Retro Blast: The Peace of Amiens, or All Major Credit Cards Accepted

Tomorrow marks the 220^th anniversary of the end of the Peace of Amiens, that strange interlude in the nearly twenty-five years of war between England and France. So I thought it might be interesting to revisit this post from 2016 and see what it was all about...

* * *

It’s 1802. Great Britain and France have been at war since 1793, when the brand new French republic went on the warpath as surrounding European kingdoms, hoping to nip this republic idea in the bud, sent troops to help restore the Bourbon monarchy. They failed despite various alliances and coalitions and, to everyone’s surprise, France started expanding its borders, thanks in no small part to a certain up-and-coming young Corsican artillery officer.

By 1801 that artillery officer, one Napoleon Bonaparte, is First Consul of the French Republic. British Prime Minister William Pitt,  a resolute foe of Napoleon, is forced out of office in February and a less hawkish PM takes his place. Austria, Russia, and the Kingdom of Naples had all sued for peace a few years before.  And both France and England agree that some peace might be nice for a change.

After much negotiating, wheeling, dealing, and making of secret clauses over the summer and into the fall of 1801 the two countries reach a preliminary agreement at the end of September. In November the Marquis Cornwallis (yes, the same one who surrendered at Yorktown) is sent to the French town of Amiens to negotiate the final terms with Napoleon’s brother Joseph and Talleyrand. Though it takes months and is unsatisfactory in many ways to the British (they in particular are unhappy over the ambiguous disposition of Malta) a final agreement is signed on March 25, 1802 and in October King George officially declares peace.

And Britain goes shopping. 

Before you snort, "yeah, right," think about it: for much of the 18^th century, France had been the center of European culture...and Paris had been its apotheosis. French fashions, French art, French food, French manners, all had been admired and imitated; an upper class young man’s education was not considered complete until he’d spent a year or so wandering the Continent—especially France. But for the last ten years, Britain and France had been at war, which meant no visiting most places on the continent.

Now the war was over thanks to the Peace of Amiens, and the English descended on France to satisfy their craving for all things French.They flocked to the Palais Royal for expensive souvenirs and to the modistes and milliners for Paris gowns. They ordered jewelry and sets of china, and went to the galleries to buy art. Artists arrived in droves, not only from England but from all over Europe to visit the Louvre and see not only the latest art but also the Roman and Egyptian sculpture brought back by Napoleon. They visited sidewalk cafes, strolled in the parcs (though Paris was, alas, looking rather shabby after the depredations of the Revolution and ten years of war.) Even scientists came, among them astronomer William Herschel to visit the Paris Observatoire. And politicians came, both for all of the above reasons and, if they could, to catch a glimpse of the First Consul. Napoleon very obligingly received several of them, most notably Charles James Fox (who took the occasion of this trip to France to formally present his heretofore secret wife, former courtesan Mrs. Armistead.) And expatriates took the opportunity to visit their homeland, from which they'd been cut off for so long.

Unfortunately, this amicable state of affairs did not last long. The tensions and discontents created in the Treaty of Amiens were its undoing, along with Napoleon's efforts in other arenas to exclude Britain as much as possible from European affairs. Britain again declared war in May 1803, rather to France's and everyone else's surprise--in fact, over a thousand British tourists ended up imprisoned in France until 1814, when Napoleon was sent to Elba. I hope the shopping had been worth it!

Napoleon Hearts Science

Napoleon Bonaparte was the big bag bogeyman for much of the Regency period. Nothing would have made him happier than to invade England, and the English knew it. His face and figure featured in many a satirical cartoon of the day. Boney. The Corsican Monster.

The promoter of science and technology.

From an early age, Napoleon showed a skill for mathematics, so much so that he was originally put into artillery school in the military. He was still a young general, his star rising, when he was voted into the equivalent of the French Academy of Sciences. Many would whisper the scientists were merely attempting to curry favor. But he reciprocated by insisting that more than 150 scientists join the “expedition” to Egypt when he and the French army attempted to conquer that country in 1798. On the trip, he held scientific discussions aboard ship, raising the brows of the other military leaders and crew alike. But that expedition ended up discovering the Rosetta stone and opening the study of Egyptology.

Once back in France, Napoleon put not only his political prowess behind scientific advancements but his finances. He paid exorbitant salaries to scientists and engineers and offered prizes to have the most learned men of the day come speak on emerging areas, like electricity. One of these was Alessandro Volta, the Italian chemist credited with inventing the battery.

He pushed France to improve iron-smelting skills, supposedly because he wanted to be able to build bigger monuments. After seeing Robert Fulton test his submarine in the Seine in 1800, Napoleon awarded him with a grant to continue advancing the technology. Unfortunately, Fulton couldn’t figure out the fine points of propulsion. He lost his grant and returned to the United States. A shame Loveday Penhale of the Regent's Devices series hadn’t been there to help him. Doesn't it just look like a device she and Celeste Blanchard would have created? 😊

Others remembered his work. When Napoleon was defeated and exiled to St. Helena, there were allegedly plans to rescue him, by submarine!

