In Italy his name had become legendary for valour. He made his mark within ninety-six hours of the opening of the campaign by carrying the village of Dego at the point of the bayonet. He led the final assault on the bridge at Lodi in the face of a hail of grapeshot and captured the enemy guns. At Arcola, when victory wavered in the balance, although already suffering from three wounds, he thrust his way out of the field hospital, took command of a column, led the assault that saved the day and was the first man to cross the Adda. Many times wounded and covered with glory, dauntless and indefatigable, he was the best leader of infantry that Bonaparte had, and the General-in-Chief had publicly acknowledged it by presenting him with captured enemy standards.
On the field of battle Lannes did not know what fear was, but this was a different matter. He had already committed himself much deeper than most men would have cared to do by defying an officer of higher rank than himself. But now that he was threatened with arrest, would he back down, apologise and, in order to make his peace, agree to leave Roger there at the mercy of Desmarets? Next moment Roger knew that his fears had been groundless.
Drawing himself up, the little Gascon cried furiously, ‘Do you know who I am? I am Lannes! I fought with General Bonaparte at Montebello. I captured the guns at Lodi. I was the first Frenchman across the Adda. Arrest me at your peril. General Bonaparte lies this night in Calais. I’ll send one of my orderlies to him with a report of your disgraceful mishandling of this affair. Before morning all hell will break about your ears. Unless you allow Colonel Breuc and myself to depart this instant you might as well tear your rank badges off here and now, for you’ll not need them tomorrow.’
Although a rough, uncultured man, Desmarets was no fool. He realised that he had unwittingly put his head into a hornets’ nest. To arrest a national hero and court the anger of the terrible little Corsican who was his master spelled certain ruin. Yet he lacked the tact to give way graciously. With a sullen scowl he muttered:
‘I’m not afraid of Bonaparte, and I’ve done my duty as I saw it. Still, I’ve never been one to make trouble. Have your way, then, and we’ll say no more of this.’
‘I’ll make no promise about that,’ snapped Lannes. Then jerking his head toward the door he added to Roger, ‘Come, Breuc. We must ride hard. The General-in-Chief is expecting me and he does not like to be kept waiting.’
Five minutes later the young Major had produced a mount for Roger. With the two Hussars behind them, he and Lannes clattered out of the camp and took the road to Calais. Alternately they cantered, trotted and walked their horses to give them a breather. During the later spells Roger gave his friend an account of his misadventure and, in turn, Lannes brought him up to date with what had been taking place since Roger had left Bonaparte to go on sick leave.
He said that on leaving Italy Bonaparte had gone to Rastatt where, it had ben agreed, the details of the Peace Treaty should be settled. Francis II was in a somewhat difficult position, for he was Emperor of Austria and also the titular head of the Holy Roman Empire. This latter consisted of numerous Germanic States that, centuries earlier, had formed a Federation giving allegiance to a Monarch elected by their Princes as the representative of the hereditary power derived from ancient Rome. In more recent times the Emperor of Austria, being by far the most powerful among them, had, almost automatically, been elected as their Suzerain. But Francis had signed a peace with Bonaparte only in his capacity as Emperor of Austria; so he now had to arrange matters with the numerous satellite, semi-independent rulers who had given him their support as the head of the Holy Roman Empire.
Under a secret agreement entered into with Bonaparte by the Emperor’s Foreign Ministers, Baron Thugut and Count Cobenzl, certain Princes whose realms had been overrun by the French, or were to be ceded to them, were to be compensated by being given other territories, and some of the German Prince-Bishops were to be deprived of their ancient fiefs altogether.
It was to initiate these delicate negotiations that Bonaparte had gone to Rastatt. However, soon foreseeing the endless wrangles that must ensue at such a conference, and detesting long hours of inaction spent listening to argument, he had, after a few days, left the plenipotentiaries appointed by the Directory to handle matters.
