Napoleonic Wars (1803-1815)
Posts in The Copybook tagged ‘Napoleonic Wars (1803-1815)’
A year into his reign as Emperor of France, Napoleon Bonaparte had much of Europe under his government but the United Kingdom still eluded him.
Napoleon Bonaparte was crowned Emperor of the French on December 2nd, 1804. He dreamt of a European empire, and as Jawaharlal Nehru recalls here on land none could resist him. On the seas, however, it was another story. Barely a year into his imperial reign Napoleon was forced to accept two facts: he would never command the seas, and he would never conquer Britain.
While inspecting troops in Colchester for duty against Napoleon, the Duke of York came upon one man who gave new meaning to the word Veteran.
In September 1811, during the Napoleonic Wars, George the Prince Regent and his brother Frederick, Duke of York and Albany, were reviewing the troops of the Eastern Command on Lexden Heath, near Colchester, when they spied an elderly man wearing a uniform from a bygone age and perched on an aged pony. They asked the division’s commander General John Pitt, Earl of Chatham, what he was doing there.
William Burdon gives us a character sketch of his friend the ‘Count’, who did not let his small stature cramp his style or narrow his mind.
Joseph Boruwlaski, who was originally from Halicz (then in Poland, now in the Ukraine), settled in Durham after years of touring Europe as a violinist, an entertainer and frankly a curiosity, for he was barely thirty-nine inches high. William Burdon offered to help him financially but Joseph would not hear of it as his modest needs were by now satisfied — which Burdon would have thought typical of the man.
A veteran of the Battle of Salamanca in 1812 was boasting of his lieutenant’s bravery when his wife sprung some unwelcome news upon him.
Joseph Boruwlaski knew how it felt to be ever on the edge of bankruptcy. Barely thirty-nine inches in stature, he had relied for over seventy years on the generosity (and curiosity) of noble and royal patrons, and on fees earned from the violin concerts he gave across Europe. The following events, which occurred some time after the Battle of Salamanca in 1812, therefore touched him deeply.
When Horatio Nelson stepped aboard HMS Victory in September 1805, the great Admiral knew he had every reason to stay on dry land.
At dawn on Sunday 15th September, 1805, Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson gave the order for his flagship HMS Victory to weigh anchor. Never had Nelson’s duty to go to sea been greater; never had his reasons to stay ashore been stronger. His diary recorded his feelings on the previous Friday night, as his chaise rattled towards towards Portsmouth, and again in the moments before the Battle of Trafalgar.
The Russians had checked it in the East, but in the West the expansion of Napoleon Bonaparte’s empire was far from over.
In 1804, Napoleon Bonaparte wrapped up the short-lived French Republic, crowned himself Emperor of the French, and set about conquering Europe. However, failure to invade Moscow in 1812 was the first sign of vulnerability, and on June 18, 1815, his dream was ended by allied forces commanded by the Duke of Wellington.