One biographer claims Napoleon said if he hadn’t been the leader of France, he would have been a scientist on the scale of Galileo and Newton. Now, that sounds like the arrogant emperor England loathed!

Bits and Bobs

Any Pokemon fans out there?

Anyone who is even slightly acquainted with Pokemon will know about the one called Eevee, a cute little fox/cat-like critter who is genetically extroverted and can evolve into a multitude of equally cute little fox/cat-like forms, all of which have names ending in –eon. There’s Vaporeon and Jolteon and Flareon and Umbreon andandand...you get the idea.

Well, my daughter presented me with the latest Eevee evolution, and this kid knows me well.  Meet...NAPOLEON!!!

Two hundred and one years ago today, Napoleon was on his final journey on French soil, which he would depart forever on July 15. This little guy, though, won’t be leaving my writing room.

I’m going to ask her if she’ll design me a Wellingteon next. ☺

Holding your Horses

Fans of Georgette Heyer and Regency-set books in general frequently feature heroes (and sometimes heroines) who are adept at “handling the ribbons”, or driving a vehicle, be it a handsome barouche, a dashing curricle, or a semi-suicidal high perch phaeton “to an inch.” I can’t be the only one in this mostly horseless era to wonder what that was like...and here’s a video that can give us a flavor. Just wonderful!

Lights...Camera...Action!

The word on the street (or more accurately, the blogosphere) is that a movie version of one of Georgette Heyer’s funniest and best-loved novels, The Grand Sophy, is in the works.

Yes, you heard me correctly—a Georgette Heyer movie.

I’m not entirely sure how I feel about this—some books are just so wonderfully crafted that being chopped, pushed, and prodded into movie form until they’re unrecognizable is positively criminal (*coughcoughWinter’sTalecough*), and I would hate to see The Grand Sophy butchered to fit some director’s “vision.”  On the other hand, if it’s done right—IF!—it could be awesome.  If you’re interested in following this story, try here and here...I know I’ll be keeping an eye on it!

 

The Peace of Amiens, or, All Major Credit Cards Accepted

It’s 1802. Great Britain and France have been at war since 1793, when the brand new French republic went on the warpath as surrounding European kingdoms, hoping to nip this republic idea in the bud, sent troops to help restore the Bourbon monarchy. They failed despite various alliances and coalitions and, to everyone’s surprise, France started expanding its borders, thanks in no small part to a certain up-and-coming young Corsican artillery officer.

By 1801 that artillery officer, one Napoleon Bonaparte, is First Consul of the French Republic. British Prime Minister William Pitt,  a resolute foe of Napoleon, is forced out of office in February and a less hawkish PM takes his place.  Austria, Russia, and the Kingdom of Naples had all sued for peace a few years before.  And both France and England agree that some peace might be nice for a change. After much negotiating, wheeling, dealing, and making of secret clauses over the summer and into the fall of 1801 the two countries reach a preliminary agreement at the end of September. In November the Marquis Cornwallis (yes, the same one who surrendered at Yorktown) is sent to the French town of Amiens to negotiate the final terms with Napoleon’s brother Joseph and Talleyrand. Though it takes months and is unsatisfactory in many ways to the British (they in particular are unhappy over the ambiguous disposition of Malta) a final agreement is signed on March 25, 1802 and in October King George officially declares peace.

And Britain goes shopping.

Before you snort, "yeah, right," think about it: for much of the 18^th century, France had been the center of European culture...and Paris had been its apotheosis. French fashions, French art, French food, French manners, all had been admired and imitated; an upper class young man’s education was not considered complete until he’d spent a year or so wandering the Continent—especially France. But for the last ten years, Britain and France had been at war, which meant no visiting most places on the continent. Now the war was over thanks to the Peace of Amiens, and the English descended on France to satisfy their craving for all things French.

They flocked to the Palais Royal for expensive souvenirs and to the modistes and milliners for Paris gowns. They ordered jewelry and sets of china, and went to the galleries to buy art. Artists arrived in droves, not only from England but from all over Europe to visit the Louvre and see not only the latest art but also the Roman and Egyptian sculpture brought back by Napoleon. They visited sidewalk cafes, strolled in the parcs (though Paris was, alas, looking rather shabby after the depredations of the Revolution and ten years of war.) Even scientists came, among them astronomer William Herschel to visit the Paris Observatoire. And politicians came, both for all of the above reasons and, if they could, to catch a glimpse of the First Consul. Napoleon very obligingly received several of them, most notably Charles James Fox (who took the occasion of this trip to France to formally present his heretofore secret wife, former courtesan Mrs. Armistead.) And expatriates took the opportunity to visit their homeland, from which they'd been cut off for so long.