During his progress through the Swiss cantons the republicans in the cities had hailed him with enthusiasm as the ‘Liberator of the Italian People’. A few minorities had even gone to the length of handing him petitions asking that he should free them from their feudal overlords.
His journey thence through France had been a triumph. His name, almost unknown eighteen months earlier, had since become synonymous with victory and the renewal of French glory. In every town and village the people had fought to touch his hand and had showered gifts upon him. When he reached Paris on December 15th the enthusiasm of the crowds had been indescribable. He was the man of the hour, and rich and poor alike went wild about him.
It was no secret that the Directors were very perturbed by his popularity, jealous of it and a little frightened of him. However, they donned the absurd, pseudo-classical robes which the Assembly had decreed as their costume for official occasions and gave the young conqueror a State welcome, during which they, in turn, embraced him, acclaimed him as a hero and urged him to undertake further conquests for the glory of France.
He had accepted all this as his due, but with commendable modesty, and had afterwards withdrawn himself on all occasions when it seemed likely that he would receive a public ovation.
He had been living quietly with his wife Josephine in their house in the Rue Chautereine, refusing to receive any visitors except his personal friends. To honour him, the Municipality had changed the name of the street to Rue de la Victoire, but the only honour which appeared to give him real pleasure had been his election to the Institute. His name had been put forward to fill the vacancy created by Carnot’s flight on 18th Fructidor, and he had been unanimously elected. At his inauguration as a member of this learned body he had addressed the assembled savants with humility and declared, to thunderous applause, that the only conquests of real value to mankind were those wrested by science from the universe for the benefit of humanity as a whole.
When Roger asked how it came about that Lannes had been riding along the beach between Calais and Boulogne, the Brigadier replied, ‘The Directory have appointed our little man General-in-Chief for the invasion of England; so at the moment he is carrying out a reconnaissance of the coast to assess the shipping available for such a project. He has brought with him only de Bourrienne, myself and, as his aide-de-camp, Sulkowsky.
‘While he carried out an inspection of Calais harbour this afternoon, he sent me to report on the beaches south of Calais, to see if there were any coves or small river mouths in which shallow-draught vessels might be assembled. But I found none, and I cannot think that he will chance the destruction of an Army in such an operation. The British Navy commands the Channel. Until we have built up a Fleet to equal it, and have made preparations on a scale which would take many months to complete, I doubt if more than a handful of us would ever get ashore in England, and those of us who did would be massacred by that ferocious people.’
This was excellent news to Roger, as Lannes was one of Bonaparte’s most trusted officers, and so exceptionally well placed to judge the way his mind was working. Moreover, the fact that the only senior officer Bonaparte had brought with him on this important reconnaissance was Lannes showed the value he set on the fiery Gascon’s judgment. Being also a very outspoken man, Lannes would not hesitate to oppose the project should ambition tempt the Corsican to face the risks involved.
It was close on two years since Roger had first mentioned to Mr. Pitt the name of Bonaparte and had informed him that, although the newly promoted General had not then commanded even a Brigade in the field, he was a man to watch. He had said that conversations with that gaunt young Artillery officer had convinced him that Bonaparte had an extraordinary grasp of military matters, a mind capa
ble of conceiving strategic plans on the grand scale and was fired by a boundless ambition; so that with Barras behind him it was certain that he would soon be given an important Command. Roger had then warned the Prime Minister that should that Command be the Army of the North he must expect an invasion that summer, as Bonaparte had maintained that the only means of ensuring permanent peace and prosperity to France lay in the destruction of her great commercial rival, Britain, and that the dearest of all his dreams was to march into London at the head of a French Army.
The Prime Minister had taken the warning seriously and had put certain measures in train to strengthen the defences on the south coast, but not long afterwards Bonaparte had been given the Command of the Army of Italy. As a result, with the laissez-faire habitual to the British, preparations to resist invasion had been allowed to slacken off. Roger was well aware that little of value had been done, and the danger of the French making a successful landing was as great as ever. It comforted him, therefore, to learn that Lannes thought it unlikely that Bonaparte would attempt it.
