of Belgium and Luxembourg after Prussia had already defeated Austria, by which time France's neutrality was no longer needed by Prussia. This extraordinary foreign policy failure saw France gain nothing while allowing Prussia's strength to increase greatly. In part the reason for the Emperor's blunder must be laid on his deteriorating health during this period—he had begun to suffer from a bladder stone that caused him great pain, even preventing him from riding a horse.^[43]

Napoleon's later attempt in 1867 to re-balance the scales by purchasing Luxembourg from its ruler, William III of the Netherlands, was thwarted by a Prussian threat of war. The Luxembourg Crisis ended with France renouncing any claim to Luxembourg in the Treaty of London (1867).

Collapse[link]

Napoleon III, after his defeat and capture at Sedan in September 1870, with the victorious Fürst Otto von Bismarck.

Napoleon III eventually paid the price for his failure to help defend Austria from Prussia. In 1870, when goaded by Prussian Prime Minister Otto von Bismarck, he began the Franco-Prussian War.

Napoleon and most French leaders were confident of an outright victory. However, in a key strategic misjudgement, Napoleon took personal command of the army, which was poorly organized. He had no skills at this level of military action, and was psychologically despondent most of the time. He ignored sound military advice, and his forces scored only a few local successes as the better-armed and better-trained German army marched into France. Napoleon refused to return to Paris and turn command over to a more competent general. As a result, he was trapped and captured on 2 September 1870, following the Battle of Sedan. In Paris, two days later, he was deposed by the forces of the newly formed Third Republic.^[44]

The war proved disastrous for France, but was instrumental in giving birth to the German Empire, which would take France's place as the major land power in continental Western Europe until the end of World War I.

Exile and death[link]

After six months as a prisoner in Germany Napoleon spent the last few years of his life in exile in England, with Eugénie and their only son. The family lived at Camden Place, Chislehurst, where he died on January 9, 1873 during surgery for a bladder stone; an autopsy showed he also had a fatal kidney disease. He was haunted to the end by bitter regrets and by painful memories of the battle at which he lost everything; Napoleon's last words, addressed to Dr. Henri Conneau standing by his deathbed, reportedly were, "Were you at Sedan?" ("Etiez-vous à Sedan?")^[45]

Napoleon III after his death; wood-engraving in the Illustrated London News of January 25, 1873, after a photograph by Mssrs. Downey.

Portrait of Napoleon III by Alexandre Cabanel. This portrait was most liked by the empress and she took it into exile with her

Napoleon was originally buried at St Mary's, the Catholic Church in Chislehurst. However, after his son died in 1879 fighting in the British Army against the Zulus in South Africa, the bereaved Eugénie decided to build a monastery. The building would house monks driven out of France by the anti-clerical laws of the Third Republic, and would provide a suitable resting place for her husband and son. Thus, in 1888, the body of Napoleon III and that of his son were moved to the Imperial Crypt at St Michael's Abbey, Farnborough, Hampshire, England. Eugénie, who died many years later, in 1920, rests in the same abbey. The caskets can be viewed by visitors to the Abbey during public tours. It was reported in 2007 that the French Government was seeking the return of his remains to be buried in France, but this is opposed by the monks of the abbey.^[46]

Personal life[link]

Louis Napoleon has a historical reputation as a womanizer, yet he referred to his behaviour in the following manner: "It is usually the man who attacks. As for me, I defend myself, and I often capitulate."^[47] He had many mistresses. During his reign, it was the task of Count Felix Bacciochi, his social secretary, to arrange for trysts and to procure women for the emperor's favours. His affairs were not trivial sideshows: they distracted him from governing, affected his relationship with the empress, and diminished him in the views of the other European courts.^[48] Among his numerous love affairs and mistresses were:^[49]

Paul Hadol's caricature of Bellanger toying with Napoleon

• Mathilde Bonaparte, his cousin and fiancee
• Maria Anna Schiess (1812–1880), of Allensbach (Lake Constance, Germany), mother of his son Bonaventur Karrer (1839–1921)^[50]
• Alexandrine Éléonore Vergeot, laundress at the prison at Ham, mother of his sons Alexandre Louis Eugène and Louis Ernest Alexandre^[51]
• Elisa Rachel Felix, the "most famous actress in Europe"
• Harriet Howard, (1823–1865) wealthy and a major financial backer
• Virginia Oldoini, Countess di Castiglione (22 March 1837 – 28 November 1899) Spy, Artist and famous beauty, sent by Camillo Cavour to influence the Emperor's politics
• Marie-Anne Waleska, a possible mistress, who was the wife of Count Alexandre Joseph Count Colonna-Walewski, his relative and foreign minister
• Justine Marie Le Boeuf, also known as Marguerite Bellanger, actress and acrobatic dancer. Bellanger was falsely rumoured to be the illegitimate daughter of a hangman, and was the most universally loathed of the mistresses, though perhaps his favorite^[52]
• Countess Louise de Mercy-Argenteau, (1837–1890), likely a platonic relationship, author of The Last Love of an Emperor, her reminiscences of her association with the emperor.

His wife, Eugenie, resisted his advances prior to marriage. She was coached by her mother and her friend, Prosper Mérimée. "What is the road to your heart?" Napoleon demanded to know. "Through the chapel, Sire", she purportedly answered.^[47] Yet, after marriage, it took not long for him to stray as Eugenie found sex with him "disgusting".^[47] It is doubtful that she allowed further approaches by her husband once she had given him an heir.^[48]

By his late forties, Napoleon started to suffer from numerous medical ailments, including kidney disease, bladder stones, chronic bladder and prostate infections, arthritis, gout, obesity, and the effects of chronic smoking. In 1856, Dr. Robert Ferguson, a consultant called from London, diagnosed a "nervous exhaustion" that had a "debilitating impact upon sexual ... performance"^[49] and reported this also to the British government.^[48]

Legacy[link]

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"Napoleon III receives the rulers and illustrious men who visited the Exposition Universelle of 1867".