Unfortunately, this amicable state of affairs did not last long. The tensions and discontents created in the Treaty of Amiens were its undoing, along with Napoleon's efforts in other arenas to exclude Britain as much as possible from European affairs. Britain again declared war in May 1803, rather to France's and everyone else's surprise--in fact, over a thousand British tourists ended up imprisoned in France until 1814, when Napoleon was sent to Elba. I hope the shopping had been worth it!

1810--What a Year It Was

I promised you a new series, didn’t I? Well, today it begins...but first, a little background.

I’ve had an idea for an adult Regency story for years...but some ideas take a long time to marinate. I jokingly say that the girls in the back room had to think about it for a while...and in 2015, they let me know they were ready to get started. The story has turned into a serial, told in novella-length episodes that are complete stories in themselves but include an overarching plot (and developing romance, of course!) that interweaves with the events of the individual stories.

The story takes place over the course of 1810 and will end in 1811, which means I’ve been doing a lot of research about that one year...and it was a pretty interesting one. So I thought it might be fun to examine some of those events that inspired my serial, because we’re all about weird history stories here at NineteenTeen, right?

So what was going on around the world in 1810?  Although my serial of course will focus on England and its concerns, there was a lot of interesting stuff happening elsewhere...

• Napoleon divorces his Josephine in order to marry Marie Louise of Austria, and adds Holland and the German kingdom of Westphalia to the empire, but French forces under Marshal Masséna are expelled from Portugal
• Beethoven composes Für Elise
• Lord Byron, sojourning in Greece, swims the Hellespont 
•  General Bernadotte, one of Napoleon’s marshals, is elected Crown Prince and heir to the throne of Sweden.
• Frédéric Chopin, composer and pianist, is born, as were Robert Schumann, English novelist Elizabeth Gaskell (who wrote the wonderful Cranford, among others), and P.T. Barnum.
• Argentina, Mexico, Venezuela, Colombia, and Chile take varying steps toward independence from Spain.
• The first steamboat on the Ohio River begins operation . 
• King George III is declared insane (again.)
• And for you Regency boxing fans, the great 40-round match between Cribb and Molineaux takes place.

Stay tuned for the first post soon!

Green and Pleasant Land, Part 2: Oxford and Windsor

The next part of the Marissa Doyle tour of southern England involved a whirlwind tour of two quintessentially English places: the city of Oxford, and Windsor Castle. While we only spent a few hours in each place, it was well worth the effort...and helped break in my family to the sheer amount of walking we’d be doing for the rest of the trip!

After a quick peek at the Ashmolean Museum, we set out for a stroll up Cornmarket Street...

to the Carfax Tower--more properly, the 12th century tower of St. Martin’s church (the clock with the little mechanical guys who ring the hour are a 19th century addition)...

up High Street to get a peek at the Radcliffe Camera (alas, closed for the day)...

and the Church of St. Mary...

up to the Botanical Gardens, then down the Broad Walk past Christ Church Meadow (which was lovely and wild but surprisingly sheep-free)...

and Merton College, one of the oldest in the university and the college of J.R.R. Tolkien...

then on for a pleasant lunch (notice the delightfully sunny and warm weather--a feature of most of the trip) at The Head of the River Pub, on the Thames...or is it the Isis? For some reason, the Thames is called the Isis where it flows through the city. From what I’ve been able to discover, this seems mostly to have been a Victorian thing, involving some romantic but erroneous mythological and linguistic shenanigans; the old Celtic name of the river was the Tamesis, so you can see where the borrowing might have come from.

Whizzing down the M40 and M25, we arrived in Windsor and made it up to the Castle just before ticket sales closed...and I’m so glad we did. It’s a very interesting place, so old in places and yet immaculately maintained and manicured. Security was fairly tight as the Queen was in residence (her standard was flying over the Castle, which was pretty cool), so we had to go through the equivalent of airport security after purchasing our tickets.

We wandered around the grounds for a bit and got a look at this charming garden...

then made our way to view the bits open to the public: the State Rooms and...the Queen’s Dolls’ House, which I blogged about a few years ago and which was beyond amazing to see in person (alas, no photographs permitted.) The State Rooms were gorgeous, especially the Waterloo Chamber with Sir Thomas Lawrence’s portraits of the leaders of the Allies. It’s kind of amazing to see the originals of artwork you’ve only seen reproduced in books.

But probably the coolest thing we saw at Windsor was a special exhibit entitled “Waterloo at Windsor”, commemorating the 200th anniversary of the battle. Again, no photos permitted (sigh!), but here's a link to the exhibit's website. On display were portraits and Rowlandson cartoons and drawings...and then there were the letters: Napoleon’s formal letter of surrender to the Prince Regent, Wellington’s dispatch to the Prince after the battle, and more. My kids were mightily amused at their mother’s hyperventilating as she scurried from display case to display case, but honestly—what amazing things to see! I was a very happy history geek that afternoon.

