On the afternoon of 5 May 1821, Napoleon Bonaparte, Emperor of the First French Empire exiled to st. Helena in the South Atlantic, came to the end of his life, when he was delirious and had difficulty speaking, uttering intermittent whispers such as "Army... France...... Josephine..."
Josephine Boarne, Napoleon's first wife and first empress of the First French Empire, was forced to divorce Napoleon in 1809 due to infertility and died on 29 May 1814 in Borussault de Malmaison, near Paris.
Josephine was 6 years older than Napoleon, and when she met Napoleon, she was already a mother of two children, a widow, her husband was executed by the Jacobins for treason, and she was once implicated in prison, supposedly because of her beauty, and was later rescued by her friend Madame Tarion.
Josephine is not only beautiful, but also has extraordinary knowledge and conversation, with super communication skills, once became a hot social flower in the Parisian social scene. Napoleon, who was 27 years old at the time, had just returned from the war, he was not yet famous and penniless, and the only thing he had was scabies, but Josephine immediately caught Napoleon's potential stock. This far-sighted woman then decided that Napoleon, who was "poor only with swords and cloaks", had a rare ambition and would become a great instrument in the future, so she created an opportunity to take the initiative to meet Napoleon, which was a blessing of knowledge for Napoleon.
Some people say that Napoleon married Josephine and became a member of the nobility, and even some Napoleon biographies say that Napoleon married Josephine in exchange for the position of commander of the Italian Legion. In fact, this is definitely a rumor. As early as 1793, Napoleon emerged in the Battle of Toulon, showed extraordinary military talent, and was promoted to brigadier general at the age of 24; in 1795, tens of thousands of royalists in Paris rebelled, the rule of the metropolitan government was in jeopardy, and at a critical juncture, Napoleon stepped forward and led 5,000 elite troops to successfully suppress the royalist rebellion and protect the fruits of the bourgeois revolution, after which Napoleon served as the commander of the Paris garrison and became the "Portuguese General" supported by Parisians.
As commander of the Garrison in Paris, Napoleon immediately presented to the Governor the plan of battle on the southern front that he had proposed many times: first annihilating the combined forces of Austria and the Kingdom of Sardinia, seizing the rich Piedmont and Lombardy regions, and then expelling the Austrian army from all of Italy and pushing the battlefield to The Austrian mainland. In this way, the threat of southeastern France could be relieved, and the main Austrian army could be avoided and the Austrian capital Vienna could be detoured from the south. This plan deeply impressed Carnot, who was the director of the Surveying and Mapping Bureau at the time, and later served as one of the five Governors of the Governorate, so when Napoleon presented the entire plan to the Governorate, it was immediately valued and appreciated. The Governor forwarded this plan to General Schererer, then commander of the Italian Front, only to receive an "arbitrary" answer: "Whoever draws up the plan should let whomever comes to the front and put it into practice!" Apparently, General Scherer considered the plan far beyond his and his army's capabilities. The Reaction of the Governor's Government was equally creative, and Napoleon was immediately appointed to succeed General Schererer. In this way, Napoleon, who was only 27 years old, became the commander of a front army, and at this time, he had not yet started a family.
Napoleon loved Josephine, there is no doubt: for Josephine, he did not hesitate to abandon his young and beautiful fiancée Dessie Clary, who had been with him for many years; for Josephine, he insisted on writing hot love letters to josephine every day of his expedition to foreign countries; for Josephine, Napoleon personally put on the crown of empress for Josephine on the day he ascended the throne, despite the restrictions of the French church; for Josephine, Napoleon could even forgive her several times for her femininity and debauchery...
Whether Napoleon was the commander of the army or later crowned emperor, he has been leading the army to fight, more than ten years of Napoleonic Wars, winning more than fifty large battles, smashing four anti-French alliances, and in the midst of the battle, he wrote countless strong and hot love letters to Josephine, which, even to this day, are the love books of young boys and girls:
"Ever since I separated from you, I've been depressed all the time. My happiness is to be able to be with you. I keep reliving your caresses, your tears, your affectionate thoughts in my memory. No one in the world can compare with you, and your charm will always burn in my heart... When will I be able to get rid of all my worries, all my annoying worries, spend every minute of my life with you, prove to you that I just need to love you, just think about the happiness I feel when I tell you my love... I thought I had loved you for a long time, but since I parted ways with you, I felt that I loved you now a thousand times more than I used to... Every day, I worship you more day by day... My beloved, not getting your message really makes me restless. Write me four pages of letters at once, four pages full of sweet words, and I will feel infinitely relieved... Hopefully soon I will hold you tightly in my arms and kiss you a billion times, as fiercely as I would under the equator..."
And what was Josephine, who received Napoleon's love letter, doing? According to the memoirs of some contemporaries who came into contact with Josephine, she was busy meeting with different lovers. Josephine's social flower personality has made her a lifetime full of flowers, and the men around her are green and endless, and every day she lives, her home is the most popular place in the Parisian social circle.