An important legacy of Napoleon III's reign was the rebuilding of Paris. Part of the design decisions were taken in order to reduce the ability of future revolutionaries to challenge the government by capitalizing on the small, medieval streets of Paris to form barricades. However, this should not overshadow the fact that the main reason for the complete transformation of Paris was Napoleon III's desire to modernize Paris based on what he had seen of the modernizations of London during his exile in the 1840s, when he lived in the small village of Chislehurst, just outside the city. With his characteristic social approach to politics, Napoleon III desired to improve health standards and living conditions in Paris with the following goals: to build a modern sewerage system to improve health, to develop new housing with larger apartments for the masses, and to create green parks all across the city. The Emperor ordered the creation of three large parks in Paris (Parc Monceau, Parc Montsouris, and Parc des Buttes Chaumont) with the clear intention of offering them for poor working families as an alternative to the pub (bistrot) on Sundays, much as Victoria Park in London was also built with the same social motives in mind. Large sections of the city were thus flattened and the old winding streets replaced with large thoroughfares and broad avenues. The rebuilding of Paris was directed by Baron Haussmann, turning Paris into the city of broad tree-lined boulevards and parks so beloved of tourists today.

With Prosper Mérimée, Napoleon III continued to seek the preservation of numerous mediaeval buildings in France, which had been left disregarded since the French revolution (a project Mérimée had begun during the July Monarchy). With Viollet-le-Duc acting as chief architect, many buildings were saved, including some of the most famous in France: Notre Dame Cathedral, Mont Saint-Michel, Carcassonne, Vézelay Abbey, Pierrefonds, and Roquetaillade castle.

Napoleon III also directed the building of the French railway network, which greatly contributed to the development of the coal mining and steel industry in France, thereby radically changing the nature of the French economy, which entered the modern age of large-scale capitalism. The French economy, the second largest in the world at the time (behind the United Kingdom), experienced a very strong growth during the reign of Napoleon III. Names such as steel tycoon Eugène Schneider or banking mogul James de Rothschild are symbols of the period. Two of France's largest banks, Société Générale and Crédit Lyonnais, still in existence today, were founded during that period. The French stock market also expanded prodigiously, with many coal mining and steel companies issuing stocks.

Although largely forgotten by later Republican generations, which only remembered the non-democratic nature of the regime, the economic successes of the Second Empire are today recognized as impressive by historians. The emperor himself, who had spent several years in exile in Victorian Lancashire, was largely influenced by the ideas of the Industrial Revolution in England, and he took particular care of the economic development of the country. He is recognized as the first ruler of France to have taken great care of the economy; previous rulers considered it secondary.

His military adventurism is sometimes considered a fatal blow to the Concert of Europe, which based itself on stability and balance of powers, whereas Napoleon III attempted to rearrange the world map to France's favour even when it involved radical and potentially revolutionary changes in politics. A 12-pound cannon designed by France is commonly referred to as a Napoleon cannon or 12-pounder Napoleon in his honour.

Napoleon III to this day lacks the favourable historical reputation that Napoleon I enjoyed. Victor Hugo portrayed him as "Napoleon the Small" (Napoléon le Petit), a mere mediocrity, in contrast with Napoleon I "The Great", presented as a military and administrative genius. In France, such arch-opposition from the age's central literary figure, whose attacks on Napoleon III were obsessive and powerful, made it impossible for a very long time to assess his reign objectively. Karl Marx, in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon, famously mocked Napoleon III by saying "Hegel remarks somewhere that all great world-historical facts and personages appear, so to speak, twice. He forgot to add: the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce." Napoleon III has often been seen as an authoritarian but ineffectual leader who brought France into dubious, and ultimately disastrous, foreign military adventures.

Historians have also emphasized his attention to the fate of the working classes and poor people. His book Extinction du paupérisme ("Extinction of pauperism"), which he wrote while imprisoned at the Fort of Ham in 1844, contributed greatly to his popularity among the working classes and thus his election in 1848. Throughout his reign the emperor worked to alleviate the sufferings of the poor, on occasion breaching the nineteenth-century economic orthodoxy of complete laissez-faire and using state resources or interfering in the market. Among other things, the Emperor granted the right to strike to French workers in 1864, despite intense opposition from corporate lobbies. Marxist sociologist Göran Therborn has characterized the reign of Napoleon III as the "first modern bourgeois regime", one which combined a movement of mass support with bourgeois rule, albeit through authoritarian statist means.^[53] According to Therborn, such a form of rule, ossified upon the point of crisis, proves fatal to such regimes once major external crises emerge.^[54]

Titles, styles, honours and arms[link]

Monarchical styles of Napoleon III, Emperor of the French
Reference style	His Imperial Majesty
Spoken style	Your Imperial Majesty
Alternative style	My Lord

Titles and styles[link]

• 20 April 1808 - 9 July 1810: His Imperial ad Royal Highness Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, Prince of Holland
• 25 July 1846 - 20 April 1808: His Imperial Highness Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, Prince Imperial of France and Count of Saint-Leu
• 10 December 1848 - 2 December 1852: His Imperial Highness Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, Prince Imperial of France and Count of Saint-Leu, President of the French Republic (Le Prince-President)
• 2 December 1852 – 4 September 1870: His Imperial Majesty the Emperor of the French
• 4 September 1870 - 9 January 1873: His Imperial Majesty the former Emperor of the French

Full title as Emperor[link]

His Imperial Majesty Napoleon the Third, By the Grace of God and the will of the Nation, Emperor of the French.^[55]

Paternity[link]

Speculation about his paternity was a favorite topic of his detractors,^[48] as his parents were estranged and his mother Hortense was known to have multiple lovers; however, the parents met briefly between 23 June and 6 July 1807, nine and a half months prior to his birth, and there is no reason to assume that Louis was not his father. Additionally, Article 312 of the Napoleonic Code stated (and still states) that the father of any child born within wedlock is the mother's husband. The meeting prior to his birth meant that there was no "impossibility" of conception, and that the Article 312 designated Louis as the father of the future Napoleon III.^[56]

Ancestry[link]

Bibliography[link]

• Brison D. Gooch, Napoleon III – Man of Destiny: Enlightened Statesman or Proto-Fascist?, editor, 1966^[57]
• The Reign of Napoleon III, Rand McNally European History series, 1969^[58]
• Les Idees Napoleoniennes – an outline of Napoleon III's opinion of the optimal course for France, written before he became Emperor.
• History of Julius Caesar, a historical work he wrote during his reign. He drew an analogy between the politics of Julius Caesar and his own, as well as those of his uncle.
• Napoleon III wrote a number of articles on military matters (artillery), scientific issues (electromagnetism, pro and con of beet versus cane sugar), historical topics (The Stuart kings of Scotland), and on the feasibility of the Nicaragua canal. His pamphlet On the Extinction of Pauperism helped his political advancement.
• David H. Pinkney, Napoleon III and the Rebuilding of Paris (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1958; paperback ed., 1972) ISBN 0-691-00768-3.

