The Invisible Emperor

The Invisible Emperor PDF

Author: Mark Braude

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2019-10-08

Total Pages: 386

ISBN-13: 0735222622

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

A gripping narrative history of Napoleon Bonaparte's ten-month exile on the Mediterranean island of Elba In the spring of 1814, Napoleon Bonaparte was defeated. Having overseen an empire spanning half the European continent and governed the lives of some eighty million people, he suddenly found himself exiled to Elba, less than a hundred square miles of territory. This would have been the end of him, if Europe's rulers had had their way. But soon enough Napoleon imposed his preternatural charisma and historic ambition on both his captors and the very island itself, plotting his return to France and to power. After ten months of exile, he escaped Elba with just of over a thousand supporters in tow, marched to Paris, and retook the Tuileries Palace--all without firing a shot. Not long after, tens of thousands of people would die fighting for and against him at Waterloo. Braude dramatizes this strange exile and improbable escape in granular detail and with novelistic relish, offering sharp new insights into a largely overlooked moment. He details a terrific cast of secondary characters, including Napoleon's tragically-noble official British minder on Elba, Neil Campbell, forever disgraced for having let "Boney" slip away; and his young second wife, Marie Louise who was twenty-two to Napoleon's forty-four, at the time of his abdication. What emerges is a surprising new perspective on one of history's most consequential figures, which both subverts and celebrates his legendary persona.

The Escape From Elba

The Escape From Elba PDF

Author: Norman Mackenze

Publisher: Pen and Sword

Published: 2007-09-20

Total Pages: 317

ISBN-13: 1844156044

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

The year is 1814. The Allies have driven Napoleon's once-mighty armies back to Paris. Trapped, forced to abdicate after two decades of triumphant rule, the Emperor takes leave of his comrades-in-arms and sets sail for his new domain - the tiny, poverty-stricken, pestilential island of Elba. Yet within ten months Napoleon will enter Paris once again, at the heels of the fleeing Bourbon king, flushed with victory and cheered by the masses. The Escape From Elba tells the heroic story of Napoleon's exile and phoenix-like return. In this classic account, now republished in paperback, Norman MacKenzie chronicles this extraordinary year: the tense last hours of Napoleon's empire, his humiliating exile, his midnight escape and his whirlwind march over snowbound mountains to Grenoble where, in a dramatic confrontation with the French army, he became a reigning prince again. Described in vivid detail are Napoleon's adventures as the head of Elba. He brought society, splendour, organization and political intrigue to this run-down backwater. And he displayed on this small stage the many sides of his charismatic.

Napoleon on Elba

Napoleon on Elba PDF

Author: Neil Campbell

Publisher: Ravenhall Books

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 216

ISBN-13:

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

In April 1814 Napoleon Bonaparte, onetime emperor of France and master of Europe, was exiled to the island of Elba. Colonel Neil Campbell was instructed to accompany the fallen monarch. Part guardian, part spy, Campbell monitored Napoleon and kept an observant watch on the comings and goings of his confidents and much reduced household staff. He eavesdropped on the island's gossip, conversed almost daily with Napoleon, attempted to gain his trust and sought to gauge his intentions. For a year, Campbell kept an intimate diary of events on the tiny island. It paints character studies of all the key personalities and wades into island gossip with relish. It records events as Napoleon builds an empire in miniature on Elba and it keeps an eye on the coming and going of agents and would-be assassins. Frank and enlightening it also reveals much about the personality of Napoleon and of the tensions and subterfuge within the exiled community as Napoleon devises and implements his plans for an escape. The vivid diary is now published in a new accessible edition and it is essential reading for anyone with an interest in this era when the fate of empires hung in the balance.

