The History of Napoleon Buonaparte

by J. G. Lockhart

At midnight the duke was again called from his bed, to attend the court which had been constituted for his trial. It consisted of eight military officers, appointed by Murat, Napoleon's brother-in-law, then governor of Paris. General Hullin, president of the military commission, commanded him to listen to the charges on which he was to be tried: of having fought against France; of being in the pay of England; and of plotting with England against the internal and external safety of the Republic. The Duke was again examined, and the second interrogatory was a mere repetition of the first, with this addition, that the prisoner avowed his readiness to take part again in the hostilities against France, if the opportunity should present itself. No other evidence whatever was adduced, except the written report of a spy of the police, who testified that the duke received many emigrants at his table at Ettenheim, and occasionally left the castle for several days together, without the spy's being able to trace where he was: a circumstance sufficiently explained by the duke's custom of hunting in the Black Forest.

General Hullin, in his account of the proceedings,[48] says, "He uniformly maintained that 'he had only sustained the rights of his family, and that a Condé could never enter France but with arms in his hands. My birth,' said he, 'and my opinions must ever render me inflexible on this point.'"—"The firmness of his answers," continues Hullin, "reduced the judges to despair. Ten times we gave him an opening to retract his declarations, but he persisted in them immovably. 'I see,' he said, 'the honourable intentions of the commissioners, but I cannot resort to the means of safety which they indicate.' Being informed that the military commission judged without appeal, 'I know it,' answered he, 'nor do I disguise to myself the danger which I incur. My only desire is to have an interview with the First Consul.'"

The irregularities of all this procedure were monstrous. In the first place, the duke owed no allegiance to the existing government of France. 2ndly, The seizure of his person was wholly illegal; it took place by means of a violation of an independent territory: an outrage for which it is impossible to offer the smallest excuse. 3rdly, Had the arrest been ever so regular, the trial of a prisoner accused of a political conspiracy was totally beyond the jurisdiction of a court-martial. 4thly, It was against the laws of France to hold any trial at midnight. 5thly, The interrogatory was not read over to the prisoner, which the law imperatively demanded; and, 6thly, No defender was assigned to him—an indulgence which the French code refuses not to the meanest or most atrocious criminal, by what tribunal soever he may be tried.

But to proceed—The judges were moved by the conduct of the prisoner, and inclined to listen to his request of an audience of the Chief Consul. But Savary, then minister of police, had by this time introduced himself into the chamber, and watched the course of procedure from behind the chair of the president. He now leaned forward, and whispered into Hullin's ear, "this would be inopportune."—These significant words were obeyed. The court pronounced the duke guilty of the capital crimes of having fought against the Republic; of having intrigued with England; of having maintained intelligence with Strasburg, with the view of seizing that place; and of having conspired against the life of the Chief Consul. The prisoner, being remanded to his confinement, the report was instantly forwarded to Buonaparte, with a request that his further pleasure might be made known.

The court remained sitting until their messenger returned: he brought back their own letter with these words inscribed on it, "Condemned to death." The prisoner being called in again, heard his sentence with perfect composure. He requested the attendance of a confessor, and was answered,—"Would you die like a monk?" Without noticing this brutality he knelt for a moment, as in prayer, and rising, said, "Let us go."

He was immediately led down a winding stair by torch-light; and, conceiving that he was descending into some subterraneous dungeon, said to one of the soldiers of the escort, "Am I to be immured in an oubliette?" "Monseigneur," the man replied, sobbing, "be tranquil on that point." They emerged from a postern into the ditch of the castle, where a party of gens-d'armes d'élite were drawn up, Savary, their master, standing on the parapet over them. It was now six o'clock in the morning, and the gray light of the dawn was mingled with the gleam of torches. The prince refused to have his eyes bandaged—the word was given, and he fell. The body, dressed as it was, was immediately thrown into a grave—which had been prepared beforehand; at least, so say all the witnesses, except M. Savary.

To resume our notice of the mere informalities of the procedure:—1. The sentence was altogether unsupported by the evidence, except as to the mere fact of D'Enghien's having borne arms against France; but this could be no crime in him: he owed no allegiance to the French government; on the contrary, he and all his family had been expressly excepted from every act of amnesty to emigrants, and thereby constituted aliens. 2. The execution took place immediately after the sentence was pronounced; this is contrary to the laws of all civilised nations, and in direct contradiction to an article in the French code then in force, which gave twenty-four hours to every prisoner convicted by a court-martial, that he might, if he chose, appeal from their sentence. But, 3rdly, the publications (long afterwards extorted) of Savary and Hullin, prove that the court, perplexed with the difficulty of making their sentence appear to have any conformity with the charge and the evidence, drew up in fact, two different sentences: one before the duke was executed, which bore the article, "immediate execution"; the other a more careful document, intended alone to meet the public eye, in which not a word about immediate execution occurs. The duke was not executed, therefore, at six in the morning of the 21st of March, upon that sentence which was made public at the time, as the authority for his death.

Every circumstance in the dismal tale, from the quantity of linen packed up at Strasburg, to the preparation of the grave in the ditch of Vincennes, attests the fact that the fate of the unfortunate young man (for he was but 32 years old when he fell) had been determined on, to the minutest particular, long before he was summoned to a mock trial, before an incompetent tribunal. If ever man was murdered, it was the Duke d'Enghien.

Such was the fate of the gallant and generous youth, who, by his fiery courage, won the battle of Bertsheim; and who, when his followers, to whom the republicans had so often refused quarter, seemed disposed to retaliate in the hour of victory, threw himself between them and their discomfited countrymen, exclaiming, "They are French—they are unfortunate; I place them under the guardianship of your honour."

The horror with which this remorseless tragedy was heard of in Paris, soon spread throughout all Europe; and from that day the name of Buonaparte was irremediably associated with the ideas of sullen revenge and tyrannic cruelty. The massacre of Jaffa had been perpetrated in a remote land, and many listened with incredulity to a tale told by the avowed enemies of the homicide. But this bloody deed was done at home, and almost in the sight of all Paris. Of the fact there could be no doubt; and of the pretexts set forth by the organs of the French government, there were few men of any party who affected not to perceive the futility. Hitherto Napoleon had been the fortunate heir of a revolution, in whose civil excesses he had scarcely participated—henceforth he was the legitimate representative and symbol of all its atrocities.