See also[link]

• Bonaparte
• History of France
• List of coupled cousins
• Second French Empire

References[link]

Sources[link]

• McMillan, J. Napoleon III (Longman, 1991)
• Thompson, J.M. Louis Napoleon and the Second Empire. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1965.
• Plessis, Alain (1989), The Rise & Fall of the Second Empire 1852–1871, Paris: Cambridge University Press 
• Randell, Keith (1991), Monarchy, Republic & Empire, Access to History, Hodder & Stoughton, ISBN 0-340-51805-7 
• Markham, Felix (1975), The Bonapartes, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, ISBN 0-297-76928-6 
• Bresler, Fenton (1999), Napoleon III: A Life, London: Harper Collins, ISBN 0-00-255787-8 

Further reading[link]

• Baguley, David. Napoleon III and His Regime: An Extravaganza (2000)
• David Harvey, Paris: Capital of Modernity, (New York: Routledge, 2003)
• Corley; T. A. B. Democratic Despot: A Life of Napoleon III (1961)
• Cunningham; Michele. Mexico and the Foreign Policy of Napoleon III (Palgrave, 2001)
• Duff, David. Eugenie and Napoleon III (Collins, 1978)
• Price, Roger. "Napoleon III: 'hero' or 'grotesque mediocrity'?" History Review (2003) pp 14+
• Price, Roger. Napoleon III and the Second Empire (Routledge, 1997)
• Price, Roger. The French Second Empire: an anatomy of political power (Cambridge University Press, 2001)
• Wawro, Geoffrey. The Franco-Prussian War: The German Conquest of France in 1870–1871(2005)
• Wetzel, David A Duel of Giants: Bismarck, Napoleon III, and the Origins of the Franco-Prussian War (University of Wisconsin Press, 2001)
• Zeldin, Theodore. The Political System of Napoleon III (Oxford University Press, 1958).

Primary sources[link]

• T. W. Evans, Memoirs of the Second French Empire, (New York, 1905)
• Marie-Clotilde-Elisabeth Louise de Riquet, comtesse de Mercy-Argenteau, The Last Love of an Emperor: reminiscences of the Comtesse Louise de Mercy-Argenteau, née Princesse de Caraman-Chimay, describing her association with the Emperor Napoleon III and the social and political part she played at the close of the Second Empire (Garden City, N.Y., Doubleday, Page & Co., 1926).

Movie portrayals[link]

• Leon Ames played him in Suez (1938), although Loretta Young as Eugenie is a more prominent character.
• Claude Rains portrays him in Juarez (1939) as a weak man ready to betray Maximilian in Mexico.
• Jerome Cowan plays Napoleon III in The Song of Bernadette (1943).
• Guy Bates Post plays Louis Napoleon in Maytime (1936).

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Napoleon III

Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article Napoleon III.

• Napoleonic ideas. Des idées napoléniennes (1859) at archive.org
• History of Julius Caesar vol. 1 at MOA
• History of Julius Caesar vol. 2 at MOA
• Histoire de Jules César (Volume 1) in French at archive.org
• Editorial cartoons of the Second Empire
• Place de la Revolution, Béziers & Napoleon 111

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Victor Hugo
Woodburytype of Victor Hugo by Étienne Carjat, circa 1880
Born	Victor-Marie Hugo 26 February 1802 (1802-02-26) Besançon, France
Died	22 May 1885 (1885-05-23) (aged 83) Paris, France
Occupation	Poet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights campaigner[citation needed]
Literary movement	Romanticism
Influences François-René de Chateaubriand, Walter Scott, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Voltaire, Alphonse de Lamartine, William Shakespeare
Influenced Louis-Honoré Fréchette, Charles Dickens, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Leo Tolstoy, Ayn Rand, Irvine Welsh, Albert Camus, Gérard de Nerval, Charles Baudelaire, Paul Verlaine, Oscar Wilde, Jean Cocteau, Gustave Flaubert, Jorge Luis Borges, Charles-Marie-René Leconte de Lisle
Signature

Victor-Marie Hugo (French pronunciation: [viktɔʁ maʁi yɡo]) (26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French poet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights activist^{[citation needed]} and exponent of the Romantic movement in France.

In France, Hugo's literary fame comes first from his poetry but also rests upon his novels and his dramatic achievements. Among many volumes of poetry, Les Contemplations and La Légende des siècles stand particularly high in critical esteem, and Hugo is sometimes identified as the greatest French poet. Outside France, his best-known works are the novels Les Misérables and Notre-Dame de Paris (also known in English as The Hunchback of Notre-Dame).

Though a committed royalist when he was young, Hugo's views changed as the decades passed;^[1] he became a passionate supporter of republicanism^{[citation needed]}, and his work touches upon most of the political and social issues and artistic trends of his time. He is buried in the Panthéon.

Biography[link]

Hugo was the third, illegitimate, son of Joseph Léopold Sigisbert Hugo (1774–1828) and Sophie Trébuchet (1772–1821); his brothers were Abel Joseph Hugo (1798–1855) and Eugène Hugo (1800–1837). He was born in 1802 in Besançon (in the region of Franche-Comté) and lived in France for the majority of his life. However, he decided to live in exile as a result of Napoleon III's Coup d'état at the end of 1851.

Hugo lived briefly in Brussels (1851) then moved to the Channel Islands, firstly to Jersey (1852–1855) and then to the smaller island of Guernsey (1855–1870). Although a general amnesty was proclaimed by Napoleon III in 1859; Hugo stayed in exile, only ending it when Napoleon III was forced from power as a result of the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War. Hugo returned again to Guernsey (1872–73), after suffering through the Siege of Paris, before finally returning to France for the remainder of his life.

Hugo's childhood was a period of national political turmoil. Napoléon was proclaimed Emperor two years after Hugo's birth, and the Bourbon Monarchy was restored before his eighteenth birthday. The opposing political and religious views of Hugo's parents reflected the forces that would battle for supremacy in France throughout his life: Hugo's father was an officer who ranked very high^{[clarification needed]} in Napoleon's army until he failed in Spain^{[clarification needed]} (one of the reasons why his name is not present on the Arc de Triomphe).^{[citation needed]}

He was a freethinking republican who considered Napoléon a hero; his mother was a Catholic Royalist who is believed^{[by whom?]} to have taken as her lover General Victor Lahorie, who was executed in 1812 for plotting against Napoléon.^{[citation needed]} Since Hugo's father was an officer, the family moved frequently and Hugo learned much from these travels.^{[citation needed]}

On his family's journey to Naples, he saw the vast Alpine passes and the snowy peaks, the magnificently blue Mediterranean, and Rome during its festivities.^{[original research?]} Though he was only nearly six at the time, he remembered the half-year-long trip vividly.^{[citation needed]} They stayed in Naples for a few months and then headed back to Paris.^{[citation needed]}

Sophie followed her husband to posts in Italy (where Léopold served as a governor of a province near Naples) and Spain (where he took charge of three Spanish provinces). Weary of the constant moving required by military life, and at odds with her husband's lack of Catholic beliefs, Sophie separated temporarily from Léopold in 1803 and settled in Paris. Thereafter she dominated Hugo's education and upbringing. As a result, Hugo's early work in poetry and fiction reflect a passionate devotion to both King and Faith. It was only later, during the events leading up to France's 1848 Revolution, that he would begin to rebel against his Catholic Royalist education and instead champion Republicanism and Freethought.

