NAPOLEON BONAPARTE

Napoleon Bonaparte - Profile in Leadership

Napoleon Bonaparte - Profile in Leadership

Introduction

Perhaps the most brilliant figure in military history, French Emperor Napoleon I reshaped Europe, commanding hatred and admiration in his own time and exerting a near mythic fascination that endures to this day. His name is simultaneously synonymous with conquest, unbounded ego, absolute power, and abject defeat.

Early Life

Napoleon's early life gave little hint of the momentous role he was to play. He was born Napoleone Buonaparte on August 15, 1769, at Ajaccio, Corsica, recently acquired by France, the second surviving son of Carlo and Maria Letizia Buonaparte. He attended the Royal Military College at Brienne-le-Château from April 1779 to October 1784, but was spurned as a provincial and a foreigner. Thus rejected, the young man grew aloof and threw himself into his studies. Nevertheless, he managed to graduate only near the bottom of his class, 42nd of 58 members. Abandoning naval for artillery training, Napoleon pursued further study at the ecole Militaire in Paris; he was commissioned a second lieutenant of artillery on September 1, 1785, and was assigned garrison duty with the La Fère artillery regiment.

During this period, Napoleon was influenced by the military theorist J. P. du Teil and also became involved in a Corsican nationalist movement beginning in 1789. He was transferred to the Grenoble artillery regiment in February 1791, securing promotion to first lieutenant. At this time, he became active in the Jacobin Club of Grenoble, traveled to Corsica, and engineered his election as lieutenant colonel of the Ajaccio Volunteers on April 1, 1792. After participating in an unsuccessful action in Sardinia during February 21-26, 1793, Napoleon fell into a dispute with the anti-French Corsican nationalist Pasquale Paoli. With his family, Napoleon fled to Marseille on June 10, 1793 (Dwyer, 2003).

Revolt of the Midi (July)

When the Revolt of the Midi (July) broke out, Napoleon joined on the side of the republicans and was appointed commander of artillery in the army of General Jean-Baptiste Carteaux. On September 16, 1793, he participated in the successful siege of Toulon, a royalist stronghold occupied by the British. By December 19, the British had been driven out, and Toulon fell to the republicans.

As a reward for his able command of the artillery, Napoleon was made a brigadier general, then designated artillery commander of the French Army of Italy in February 1794. With the overthrow of Maximilien Robespierre in July 1794, however, Napoleon was imprisoned from August 6 to September 14, 1794.

Following his release, Napoleon declined artillery command of the Army of the West and was assigned instead to the war office's Topographical Bureau. Appointed second in command of the Army of the Interior, he ended the Parisian uprising of 13 Vendemiaire (October 5, 1795), which protested the means of implementing the new constitution introduced by the National Convention. Napoleon dispersed the insurrectionists with a "whiff of grapeshot," thereby saving the Convention. The Directory, as the new government was called, rewarded him with full command of the Army of the ...