Madame de Staël v. Napoleon Bonaparte
Château de Chaumont, Loire Valley
Madame de WHO? Quite.
Who now remembers the woman who took on Napoleon and rattled his cage?
Madame de Staël was a political activist. She headed a group of Pro-Constitutional Monarchists.
France was like a rabbit caught in his headlights but she saw through him. She had him bang to rights. For more than ten years, right up to his downfall, she was a thorn in his side. In one of the first histories of the French Revolution, she savaged his tyrannical rule.
An enraged Napoleon exiled her.
Madame de Staël was unbelievably wealthy. Exiled from her beloved Paris, she flitted between her own château in Switzerland and those of wealthy friends in Germany, Italy, Austria, Russia, Sweden, Turkey, Finland and England.
In 1810, on the pretext of needing to put her affairs in order before emigrating to America, Madame de Staël was given temporary permission to enter France. Her real purpose was to proofread her book De l’ Allemagne and oversee its printing in Tours.
In it, she praised Prussia’s political system, indirectly criticizing Napoleon.
Her wealthy French/American friend James Le Ray, who lived in New York, offered her the use of his magnificent Château Chaumont* near Amboise with its fairy tale pepper pot turrets and panoramic views over the Loire. Among previous owners were Catherine de Medicis and her nemesis, Diane de Poitiers.
He forewarned her that he would be arriving with his own family and friends in September.
Madame de Staël arrived in April with her children, their governess, their music tutor, her draft manuscript and a passport to America.
America, she said, would ‘inherit the civilisation of Europe’.
Within weeks she was joined by between fifteen and twenty close friends who understandably, very much looked forward to spending the summer on the banks of the royal river.
The Château became a literary salon and a hub of political opposition to Napoleon.
Days were spent writing, reading, listening to and playing music. The friends met for dinner every evening to discuss politics.
In August, a month earlier than planned, James Le Ray and his entourage arrived at Château Chaumont. War had broken out between America and England but they managed to board a frigate bound for France sailing under the flag of truce.
Another well heeled friend, the royalist Count of Salaberry, a fierce opponent of Napoleon, offered her his nearby Château de Fossé**. His father, for no other reason other than he was an aristocrat, was guillotined during The Terror.
Madame de Staël startled sleepy Fossé. When she and her ‘court’ walked through Blois to attend the opera the whole of the local population followed them.
One day, returning to Fossé, her coachman got hopelessly lost in the forest. A local aristocrat on horseback, Le Chevalier de Conan, came across her carriage. He invited her to dinner and to spend the night in his mother’s nearby Château.
In the morning she was excited to see the Château was filled with the exotic art and furniture the family had brought back from their travels in India. While examining the curios, she looked up and was astonished to see her son who had arrived from Paris.
When she failed to arrive at Fossé the night before, he went out searching for her and by chance ended up in the same Château. He told her De l’ Allemagne had got her into more trouble with Napoleon. The self-crowned Emperor sensed that hostility towards him was gaining in public opinion. Her book praising Prussia would make it worse.
In October 1810 he ordered all ten thousand copies be destroyed and gave Madame de Staël forty eight hours to leave France.
1813. When her book was published in England, Madame de Staël left for London where she was given a rapturous welcome. She had Lord Byron, William Wilberforce, the abolitionist, Sir Humphry Davy, the chemist, the duke of Wellington and other influential figures eating out of her hand.
1814. Restoration of the monarchy. Louis XVIII was crowned. Madame de Staël returned to Paris.
1815 20 March. Napoleon returned to Paris from exile on Elba. The king went into exile.
1815 21 June. Following his defeat at Waterloo, Napoleon was exiled to St Helena.
1815 8 July. Restoration of the monarchy.
Madame de S died in Paris in 1817.
Napoleon died on St. Helena in 1821***.
Post by Pamela (BA History of Art), Photography by Mark.
* Read about Château de Chaumont
** The Salaberry family still owns the Château de Fossé.
*** Read what happened to Napoleon’s remains in our blog: La Belle Poule
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