Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte — Complete
the provinces and foreign countries, and was everywhere accompanied by
astonishment and sorrow. There is in the departments a separate class of
society, possessing great influence, and constituted entirely of persons
usually called the "Gentry of the Chateaux," who may be said to form the
provincial Faubourg St. Germain, and who were overwhelmed by the news.
The opinion of the Gentry of the Chateaux was not hitherto unfavourable
to the First Consul, for the law of hostages which he repealed had
been felt very severely by them. With the exception of some families
accustomed to consider themselves, in relation to the whole world, what
they were only within the circle of a couple of leagues; that is to say,
illustrious personages, all the inhabitants of the provinces, though
they might retain some attachment to the ancient order of things,
had viewed with satisfaction the substitution of the Consular for the
Directorial government, and entertained no personal dislike to the First
Consul. Among the Chateaux, more than anywhere else, it had always been
the custom to cherish Utopian ideas respecting the management of public
affairs, and to criticise the acts of the Government. It is well known
that at this time there was not in all France a single old mansion
surmounted by its two weathercocks which had not a systems of policy
peculiar to itself, and in which the question whether the First Consul
would play the part of Cromwell or Monk was not frequently canvassed. In
those innocent controversies the little news which the Paris papers were
allowed to publish was freely discussed, and a confidential letter from
Paris sometimes furnished food for the conversation of a whole week.
While I was with Bonaparte he often talked to me about the life in the
Chateaux, which he considered as the happiest for men with sufficient
income and exempt from ambition. He knew and could appreciate this
sort of life, for he often told me the period of his life which he
remembered. with the greatest pleasure was that which he had passed in a
Chateau of the family of Boulat du Colombier near Valence. Bonaparte set
great value on the opinion of the Chateaux, because while living in
the country he had observed the moral influence which their inhabitants
exercise over their neighbourhood. He had succeeded to a great degree
in conciliating them, but the news of the death of the Duc d'Enghien
alienated from him minds which were still wavering, and even those which
had already declared in his favour. That act of tyranny dissolved the
charm which had created hope from his government and awakened affections
which had as yet only slumbered. Those to whom this event was almost
indifferent also joined in condemning it; for there are certain
aristocratic ideas which are always fashionable in a certain class
of society. Thus for different causes this atrocity gave a retrograde
direction to public opinion, which had previously been favourably
disposed to Bonaparte throughout the whole of France.
The consequences were not less important, and might have been disastrous
with respect to foreign Courts. I learned, through a channel which
does not permit me to entertain any doubt of the correctness of my
information, that as soon as the Emperor Alexander received the news it
became clear that England might conceive a well-founded hope of
forming a new coalition against France. Alexander openly expressed his
indignation. I also learned with equal certainty that when Mr. Pitt was
informed of the death of the French Prince he said, "Bonaparte has
now done himself more mischief than we have done him since the last
declaration of war."
--[The remark made on this murder by the astute cold-blooded Fouché
is well known. He said, "It was worse than a crime--it was a
blunder!"--Editor of 1836 Edition.]--
Pitt was not the man to feel much concern for the death of any one;
but he understood and seized all the advantages afforded to him by this
great error of policy committed by the most formidable enemy of England.
In all the Treasury journals published in London Bonaparte was never
spoken of under any other name than that of the "assassin of the Duc
d'Enghien." The inert policy of the Cabinet of Vienna prevented the
manifestation of its displeasure by remonstrances, or by any outward
act. At Berlin, in consequence of the neighbourhood of the French troops
in Hanover, the commiseration for the death of the Duc d'Enghien was
also confined to the King's cabinet, and more particularly to the salons
of the Queen of Prussia; but it is certain that that transaction almost
everywhere changed the disposition of sovereigns towards the First
Consul, and that if it did not cause, it at least hastened the success
of the negotiations which England was secretly carrying on with Austria
and Prussia. Every Prince of Germany was offended by the violation of
the Grand Duke of Baden's territory, and the death of a Prince could not
fail everywhere to irritate that kind of sympathy of blood and of race
which had hitherto always influenced the crowned heads and sovereign
families of Europe; for it was felt as an injury to all of them.
When Louis XVIII. learned the death of the Duc d'Enghien he wrote to
the King of Spain, returning him the insignia of the Order of the
Golden Fleece (which had also been conferred on Bonaparte), with the
accompanying letter:
SIRE, MONSIEUR, AND DEAR COUSIN--It is with regret that I send back
to you the insignia of the Order of the Golden Fleece which his
Majesty, your father, of glorious memory conferred upon me. There
can be nothing in common between me and the great criminal whom
audacity and fortune have placed on my throne, since he has had the
barbarity to stain himself with the blood of a Bourbon, the Duc
d'Enghien.
Religion might make me pardon an assassin, but the tyrant of my
people must always be my enemy.
