Key figures of the era

Good luck with that, Monsieur 😁. - Of course he did no such thing, as a divorce did not exist in Catholic France before the Revolution.

Wrong date. Rose left for Martinique (for unknown reasons) with her daughter in June 1788 and returned to France in the first days of November 1790, so Hortense was only 7 years old when she returned. As to the plantation, I understand it had been pretty run-down at the time Rose left for France, so unless Hortense’s grandmother had worked a miracle, it probably still was.

Again, wrong date. In 1793, Hortense and her mother were long back in Paris – which the speaker ought to know if she had actually read Hortense’s memoirs, as Hortense dedicates half a page to the time when Alexandre de Beauharnais was president of the Assemblée Nationale, and that was during the time of Louis XVI attempted flight to Varennes.

First of all, Eugène is Hortense’s older brother, as we heard in the beginning (even if he admittedly always stayed the baby of the family in some aspects), and secondly, of course they were not really alone. They had a governess and servants. Eugène also started an apprenticeship as a carpenter.

This I presume to be a language problem/misunderstanding, as it sounds as if Hortense had been at Madame Campan’s school while Rose-Josephine was imprisoned. That’s of course not the case; something as elitist as Madame Campan’s boarding school for upper class daughters would never have been possible before Thermidor, and barely was allowed after. I understand Hortense only entered Madame Campan’s school in autumn 1795 (according to Baylac).

No, she didn’t, actually. Baylac quotes from a school report that says otherwise. Madame Campan in her letters to Hortense would later often implore Hortense to complete her education.

… apparently so rapidly that it jumped over the whole Egyptian campaign; Napoleon triumphantly returns from Italy and overthrows the government.

I would contest that, both the »he bored everyone« and the »hypochondriac« part. It is hard to diagnose from the distance of 200 years what precisely Louis’ illness was but there is no question about him being ill. I am also unaware of Louis being disliked by anyone at the time of his marriage to Hortense. To the contrary.

Contested by Lucien’s memoirs and by the tender letters Louis writes to Hortense during the first time of their marriage. It’s Hortense who pushed back Louis, not the other way around.

Here we have a grave omission, in my opinion, of the first rumours regarding Hortense’s lack of virtue: British newspapers claiming that Hortense’s son had been fathered by Napoleon (this is again according to Hortense’s memoirs).

Little Napoléon Charles had never been declared heir to the imperial throne.

Napoleon’s star still on the fast lane, it seems, bypassing several years in a single half-sentence after his own coronation.

Obviously wrong. Just to ascertain the proper timeline: Napoléon Louis Bonaparte was born in October 1804, some weeks before Napoleon's coronation ceremony, while Louis Bonaparte became King of Holland in June 1806

I highly contest that Hortense was ever popular in Holland. Or that she ever tried to be. She never bothered to learn Dutch or made any other effort to settle down in Holland – she took every opportunity to leave the country and to return to Napoleon's court, as a matter of fact. But this will come down to opinion rather than factual errors, so I’ll leave it be.

Another grave omission. Hortense was taken to France indeed – and then she left her husband, her baby son, her family, in order to go to a spa in the Pyrenees, alone. From there she undertook a long trip in the mountains, somehow lost her servants and companions on the way one by one and ended up almost unaccompanied. The journey in itself, when she was in mourning for her son, in those days was already seen as somewhat of a scandal (there’s a letter from Eugène imploring Hortense to not go and to stay with her family). But then, nine months later, and only eight months after she had met her husband, Hortense gave birth. Welcome future Napoleon III. - Louis being sceptical of this new pregnancy had really nothing to do with paranoia, and he was far from the only person doubting that he was the father. Jokes were running all through Paris.

Should probably be »Hortense«? - There was similar confusion at the beginning, when describing the drawing of Hortense and her friend Aglaé Auguié, future Madame Ney.

Also, from what I gather from Baylac’s book, Hortense only stayed in Utrecht a couple of weeks, during the Easter holidays, before moving to Amsterdam.

Should probably be »of Holland«?