By taking the inland road they covered the twelve miles to Calais in good time and entered the town a little before seven o’clock. Lannes said that their General had taken up his quarters for the night at the house of the Military Commandant, General Réveillon. It was a spacious mansion which, before the Revolution, had been the property of a wealthy noble. In the courtyard Lannes and Roger handed their mounts over to the two Hussars and the Brigadier led the way inside.
In the hall they ran into another old friend of Roger’s, Fauvelet de Bourrienne. He was a ci-devant noble and as a youth had been a cadet at the Military Academy at Brienne with Bonaparte, although he had later gone into the Diplomatic Service instead of entering the Army. During the Revolution he had been recalled from his post in Germany but, fearing that as an aristocrat he would be sent to the guillotine, he had refused to return to France; so he had been listed as an émigré.
When peace negotiations were about to be entered into, following the signing of the armistice at Leoben, Bonaparte had felt the need of a really capable man, on whose devotion he could rely, to act as his Chef de Cabinet. At Brienne, Bonaparte, as the poor son of a landless Corsican gentleman, had been almost ostracised by his rich and noble school-fellows. Bourrienne had been one of the few who, as well as being a star pupil, had befriended him; so he had written and offered him the post. Bourrienne had accepted, joined him in Italy and soon showed such ability that Bonaparte had every reason to be pleased with his choice.
On seeing Roger, Bourrienne opened wide his arms, embraced him and cried, ‘Mon ami, what a joy to have you back with us! But what a state you are in! You look as though you have been dragged through a hedge backwards. What the deuce have you been up to?’
Between them Roger and Lannes gave him a rough outline of what had occurred, the latter promising a more detailed account later. Then Bourrienne took him into a room at the front of the house which their host used as an office.
General Réveillon was sitting there: a big, red-faced, jolly-looking man in his late forties. Having welcomed Roger, he took him up to a bedroom on the third floor and ordered a soldier servant to bring up cans of hot water so that Roger could wash and tidy himself up. As he was about to leave, he said:
‘When you are ready, come down to the big salon on the first floor. Supper will be in about three-quarters of an hour, and I have asked some of my officers to meet the General-in-Chief; so we’ll be quite a big party.’
Half an hour later, having made himself as presentable as he could and with a light heart now that all his troubles were over, Roger went downstairs and entered the salon. There were nearly twenty officers there, and Bonaparte was standing near one of the tall windows, talking to Réveillon. The young conqueror was then twenty-eight and a half, so was some eighteen months younger than Roger.
The eagle eyes in the pale face of the weedy-looking little Corsican lit on Roger immediately. With an abrupt gesture he beckoned him over. Roger drew himself up, walked forward and stood stiffly to attention.
Bonaparte, whose memory was prodigious, said sharply, ‘Breuc, you were due to report back from leave not later than January 31st. You are twelve days late. Explain yourself.’
Roger replied with quiet confidence. ‘Mon Général, it was in your service. I recovered from the wound I received in Venice more speedily than I had expected; so I decided to put the remainder of my sick leave to good purpose. Since you have often spoken to me of your intention, sooner or later, to invade and conquer England, and since I can so easily pass for an Englishman, I had myself smuggled across the Channel. My return was delayed by appalling weather, but in the six weeks I spent there I carried out a reconnaissance of the present state of defence on the south coast, from Ramsgate to Lymington.’
A sudden smile twitched Bonaparte’s thin lips and his large dark eyes lit up as he murmured, ‘That was well done, Breuc. Well done indeed. I have always counted on your value when we make our descent on England, and now you will be worth an extra Division to me.’
