On May 5, 1821, Napoleon Bonaparte's life ended on a small island in the Atlantic.
Saint Helena Island in the Atlantic Ocean, discovered by the Portuguese navigator João da Nova on Saint Helena's Day in 1502, before the construction of the Suez Canal was a strategic point on the route of ships to the Indian Ocean.
In the 17th century, after a bitter struggle with the Dutch, the island came under the control of the British Empire.
A small piece of land became known to the whole world thanks to a man for whom the island of St. Helena was the last refuge.
I would prefer to be handed over to the Bourbons
On October 17, 1815, a ship arrived at the port of Jamestown, which brought the abdicated Emperor of France Napoleon Bonaparte and his small retinue.
After his first abdication in 1814, Napoleon made an attempt to commit suicide, but it turned into only a slight malaise. Considering that this is a sign of fate, the emperor accepted the fate that the victors determined for him - he left for the small island of Elba in the Mediterranean Sea, which was transferred to him.
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On Elba, Napoleon continued to monitor the situation in France, and in February 1815 decided that the moment was right for his return. Escaping from exile, he landed on the French coast, and less than three weeks later entered Paris in triumph.
The attempt at revenge ended on June 18, 1815, when Napoleon's troops were defeated at the Battle of Waterloo.
Once in the hands of the British, Napoleon calmly awaited the decision of his fate. But the decision to exile to St. Helena still shocked him: "I would prefer to be extradited to the Bourbons."
Longwood house
The British wanted to be sure that Napoleon would not be able to return from his exile.
The emperor's retinue consisted of only 26 people, but his ship was accompanied to the island by a fleet of nine ships, on which there were a total of about 1000 soldiers.
Remote from Europe, Saint Helena was more than a safe haven for isolation. But the British did not like that either.
After two months, which Napoleon spent with the Balcomb family on the estate of Briara, he was sent to the village of Longwood, where Longwood House was placed at the disposal of the deposed emperor.
The former residence of the lieutenant governor, located in an uncomfortable place on the island, was, in fact, a prison. The house was completely surrounded by sentries; any movements of Napoleon were closely monitored.
Longwood House.
Governor and "General Bonaparte"
The already difficult conditions of exile for Napoleon were complicated by the conflict with the British governor of the island, Hudson Lowe.
Low, jealous of his duties, considered it his duty to curtail even the small freedom that was given to Napoleon. This infuriated the prisoner - he categorically refused to meet with the governor, defiantly ignoring his dinner invitations.
At the same time, Lowe was a real provocateur - for example, he stubbornly referred to Napoleon as "General Bonaparte", which the prisoner considered a deliberate belittling of his status.
The governor, under one pretext or another, expelled from the island the people closest to Napoleon.
But even the skirmishes with Lowe were not as disastrous as the lack of opportunity for any activity. Napoleon Bonaparte lived all his life, setting himself huge tasks and solving them, no matter how difficult they seem.
Our hour of death is predetermined
The state of rest was killing him. Due to his sedentary lifestyle, Napoleon began to noticeably gain weight, and his health already seriously deteriorated in 1816.
In 1817, the British princess Charlotte died, who treated the exiled emperor well. Charlotte was a contender for the throne, and Napoleon had high hopes for her coming to power. Upon learning of the death of the princess, he fell into a deep depression.
The emperor was diagnosed with hepatitis, but Napoleon told his entourage that he was overtaken by cancer, the same disease that killed his father.
In 1819, relatives managed to achieve the arrival of the famous French doctor François Carlo Antommarka to Napoleon.
The physician, however, was faced with the fact that the patient himself does not strive for recovery. It seems, realizing that fate would not give another chance, Napoleon really wanted to die.
At the beginning of 1821, the emperor told Antommarka: "How can we doubt that our hour of death is predetermined."
In March 1821, Napoleon's condition began to deteriorate rapidly. By early April, the entourage began to prepare for his death. The efforts of the doctor did not help, the emperor could hardly move.
On April 15, he dictated his will. On May 1, Napoleon felt some improvement, and even tried to get out of bed, but he became ill again.
On the night of May 4-5, Bonaparte was in a semi-conscious state. At his bedside, the confidants gathered - all the signs indicated that only a few hours remained before the denouement.
On May 5, 1821 at 17 hours 49 minutes Napoleon Bonaparte died. His last words, according to the statements of witnesses, were: "The vanguard of the army …".
The emperor was buried in the "Geranium Valley" on St. Helena.
Poisoned or cured?
At the time of his death, Napoleon was only 51 years old, and the rapid deterioration of his health, which occurred in exile, led his supporters to think that the case here was unclean - there was a suspicion that the British had poisoned the prisoner using "slow poison". We are talking about substances that do not lead to death instantly, but as a result of accumulation in the body.
Research that could confirm or deny the version of the poisoning began almost 150 years after the death of Napoleon.
In 1955, Swedish toxicologist Sten Forschwood accidentally read the memoirs of Louis Marchand, bodyguard and servant of the Emperor of France. The toxicologist found 22 symptoms of arsenic poisoning by Napoleon in his memoirs.
In 1960, British scientists analyzed the chemical composition of Napoleon's hair from a strand cut from the emperor's head the day after death using the neutron-activation method. The concentration of arsenic in them was significantly higher than normal.
Opponents object - in the first half of the 19th century, arsenic was part of many medicines, including those with which the emperor was treated. Therefore, there are no unequivocal grounds to claim that he was a victim of murder.
We must not forget that the medicine of the XIX century was very far from the modern one and many ailments that are quite curable today turned out to be fatal in those days.
Napoleon in exile was forced to radically change his lifestyle, and this, perhaps, turned out to be the main factor that shortened the days of the French emperor.
Author: Andrey Sidorchik