Young Victor fell in love and against his mother's wishes became secretly engaged to his childhood friend Adèle Foucher (1803–1868).^{[citation needed]}

Unusually close to his mother,^{[citation needed]} he married Adèle (in 1822) only after his mother's death in 1821. They had their first child Léopold in 1823, but the boy died in infancy. Hugo's other children were Léopoldine (28 August 1824), Charles (4 November 1826), François-Victor (28 October 1828) and Adèle (24 August 1830).

Hugo published his first novel the following year (Han d'Islande, 1823), and his second three years later (Bug-Jargal, 1826). Between 1829 and 1840 he would publish five more volumes of poetry (Les Orientales, 1829; Les Feuilles d'automne, 1831; Les Chants du crépuscule, 1835; Les Voix intérieures, 1837; and Les Rayons et les ombres, 1840), cementing his reputation as one of the greatest elegiac and lyric poets of his time.

Illustration by Luc-Olivier Merson for Notre Dame de Paris (1881) showing the recently restored galerie des chimères.

Hugo was devastated when his oldest and favorite daughter, Léopoldine, died at age 19 in 1843, shortly after her marriage. She drowned in the Seine at Villequier, pulled down by her heavy skirts, when a boat overturned. Her young husband Charles Vacquerie also died trying to save her. Victor Hugo was traveling with his mistress at the time in the south of France, and learned about Léopoldine's death from a newspaper as he sat in a cafe.^[2] He describes his shock and grief in his poem À Villequier:

Hélas ! vers le passé tournant un oeil d'envie,
Sans que rien ici-bas puisse m'en consoler,
Je regarde toujours ce moment de ma vie
Où je l'ai vue ouvrir son aile et s'envoler !

Je verrai cet instant jusqu'à ce que je meure,
L'instant, pleurs superflus !
Où je criai : L'enfant que j'avais tout à l'heure,
Quoi donc ! je ne l'ai plus !

Alas! turning an envious eye towards the past,
unconsolable by anything on earth,
I keep looking at that moment of my life
when I saw her open her wings and fly away!

I will see that instant until I die,
that instant—too much for tears!
when I cried out: "The child that I had just now--
what! I don't have her any more!"

He wrote many poems afterwards about his daughter's life and death, and at least one biographer claims he never completely recovered from it. His most famous poem is probably Demain, dès l'aube, in which he describes visiting her grave.

Writings[link]

Victor Hugo in 1853.

Like many young writers of his generation, Hugo was profoundly influenced by François-René de Chateaubriand, the famous figure in the literary movement of Romanticism and France's preeminent literary figure during the early 19th century. In his youth, Hugo resolved to be "Chateaubriand or nothing," and his life would come to parallel that of his predecessor in many ways. Like Chateaubriand, Hugo would further the cause of Romanticism, become involved in politics as a champion of Republicanism, and be forced into exile due to his political stances.

The precocious passion and eloquence of Hugo's early work brought success and fame at an early age. His first collection of poetry (Odes et poésies diverses) was published in 1822, when Hugo was only twenty years old, and earned him a royal pension from Louis XVIII. Though the poems were admired for their spontaneous fervor and fluency, it was the collection that followed four years later in 1826 (Odes et Ballades) that revealed Hugo to be a great poet, a natural master of lyric and creative song.

Victor Hugo's first mature work of fiction appeared in 1829, and reflected the acute social conscience that would infuse his later work. Le Dernier jour d'un condamné (The Last Day of a Condemned Man) would have a profound influence on later writers such as Albert Camus, Charles Dickens, and Fyodor Dostoevsky. Claude Gueux, a documentary short story about a real-life murderer who had been executed in France, appeared in 1834, and was later considered by Hugo himself to be a precursor to his great work on social injustice, Les Misérables.

Hugo's first full-length novel^{[citation needed]} would be the enormously successful Notre-Dame de Paris (The Hunchback of Notre-Dame), which was published in 1831 and quickly translated into other languages across Europe. One of the effects of the novel was to shame the City of Paris into restoring the much-neglected Cathedral of Notre Dame, which was attracting thousands of tourists who had read the popular novel. The book also inspired a renewed appreciation for pre-Renaissance buildings, which thereafter began to be actively preserved.

Portrait of "Cosette" by Émile Bayard, from the original edition of Les Misérables (1862).

Hugo began planning a major novel about social misery and injustice as early as the 1830s, but it would take a full 17 years for Les Misérables to be realized and finally published in 1862. Hugo was acutely aware of the quality of the novel and publication of the work went to the highest bidder. The Belgian publishing house Lacroix and Verboeckhoven undertook a marketing campaign unusual for the time, issuing press releases about the work a full six months before the launch. It also initially published only the first part of the novel ("Fantine"), which was launched simultaneously in major cities. Installments of the book sold out within hours, and had enormous impact on French society.

The critical establishment was generally hostile to the novel; Taine found it insincere, Barbey d'Aurevilly complained of its vulgarity, Gustave Flaubert found within it "neither truth nor greatness", the Goncourts lambasted its artificiality, and Baudelaire – despite giving favorable reviews in newspapers – castigated it in private as "tasteless and inept". Les Misérables proved popular enough with the masses that the issues it highlighted were soon on the agenda of the National Assembly of France. Today the novel remains his most enduringly popular work. It is popular worldwide, has been adapted for cinema, television and stage shows.

