Revolutionary Europe, 1789-1815

by H. Morse Stephens

Exhaustion of France.

There must be considered also the exhaustion of actual physical resources. In the campaigns of 1812 and 1813, it is estimated that nearly 750,000 Frenchmen were either killed, wounded, or taken prisoner. Before that time the Grand Army had been slowly destroyed on many a field of battle, and there simply were not sufficient men of military instinct and physical strength to fill the ranks. In 1813 Napoleon enrolled the conscripts whose turn would have come in 1815—mere boys of sixteen, who had melted away after the battle of Leipzig—and the men he called to the ranks in 1814 were those who had been passed over by the conscription in previous years, and were too long inured to civil life to be willing to serve as soldiers.

To the feeling that resistance to the invaders was not a national duty, must be added a general indisposition to support the Empire. The opinions which had found vent during the French Revolution had not been extinguished by the Empire; they had only been suppressed; and all the educated part of the nation was united in desiring representative institutions so as to exercise a share in directing the policy of the government. This opinion showed itself in the Legislative Body which was summoned in December 1813. Napoleon had announced that his cause was the cause of France; but in return the leaders of the Legislative Body only begged him to make peace. A paragraph was inserted in the report of the Legislative Body upon the Proposals of Frankfort, which contains the following words: ‘It belongs to the Government according to the Constitution to propose the most effectual means to repel the enemy and secure peace. These means will only be effectual if the French people are convinced that their blood will be shed only to defend the country and our protective laws. It appears, therefore, indispensable that at the same time that His Majesty shall propose the most prompt and efficacious measures for the safety of the State, the Government should be besought to maintain the entire and constant execution of the laws which guarantee to the French people the rights of liberty, security, and property, and to the nation the complete enjoyment of its political rights. That guarantee appears the most effectual means for restoring to the French people the energy necessary for their defence in the present crisis.’ Napoleon was much irritated by this attack on his arbitrary authority, and although this paragraph was expunged from the report by 254 votes to 223 he nevertheless dissolved the Legislative Body in a rage.

The Bourbons.

Neither at the Congress of Châtillon nor in the Legislative Body was a single word said about restoring the Bourbons. They had lost all credit during their exile. The French people did not want them. The allied powers did not care about them. By Lord Castlereagh’s orders Wellington received the Duc d’Angoulême, son of the Comte d’Artois, in his camp in the south of France, but he distinctly refused to recognise him in any way whatever. The English general went further and issued a proclamation in which he declared that the war was being waged for security to Europe, not for a change of dynasty in France, and that no interference was either intended or would be permitted in the free decision of the French people with regard to their internal government. When the Duc d’Angoulême was favourably received in Bordeaux and the Mayor of that city hoisted the white flag, Wellington wrote to the Bourbon prince defining his attitude and censuring the assertion in the Duke’s proclamation, that he was supported by England.

Treaty of Chaumont. 1st March 1814.

In spite of his real weakness Napoleon was so infatuated by his successes in February 1814 that, as has been said, the Congress came to an end, but he was not far wrong in his estimation of the effect of his victories upon the allied monarchs. So profoundly was Schwartzenberg terrified by the destruction of Blücher’s army and the victories of Nangis and Montereau that he wished to retreat from France. Differences between the powers at this juncture threatened to break up the coalition, and it was only the determination of Lord Castlereagh that kept them together. The English minister on the 1st of March 1814 concluded the secret Treaty of Chaumont. By this treaty the relations of the allied monarchs to each other on several points were defined, and though many fresh causes of dissension arose at a later date, it was the Treaty of Chaumont which kept the powers together until the overthrow of Napoleon, and which laid the basis of the final settlement at Vienna. By this treaty the four great powers, England, Russia, Austria and Prussia, bound themselves, if France refused to return within her ancient limits, to form an offensive and defensive alliance. Each member of the coalition was to maintain 150,000 men in the field, and England bound herself, in addition to paying her own contingent and maintaining her navy, to contribute a subsidy of £5,000,000 a year to be divided equally amongst the other three contracting parties. As England by this arrangement offered more than twice as much as any other country, Castlereagh practically became the master of the coalition. After peace was concluded each of the powers was to furnish a contingent of 60,000 men if any one of them were attacked. The resettlement of Europe was to be arranged on the following bases: that the German Empire should be restored as a federal union; that Holland and Belgium should be united into a monarchy under the House of Orange; that Spain should be restored to its ancient sovereign; that Italy should be divided into independent states; and that Switzerland should be guaranteed as independent and neutral by all the great powers.

Napoleon’s Second Campaign in France. March 1814.

Battle of Paris. 30th March 1814.

Occupation of Paris by the Allies.