RULERS—The same as in the previous year.
1806
Napoleon dethroned the Bourbons in Naples, and made Joseph Bonaparte King of Naples and Sicily; Louis Bonaparte made King of Holland, and Jerome Bonaparte was commanded to leave his American wife and child, marry Catherine of Würtemberg, and rule Westphalia; Lucien Bonaparte exiled for refusing to leave his wife and become a king. Napoleon parceled out acquired territory among his followers and members of his family; obliged neighboring countries to harbor and support the French army, and ordered the completion of the Louvre.
The English admirals Strachan, Duckworth, Warren, and Hood destroyed almost all of the few remaining French war-ships. England and France mutually laid embargoes. English interference with the commerce of all nations; President Jefferson protested without avail; anger in America because of the killing of an American sailor by a stray shot from the British cruiser Leander.
At Maida, Calabria, four thousand English under Sir John Stuart killed or captured four thousand out of seven thousand French, and lost but forty-five men killed. France, however, suppressed the revolt in Calabria at great loss of lives.
The Holy Roman Empire dissolved, and the Confederation of the Rhine formed. Denmark annexed Holstein. Palm, a Nuremberg publisher, shot for circulating an anti-Napoleonic book. Queen Louise led the Prussian opposition to Napoleon, and Prussia joined the war against him. Germany invaded, and at Auerstadt, Davoust defeated Charles William of Brunswick, while at Jena Napoleon defeated Prince Hohenlohe; in both battles, fought August 14, the Prussians lost nearly fifty thousand killed, wounded, and captured, while the French lost about sixteen thousand. The French entered Berlin, and Napoleon despoiled Frederick the Great's tomb with his sword. Napoleon constructed the kingdom of Westphalia from a part of Prussia, Hanover, Hesse-Cassel, and upper Saxony; exacted an indemnity of thirty million dollars from Prussia; forbade trade with Great Britain, and stirred the Poles to revolt against Russia, then at war with Turkey. He advanced through Poland against Russia, won hard-fought battles at Moehrungen, Golymin, and Pultusk. The French army wintered around Warsaw. Here Napoleon met Countess Walewski, who later became the mother of his son Alexander.
Lewis and Clark returned from their trip across America. William Pitt and Charles Fox, English statesmen, died. Public funeral of Nelson.
RULERS—The same as in the previous year.
1807
The winter quarters of Napoleon's army in Warsaw were unendurable, and in attempting to move on Königsberg the French were attacked by the Russians at Eylau, where both sides lost sixty thousand men in a desperate but indecisive battle. The Russian Czar Alexander freed the serfs of the Baltic Provinces. England declared war against Turkey in order to assist Russia. Continuation of the fight of the Russians and Prussians against the French in Poland. The Prussian fortress of Dantzig captured by the French. Sweden was forced to a truce with Russia. At Heilsburg the Russians and Prussians inflicted a loss of ten thousand on the French. June 14, anniversary of Marengo, Napoleon won a superb victory at Friedland, Ney saving the day by a splendid charge. Russia and Prussia forced to ask for an armistice.