When he had first addressed Roger so sharply a sudden hush had descended on the room. Now, raising his voice so that all could hear, he laid his hand on Roger’s arm and said, ‘I appoint you my Aide-de-Camp-in-Chief for the invasion of England, and I have today decided to lead the Army of the North against that accursed island before the spring is out.’
6
The New Babylon in 1798
Bonaparte’s pronouncement was received with great enthusiasm. Lannes alone among the assembled officers refrained from joining in the cheers and for a moment it looked as if he were about to voice a protest. But evidently considering the time and place inappropriate, he refrained and confined himself to exchanging an uneasy glance with Bourrienne.
Having dealt with Roger, the General-in-Chief resumed his conversation with Réveillon; so Roger tactfully withdrew and mingled with the others. When supper was announced they filed into a large dining room where, although Réveillon was the host, he insisted on Bonaparte taking the head of the long table. The gesture showed Roger that his chief had by his return to France lost nothing of the status he had achieved for himself in Italy.
There, at Montebello, during the peace parleys with Austria, he had in a few months transformed his position from that of a fighting soldier, who shared all hardships with his strongly Republican officers and men, to that of an almost royal personage. He had formed a Court at which his wife, mother and sisters set the tone for the many other ladies who had been invited from France to join his senior officers. Even his oldest friends no longer dared to ‘thee and thou’ him. Like royalty, he dined every night in state, with his family and only a few others whom, from time to time, he chose to honour. The drawing rooms and ante-chambers of the Palace were always crowded, not only with his Generals but with a score of German and Italian nobles sent by their Princes to fawn upon him and win his goodwill.
He talked almost incessantly and now, as then, everyone hung upon his words while his agile mind flashed from subject to subject, hardly waiting for answers to the questions he shot at those nearest him. Réveillon had taken the place on his right and Bourrienne was on his other side. Lannes and Roger were on the opposite side of the table, a few places down. The meal was nearly over when, during a brief pause in the conversation, Lannes said to his master:
‘But for my arrival on the scene this afternoon you would have been short of an aide-de-camp. At four o’clock Breuc was on the point of being shot as a spy.’
Bonaparte gave Roger an amused glance. ‘That would have been carrying your pretence of being an Englishman a little too far. Tell us how you got yourself into such a predicament.’
One of Roger’s most valuable gifts was his ability as a raconteur. He plunged into his story with gusto, deliberately raised several laughs against himself, gave a graphic description of the terror he had felt and belittled his achievement of having got away from seven armed men.
He could
afford to adopt such an attitude because Bonaparte believed him to be fearless. At the siege of Toulon, soon after they first met, Roger had got himself into a position where he had had no alternative but to lead an assault on an enemy battery over open ground in full daylight, and the out-at-elbows little Commander of the Artillery was under the impression that he had deliberately volunteered to undertake this suicidal act. More recently, too, on an island near Mestre, he had defended himself against a dozen Venetians under the eyes of the General-in-Chief, and in so doing had saved him from their most unwelcome attentions. He had received a sword of honour as a reward and a mention in Army Orders that had established his reputation for valour.
As Bonaparte loved stories he listened attentively, interrupting only to tell Roger what he ought to have done on several occasions when he might have taken some different line in his defence. By the time the tale was completed everyone had finished eating, the wine was circulating freely and several officers had lit cheroots. Bonaparte’s comment on Roger’s account of himself was:
‘Like myself, Breuc, you were born under a lucky star. Desmarets I know only by name. He is one of those Old Guard Generals who owes his rise to the Revolution. Most of them should never have been promoted above Sergeant-Major. His attitude shows laziness as well as irresponsibility. On that account I shall take steps to have him removed from his Command. Now tell me the impression you formed of the defences of England.’
In replying, Roger had to be extremely careful. It was in the interests of his country to report that the south coast now bristled with formidable obstacles designed to prevent an enemy landing. However, he knew that the French must have numerous spies in England who would be sending back more or less accurate assessments; so he dared not depart very far from the truth. With a thoughtful look, he said:
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