Next stop on our tour: Bath!

The Battle of Waterloo: Was it Necessary?

Two hundred years ago today, Napoleon experienced his final victory at the Battle of Ligny...and his final defeat two days later, at Waterloo. But was his final defeat really necessary?

Earlier this year, British biographer Andrew Roberts published an enormous and quite readable biography of Napoleon. And in it he wonders if the Battle of Waterloo was really necessary. After returning to France from temporary exile in Elba, Roberts argues that Napoleon had changed. He was now in his mid-forties and beginning to feel his age and the years of hard campaigning, and according to a letter sent to the Allied governments still meeting at the Congress of Vienna, had given up on reconstituting his empire and simply wanted to concentrate on continuing his reforms and modernizations within France. He set about instituting a new constitution which including something approximating a legislature, and started in on further building projects in Paris and reopening several cultural institutions that Louis XVIII had closed during his brief return to the throne.

The Allies, though, would have nothing to do with that, not trusting the word of the man who’d beaten them so soundly so many times. And, Roberts states, they had other reasons for wanting to remove Napoleon—namely, to stop the growth of democratic ideas and ideals that Napoleon had kept as a legacy from the French Revolution, even during his rule as emperor. So they rejected his mild letter in the Vienna Declaration:

"By thus breaking the convention which had established him in the island of Elba, Bonaparte destroys the only legal title on which his existence depended, and by appearing again in France, with projects of confusion and disorder, he has deprived himself of the protection of the law, and has manifested to the universe that there can be neither peace nor truce with him.

The powers consequently declare, that Napoleon Bonaparte has placed himself with out the pale of civil and social relations; and that, as an enemy and disturber of the tranquillity of the world, he has rendered himself liable to public vengeance.” 

That vengeance happened to occur in what is now Belgium. Napoleon chose to make his stand there, in order to prevent the British and Prussian troops from being able to join together. At the Battle of Ligny, he defeated the Prussian General Blucher and kept the rest of the Prussian army pinned down...but strategic errors committed by some of his generals, most notably Marshal Ney, sowed the seeds of Napoleon’s final defeat two days later at Waterloo.

We’ve had a look at the battle here...and the rest is history. But Andrew Roberts states that history, and European civilization, might have been better off if the battle had never happened and Napoleon had been allowed to rule France. His defeat allowed the old reactionary monarchies who were still living in the early 18th century to hold onto power and crush the nascent movements toward democracy that were sprouting across the continent. The bloody revolutions of the 1840s might not have happened if constitutional monarchies had been adopted...and the world might have been a very different place as a result.

For a fun look at a recreation of today’s Battle of Ligny, check out this article in the New York Times...and if your interest is piqued, I highly recommend Andrew Robert’s Napoleon.

Green and Pleasant Land, Part 1: London

London is an amazing city. Of course the history aspect is amazing...but it’s also a remarkably livable city, at least for me who gets antsy when there aren’t trees nearby. There’s little of the canyon-like effect you get in Manhattan...and the parks are truly lovely. And did I mention the history? ☺

So the five of us arrived at our hotel in Westminster in what is probably an ideal place for sightseeing: we were at the St. James Courtyard hotel, a five-minute walk from Buckingham Palace (and on the same street as the Bluecoat School, about which Regina blogged). The hotel itself dates to the Edwardian era, and is built around a courtyard with all sorts of delightful architectural bits. London abounds in delightful architectural bits, by the way—no walk is ever dull there.

I’m happy to report that the statue of Queen Victoria at her memorial in front of the Palace still looks like a lifeguard (which I’d noticed on my first visit to London about thirty years ago)—for some reason Her Majesty’s nose is lighter than the rest of her, as if smeared with zinc oxide. And Canada Gate at the entrance to Green Park off Constitution Hill is as shiny as ever:

However, I was very sad to see that cows are no longer kept in Green Park as they were during the Regency, despite this reminder of their presence:

I found it a little surprising to see how small St. James’s Palace was, and how “right there” as well—the streets run right alongside it—considering it’s actually the official home of the sovereign (ambassadors are still accredited to the Court of St. James.) It was built by Henry VIII and added onto over the centuries, but still has that sixteenth century feel:

And then we were in St. James’s Street, Masculinity Central of Regency London, home of such places as Brooks’s and White’s Club (and yes, there’s the famous Bow Window at White’s)

What I found interesting (beside all the famous historical landmarks and stores) was the topography. St. James’s Street trends uphill, which I did not know—it’s one of those things that somehow doesn’t get mentioned very often, and which I’m glad I now know. But even more exciting to me was catching sight of King Street off St. James’s. The King Street, home of Almack’s Assembly Rooms? You bet—only, Almack’s is long gone, replaced by (sob!) an office building. But at least I can now say I was there as I scribble away at my Almack’s stories. That's me with Child #1. Yes, he's pretty tall.