The shortest correspondence in history is said to have been between Hugo and his publisher Hurst and Blackett in 1862. Hugo was on vacation when Les Misérables was published. He queried the reaction to the work by sending a single-character telegram to his publisher, asking "?". The publisher replied with a single "!" to indicate its success.^[3]

Hugo turned away from social/political issues in his next novel, Les Travailleurs de la Mer (Toilers of the Sea), published in 1866. Nonetheless, the book was well received, perhaps due to the previous success of Les Misérables. Dedicated to the channel island of Guernsey where he spent 15 years of exile, Hugo's depiction of Man's battle with the sea and the horrible creatures lurking beneath its depths spawned an unusual fad in Paris: Squids. From squid dishes and exhibitions, to squid hats and parties, Parisians became fascinated by these unusual sea creatures, which at the time were still considered by many to be mythical.^{[citation needed]}

The word used in Guernsey to refer to squid (pieuvre, also sometimes applied to octopus) was to enter the French language as a result of its use in the book. Hugo returned to political and social issues in his next novel, L'Homme Qui Rit (The Man Who Laughs), which was published in 1869 and painted a critical picture of the aristocracy. The novel was not as successful as his previous efforts, and Hugo himself began to comment on the growing distance between himself and literary contemporaries such as Flaubert and Émile Zola, whose realist and naturalist novels were now exceeding the popularity of his own work.

His last novel, Quatre-vingt-treize (Ninety-Three), published in 1874, dealt with a subject that Hugo had previously avoided: the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution. Though Hugo's popularity was on the decline at the time of its publication, many now consider Ninety-Three to be a work on par with Hugo's better-known novels.

Political life and exile[link]

Among the Rocks on Jersey (1853–55).

After three unsuccessful attempts, Hugo was finally elected to the Académie française in 1841, solidifying his position in the world of French arts and letters. A group of French academicians, particularly Etienne de Jouy, were fighting against the "romantic evolution" and had managed to delay Victor Hugo's election.^[4] Thereafter he became increasingly involved in French politics.

He was elevated to the peerage by King Louis-Philippe in 1841 and entered the Higher Chamber as a pair de France, where he spoke against the death penalty and social injustice, and in favour of freedom of the press and self-government for Poland. However, he was also becoming more supportive of the Republican form of government and, following the 1848 Revolution and the formation of the Second Republic, was elected to the Constitutional Assembly and the Legislative Assembly.

When Louis Napoleon (Napoleon III) seized complete power in 1851, establishing an anti-parliamentary constitution, Hugo openly declared him a traitor to France. He relocated to Brussels, then Jersey, from where he was expelled for supporting a Jersey newspaper that had criticised Queen Victoria and finally settled with his family at Hauteville House in Saint Peter Port, Guernsey, where he would live in exile from October 1855 until 1870.

While in exile, Hugo published his famous political pamphlets against Napoleon III, Napoléon le Petit and Histoire d'un crime. The pamphlets were banned in France, but nonetheless had a strong impact there. He also composed or published some of his best work during his period in Guernsey, including Les Misérables, and three widely praised collections of poetry (Les Châtiments, 1853; Les Contemplations, 1856; and La Légende des siècles, 1859).

He convinced the government of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom to spare the lives of six Irish people convicted of terrorist activities and his influence was credited in the removal of the death penalty from the constitutions of Geneva, Portugal and Colombia.^[5] He had also pleaded for Benito Juárez to spare the recently captured emperor Maximilian I of Mexico but to no avail. His complete archives (published by Pauvert) show also that he wrote a letter asking the USA, for the sake of their own reputation in the future, to spare John Brown's life, but the letter arrived after Brown was executed.

Although Napoleon III granted an amnesty to all political exiles in 1859, Hugo declined, as it meant he would have to curtail his criticisms of the government. It was only after Napoleon III fell from power and the Third Republic was proclaimed that Hugo finally returned to his homeland in 1870, where he was promptly elected to the National Assembly and the Senate.

He was in Paris during the siege by the Prussian army in 1870, famously eating animals given to him by the Paris zoo. As the siege continued, and food became ever more scarce, he wrote in his diary that he was reduced to "eating the unknown".

Because of his concern for the rights of artists and copyright, he was a founding member of the Association Littéraire et Artistique Internationale, which led to the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works. However, in Pauvert's published archives, he states strongly that "any work of art has two authors : the people who confusingly feel something, a creator who translates these feelings, and the people again who consecrate his vision of that feeling. When one of the authors dies, the rights should totally be granted back to the other, the people".

Religious views[link]

Hugo's religious views changed radically over the course of his life. In his youth, he identified himself as a Catholic and professed respect for Church hierarchy and authority. From there he became a non-practicing Catholic, and increasingly expressed anti-Catholic and anti-clerical views. He frequented Spiritism during his exile (where he participated also in many séances conducted by Madame Delphine de Girardin),^[6][7] and in later years settled into a Rationalist Deism similar to that espoused by Voltaire. A census-taker asked Hugo in 1872 if he was a Catholic, and he replied, "No. A Freethinker".

After that point, Hugo never lost his antipathy towards the Catholic Church, due largely to what he saw as the Church's indifference to the plight of the working class under the oppression of the monarchy; and perhaps also due to the frequency with which Hugo's work appeared on the Church's Index Librorum Prohibitorum (Hugo counted 740 attacks on Les Misérables in the Catholic press). On the deaths of his sons Charles and François-Victor, he insisted that they be buried without a crucifix or priest, and in his will made the same stipulation about his own death and funeral. However, although Hugo believed Catholic dogma to be outdated and dying, he never directly attacked the actual doctrines of the Church.

Hugo's Rationalism can be found in poems such as Torquemada (1869, about religious fanaticism), The Pope (1878, anti-clerical), Religions and Religion (1880, denying the usefulness of churches) and, published posthumously, The End of Satan and God (1886 and 1891 respectively, in which he represents Christianity as a griffin and Rationalism as an angel). "Religions pass away, but God remains", Vincent van Gogh wrote that Hugo declared (but actually it was Jules Michelet).^[8] Christianity would eventually disappear, he predicted, but people would still believe in "God, Soul, and the Power".^{[citation needed]}

Victor Hugo and music[link]

Photogravure of Victor Hugo, 1883.

