Napoleon's Poisoned Chalice

by Dr Martin Howard

  Forsyth avoids any mention of the change to the autopsy report. Lowe thought the matter important enough to require some explanation and he wrote to Bathurst on 10th May.

  With reference to what I mentioned in the previous letter I addressed to Your Lordship respecting the state of the liver on dissection, I beg leave to enclose a letter which Sir Thomas Reade had addressed to me on the subject [Reade’s report of the post-mortem quoted earlier]. I regret the point of view in which it exhibits the conduct of Dr Shortt whose attachment to every part of his public duty and private professional duty has been calculated to give very general satisfaction, and I trust, therefore it may not be necessary to advert to it again … I have to add that Mr Livingstone (whose proper line of conduct in some discussions with Dr Verling I had occasion to mention), who being present when the stomach and liver were examined, and being asked by me in Dr Shortt’s presence if he had observed any largeness in the liver, directly said he had not. Some degree of contrivance it appeared to me had been previously used to prevent Mr Livingstone from being present during the dissection, though specifically named by me to attend and even to send him away before the dissection was over.

  P.S. Dr Arnott has appeared to me to have conducted himself as a perfectly honest and upright man in not encouraging, at the dissection of General Bonaparte, the desire evinced to ascribe his disease to the liver and showed his judgment also in having an opinion to the contrary. Dr Shortt thought the disease produced from the liver without having ever seen the patient alive, but he feels a little ashamed, I believe, of the opinion he has offered.7

  Norwood Young does describe the amended post-mortem report. He defends the Governor against any accusation of wrongdoing by claiming that Shortt was not coerced into making the alteration. He had, Young claims, a change of mind. The author suggests that the doctor’s initial opinion that the liver was enlarged was simply a ‘hasty assertion which he afterwards regretted’. Young supports his theory that the physician was the victim only of his own mistake by quoting two letters written by Shortt on the day after the autopsy. The first, to his brother-in-law in Dumfries, was later published in the North British Advertiser in 1873.

  St. Helena

  7th May, 1821

  My Dear Sir

  You will, no doubt, be much surprised to hear of Bonaparte’s death, who expired on the 5th May, after an illness of some standing. His disease was cancer in the stomach that must have lasted some years, and been in a state of ulceration some months. I was in consultation and attendance several days, but he would not see strangers. I was officially introduced, the moment he died. His face was in death the most beautiful I ever beheld, exhibiting softness and very good expression in the highest degree, and really seemed formed to conquer. The following day I superintended the dissection of his body – (at this time his countenance was much altered) – which was done at his own request, to ascertain the exact seat of the disease (which he imagined to be where it was afterwards discovered to be), with the view of benefiting his son, who might inherit it. During the whole of his illness he never complained and kept his character to the last. The disease being hereditary, his father having died of it, and his sister, the Princess Borghese, being supposed to have it, proves to the world that climate and mode of life had no hand in it and, contrary to the assertions of Messrs O’Meara and Stokoe, his liver was perfectly sound; and had he been on the throne of France instead of an inhabitant of St. Helena, he would equally have suffered, as no earthly power could cure the disease when formed.

  A second letter of the same date, containing much the same information, was published by a member of the Shortt family in the English Review in 1831. If we take his comment that the liver was ‘perfectly sound’ literally, then the doctor had indeed had a dramatic change of opinion. This is improbable as there had been no reason for him to revise his original medical assessment in the twenty four hours after the autopsy. It is more likely that he was telling his brother-in-law only part of the truth. He would not have wanted to admit to a close relative that he had been bullied into changing a crucial medical report for political reasons. Neither would he have wished to place such an explosive revelation into the public domain; the post on St. Helena was censored and the contents of his letters were almost certainly scrutinised by Lowe’s staff. That he was forced to change the official report against his will is confirmed by an entry in Gorrequer’s diary for 7th May, the same day on which Shortt wrote his letters home.

  Mach [Lowe] worried Dr Shortt and Dr Arnott to make them alter the report of the dissection, and the whole of the doctors concerned, who after much noise and much rage on his part did alter it. By dint of persevering in worrying the above two named, he obtained letters from them, to annex to reports subsequently sent, saying that Napoleon would not have lived so long had it not been for the adhesion of the liver.

  Lowe not only demanded the erasure of any reference to the liver as a possible source of disease; he wanted to portray the organ as a positive influence. Arnott, who had originally thought that the liver was large, had evidently sided with Shortt but both doctors had been forced to capitulate. Lowe was correct in his claim that Shortt was ashamed but this was not for the reason he inferred.8

  The Governor had a personal reason to be grateful to his Principal Medical Officer. His son became seriously ill with croup and Shortt successfully treated him. Lowe showed the doctor no public ill will. He praised him in his General Order of 25th July 1821. Conversely, Shortt never forgave Lowe for forcing him to act unethically. When O’Meara’s book appeared, the doctor joined in the attacks on the beleaguered ex-Governor. He was consulted by Sir Walter Scott who was working on his Life of Napoleon; much of Scott’s prejudice against Lowe was derived from Shortt.

  It is possible that Shortt departed from St. Helena sooner than he wished. The reasons for this are obscure. One would have thought that he would have been keen to return to his lucrative private practice but his inclination to stay on the island is suggested by a conversation of Reade’s, cryptically documented by Gorrequer in late June. According to the Deputy Adjutant-General, Shortt ‘only wanted to be asked to remain here … but was disappointed’. He adds that the doctor ‘would have given anything to stay’. Shortt sailed for home in September and resumed his previous work in Edinburgh. In 1827, he refused a further call up from the Army Board and, following an application to the Duke of Wellington, he was granted £1,000 in lieu of his half-pay. His successful career culminated in his appointment as Inspector of Prisons in 1842. He died from pneumonia the following year at the age of fifty-five and was buried at Newport on the Isle of Wight.9

  After the autopsy, Saint-Denis and Marchand dressed the Emperor in the complete uniform of the mounted chasseurs of the Imperial Guard. They carried the body to his former bedroom, which had been draped in black and turned into a mortuary chapel. He was laid on the field bed on which he had died and, as has been related, was guarded by Arnott and Rutledge. It was now decided to make a cast of the Emperor’s face; a death mask. Both valets say that Madame Bertrand was the chief proponent. She wanted to take an imprint of the Emperor’s features, both for his own family and for posterity.

  There was nothing surprising in this. It was the fashion of the time to take casts of the face or the whole head, both in life and after death. The technique was not straightforward. Even in the hands of an expert, death-moulding was unsatisfactory as nothing could prevent the sinking of the eyes, the compression of the nose, and the drawing in of the cheeks. The normal method was to shave the head, to block up the orifices (in life a thin quill was inserted into the nose for breathing) and then to place a thin sheet of muslin on the skin. One or two silk threads were laid on to allow the eventual removal of the mould. The plaster, prepared from gypsum, was then applied in layers over the whole head and allowed to set hard. The threads were pulled and the mould came apart, often in three pieces. These were re-soldered together with wet plaster and bound with string to form the final m
ould. The casting involved pouring in, at the throat, enough plaster to line the inside. The mould was rocked to ensure that this filled every cranny and more plaster was added until the cast attained a thickness of around one inch. The whole was allowed to set and dry for a few hours and a chisel was then used to chip away the mould leaving the cast of the head. Ideally, this was a perfect reproduction but, particularly if performed after death, there was often the need for a sculptor to repair cracks and beautify the final product.

  At first, there was little public reference to Napoleon’s death mask. A letter to The Times in September 1821 alluded to a conversation in which Antommarchi described fashioning a mask. This was penned anonymously and was very likely a forgery as it contained a number of obvious inaccuracies. Three years later, Antommarchi published his memoirs, Les Derniers Moments de Napoléon, in which he made reference to the existence of a mask and claimed that he was the maker. Although Antommarchi wrote that he moulded the face before the post-mortem – all other witnesses indicate that it was done afterwards – his assertion was not challenged. In the nineteenth century, it was commonly assumed that it was ‘Antommarchi’s mask’. However, the waters were already becoming muddied. There was more than one mask in circulation and the story of the creation and subsequent fate of the original was becoming part of St. Helena mythology. Which mask was the true version? There were almost as many different theories as for the cause of death of the Emperor. In the first decade of the twentieth century, the story of the mask took a dramatic turn – an eminent French historian stated that the true author of the mask was a British army doctor.10

  Francis Burton was born in 1784 at Tuam in County Galway and he studied medicine at Dublin. He joined the British army in 1805 and served in the Peninsular War, first as Assistant Surgeon in the 36th Foot and then as Surgeon to the 4th Regiment. He also saw action in the Walcheren Campaign and at Waterloo. He was highly regarded both by his comrades and medical superiors. At the end of the war, the officers of his regiment presented him with a piece of plate as testimony to their gratitude. He resided in Edinburgh for some time before he was recalled to active service at the special request of James McGrigor. It was in the capacity of Surgeon to the 66th Regiment that he arrived on St. Helena on 31st March 1821.11

  Burton had a reputation for integrity both during his university years in Dublin and through his later military career. This is important as we are greatly dependant on his papers and letters in unravelling the story of Napoleon’s death mask. There are three main sources for the doctor’s version of events. In 1835, seven years after Burton’s death, the celebrated Dublin pathologist Professor James Graves gave two lectures on the subject of Napoleon. Graves was Burton’s cousin and he had unique access to his correspondence. In the second of his lectures, the professor declared that Burton was the author of the death mask. This should have caused a stir and seriously undermined Antommarchi’s pretensions but the talk was delivered to a handful of medical students on an ordinary professorial round and was published in the highly specialised London Medical and Surgical Journal. It only reached a very limited number of people and it is unlikely that word spread across the Channel. Graves’s revelations were quickly forgotten and only received wider attention over seventy years after the original lecture. The second source is a letter written by Burton to The Courier in September 1821 and the third is correspondence between Lowe and Bathurst in which the Governor gives the surgeon full credit for the creation of the mask.