What else? We dined at Wilton’s on Jermyn Street, established 1742, and had a wonderful dinner...and a delightful tea at Duke’s Hotel. We carried out a quick raid on Harrod’s and came away with tea and chocolates (alas, the presence of a husband and son necessitated the visit being brief). And we visited the Victoria and Albert Museum (glorious sensory overload—it’s the world’s largest museum of art and design) and Apsley House, the Duke of Wellington’s house at Hyde Park Corner, which was amazing.

No interior photographs permitted, alas, as my little history-geek heart was a-galloping at the eleven-foot tall statue of Napoleon at the base of the Principal Staircase on which it is rumored Wellington used to hang his hat as he went up the stairs (and the painting of Wellington in old age presenting a gift to his godson, Queen Victoria’s son Arthur)...at the astonishing Waterloo Shield, which really has to be seen to be appreciated (Google it!) Wellington came away from the wars with a ton of goodies from grateful European heads of state. And most of all at the Waterloo Gallery, the room where Wellington held his annual dinners to commemorate the battle and which held his collection of Spanish masters. Curiously, among the amazing art collection amassed here are multiple portraits of Napoleon and members of his family. After Waterloo, Wellington would be linked for the rest of his life to the former French emperor—without Napoleon, Wellington would not have been Wellington. That must have been a strange thing to have to live with for the rest of his life—so closely linked to someone he actually never met face-to-face—and he lived nearly forty more years after the battle.

And right around the corner from Apsley House in Hyde Park? Rotten Row, of course!

Next time: visiting Oxford and Windsor

Corporal Violet

Violets. Aren’t they pretty? Such a charming picture to print—or rather, re-print in Ackermann’s Repository. The original image was a hugely popular one around France in 1814 and early 1815, so much so that it was quickly banned by the French government and continued to be so on and off for the next sixty years. What could be so controversial about an innocent bunch of violets?

Look closely at the image, in particular the upper right hand side of it. Do you by chance see a face in profile there, with a distinctive (and familiar) hat formed by the folded leaf? Directly opposite it on the left side, do you see another one facing it? And between and below them, hard by the stems, is there a third, smaller one? They are Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, his wife Marie Louise of Austria, and their three-year-old son. So what does Napoleon have to do with violets?

The story goes that after Napoleon’s defeat in early spring 1814, while he wrestled with whether or not to accept his banishment to Elba quietly, he was walking in the gardens at Fontainebleau and was given a bunch of violets by a child there. The emperor took it as a sign and declared that he would henceforth take the violets as his emblem and accept his exile meekly, like the shy and retiring violet. But the following day, while again walking in the gardens, he went to pick more of the flowers. According to an account in the Pall Mall Gazette:

The violets were rather scarce on the spot, and the grenadier Choudieu, who was on guard, said to him, “Sire, in a year's time it will be easier to pick them; they will then be more plentiful.” Bonaparte, greatly astonished, looked at him. “You think, then, that next year 1 shall be back?” “Perhaps sooner; at least we hope so.” “Soldier, do you not know that after to-morrow I start for Elba?” “Your Majesty will wait till the clouds roll by.” “Do your comrades think like you?” “Almost all.” “They may think it, but may not say it. After you are relieved go to Bertrand and let him give you 20 Napoleons d'or, but keep silence.” Choudieu returned to the barracks, and drew the attention of his comrades to the fact that for the last two days the Emperor had been walking about with a bunch of violets. “We will call him among ourselves Pere la Violette.” From that day forth Napoleon was only called by that name in the barracks.

And as he prepared to set sail for Elba a few days later, he addressed the Imperial Guard: “I would embrace every one of you to display my affection, but I will kiss this flag, for it represents all of you. But know that I shall return to France when the violets will bloom.” After that, violets were all the rage. Not only did Frenchman carry little posies of them around: asking someone if they liked violets became shorthand for asking what their political alignment was. A yes meant you were for the return of the emperor; a no meant you supported the reinstated Bourbon monarchy. Copies of this image, with its hidden-in-plain-sight portraits, were all the rage as well, especially as more and more Frenchman became disillusioned with the reactionary and repressive regime of the new King Louis XVIII.

True to his word, Napoleon returned with the violets, slipping away from Elba under the noses of the British and landing in the south of France on March 20, 1815. Corporal Violet had returned, along with his namesake, though not for long...by June, both the flowers and the emperor were gone. 

Nineteenth Century Heroines: Lighter Than Air

Some of you will remember a series I did a while ago at QNPoohBear's suggestion of real-life nineteenth century ladies who were inspiring enough to be heroines in a book.  We talked about Caroline Herschel’s stargazing, Ada Byron’s mathematical computing, and Mary Anning’s dinosaur hunting.  I recently stumbled upon another lady I simply had to add to the list:  the commander of Napoleon’s balloon army, Sophie Blanchard.