Although Hugo's many talents did not include exceptional musical ability, he nevertheless had a great impact on the music world through the inspiration that his works provided for composers of the 19th and 20th century. Hugo himself particularly enjoyed the music of Gluck and Weber and greatly admired Beethoven, and rather unusually for his time, he also appreciated works by composers from earlier centuries such as Palestrina and Monteverdi.^[9]

Two famous musicians of the 19th century were friends of Hugo: Berlioz and Liszt. The latter played Beethoven in Hugo's home, and Hugo joked in a letter to a friend that thanks to Liszt's piano lessons, he learned how to play a favourite song on the piano – with only one finger. Hugo also worked with composer Louise Bertin, writing the libretto for her 1836 opera La Esmeralda which was based on the character in The Hunchback of Notre Dame.^[10]

Although for various reasons the opera closed soon after its fifth performance and is little known today, it has been recently enjoying a revival, both in a piano/song concert version by Liszt at the Festival international Victor Hugo et Égaux 2007^[11] and in a full orchestral version presented in July 2008 at Le Festival de Radio France et Montpellier Languedoc-Roussillon.^[12]

Well over one thousand musical compositions have been inspired by Hugo's works from the 19th century until the present day. In particular, Hugo's plays, in which he rejected the rules of classical theatre in favour of romantic drama, attracted the interest of many composers who adapted them into operas. More than one hundred operas are based on Hugo's works and among them are Donizetti's Lucrezia Borgia (1833), Verdi's Rigoletto (1851) and Ernani (1844), and Ponchielli's La Gioconda (1876).^[13]

Hugo's novels as well as his plays have been a great source of inspiration for musicians, stirring them to create not only opera and ballet but musical theatre such as Notre-Dame de Paris and the ever-popular Les Misérables, London West End's longest running musical. Additionally, Hugo's beautiful poems have attracted an exceptional amount of interest from musicians, and numerous melodies have been based on his poetry by composers such as Berlioz, Bizet, Fauré, Franck, Lalo, Liszt, Massenet, Saint-Saëns, Rachmaninov and Wagner.^[14]

Today, Hugo's work continues to stimulate musicians to create new compositions. For example, Hugo's novel against capital punishment, The Last Day of a Condemned Man, was adapted into an opera by David Alagna, with a libretto by Frédérico Alagna and premiered by their brother, tenor Roberto Alagna, in 2007.^[15] In Guernsey, every two years the Victor Hugo International Music Festival attracts a wide range of musicians and the premiere of songs specially commissioned from such composers as Guillaume Connesson, Richard Dubugnon, Olivier Kaspar and Thierry Escaich and based on Hugo's poetry.

Declining years and death[link]

Victor Hugo, by Alphonse Legros.

Marble bust of Victor Hugo by Auguste Rodin.

Tomb of Victor Hugo and Émile Zola.

When Hugo returned to Paris in 1870, the country hailed him as a national hero. Despite his popularity Hugo lost his bid for reelection to the National Assembly in 1872. Within a brief period, he suffered a mild stroke, his daughter Adèle's internment in an insane asylum, and the death of his two sons. (Adèle's biography inspired the movie The Story of Adele H.) His wife Adèle had died in 1868.

His faithful mistress, Juliette Drouet, died in 1883, only two years before his own death. Despite his personal loss, Hugo remained committed to the cause of political change. On 30 January 1876 Hugo was elected to the newly created Senate. The last phase of his political career is considered a failure. Hugo took on the role of a maverick and got little done in the Senate.

In February 1881 Hugo celebrated his 79th birthday. To honor the fact that he was entering his eightieth year, one of the greatest tributes to a living writer was held. The celebrations began on the 25th when Hugo was presented with a Sèvres vase, the traditional gift for sovereigns. On the 27th one of the largest parades in French history was held.

Marchers stretched from Avenue d'Eylau, down the Champs-Élysées, and all the way to the center of Paris. The paraders marched for six hours to pass Hugo as he sat in the window at his house. Every inch and detail of the event was for Hugo; the official guides even wore cornflowers as an allusion to Fantine's song in Les Misérables.

Victor Hugo's death on 22 May 1885, at the age of 83, generated intense national mourning. He was not only revered as a towering figure in literature, he was a statesman who shaped the Third Republic and democracy in France. More than two million people joined his funeral procession in Paris from the Arc de Triomphe to the Panthéon, where he was buried. He shares a crypt within the Panthéon with Alexandre Dumas and Émile Zola. Most large French towns and cities have a street named for him. The avenue where he died, in Paris, now bears his name.

Last will[link]

He left a set of five sentences as his last will to be officially published :

« Je donne cinquante mille francs aux pauvres. Je veux être enterré dans leur corbillard.

Je refuse l'oraison de toutes les Eglises. Je demande une prière à toutes les âmes.

Je crois en Dieu. »

[In English:]

I leave 50 000 francs to the poor. I want to be buried in their hearse.

I refuse [funeral] orations of all churches. I beg a prayer to all souls.

I believe in God.

Drawings[link]

Hugo produced more than 4000 drawings. Originally pursued as a casual hobby, drawing became more important to Hugo shortly before his exile, when he made the decision to stop writing in order to devote himself to politics. Drawing became his exclusive creative outlet during the period 1848–1851.

Hugo worked only on paper, and on a small scale; usually in dark brown or black pen-and-ink wash, sometimes with touches of white, and rarely with color. The surviving drawings are surprisingly accomplished and "modern" in their style and execution, foreshadowing the experimental techniques of Surrealism and Abstract Expressionism.

He would not hesitate to use his children's stencils, ink blots, puddles and stains, lace impressions, "pliage" or folding (i.e. Rorschach blots), "grattage" or rubbing, often using the charcoal from match sticks or his fingers instead of pen or brush. Sometimes he would even toss in coffee or soot to get the effects he wanted. It is reported that Hugo often drew with his left hand or without looking at the page, or during Spiritualist séances, in order to access his unconscious mind, a concept only later popularized by Sigmund Freud.

Hugo kept his artwork out of the public eye, fearing it would overshadow his literary work. However, he enjoyed sharing his drawings with his family and friends, often in the form of ornately handmade calling cards, many of which were given as gifts to visitors when he was in political exile. Some of his work was shown to, and appreciated by, contemporary artists such as Van Gogh and Delacroix; the latter expressed the opinion that if Hugo had decided to become a painter instead of a writer, he would have outshone the artists of their century.

Gallery:

• 

  Crépuscule ("Twilight"), Jersey, 1853–1855.

• 

  Ville avec le pont de Tumbledown, 1847.

• 

  Pieuvre avec les initales V.H., ("Octopus with the initials V.H."), 1866.

• 

  Le Rocher de l'Ermitage dans un paysage imaginaire ("Ermitage Rock in an imaginary landscape")

• 

  Gavroche a 11 ans, ("Gavroche at 11 years old").

Memorials[link]

Avenue Victor-Hugo in Paris.

The people of Guernsey erected a statue in Candie Gardens (St. Peter Port) to commemorate his stay in the islands. The City of Paris has preserved his residences Hauteville House, Guernsey and 6, Place des Vosges, Paris as museums. The house where he stayed in Vianden, Luxembourg, in 1871 has also become a commemorative museum.

