by Alan Schom
An even more elegant fete was given in his honor a few days later by the combined councils (Ancients and Five Hundred) in the gallery of the Louvre, set against the hundreds of looted Michelangelos, Titians, Veroneses, Correggios, Carraccis, Raphaels, and Leonardos. Bonaparte made little attempt to conceal his boredom with these apparent signs of praise. The general did not find a palatial dinner with nearly eight hundred persons particularly convivial. Although he enjoyed the theater and attended it with Josephine, he was also upset when the limelight always shone on him as he entered his loge, accompanied by enormous peals of applause. While he quickly stepped back, attempting to hide, Josephine in her sparkling diamonds loved every minute of it, smiling and bowing. Never trusting such public demonstrations, he afterward confided to Bourrienne, “In Paris they never remember anything...In this great Babylon, he whom they praise today, is forgotten on the morrow, replaced with the next, most recent hero of the day.”[97]
In his case the clamor lasted well beyond “today,” as the municipality of Paris ordered the changing of the name of the little street in which he lived, the Rue Chantereine (“Street of the Singing Frog”), to the Rue de la Victoire.[98] Great and lesser men came to pay their respects, and Bonaparte, now playing a new modest role, generally returned them. And despite an alleged abortive attempt to poison him, the festivities continued, one after another, although only one really interested him. Thanks to Monge’s initiative and support, on December 28, 1797, Napoleon was welcomed as the newest member — in Sciences and Arts — of the prestigious Institut de France (which had recently replaced the Académie Française), where, as he put it, he received the only ovation “that really touched me.”[99]
*
General Bonaparte’s immediate responsibility was the command of the invasion army forming along the Channel, from Brest all the way up to the Batavian Republic on the North Sea. It could prove an extraordinary challenge, the kind Napoleon liked best — everything was at stake. If it succeeded, he, Napoleon Bonaparte, would be the first military commander to invade England since William the Conqueror in 1066. After his brilliant military and diplomatic successes in Italy, if all went well he could return to France with the English crown jewels, sweep away the Executive Directory, and seize the reins of power, to the unanimous acclaim of the whole of France. As Director Barras saw it, even if Napoleon failed, at least he would be sidetracked on an otherwise minor command along the Channel for months or even years. And afterward the ambitious troublemaker would end up just another army commander.
Bonaparte set out from Paris on February 10, 1798, on a whirlwind tour of the Channel ports, depots, and camps of the army gathering for the projected invasion. Interviewing officers, sailors, fishermen, coastal traders, and smugglers, he listened “with that patience, that presence of mind, that comprehensive tact and perspicacity that he possessed to such a high degree.”[100] This invasion was, of course, just one of the ploys Bonaparte was considering as a means of bringing off the great coup to seize power. French troops on English soil could force their government to the negotiating table. But Napoleon cut short this coastal tour, apparently as a result of a special dispatch he received from Talleyrand, advising him to return post haste to Paris in order to proceed to the Congress of Rastadt, where “our plenipotentiaries are urgently insisting on your presence.”[101]
But on reaching the French capital on February 24 he learned that the mercurial diplomatic situation at Rastadt had altered yet again. He would not be going there after all. At the same time he submitted a negative report on the proposed invasion of England,[102] pointing out that everything was against such an attempt at this time. To begin with, if the element of surprise was to be achieved, the season was wrong — long, dark wintry nights being preferable for a successful Channel crossing. What is more, “without our being complete masters of the sea, our descent upon England will be rendered most risky and difficult...Regardless of the efforts we might make now,” he pointed out, “we will not achieve superiority of the seas for several years to come. A successful attempt on England now therefore seems too doubtful,” he informed the Directory,[103] while privately telling Bourrienne that Europe was “just a molehill. The truly great empires and revolutions have taken place only in the Orient.”[104] To the directors he explained that there were now only ten French warships at Brest, and they without crews. Under such circumstances he had no intention of challenging the entire English navy in the Channel.[105] Nevertheless, the idea and strategy were sound for the future. France must begin to prepare in order to be ready to deliver that blow in several years’ time.