In the present age it is more glorious to merit a sceptre than to
possess one.
Providence, for incomprehensible reasons, may condemn me to end my
days in exile, but neither my contemporaries nor posterity shall
ever have to say, that in the period of adversity I showed my self
unworthy of occupying the throne of my ancestors.
LOUIS
The death of the Duc d'Enghien was a horrible episode in the proceedings
of the great trial which was then preparing, and which was speedily
followed by the accession of Bonaparte to the Imperial dignity. It
was not one of the least remarkable anomalies of the epoch to see
the judgment by which criminal enterprises against the Republic were
condemned pronounced in the name of the Emperor who had so evidently
destroyed that Republic. This anomaly certainly was not removed by the
subtlety, by the aid of which he at first declared himself Emperor of
the Republic, as a preliminary to his proclaiming himself Emperor of
the French. Setting aside the means, it must be acknowledged that it
is impossible not to admire the genius of Bonaparte, his tenacity in
advancing towards his object, and that adroit employment of suppleness
and audacity which made him sometimes dare fortune, sometimes avoid
difficulties which he found insurmountable, to arrive, not merely at the
throne of Louis XVI., but at the reconstructed throne of Charlemagne.
CHAPTER XXIV.
1804.
Pichegru betrayed--His arrest--His conduct to his old aide de camp--
Account of Pichegru's family, and his education at Brienne--
Permission to visit M. Carbonnet--The prisoners in the Temple--
Absurd application of the word "brigand"--Moreau and the state of
public opinion respecting him--Pichegru's firmness--Pichegru
strangled in prison--Public opinion at the time--Report on the death
of Pichegru.
I shall now proceed to relate what I knew at the time and what I have
since learnt of the different phases of the trial of Georges, Pichegru,
Moreau and the other persons accused of conspiracy,--a trial to all the
proceedings of which I closely attended. From those proceedings I was
convinced that Moreau was no conspirator, but at the same time I must
confess that it is very probable the First Consul might believe that
he had been engaged in the plot, and I am also of opinion that the real
conspirators believed Moreau to be their accomplice and their chief;
for the object of the machinations of the police agents was to create a
foundation for such a belief, it being important to the success of their
scheme.
It has been stated that Moreau was arrested on the day after the
confessions made by Bouvet de Lozier; Pichegru was taken by means of the
most infamous treachery that a man can be guilty of. The official police
had at last ascertained that he was in Paris, but they could not learn
the place of his concealment. The police agents had in vain exerted all
their efforts to discover him, when an old friend, who had given him his
last asylum, offered to deliver him up for 100,000 crowns. This infamous
fellow gave an exact description of the chamber which Pichegru
occupied in the Rue de Chabanais, and in consequence of his information
Comminges, commissary of police, proceeded thither, accompanied by some
determined men. Precautions were necessary, because it was known that
Pichegru was a man of prodigious bodily strength, and that besides,
as he possessed the means of defence, he would not allow himself to
be taken without making a desperate resistance. The police entered his
chamber by using false keys, which the man who had sold him had the
baseness to get made for them. A light was burning on his night table.
The party of police, directed by Comminges, overturned the table,
extinguished the light, and threw themselves on the general, who
struggled with all his strength, and cried out loudly. They were obliged
to bind him, and in this state the conqueror of Holland was removed to
the Temple, out of which he was destined never to come alive.
It must be owned that Pichegru was far from exciting the same interest
as Moreau. The public, and more especially the army, never pardoned
him for his negotiations with the Prince de Condé prior to the 18th
Fructidor. However, I became acquainted with a trait respecting him
while he was in Paris which I think does him much honour. A son of M.
Lagrenee, formerly director of the French Academy at Rome, had been one
of Pichegru's aides de camp. This young man, though he had obtained the
rank of captain, resigned on the banishment of his general, and resumed
the pencil, which he had lad aside for the sword. Pichegru, while he was
concealed in Paris; visited his former aide de camp, who insisted upon
giving him an asylum; but Pichegru positively refused to accept M.
Lagrenee's offer, being determined not to commit a man who had already
given him so strong a proof of friendship. I learned this fact by a
singular coincidence. At this period Madame de Bourrienne wished to have
a portrait of one of our children; she was recommended to M. Lagrenee,
and he related the circumstance to her.
It was on the night of the 22d of February that Pichegru was arrested
in the manner I have described. The deceitful friend who gave him up was
named Le Blanc, and he went to settle at Hamburg with the reward of his
treachery, I had entirely lost sight of Pichegru since we left Brienne,
for Pichegru was also a pupil of that establishment; but, being older
than either Bonaparte or I, he was already a tutor when we were
only scholars, and I very well recollect that it was he who examined
Bonaparte in the four first rules of arithmetic.
Pichegru belonged to an agricultural family of Franche-Comte. He had a
relation, a minim,' in that country. The minim, who had the charge of