Hugo is venerated as a saint in the Vietnamese religion of Cao Dai.^[16]

The Avenue Victor-Hugo in the XVIème arrondissement of Paris bears Hugo's name, and links the Place de l'Étoile to the vicinity of the Bois de Boulogne by way of the Place Victor-Hugo. This square is served by a Paris Métro stop also named in his honor. A number of streets and avenues throughout France are likewise named after him. The school Lycée Victor Hugo was founded in his town of birth, Besançon in France. Avenue Victor-Hugo, located in Shawinigan, Quebec, Canada, was named to honor him.

In the city of Avellino, Italy, Victor Hugo lived briefly stayed in what is now known as Il Palazzo Culturale, when reuniting with his father, Leopold Sigisbert Hugo, in 1808. Hugo would later write about his brief stay here quoting "C’était un palais de marbre...".

In Havana, Cuba there is a park named after him and bust of Hugo stands near the entrance of the Old Summer Palace in Beijing.

Works[link]

1952 Soviet Union postage stamp.

Published during Hugo's lifetime[link]

• Cromwell preface only (1819)
• Odes et poésies diverses (1822)
• Odes (Hugo) (1823)
• Han d'Islande (1823) (Hans of Iceland)
• Nouvelles Odes (1824)
• Bug-Jargal (1826)
• Nils Gunnar Lie's history (1826)
• Odes et Ballades (1826) (Odes and Ballads)
• Cromwell (1827)
• Les Orientales (1829) (Orientalia)
• Le Dernier jour d'un condamné (1829) (The Last Day of a Condemned Man)
• Hernani (1830)
• Notre-Dame de Paris (1831), (The Hunchback of Notre-Dame)
• Marion Delorme (1831)
• Les Feuilles d'automne (1831) (Autumn Leaves)
• Le roi s'amuse (1832)
• Lucrèce Borgia (1833) (Lucretia Borgia)
• Marie Tudor (1833)
• Littérature et philosophie mêlées (1834) (A Blend of Literature and Philosophy)
• Claude Gueux (1834)
• Angelo, tyran de padoue (1835)
• Les Chants du crépuscule (1835) (Songs of the Half Light)
• La Esmeralda (only libretto of an opera written by Victor Hugo himself) (1836)
• Les Voix intérieures (1837)
• Ruy Blas (1838)
• Les Rayons et les ombres (1840)
• Le Rhin (1842)
• Les Burgraves (1843)
• Napoléon le Petit (1852) (Napoleon the Little)
• Les Châtiments (1853)
• Les Contemplations (1856) (The Contemplations)
• Les TRYNE (1856)
• La Légende des siècles (1859) (The Legend of the Ages)
• Les Misérables (1862)
• William Shakespeare (1864)
• Les Chansons des rues et des bois (1865) (Songs of Street and Wood)
• Les Travailleurs de la Mer (1866), (Toilers of the Sea)
• La voix de Guernsey (1867)
• L'Homme qui rit (1869), (The Man Who Laughs)
• L'Année terrible (1872)
• Quatrevingt-treize (Ninety-Three) (1874)
• Mes Fils (1874)
• Actes et paroles – Avant l'exil (1875)
• Actes et paroles – Pendant l'exil (1875) (Deeds and Words)
• Actes et paroles – Depuis l'exil (1876)
• La Légende des Siècles 2e série (1877)
• L'Art d'être grand-père (1877) (The Art of Being a Grandfather)
• Histoire d'un crime 1re partie (1877) (History of a Crime)
• Histoire d'un crime 2e partie (1878)
• Le Pape (1878)
• La pitié suprême (1879)
• Religions et religion (1880) (Religions and Religion)
• L'Âne (1880)
• Les Quatres vents de l'esprit (1881) (The Four Winds of the Spirit)
• Torquemada (1882)
• La Légende des siècles Tome III (1883)
• L'Archipel de la Manche (1883)

Poems of Victor Hugo

Published posthumously[link]

• Théâtre en liberté (1886)
• La Fin de Satan (1886)
• Choses vues (1887)
• Toute la lyre (1888) (The Whole Lyre)
• Amy Robsart (1889)
• Les Jumeaux (1889)
• Actes et Paroles Depuis l'exil, 1876–1885 (1889)
• Alpes et Pyrénées (1890) (Alps and Pyrenees)
• Dieu (1891)
• France et Belgique (1892)
• Toute la lyre – dernière série (1893)
• Les fromages (1895)
• Correspondences – Tome I (1896)
• Correspondences – Tome II (1898)
• Les années funestes (1898)
• Choses vues – nouvelle série (1900)
• Post-scriptum de ma vie (1901)
• Dernière Gerbe (1902)
• Mille francs de récompense (1934)
• Océan. Tas de pierres (1942)
• L'Intervention (1951)
• Conversations with Eternity (1998)

	Biography portal
	France portal
	Literature portal
	Poetry portal
	Children's literature portal

Online texts[link]

• Works by Victor Hugo at Project Gutenberg
• Works by Victor Hugo at Internet Archive
• Works by Victor Hugo at The Online Books Page
• Political speeches by Victor Hugo: Victor Hugo, My Revenge is Fraternity!
• Selected Poetry
• Biography and speech from 1851
• Obituary in The Times

References[link]

Online references[link]