Like Bonaparte, the Directory too was at a crossroads — indeed, in a state of considerable confusion. They had signed a decree favorable to the invasion, naming a three-man commission “to prepare, and execute the measures that General Bonaparte will prescribe to you relative to the expedition against England.”[106] But at a special strategy conference, the Directory then reversed itself, shelving the Channel operation for the time being.[107]
Napoleon suggested instead two more viable alternatives, an invasion of (British — owned by the king) Hannover, or an expedition to “the Orient.”[108] Of the two Bonaparte (with Talleyrand’s full support) pressed for the latter. As early as July 3, 1797, Talleyrand had addressed the institute in Paris “on the advantages to be drawn from establishing new colonies” in the eastern Mediterranean.[109] In fact, on February 14, 1798 — even before Bonaparte had returned from the Channel with his negative report on the English expedition — Talleyrand had submitted a lengthy formal proposal for the conquest of Egypt to the Directory.[110]
Reminding the five-man board that although Egypt had not always belonged to the Turks — they conquered it in the early sixteenth century — it was France’s responsibility now to step in and save that unruly province, administering it in Turkey’s name. The ostensible rationale for such an extraordinary act was twofold: the prejudicial acts carried out against French businessmen throughout Egypt, including forced “loans” extorted by the Mamelukes; and two humiliating public beatings of the French consul general, Charles Magallon. It was simply outrageous, the foreign minister insisted. In return for military intervention, France would receive adequate compensation, Egypt offering “the advantages of one of the most fortunate climates in the world,” not to mention the land’s rich agricultural production — “the cereals and vegetables are most abundant” — including rice, saffron, sugar, coffee, indigo, and cotton. As for the Ottoman sultan retaliating by declaring war on France, Talleyrand hastened to assure the wary Directory “that he would never do so” because of the cataclysm currently racking much of the tottering Ottoman Empire, particularly in Albania, the Peloponnesus, and Macedonia. The Turks had quite enough on their plate already. Nor “can England intimidate us,” he continued, “for our war with her provides the perfect opportunity for a French invasion of Egypt. Threatened by a possible French descent upon the British Isles themselves at this time, she will hardly strip her coasts of naval protection in order to send those same ships to attack us in Egypt.” What was more, once established in Egypt, France would be in a position to send a corps of fifteen thousand men from Suez “to chase the English out of India.”[111] What sort of resistance would the French encounter in Egypt? he asked: “A maximum of 8,000 Mameluke cavalry, and moreover, they totally ignorant of modern tactics.” With a mere twenty-five thousand men, France could hold the country, while “five ships of the line and six frigates [would] suffice to escort the troop vessels.” As for the ruling Mamelukes, they would be abandoned by the enslaved Egyptian people, who would “look upon us with transports of joy [as we] free them from their oppressors.” As for the invasion itself, it “will be easy...[France] will be incurring only moderate expenses, for which the Republic will soon receive full compensation,” from loot and the like. Summing up, the foreign minister remarked “that the conquest of Egypt would be but the just compensation for the wrongs and affronts inflicted on us by the Su
blime Porte[112]...Egypt was once a province of the Roman Empire and must now become one of ours.”[113]
And so the Executive Directory decided to shelve the plans for England and instead concentrate on an expedition to Egypt.[114] To attain glory, wealth, power, and the possibility of peace with England, while ridding themselves of that hectoring and intimidating General Bonaparte, seemed to be the only possible answer. After all, fewer troops were needed in Europe now, thanks to the conclusion of peace with Austria, and once England was truly intimidated, peace would be universal.
Chapter Five – The Decision
‘In order to truly destroy England, we must [also] seize Egypt...How easy it will be, and even fool-proof.’
The idea of the French colonizing Egypt was neither as new nor as palpably absurd as it might at first appear. After all, the Dutch were in the Far East, the Spaniards were in South America and even the South Pacific, and of course Great Britain — the only country with which France remained at war since the signing of the Treaty of Campo Formio — had a lucrative empire spanning several continents. What is more, French republicans felt they had the right and duty to bring the hard-earned fruits of their revolution to the rest of the world!
