Why on Earth was Napoleon treated to leniently?
- Thread starter RedRalph
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innonimatu
the resident Cassandra
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Suppose that you are a head of state who has to give his input about how Napoleon should be treated. Would you further encourage the precedent of chopping off the heads from heads of state? Or even just killing them in a dungeon? I think that after that whole mess people wanted very much to put the war and any more violence back. Break the cycle. And they did it too.
Then, there's also the fact that even after Napoleon's second defeat there were a lot of bonapartists around throughout Europe. Better not give them a martyr to avenge!
Communisto
Condottiere
Short answer: He was well known. European gentleman-ship and all that.
Communisto
Condottiere
Like who?
How many leaders weren't treated so leniently prior to Napoleon?
madviking
north american scum
To be fair, the second island was a pretty damning sentence.
While it might seem unusual, exile of autocrats from their homeland is not unheard of. Hannibal is a prominent trendsetter in this regard, although he ended up selling his services in eastern kingdoms. Former dictators like Jean-Claude Duvalier don't even have to go to St. Helena--he ended up in France.
If you count pretenders to European monarchies, the list grows even longer. The Stuart line also lived in France, and if I recall correctly in Rome, after the Glorious Revolution (see "James III" and "Charles III" of England).
If you count pretenders to European monarchies, the list grows even longer. The Stuart line also lived in France, and if I recall correctly in Rome, after the Glorious Revolution (see "James III" and "Charles III" of England).
Perhaps because they didn't want to set an example of executing the losing rulers, just in-case they wound up getting defeated as some point in the future. No need to let that genie out of the bottle. Plus you have the possibility of him being viewed as a martyr.
Of course, one more reasons exists. They respected as a monarch and as a greatish ruler.
(I am just assuming that you meaning getting off lightly means not getting executed)
Verbose
Deity
Seems about right.
Napoleon in St Helena did realize his predicament, and promptly set about martyring himself by picking a conflict with his gaoler Hudson Lowe, who apparently wasn't quick enough in the uptake to realize Napoleon was playing him. Napoleon succeeded well enough for reports about the intolerable constant insults and mistreatment of him at the hands of the English to start trickling back to France, and the Bonapartists still keeping the faith.
privatehudson
The Ultimate Badass
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Indeed, there's something to be said for the idea that confining a man like Napoleon to a small island with very little power, or no power at all was actually a harsher thing to do to him than to execute him.
They certainly did spend a lot of time in Rome, so much so that "Charles III of England and Scotland" was born there, died there and had never set foot in either country apart from the year or so he spent in them trying to reclaim the throne for his father and a brief visit in 1750.
schlaufuchs
Break My Heart
Same reason James II wasn't killed when he was deposed. Bad memories die hard.
I pretty much agree with your post except for this part. The Romans weren't the ones who kicked Hannibal out - his displacement was more so a result of Qarthadastei internal maneuvering. His opponents among the softim started a propaganda campaign against him at Rome - where only a few years earlier Scipio himself had made a famous and well-received speech warning the conscript fathers against intervention in Punic internal politics - spurring the Senate to dispatch some envoys to see what it was all about. Hannibal skipped town as soon as they got there, suspecting that he'd get a kangaroo court if he got any at all. So it's not really comparable to Napoleon's situation; the exile was more or less independent of the peace that ended the war, and it was not imposed by the victorious party.
Thanks for the clarification--this is one of the many gaps in my Punic War knowledge. I don't know of any good references for the Carthaginians, especially their internal politics, etc.
Tahuti
Writing Deity
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The Nazis? Practically everyone who wielded power in the Third Reich was sentenced to death if they hadn't committed suicide already.
Communisto
Condottiere
Completely different time period/situation. Totally incomparable.