• Afran, Charles (1997). “Victor Hugo: French Dramatist”. Website: Discover France. (Originally published in Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia, 1997, v.9.0.1.) Retrieved November 2005.
• Bates, Alfred (1906). “Victor Hugo”. Website: Theatre History. (Originally published in The Drama: Its History, Literature and Influence on Civilization, vol. 9. ed. Alfred Bates. London: Historical Publishing Company, 1906. pp. 11–13.) Retrieved November 2005.
• Bates, Alfred (1906). “Hernani”. Website: Theatre History. (Originally published in The Drama: Its History, Literature and Influence on Civilization, vol. 9. ed. Alfred Bates. London: Historical Publishing Company, 1906. pp. 20–23.) Retrieved November 2005.
• Bates, Alfred (1906). “Hugo’s Cromwell”. Website: Theatre History. (Originally published in The Drama: Its History, Literature and Influence on Civilization, vol. 9. ed. Alfred Bates. London: Historical Publishing Company, 1906. pp. 18–19.) Retrieved November 2005.
• Bittleston, Misha (uncited date). "Drawings of Victor Hugo". Website: Misha Bittleston. Retrieved November 2005.
• Burnham, I.G. (1896). “Amy Robsart”. Website: Theatre History. (Originally published in Victor Hugo: Dramas. Philadelphia: The Rittenhouse Press, 1896. pp. 203–6, 401–2.) Retrieved November 2005.
• Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th Edition (2001–05). “Hugo, Victor Marie, Vicomte”. Website: Bartleby, Great Books Online. Retrieved November 2005. Retrieved November 2005.
• Haine, W. Scott (1997). “Victor Hugo”. Encyclopedia of 1848 Revolutions. Website: Ohio University. Retrieved November 2005.
• Illi, Peter (2001–2004). “Victor Hugo: Plays”. Website: The Victor Hugo Website. Retrieved November 2005.
• Karlins, N.F. (1998). "Octopus With the Initials V.H." Website: ArtNet. Retrieved November 2005.
• Liukkonen, Petri (2000). “Victor Hugo (1802–1885)”. Books and Writers. Website: Pegasos: A Literature Related Resource Site. Retrieved November 2005.
• Meyer, Ronald Bruce (2004). “Victor Hugo”. Website: Ronald Bruce Meyer. Retrieved November 2005.
• Portasio, Manoel (2009). “Victor Hugo e o Espiritismo”. Website: Sir William Crookes Spiritist Society. (Portuguese) Retrieved August 2010.
• Robb, Graham (1997). “A Sabre in the Night”. Website: New York Times (Books). (Excerpt from Graham, Robb (1997). Victor Hugo: A Biography. New York: W.W. Norton & Company.) Retrieved November 2005.
• Roche, Isabel (2005). “Victor Hugo: Biography”. Meet the Writers. Website: Barnes & Noble. (From the Barnes & Noble Classics edition of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, 2005.) Retrieved November 2005.
• Schneider, Maria do Carmo M (2010). “Victor Hugo, gênio sem fronteiras”. Website: MiniWeb Educacao. (Portuguese) Retrieved August 2010.
• Uncited Author. “Victor Hugo”. Website: Spartacus Educational. Retrieved November 2005.
• Uncited Author. “Timeline of Victor Hugo”. Website: BBC. Retrieved November 2005.
• Uncited Author. (2000–2005). “Victor Hugo”. Website: The Literature Network. Retrieved November 2005.
• Uncited Author. "Hugo Caricature". Website: Présence de la Littérature a l'école. Retrieved November 2005.

Further reading[link]

• Barbou, Alfred (1882). Victor Hugo and His Times. University Press of the Pacific: 2001 paper back edition. ISBN 0-89875-478-X
• Barnett, Marva A., ed. (2009). Victor Hugo on Things That Matter: A Reader. New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press. ISBN 0-300-12245-4
• Brombert, Victor H. (1984). Victor Hugo and the Visionary Novel. Boston: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-93550-0
• Davidson, A.F. (1912). Victor Hugo: His Life and Work. University Press of the Pacific: 2003 paperback edition. ISBN 1-4102-0778-1
• Dow, Leslie Smith (1993). Adele Hugo: La Miserable. Fredericton: Goose Lane Editions. ISBN 0-86492-168-3
• Falkayn, David (2001). Guide to the Life, Times, and Works of Victor Hugo. University Press of the Pacific. ISBN 0-89875-465-8
• Feller, Martin, Der Dichter in der Politik. Victor Hugo und der deutsch-französische Krieg von 1870/71. Untersuchungen zum französischen Deutschlandbild und zu Hugos Rezeption in Deutschland. Doctoral Dissertation, Marburg 1988.
• Frey, John Andrew (1999). A Victor Hugo Encyclopedia. Greenwood Press. ISBN 0-313-29896-3
• Grant, Elliot (1946). The Career of Victor Hugo. Harvard University Press. Out of print.
• Halsall, A.W. et al. (1998). Victor Hugo and the Romantic Drama. University of Toronto Press. ISBN 0-8020-4322-4
• Hart, Simon Allen (2004). Lady in the Shadows: The Life and Times of Julie Drouet, Mistress, Companion and Muse to Victor Hugo. Publish American. ISBN 1-4137-1133-2
• Houston, John Porter (1975). Victor Hugo. New York: Twayne Publishers. ISBN 0-8057-2443-5
• Hovasse, Jean-Marc (2001), Victor Hugo: Avant l'exil. Paris: Fayard. ISBN 2-213-61094-0
• Hovasse, Jean-Marc (2008), Victor Hugo: Pendant l'exil I. Paris: Fayard. ISBN 2-213-62078-4
• Ireson, J.C. (1997). Victor Hugo: A Companion to His Poetry. Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-815799-1
• Laster, Arnaud (2002). Hugo à l'Opéra. Paris: L'Avant-Scène Opéra, no. 208.
• Maurois, Andre (1956). Olympio: The Life of Victor Hugo. New York: Harper & Brothers.
• Maurois, Andre (1966). Victor Hugo and His World. London: Thames and Hudson. Out of print.
• Pouchain, Gérard and Robert Sabourin (1992). Juliette Drouet, ou, La dépaysée. Paris: Fayard. ISBN 2-213-02095-7
• Robb, Graham (1997). Victor Hugo: A Biography. W.W. Norton & Company: 1999 paperback edition. ISBN 0-393-31899-0, (description/reviews at wwnorton.com)
• Tonazzi, Pascal (2007) Florilège de Notre-Dame de Paris (anthologie) Paris, Editions Arléa ISBN 2-86959-795-9

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Victor Hugo

Wikisource has original works written by or about: Victor Hugo

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Victor Hugo

• France of Victor Hugo
• Guernsey’s Official Victor Hugo Website
• Guernsey’s Victor Hugo International Music Festival
• Victor Hugo Central
• Victor Hugo's works: text, concordances and frequency lists
• 1867 Caricature of Victor Hugo by André Gill
• Victor Hugo le dessinateur
• Translation of Victor Hugo note found in "Hunchback of Notre Dame," french edition
• (French) Les Voix intérieures - at athena.unige.ch
• English translation of Hugo's At Dawn Tomorrow (Demain, dès l'aube)
• Another English translation of Demain, dès l'aube
• English translation of Hugo's A Villequier
• English translation of Hugo's Oh ! je fus comme fou dans le premier moment ('Oh! I was like a crazy man in the first moment') on the death of his daughter Léopoldine
• Official site of the Société des Amis de Victor Hugo
• Official site of the Festival international Victor Hugo et Égaux
• Victor Hugo at the Internet Book List
• Translation of The legend of Victor Hugo by Paul Lafargue
• Works by Victor Hugo on Open Library at the Internet Archive
• Works by or about Victor Hugo in libraries (WorldCat catalog)