In 1769 the French foreign minister, the duc de Choiseul, had proposed to King Louis XV making a French colony of Egypt “to replace those in America, in the event they are lost to us” — but the idea was rejected. A few years later Foreign Minister Baron de Tott had reintroduced the project to Louis XVI, only to see it too rejected.
The Ottoman Empire, in a gradual state of decline, was already losing its grip on some of its more distant provinces. Algeria and Tunisia had long been merely nominal members of the sultan’s realm, and Egypt was not much better, controlled as it was by the Mamelukes — formerly brought to Egypt as slaves, from the Caucasus and Circassia and later from the Balkans, to form the country’s elite military. On seizing Egypt for the new Ottoman Empire in 1517, Sultan Selim II had simply incorporated the Mamelukes in their traditional role, though by the 1790s Egypt was ruled de facto by twenty-four Mameluke beys, or princes, under a titular pasha appointed by the Sublime Porte.
The possibility of invading Egypt may have been brought to General Bonaparte’s notice as early as April 1796 by French minister Raymond Verninae, when, on his return from his post with the Sublime Porte, he pointed out the interior disintegration of the Ottoman Empire, even as the pressure of foreign encroachment by both Russia and Austria grew. But the most persistent recent supporter for such an invasion had been a wealthy French businessman, long based in Cairo, Charles Magallon, who in his capacity as French honorary consul had direct access to Paris and the Foreign Ministry (and thus the Directory).
In August 1797 Magallon sent a memorandum to Paris pointing out the necessity and advantages of seizing Egypt. He proposed a French landing in the month of May (before the beginning of the great summer heat and the annual flooding of the Nile), claiming that “the conquest of the whole of Egypt may and must be executed within nine months [of arrival]. The three months of inundation [would] then give time in which to fortify Alexandria, Damietta, and Rosetta,” which in turn would permit the French “to land an army in India and chase out the English,” or else simply result in putting the French in a position “from which to annihilate English commerce with India” — all as a consequence of their new strategic position in Egypt, which in turn would enable the establishing of entrepôts in Cairo, Alexandria, and Marseilles, making those cities the greatest commercial centers in the world.[115] While Magallon’s latest proposal was receiving a favorable hearing by Foreign Minister Talleyrand (with whom Bonaparte had remained in touch) during the summer of 1797, Gaspard Monge was independently encouraging the Corsican general to give serious thought to such an Egyptian venture. Monge’s perspective was altogether different, however. He saw the seizure of Egypt as the triumph of French revolutionary ideals over the forces of ignorance and tyranny.[116] It was France’s civic right to conquer.
In addition, throughout the spring and summer of 1797, a victorious Napoleon had been sending the Executive Directory in Paris a series of unsolicited international political analyses. On May 26, for instance, he encouraged the capture of Malta, an “island simply beyond all price to us, which sooner or later will fall to the English if we are so foolhardy as to permit it.”[117] He added that along with the recently acquired Ionic islands of Corfu, Zante, and Cephalonia — these were “of greater value than the whole of Italy.” Not only were these islands “a source of riches and prosperity for our commerce,” they were also strategic locations from which France could support its Turkish allies. But it was only after talking with Monge at Passeriano, near Udine, in September and October that he expanded this concept, arguing that “in order to truly destroy England, we must [also] seize Egypt.”[118] (He was to take the same rather contradictory line throughout the venture, emphasizing the necessity of supporting the Turkish Empire while simultaneously advancing a project to strip that very empire of its choicest province.) Following the discussions with Monge, Bonaparte decided to send Treasury Comptroller Emile Poussielgue on a secret mission to Malta.