You wouldn’t think ballooning would be a career for a lady in the late eighteenth, early nineteenth century, much less leading a squadron of armed forces for a major power.  Sophie was one of a handful of women who ventured up in balloons, and one of the only ones skilled enough to go up alone.  Born in 1778 in France, Sophie was a nervous girl who disliked riding in carriages and startled at loud noises.  We don’t know a great deal about her early life, but somewhere between the ages of 16 and 26, she married one of the premiere balloonists of the day, Jean-Pierre Blanchard. 

Jean-Pierre was a showman who had already toured Europe and America, helped pioneer the parachute, and set records around the world.  Unfortunately, he hadn’t a lick of business sense and was always in debt.  In hopes of recovering, he added Sophie to his act, and the two were popular sights for coronations, royal birthdays, the opening of major buildings, and the like.  Sophie was undaunted by the dangers of balloon flight, claiming at one point that she’d rather sleep in a balloon than on land.  She flew high enough that she nearly passed out from lack of oxygen, she risked freezing at the cold temperatures aloft, and once she almost drown when her balloon landed in a swamp. 

She performed so many times for Napoleon, both with her husband and solo, that he made her the Aeronaut of Official Festivities.  Determined to reach England by any way possible, he also appointed her the Chief Air Minister of Ballooning and asked her to draw up plans for how he could fly his army over the Channel to attack.  Sophie is reported to have had little faith in the venture.  Balloons at that time had few ways to control them, and she recognized, even if Napoleon did not, that the wind generally blew the wrong way.

Tragedy struck the couple in 1809 when Jean-Pierre had a heart attack while performing and fell from his balloon to his death.  Sophie, however, continued to perform.  Despite the fact that she was afraid of loud noises, she perfected an act in which she lighted fireworks and tossed them by parachute from her balloon to the delighted crowds below.  Her vehicle of choice was a hydrogen-filled balloon with a tiny basket below.  She flew to celebrate the marriage of Napoleon to Marie-Louise of Austria in 1810 and on Napoleon’s 42nd birthday in 1811.  She flew over Paris and threw down leaflets proclaiming the birth of Napoleon’s son.  She also performed in Germany, Rome, and the Alps.

I wish I had a happy ending for you.  Unfortunately, it seems Sophie and Jean-Pierre had no children, or at least none that survived beyond infancy.  In July 1819, Sophie was performing at the Tivoli Gardens in Paris when her balloon caught fire and she too fell to her death, entangled in the cords of her basket.  All proceeds from the event were used to build her a monument in a Paris cemetery. 

But Sophie wasn’t forgotten.  Jules Vernes mentioned her in Five Weeks in a Balloon, proving that, nearly 50 years after her death, her amazing accomplishments lived on.

Celebrity Chefs of the 19th Century, Part 1: Carême

Gordon Ramsay, Anthony Bourdain, Emeril Lagasse…everyone’s heard of (or seen on television) these and a dozen other celebrity chefs. But celebrity chefdom isn’t by any means a modern phenomenon. It actually began early in the 19th century with a Frenchman named Marie-Antoine (though he preferred to be known as Antonin) Carême. And just how much of a superstar chef was he? Hmm…how does working for Napoleon, the Prince Regent, and the Tsar of Russia sound to you?

Carême’s career in cookery started more or less by accident. Born in Paris to an impoverished family sometime in 1783, he was abandoned by his parents in 1792, in the middle of the Terror, to make his own way in life. Fortunately for him, he was taken in by a cook at a chophouse to serve as a lowly kitchen-boy in exchange for room and board. Cookery must have suited him, for in 1798 he left the become an apprentice to a pâtissier, or pastry and confectionery chef, in the busy and fashionable Palais Royal district of Paris.

He also became a reader, and spent all his free hours at the Bibliothèque Nationale reading about food in history and classical architecture…and soon after, began recreating the ruins, temples, and castles that he’d studied in pastry and marzipan and spun sugar. These centerpieces or extraordinaires, often several feet high and wide, gained him the title of master patissier (premier tourrier) by his 17th birthday. They also brought him to the attention of Charles Maurice Talleyrand, that wily politician who somehow managed to hold high office under every administration in France from King Louis XVI to Napoleon to the Citizen King Louis-Philippe.

In addition to being a brilliant politician, Talleyrand was also a brilliant connoisseur of food. It’s likely that Carême came to his attention via his extraordinaires, and soon he was serving as a freelance chef, supervising Talleyrand’s more important dinners as well as making his famous centerpieces. He became known to many important people in this way, and was able to earn enough to open his own pâtisserie in 1803, before he had even reached his majority. He continued to work hard, learning from other chefs, and became better and better known thanks to his continuing work for Talleyrand. He catered the wedding of Napoleon’s brother Jerome in 1808, and in 1810, made the wedding cake for the Emperor’s own marriage to Marie Louise of Austria (and the following year, one of his extraordinaires for the christening of Napoleon’s son).

