This summer the cruise ship industry is getting back on its feet after being shut down by the pandemic for 15 months. According to the Cruise Lines international Association, 31.5 million passengers are expected to board a cruise ship in 2023, surpassing 2019 pre-pandemic numbers.
For many, a summer cruise means a fun vacation, a journey to anticipate and an opportunity to escape mundane cares and responsibilities. But a summer cruise 208 years ago promised a different experience for Napoleon Bonaparte.
That August the former Emperor of France set out unwillingly on a special voyage, designed just for him. His ship was no luxury liner; it was more like a prison transport, taking him to his final place of exile.
Consequences of Waterloo
I doubt Napoleon knew he would wind up in St. Helena after two Coalition armies, led by the Duke of Wellington and the Prussian Prince Blücher, decisively defeated the French forces at the Battle of Waterloo on June 18, 1815. But he must have suspected that his glorious career as a European emperor had run its course.
Napoleon’s first stop after his defeat was Paris. There he methodically prepared for the next phase of his life. After all, it wasn’t the first time he’d lost a battle and been forced into exile.
However, Napoleon’s stay on the Mediterranean island of Elba in 1814 following the Treaty of Fontainebleau didn’t last long. He traded this relatively cushy exile for another shot at glory when he escaped to France on February 26, 1815, and assembled an army.
After vanquishing Napoleon four months later at Waterloo, Coalition commanders were determined not to let history repeat itself. This time, the consequences of defeat would include a much stricter exile for their former enemy. However, Napoleon still tried to exert some control over where he would spend the rest of his life.
First, though, he had business to attend to. In Paris, he abdicated his throne in favor of his son. Which incidentally didn’t work – the French throne went to Louis XVIII, brother of Louis XVI, the unfortunate monarch who was guillotined during the French Revolution.
The next step in Napoleon’s retirement plan was to escape France and go to the United States. He was even promised a passport to the U.S. by the French provisional government.
But the promised passport never materialized. So Napoleon decided to take matters into his own hands. He went to Rochefort, a port on the southwestern coast of France. Still determined to go to the U.S., he hoped to slip past the Royal Navy blockade.
A thwarted escape
But Napoleon’s dreams of escape evaporated when he saw the tall ships of the Royal Navy blocking every conceivable exit. So, on July 15, 1815, Napoleon accepted the inevitable and surrendered to Captain Frederick Maitland aboard the HMS Bellerophon, a British man-of-war anchored off the small island of Aix near Rochefort.
“I have come to put myself under the protection of your prince [that would be the Prince Regent] and your laws,” said the man who was once a feared British foe.
Next, the Bellerophon carried the former Emperor of the French (now known simply as General Bonaparte) to Plymouth and Torquay Harbor on the north shore of Tor Bay.
At Torquay Napoleon stayed on the ship, becoming a tourist attraction for the curious who clustered onto small boats and rowed out into the English Channel hoping to catch a glimpse of the defeated emperor.
If Napoleon thought he’d ever get off a Royal Navy ship while in England he was sadly mistaken. British officials vowed they wouldn’t make the same blunder they’d made in 1814.
So they decided to exile their old enemy to a remote location far away from Europe and any chance of a comeback. On July 31, Napoleon was told that he was headed for St. Helena, an island off the coast of Africa.
Concerned that the aging Bellerophon couldn’t make the voyage, the Navy transferred Napoleon to another ship, the HMS Northumberland, which set sail for St. Helena on August 7, finally leaving British waters on August 9.
Napoleon left the British Isles without ever having set foot on British soil. In fact, he would never return to Europe at all, alive at least.
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Sources for this post include:
- “From Waterloo to the island of St. Helena,” by Joanna Benazet and Irène Delage, October 2015 (translation Rebecca Young); Napoleon.org, the history website of the Fondation Napoleon
- The Wars of Napoleon: The History of the Strategies, Tactics, and Leadership of the Napoleonic Era, by Albert Sidney Britt III, The West Point Military History Series, Thomas E. Greiss, Series Editor, Department of History, United States Military Academy, West Point, New York, Avery Publishing Group Inc., Wayne, New Jersey, 1985.
- “The Cruise Industry Is Back—and Breaking Pre-Pandemic Travel Records,” by Simmone Shah, Time Magazine, March 16, 2023
Images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons