Napoleon III Survives Death November 14, 2016
Author: Beach Combing | in : Modern , trackback
Beach was so moved to discover that Marshal Ney had not really been killed in 1815 that he went out looking for other unlikely survivors. This is one he dredged up from, of all places, Leeds Times (19 Apr 1873), 8. Napoleon III it will be remembered had come to Britain in 1871 after being forced to abdicate in France. He died a broken and humiliated man in 1873. Or did he…
Sir,
Be kind enough to have the patience to read this letter throughout. I am living in London for the last month, and I give you with my name the address of the hotel at which l am staying. My business relations have obtained me many introductions to members of the Army and Navy Club, and I have discussed with them European politics, and particularly the internal troubles of our country. Every time that the word ‘Emperor’ turned up I noticed an inexplicable mannerism – knowing winks and nods – on the faces of these club gentlemen. I was at first puzzled; afterwards I felt annoyed. One day my irritation led me to have an explanation from Sir W. T. He was rather reserved, and this ruffled me still more. My annoyance led him to say to me. ‘I thought you knew all about it.’ This increased my astonishment. I questioned him, therefore, and you may judge of my surprise when, with the most serious and natural air, he related to me what follows :
The conversation is the Victorian version of a 1980s indiscretion from someone in government about imprisoned aliens.
‘A great number of persons here,’ he said, ‘are persuaded that Napoleon III escaped from his prison at Chislehurst on the 8th of January, 1873, just as he escaped from Ham on the 25th of May, 1846, and that he is not dead.’ You can understand, again, my astonishment when I heard an honourable man, and with a face which forbade for a moment the idea of a joke, make such an assertion. ‘But how can you uphold,’ I said to my informant, ‘the probability of such a seemingly absurd proposition’: ‘Nothing,’ he replied, ‘is more simple than the occurrence of such an event, great as the consequences may be which flow from it. Were you not struck with all the unlikely details which accompanied the accounts of the decease of his Majesty? A month before his illness a congress of the chiefs of the Bonapartist party had been held at Chiselhurst. Admit for a moment that they had decided that the Emperor should escape from his State prison. What need they have done to make such an enterprise succeed? Two things only: surgical complicity and a substitute. Who proves to us that Napoleon III, did not find in an English surgeon the devotion which he inspired into Dr. Conneau in 1846, at Ham? As to resemblances, they are frequent enough, and you and I can cite more than one. Nothing besides remained but to confide the secret only to two or three people whose discretion could be trusted. The whole plot could be rehearsed beforehand, and rapidity of execution attained. The substitute being at hand, they call in the autopsy doctors who did not know the patient. The corpse was made as like as possible what that of the Emperor might be supposed to be; and the trick was complete. The Empress is, perhaps, in their confidence. The Prince Imperial, Queen Victoria and the rest of the world, knew nothing of the mystery. While the faculty of Pans was justly as surprised that no illustrious one of their number was called upon – Ricord, for instance, who operated successfully on the Emperor in 1870 – Napoleon III took refuge in a little hotel in London, with his papers all in order, cut his moustache off, shaved his ‘Imperial’, put on a wig, artistically wrought, and waited quietly in his retirement till the last of the simple people who had come to his funeral, had got back again to their own country. He then followed them, and has since been travelling at his ease, studying the situation and attitude of parties in France, and preparing for the coup which must soon come. Such, without going more into details, are the facts of this extraordinary adventure which we possess. The entire world will yet ring with the results of this enterprise, and you will then remember what I have revealed to you today. I have not the desire, nor the pretension, to convince you. It is immaterial to me whether you believe it or not. I believe because I know.
The narrator finishes as follows.
On going home after this extraordinary revelation I wrote down faithfully the subject of our conversation, not intending at the time to use the information. Chance has placed, however, under my eyes just now the following telegram:
‘Our friend C. correspondent of the xxx, met yesterday in the Faubourg St. Honore a person whom he declares to have recognised as Napoleon III. His wife also recognised him positively. Inform yourself if there be anything underneath this. C. is ill with emotion.’
The idea of such an evasion as I have related has taken root in a certain class of English society. That which has put the climax to this puzzle and decided me on writing to you to-day was a discovery that my friend Lxxx had just made in an old number of the Times, in the shape of the following advertisement: ‘A gentleman about bringing out a drama offers the sum of £100 to the person who will consent to figure in a sensational piece. Very advantageous conditions. They only exact from the person who will present himself as perfect a resemblance as possible with the ex-Emperor of the French. Reply in one of the numbers of the Times.’ May I confess to you, sir, that I am very much embarrassed by these reflections and facts?
History tells us that Napoleon III retook power in March 1871 and revenged his defeat at Sedan and… Only of course it doesn’t. Other dead heroes past? Drbeachcombing At yahoo dot com Arthur under the mountain is so passé, so sixth century…