Letters of Napoleon

Letters of Napoleon PDF

Author: J. M. Thompson

Publisher: Read Books Ltd

Published: 2013-03-06

Total Pages: 550

ISBN-13: 1444659758

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

This vintage book comprises a fascinating collection of Bonaparte's letters; selected, translated, and edited by J. M. Thompson. This anthology forms one of the most truthful and interesting collections of historical documents pertaining to the famous French military and political leader - Napoleon Bonaparte. It offers the reader an interesting and unparalleled insight into his mind and personal life in 292 letters. The letters contained herein include: 'The Brothers', 'His Father's Death', 'The Corsican's Patriot', 'History of Corsica', 'Brothers Louis', 'The Young Jacobin', 'Paris in Revolution', 'Heroics', 'Brother's Joseph', 'Paris Life', 'Fatalism', 'Whiff of Grape-Shot', 'First Night', 'Separation', etcetera. Many antiquarian books such as this are becoming increasingly hard-to-come-by and expensive, and it is with this in mind that we are republishing this text now in an affordable, modern edition - complete with a specially commissioned new biography of the author.

The Hundred Days

The Hundred Days PDF

Author: Joseph Roth

Publisher: New Directions Publishing

Published: 2016-01-11

Total Pages: 183

ISBN-13: 0811222799

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Now in paperback, Napoleon’s return to the throne in Paris, as imagined by the incomparable Joseph Roth Joseph Roth paints a vivid portrait of Emperor Napoleon’s last grab at glory, the hundred days spanning his escape from Elba to his final defeat at Waterloo. This particularly poignant work, set in the first half of 1815 and largely in Paris, is told from two perspectives, that of Napoleon himself and that of the lowly, devoted palace laundress Angelica—an unlucky creature who deeply loves him. In The Hundred Days, Roth refracts the deep sorrow of their intertwined fates. Roth’s signature lyrical elegance and haunting atmospheric details sing in The Hundred Days. “There may be,” as James Wood has stated, “no modern writer more able to combine the novelistic and the poetic, to blend lusty, undamaged realism with sparkling powers of metaphor and simile.”

Navies in Multipolar Worlds

Navies in Multipolar Worlds PDF

Author: Paul Kennedy

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2020-10-15

Total Pages: 455

ISBN-13: 1000203239

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Recent challenges to US maritime predominance suggests a return to great power competition at sea, and this new volume looks at how navies in previous eras of multipolarity grappled with similar challenges. The book follows the theme of multipolarity by analysing a wide range of historical and geographical case studies, thereby maintaining the focus of both its historical analysis and its policy implications. It begins by looking at the evolution of French naval policy from Louis XIV through to the end of the nineteenth century. It then examines how the British responded to multipolar threat environments, convoys, the challenges of demobilization, and the persistence of British naval power in the interwar period. There are also contributions regarding Japan’s turn away from the sea, the Italian navy, and multipolarity in the Arctic. This volume also addresses the regional and global distribution of forces; trade and communication protection; arms races; the emergence of naval challengers; fleet design; logistics; technology; civil-naval relations; and grand strategy, past, present, and future. This book will be of much interest to students of naval history, strategic studies and international relations history, as well as senior naval officers.

Idris Elba - So, Now What? The Biography

Idris Elba - So, Now What? The Biography PDF

Author: Nadia Cohen

Publisher: Kings Road Publishing

Published: 2016-07-07

Total Pages: 240

ISBN-13: 178606118X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

From starring as the ruthlessly ingenious drug lord Stringer Bell in the iconic HBO series The Wire, to playing Madiba himself in the long-awaited biopic of Nelson Mandela, it has been some journey for Idris Elba. From humble beginnings, a second generation immigrant born in Hackney, London, Elba set up his own wedding DJ business at the age of 14 but, encouraged by his drama teacher to pursue his natural talent, won a place at the National Youth Music Theatre. Though possessed of a brooding screen presence which served him so well in the BBC's terrifying crime drama series Luther, 2016 showed a whole new side to Idris as he entered the voice acting world with The Jungle Book and Finding Dory. He inhabits each role as if he were born to play it--but what of the man himself? This biography reveals Elba's life behind the lens, exploring what makes him so ambitious, adaptable and endlessly watchable. His charisma has won him admirers on both sides of the Atlantic, and the role of Bond may yet beckon.

The Road to St Helena

The Road to St Helena PDF

Author: J. David Markham

Publisher:

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 240

ISBN-13:

DOWNLOAD EBOOK →

Examines the life of Napoleon after the Battle of Waterloo, his fall from power, and the politics surrounding his surrender.