Napoleon I

Napoleon was one of the greatest figures of the early 19th century, a man who made himself the military leader and emperor of France by his own efforts. He was a military genius and also an excellent administrator. He was born in Corsica in 1769, to a family of minor nobles, and was the second of a large number of children. He had an older brother Joseph who was much less clever and ambitious and younger brothers. His father died young and the family were not well off and came to France to try and get an education and improve their prospects. The children originally had Italian names, but on moving to France they changed them to Frenchified ones. The eldest daughter, Maria Anna, became known as Elisa and she got a charity position in a school for girls of good birth but no fortune. Napoleon got into the Military academy of France and began to train as an army officer. He lived on a small income and looked after his younger Brother Louis. Letizia, the mother of the family tried to manage her 8 children but in spite of her forceful personality, her 2 younger daughters, Pauline and Caroline, were rather wild, and precocious. Napoleon had old fashioned ideas about women, having spent his earliest years in Corsica. He belived that the best women were good mothers and housekeepers, and disapproved of the sexual freedom that they often had in French society. Napoleon and many of his family sympathised with the Revolution, like many aristocrats. It was obvious that France needed reform, that the Ancien Regime was a tangled mess and there was a need for tax reform and control of the monarchy. Louis XVI was a not very clever man who lacked the will to put reforms in place or to control the mob. In the early years of the Revolution the young Napoleon made a name for himself as a skilled warrior and he became intensely ambitious, wanting not only a military role but to go into politics. His younger brother, Lucien was an ardent reformer, Napoleon himself was more conservative but he still saw the need for reform.