With the renewed possibility of a diplomatic role at Rastadt having faded yet again, Napoleon concentrated on the Egyptian operation, organizing it from beginning to end. On March 5 he submitted a long, formal analysis of the proposed expedition, including his estimate of the troops required — twenty-five thousand infantry, three thousand cavalry — “with which to seize Egypt and Malta.”[119]
Napoleon’s report was only a formality; the Directory had already consulted with him and decided on this course. That same day it issued a series of decrees launching the new operation. One included Napoleon’s idea for an “Armaments Commission of the Mediterranean Coast” to oversee the entire process. Another decree authorized the provisioning of troops at Marseilles, Toulon, and other ports, and the assembling of a battle fleet to escort the expedition. Simultaneously the war minister was authorized to transfer the first million francs to the new Armaments Commission, to be followed by five hundred thousand francs every ten days thereafter to be allocated to the army and navy respectively until the preparations were completed. A separate decree ordered the naval minister to arm the warships at Toulon and victual them for a three-month voyage.[120] A spate of other orders and decrees by the Directory of that same date instructed army commanders in the Ligurian and Cisalpine Republics “to seize all ships” required by the Armaments Commission for the embarkation of troops at Genoa, while General Masséna was ordered to proceed to Civitavecchia to help prepare for the embarkation of troops and artillery there, and General Vaubois was ordered to do the same in Ajaccio.[121]
Although the actual destination was classified top secret and was revealed to only a handful of Bonaparte’s most senior officers, the actual plan was set in motion in maddening haste, as government couriers set out from the War Ministry, the Naval Ministry, and the Luxembourg Palace — for the Channel, Lyons, the Midi, Italy, Switzerland, and a dozen major French garrisons elsewhere. This was the beginning of an intensive flurry of activity, attended by an incessant flow of decrees and orders issued for the preparation of the invasion fleet, for its accompanying convoy of transport vessels, and of course for the gathering of the expeditionary army itself.
Two days later, on March 7, Rear Adm. François Paul Brueys d’Aigailliers was named commander-in-chief of the combined invasion fleet and convoy, accompanied by instructions for supplying the manpower, munitions, and artillery for this burgeoning force.[122] The following day Berthier was relieved of his command in Italy, with orders to proceed to Paris to take up his new posting as chief of staff of the “Armée d’Angleterre,” as it was still officially called (to conceal its real purpose).[123] A week later Gen. Louis Desaix was sent to take over at Civitavecchia.[124]
In mid-March, War Minister Schérer notified the army commissaires of the eastern and southeastern departments of the country that large-scale tro
op movements were going to be taking place in their jurisdictions.[125] He also issued a series of orders to army commanders all over France and French-occupied territories, transferring units to Lyons, where General Bon was reorganizing and equipping most of them prior to sending them down the Rhône to the Mediterranean in hundreds of barges and other shallow craft.[126]
So thoroughly enforced — at least at certain levels — was the Directory’s insistence on secrecy that one general who had never served with Bonaparte, Jean-Baptiste Kléber, and still ignorant of the expedition’s ultimate destination, asked to be attached to the general staff of the “Armée de l’Angleterre.”[127] Even more surprising, the acting naval minister himself was not apprised of the expedition’s real objective until March 15![128]
Two weeks later, on March 30, General Bonaparte informed Chief Army Ordonnateur Sucy — who held a position equivalent in rank, pay, and importance to that of a quartermaster general — that the expeditionary force would be comprised of five army divisions requiring two months’ food and munitions (for their use on reaching their destination), each division to stage at one of five principal embarkation ports: Marseilles, Toulon, Genoa, Ajaccio, and Civitavecchia. Gen. E. A. C. de Dommartin was to take command of the army’s artillery, while its medical corps was to be headed by Dr. René Nicolas Desgenettes, seconded by Chief Army Surgeon Dominique Larrey, commanding eighteen medical doctors and surgeons as well as some three hundred nurses and pharmacists.[129] And although Bonaparte informed the “Armaments Commission for the Mediterranean Coast” on March 21 that “everything must be ready to sail” on April 9, so far none of the ports had a sufficient number of transport vessels ready, not to mention the escorting vessels, most of which were either being constructed or repaired, or were with Rear Admiral Brueys, returning from Corfu.[130]