During Napoleon's conquest of Italy, Josephine lived a life of drunkenness in Paris, and those aristocratic balls and dinners fascinated Josephine very much, she liked such a life of song and swallow, and forgot about Napoleon who fought bloody battles on the front line. Every time Napoleon asked her to accompany her, she not only refused again and again, but also read aloud the letter napoleon wrote to her friends, and even if she replied, it was a formula. But the infatuated Napoleon was always ecstatic when he received a reply from his wife.
Once, Napoleon's subordinate Murat was ordered to deliver a letter to Josephine. Who knows, Josephine was suddenly attracted to this tall and rugged man, and then the two rolled the sheets for a while. Shortly thereafter, Josephine fell in love with a lieutenant officer named Hippolyte Charles. Lieutenant Charles was not only good-looking, but also sociable, and his humorous and witty personality greatly favored Josephine. She and Charles not only attended the various evenings in pairs, but also often snuggled up to each other and walked through the green lanes of Paris.
Faced with Josephine's delay, Napoleon was haunted by dreams and fidgeted, and only wanted to return to Paris to see Josephine. At this time, the Governor could not sit still, and in order to succeed in the war, the Governor asked Josephine to leave for the front to meet Napoleon. So Josephine had to cry and get on the carriage and take her lover Charles to Italy. Napoleon held a grand banquet at the Montabello Palace to welcome his wife, but after two nights of wartime emergencies, Napoleon returned to the front line and continued to fight, and josephine and Charles once again indulged in revelry and still lived a comfortable life. Later, josephine was denounced by Napoleon of his adultery, but Napoleon had no strong evidence and did not dispose of josephine.
In the summer of 1798, Napoleon conquered Egypt, and Josephine continued to hang out with her lover Charles, and almost all the people in Paris knew about it. The prestige of Napoleon was not willing to be humiliated, and decided to divorce Josephine, but Josephine refused and adopted the "tear-inducing law" for Napoleon. In the end, Napoleon, who loved Josephine deeply, forgave his wife...
In many historical articles, Josephine is portrayed as a woman living a life of debauchery, but in fact, the people who preached these materials were mostly enemies of Napoleon and were not necessarily really credible. Josephine, on the other hand, was able to share Napoleon's troubles and advances. After Napoleon's return from Egypt, he actively prepared to launch a coup d'état, josephine made full use of his social skills, mediated from it, and tried his best to win help for Napoleon, she won napoleon many originally neutral and even opposing figures, during this time she was only a virtuous and capable wife, and Josephine was called "Napoleon's pure and flawless angel" during the reign of the ruling king.
Once, Napoleon was assassinated on his way to the Opera House, and gunpowder exploded between his and Josephine's two carriages, and Napoleon's carriage passed first without noticing, and Josephine's horse stopped in fright. Josephine, who had fortunately escaped death, was pale, and the female officer in the same car asked her if she wanted to go back, but she flatly refused, "No, how can I let Bonaparte go alone?!" "Here, people see that they are inseparable, life and death are together.
On December 2, 1804, Napoleon was crowned emperor, took the crown from Pope Pius VII and personally put it on the heads of himself and his wife Josephine, implying "the throne he fought for", becoming "emperor of the French", and making his stepson Eugène de Boarone the deputy king of Italy, in charge of Italy.
The greatest misfortune of Josephine's union with Napoleon was the lack of children, and although Napoleon had always loved Josephine, the French princes and ministers objected: Empress Josephine had not given birth for several years! For the sake of his successor, Napoleon also had to succumb to reality and divorced Josephine in 1809. When Napoleon signed the divorce papers, he couldn't help but cry. On the third day after his divorce, he sat in the palace, staring at the sky, meditating behind closed doors, refusing to receive anyone and having no intention of doing anything.
After the divorce, Napoleon gave Josephine a series of preferential treatment and allowed Josephine to retain the title of Empress, and Josephine has been living in Malmaison's bedchamber ever since, and Napoleon often visits her.
In 1814, Napoleon's unsuccessful expedition to Russia was forced to abdicate and was exiled to the Mediterranean island of Elba. According to Josephine's daughter Otans, Josephine was originally going to the island of Elba to accompany Napoleon, but because he had no name, he had to write a letter to ask Napoleon's opinion, but before he could reply to Josephine, he suddenly fell ill and died, which has to be said to be a pity.
In February 1815, Napoleon returned to Paris and re-proclaimed himself emperor, facing a severe situation, Napoleon still took the time to visit Josephine's grave, thinking that he and Josephine were separated by yin and yang, and Napoleon, who had always been resolute, cried like a child: "My dear Josephine, at least she will never abandon me..."
Josephine Boarne, a woman who is legendary in French history and even in the history of the world.