What the F? - I seriously have no clue what she means there. As to the events: Louis/Lodijwik abdicated on July 1st, 1810, and left the country during the night. Hortense was (while on holiday in Plombières) declared regent for the new five-year-old king, according to Holland’s constitution. She during the coming days did not move a finger to save Holland’s crown for her son when Napoleon annexed Holland, to the contrary. Not that I think she would have stood a chance, mind you. But it would have looked good on a mother and queen to at least formulate a protest. Apparently, making sure that she would still be part of Napoleon’s court, could enchant everybody with her dancing skills and her oh-so-incredible charms, was more important.

Factually wrong. Eugène was not even in France but attended the Congress of Vienna, where he declared himself »archi-neutre« in a letter to Auguste when news of Napoleon’s escape reached the city. Hortense did manage to make Eugène even more suspect than he already was, by sending him badly hidden secret messages. This cost them the tsar’s support and might have gotten her brother locked up in a prison in Hungary if he had not been the son-in-law of the Bavarian king.

He surrendered – technically, he even asked for asylum.

It may be of interest that these memoirs were edited and published by nobody else but Hortense herself, against the wishes of Louise Cochelet’s brothers. Hortense was an excellent advertiser of her own person, which should also suggest some caution when reading her memoirs.

Her role in Napoleon’s return from Elba is indeed quite unclear. At the very best, the Bonapartists in Paris had taken advantage of her need to be in the limelight, to have soirées and to gather a crowd of admirers around her, in order to meet and conspire in her house without her knowledge. But she may very well have been in on it. I seem to recall that Napoleon on Saint Helena made a comment on La Bédoyère being under the influence of Hortense.

That one almost had me laughing out loud. What would she have done there?

Well, duh. What else?

It might be worth to point out that the Grand-Duchess of Baden was her cousin Stéphanie.

I’m not sure I properly understood this part, or properly understood the novelty of this measure (or any other measure described there), to be honest. Passports existed literally since the middle ages? And all countries of course had a secret police trying to sound out and/or influence public opinion? So I would assume the Allied occupation force in France (under Wellington’s command, right?) setting up their own secret police would not be all that surprising? What astonishes me is rather how little influence Louis XVIII seems to have had on matters in his own country. Poor Ney.

Again with the huh? I fail to understand what the novelty was about these passports.

Possible, though neither of them actually went there, Joseph living in the US and Murat being quite dead

Yet another omission: Hortense at the time had moved to Augsburg and was living under the protection of Bavarian King Max Joseph for years. Her younger son went to school there (that’s why France’s other emperor would always speak French with a Swabian (or rather »Datschiburg«) accent.

Actually, Kühn in his book argues that, at the time, she was anything but a Bonapartist. In any case, she only raised one son, as the older son was living with his father in Italy (Louis was shocked at the lack of education this boy had, btw).

It may be of interest that in 1827, Le Bas was kicked out by Hortense rather abruptly due to him being a staunch republican (and also rather critical of her lifestyle)

… after the Carbonari had started an open uprising in several Papal Staes. Might be worth mentioning?

From where Hortense was banned, as should be remembered. So she deliberately broke the law, using a fake passport, btw, counting on Louis Philippe being unable to do much against her, as he needed Bonapartist support to keep himself on the throne. That was quite a bold and shrewd move on her part! She even published a book about that journey.

Uh… duh? Of course. Isn’t that what all those measures conducted by the Allies had been about?

Are you f’ing kidding me? That’s not even an omission any more, that’s falsifying history. Louis Napoléon was not »travelling the world«, he had been banned to the USA - after having carried out the first attempt of a coup in France! At a time when he was still living with his mother! Whose involvement in this coup would have been very interesting to investigate, I suppose?

Frankly, I’m surprised they remembered her at all, given how little time she had ever lived in Holland, and how little interest she had shown in the country. Quite a difference to the respect Louis would always receive in Holland, btw, even by his successors (I understand he actually was invited back to visit the country once by the new king after Napoleon’s fall).