But though Napoleon fell in 1814-1815, Talleyrand and Carême did not. When Tsar Alexander I entered Paris after Napoleon’s defeat, he stayed at Talleyrand’s house…and ate Carême’s cooking. Alexander’s steward offered him a job on the spot, but Carême refused for the time being. Instead he wrote a cookbook while Talleyrand went to the Congress of Vienna, and a year later, accepted the offer of the Prince Regent to be his chef for the enormous salary of £2000 per year. Prinny redid his kitchens at the Brighton Pavilion expressly for Carême, now known as the best chef in the world. But despite his splendid kitchens, the best ingredients, and the personal interest of the Prince, who actually came down to the kitchens to see his chef in action, Carême returned to France within a year, uncomfortable with the English way of life and profoundly homesick for Paris. He worked for a while for British diplomat Lord Charles Stewart, brother of Prime Minister Lord Castlereagh, and then in 1819 finally accepted that offer to become Tsar Alexander’s chef. He did not last long in Russia either, however, and returned to France, working again for Lord Charles and writing more cookbooks, before joining in 1823 the household of James de Rothschild, with whom he stayed until his early death in 1833, probably from pulmonary disease brought on by years of working in badly ventilated kitchens.

Carême’s influence on what and how we eat lasts to this day: he was the first to pipe meringue from a pastry bag and created vol-au-vents, or puff-pastry cases, and the classification and use of French sauces. He was one of the first chefs to pay attention to the pairing of wines with food, and brought back from Russia a preference for decorating dining tables with flowers rather than with displays of fruit and crockery, and for service à la russe, the method of serving food by individual courses rather than by placing it all on the table at once (called service à la française). Oh, and he created the tall white chef's toque worn by chefs to this day. Definitely a candidate for his own show on the Food Network, don’t you think?

Sighting the Great Comet

On March 25, 1811, an astronomer named Honore Flaugergues was scanning the night skies over his home in Viviers, France, when he suddenly sighted something odd. A glowing ball sat low on the horizon to the south and moved northward each night as it brightened. Over the next 16 months, people the world over watched the Great Comet as it passed earth on its 3,757-year orbit. Only Comet Hale-Bopp in 1997 was visible longer in recorded history, and it was not as large. The Great Comet of 1811 must have been a magnificent sight, for its diameter was roughly the same as that of the sun. The tail was 110 million miles long, split into two branches like a crescent with the head at the center.

Today we know that comets are made from dust, rocks, and frozen methane, ammonia, and water. In the Regency, men of science knew them for anomalies in the solar system. People of a less scientific bent considered them omens of either good, or dire, fortune. Napoleon, for example, saw the comet as a sign of his divine right to conquer. He chose that winter to invade Russia, where the weather and valiant Russian people offered him his first major defeat.


In the United States, on the other hand, cults prepared for the end of the world. Particularly in the Ohio and Kentucky wilderness, people feared the worst. Of course, they’d had a rough year by any account. A summer drought killed the crops, and tornadoes and hurricanes plagued the area. Native American uprisings, a massive suicide by squirrels trying to swim the Ohio River, and a total eclipse of the sun on September 17 might have given anyone pause. However, what really shook things up was the Great Madrid earthquake.

The Great Madrid earthquake, centered in Madrid, Missouri, in December 1811 was felt all the way to Boston and changed the course of the Mississippi River for a time. It was the largest earthquake in the U.S. history, estimated to be at least 8.0 on the Richter scale (which had yet to be invented). The Louisiana Gazette and Daily Advertiser (New Orleans) said that the shake was possibly caused by the Great Comet passing westward and striking the “mountain in California.” Either that or God was visiting His wrath on northern areas beyond Natchez, which they deemed as particularly lawless.

An earlier earthquake in Cape Town, Africa, on June 2, 1811, was also blamed on the comet, which had been seen in the skies every night since May 12. People were certain the Cape was going to be annihilated. Today’s scholars even blame the comet for helping to inspire the Luddite riots in England in April 1811.

On there’s an excuse if I ever heard one: “I cannot favor you with a dance, Mr. Jones. The Great Comet was visible tonight, and I do not dare take the chance of something dire happening in this set.”

"The Nearest Run Thing You Ever Saw in Your Life"

Last Friday marked the 195th anniversary of an event that was...well, not to sound too dramatic, but an event that marked the beginning of modern Europe. I'm talking about the Battle of Waterloo.

It was June 1815. Napoleon Bonaparte, Emperor of the French, had been defeated in 1814 after running roughshod over most of Europe and sent into exile on the island of Elba...and had come back eight months later, determined to return to his former position. Everyone who was anyone in Europe was at the Congress of Vienna, where they were busy carving up the former French empire into bits based on who owed whom favors when Napoleon sailed from Elba on February 26 and landed in the south of France. By March 20 he was back in Paris, having retaken the country without firing a single shot. King Louis XVIII (brother of Louis XVI who had been guillotined in the Revolution) who had been restored to the throne after Napoleon's ouster, fled to Belgium (at this time still part of the Netherlands).

However, the crowned heads of Europe were not about to let Napoleon stay where he was and risk his reconquering Europe once again. The man who'd been most responsible for Napoleon's recent downfall, Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, left Vienna, where he'd been head of the English delegation, and headed to Brussels, Belgium. It had been decided that the armies of Europe would hastily re-gather themselves and march on France on three fronts; English and Dutch and Prussian troops would take the northeast frontier in Belgium. It was thought that Napoleon might begin his defense of France there, and the guess proved correct: on June 15, while at a ball in Brussels given by the English Duchess of Richmond, the Duke of Wellington received word that Napoleon had crossed the border with his army and was marching toward the city.

The indecisive Battle of Quatre Bras, fought on June 16, ended in more or less a draw, and ensured that further battle would follow...which it did, two days later, near the small village of Waterloo south of Brussels. Noteworthy for readers of Nineteenteen is the age of many of the soldiers who fought in this battle: there wasn't time to gather the seasoned troops who'd fought with Wellington in Spain and Portugal (many of them had been deployed to fight in America in what we know as the War of 1812) and so thousands of youths enlisted to fill the void. Though legally 18 was the enlisting age, enlistees as young as fifteen were permitted, with a nod and a wink, to join up. Many of them never returned home; of the Allied (Dutch/Belgian, German, and British) troops, 23,000 of them British, one in four did not survive.

The battle itself was hell. It had poured the previous night and everyone was wet and miserable; indeed, Napoleon did not attack until nearly noon, waiting for the ground to dry so that his artillery pieces could be better manoeuvered. This delay favored the Allies; they were awaiting the arrival of reinforcements in the form of the Prussian army under General Blucher. Wellington's strategy was to simply stand in the way and not let Napoleon progress along the road to Brussels. This he did; General Blucher's arrival with the mass of his army early that evening enabled the combined Allied/Prussian army to go on the offensive, and by half-past eight, the French began to flee. Napoleon abdicated a second time on June 24, and the years of war were finally over.

This is, of course, the briefest outline of the Battle and the circumstances around it. If you're interested in getting deeper into it, I recommend two books: the first is An Infamous Army by (yes, really) Georgette Heyer. Don't laugh; it was used as a text at Sandhurst (Britain's West Point) to teach about the battle, so well-regarded was her account. The second is Dancing into Battle: A Social History of the Battle of Waterloo by Nick Foulkes--non-fiction, but as readable and lively as fiction.

Oh, and today's title? It's a quote from the Duke himself, who is supposed to have said it to describe the day's events.

Fashion Forecast: 1815

Time for more eye candy!

What was the well-dressed young woman wearing in 1815?

1815 was, of course, a momentous year in European history as it saw the final defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte by a combined English, Dutch, and Prussian army under the Duke of Wellington and General Blucher.

In January, however, this was all in the future; the Congress of Vienna still hashed over the terms of the new Europe, Napoleon was apparently contained in exile on Elba, and England got used to the reality of peace again. Equally serene is this charming Evening Dress from Ackermann’s Repository. Note the pretty embroidered hem and the becoming upswept hair style:
In February that serenity was shattered with news of the escape of Napoleon from Elba and his nearly unopposed March on Paris, which greeted him rapturously. Was the young lady in this graceful and very classically inspired Evening Dress from Ackermann’s Repository contemplating a suddenly uncertain future?:
I just adore this Ackermann print, as one of the characters in my upcoming book has a pet parakeet who plays an important role in the plot in April 1815, when this print was published. That’s quite an elaborate cap for a morning dress, don’t you think?:
In June came the Battle of Waterloo, as mentioned above. Wellington’s “near run thing” captured the popular imagination…and led to merchandising opportunities. I don’t have a date for this print from La Belle Assemblee, but I would dearly like to know just what made it a “Waterloo Walking Dress”!:
Charming is the first word that comes to mind when looking at this Promenade Dress from the August edition of Ackermann. Note the quizzing glass, an essential item when strolling in the park in order to see and be seen. Note also that the waist has crept up on most of the dresses in 1815, after bouncing around a bit in earlier years:
I love the sleeves on this Dinner Dress from September’s Ackermann’s Repository. This very Renaissance look will stay in style for the next decade or so. I also like the Vandyke collar:
Let’s end with a burst of color! England was suffering through an economic depression caused by the end of the war, and social unrest would be a major feature if life for the next several years…but Napoleon had been sent to a tiny island in the middle of the barren South Atlantic. The long years of war were over.

I don’t have the text accompanying this print, but I would dearly like to know if the flowers decorating the hem of this show-stopping Evening Dress were real or artificial. Notice the ruffles at the hem of her gloves and the interesting chunky necklace she’s wearing! (Ackermann’s Repository, December 1815):

What do you think of 1815’s fashions?