  Burton states that he had previous experience of taking casts in plaster of Paris but he does not elaborate. He asked the Governor for permission to make a death mask ‘both before and after the death of General Bonaparte’. He later adds that he was ‘very anxious’ to take a ‘bust’ of the Emperor. Lowe gave the doctor permission to proceed. Marchand remembers that the Governor offered Antommarchi the services of a doctor who was adept at plaster casts to help him take that of Napoleon but the Corsican replied that he needed only plaster and not assistance. Burton is not mentioned by name but this incident agrees with his own account.12

  What happened next is best told in Burton’s own words. The doctor sometimes uses the term ‘bust’ rather than ‘cast’.

  I accordingly [having received Lowe’s approval], the morning after General Bonaparte’s death [6th May], proceeded to Longwood. On my arrival there, Dr Antommarchi informed me that he intended taking a cast: I asked his permission to be present, and also to take one myself to which he agreed. Dr Antommarchi, however, on trial of the material sent to him, said it could not succeed; upon which I returned to Jamestown and found that there was no plaster to be had in the shops but learned that the crude material (sulphate of lime) was to be found scattered about in different parts of the island. The Admiral [Robert Lambert] was then applied to, who allowed his boats to proceed in search of it, Mr Payne [John Paine], ornamental house-painter, employed at Longwood, having offered his services in preparing the plaster.

  As soon as it was ready, I had it conveyed to Dr Antommarchi under the feeling that the friends of the deceased ought to have the first trial; he, however, on seeing the plaster, said it could not succeed, and positively refused even to attempt it. This occurred in the presence of Madame Bertrand, several British officers, Mr Payne, Mr Rubridge [Joseph Rubridge, the portrait painter] and many of the household. On seeing Dr Antommarchi positively refuse the take the cast, Madame Bertrand not only gave me permission, but urged me even to attempt it. With little difficulty I succeeded in forming the mould, but at so late an hour that a second could not be taken. Dr Antommarchi, after the only difficulty had been surmounted, thought it proper to assist. Next morning [7th May], the bust was taken from the mould, but finding the plaster very bad, I was most reluctantly obliged to sacrifice the mould to preserve the bust perfect.

  The last comment suggests that Burton had no experience of making death masks. It was routine practice to destroy the mould. His previous handling of plaster was probably limited to surgical procedures in live patients. He continues,

  Here then lay a difficulty; for although the person [Antommarchi] employed by the friends of the deceased could not execute the business, I thought it a necessary compliment that the friends should have one of the best busts that I could execute; and under this impression I have ever acted. I represented to them, through Dr Antommarchi, the great danger of trying to take a second mould from the bust [i.e. a secondary or piece-mould from the original cast in order to multiply casts] owing to the badness of the plaster; but to obviate the difficulty, proposed that it should not be attempted until our arrival in England, which was agreed to, and Dr Antommarchi proposed that it should be done at the Sablonière Hotel, London, to which he intended going.

  From Burton’s account, it seems that the room was full of people when he fashioned the mould for the mask. In addition to himself and Antommarchi, there was Madame Bertrand and a number of members of the household, including Marchand and Saint-Denis, and perhaps as many as ten British spectators. Very few have left accounts of who did what and the eyewitness evidence that we do have is contradictory. Marchand says that Antommarchi made the mask with Burton’s help but this is dubious. The valet wrote his memoirs long after the appearance of Antommarchi’s book and he would not have wanted to publicly accuse his companion in exile of lying. Saint-Denis gives equal credit to the British and Corsican doctors. The two British sources available, Ensign John Ward of the 60th Regiment and Ensign Duncan Darroch of the 20th, insist that Burton was the chief operator. Darroch’s account has an air of authenticity; he remembers that he was unable to remain long in the room because of the ‘horrible stench’.

  To understand subsequent events, it is important to appreciate that Burton made his cast in two parts taken from two separate moulds. There was a larger front part containing the features of the face and the ears and a smaller back part with the outline of the back of the head. Again, this suggests that the doctor was an amateur at making death masks. A more experi
enced practitioner would have joined the two moulds together to produce a single cast of the whole head.13

  Despite his inexperience, the surgeon had succeeded in creating a recognisable mask. He had shown more determination and had overcome more difficulties than he later admitted; to fashion the object from crude material taken directly from the soil was a considerable achievement. Well satisfied with his efforts, Burton left the two halves of the cast to dry and retired to his quarters for some refreshment. Here he recounted his efforts to his brother officers who were keen to see the mask. On being informed that it was at Longwood, one of the more senior officers, whom Burton does not identify, immediately exclaimed, ‘You have been deceived, you will never see the mould again.’ Here, Burton uses the word ‘mould’ when he actually means the cast.

  The doctor naively protested that it was impossible that the mask could be spirited away as he had made it in front of so many witnesses. He was, however, unsettled enough by the remark to return to Longwood – it is unclear whether this was later the same day or early the following morning. Here he found the suspicions of his worldlier companion to have been fully justified. The front, or face part, of the cast had been taken. The back part was left behind; the theft was committed by someone who did not fully understand the significance of the two halves.