Jérôme Bonaparte

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Jérôme Bonaparte as King of the Kingdom of Westphalia, portrait by François Gérard . Jérôme's signature:
Signature Jérôme Bonaparte.PNG
Jérôme and Katharina as King and Queen of the Kingdom of Westphalia, portrait by Sebastian Weygandt

Jérôme Bonaparte (born November 15, 1784 in Ajaccio , † June 24, 1860 in the Château de Vilgénis, Massy ), originally Girolamo Buonaparte , was the youngest brother of Napoléon Bonaparte . From 1807 to 1813 he was King of the Kingdom of Westphalia , his official royal name there was Jérôme Napoleon (JN) or Hieronymus Napoleon (HN).

Life until assuming power (1784–1807)

origin

As the twelfth child of Carlo Buonaparte and his wife Laetitia Ramolino , Jérôme Buonaparte was born on November 15, 1784 into a family that belonged to the Corsican nobility and enjoyed a modest affluence. The leading noble families of Corsica, to which the Buonaparte belonged, were in close competition with each other, especially with the revolutionary Pasquale Paoli , who had led a failed Corsican struggle for independence first against the Republic of Genoa and then against the Kingdom of France . Even after the French suppression of the uprising in 1769, he felt himself to be the actual ruler of Corsica. Since Carlo Buonaparte died just a few weeks after Jerome was born, he was mainly raised by his mother and grandmother. His brothers Joseph and Napoleon Bonaparte , 16 and 15 years older, respectively , had taken on the roles of surrogate fathers for him. They then took care of the education and training of Jerome. When the French Revolution broke out in Paris in 1789 , the 5-year-old Jerome, unlike Napoleon, was still in Corsica and could not classify the epochal upheavals in the distance. The experience of fleeing from the followers of Pasquale Paolis on June 13, 1793 will have had a far more impact on him. When Lucien Bonaparte boasted in a letter that the Bonaparte family was responsible for the arrest of “the enemy” Paolis ordered by the French National Convention, his supporters devastated the Bonaparte house. The young Jerome must have realized that he was part of a family clan deeply rooted in Corsica. With the rise of Napoleon, Jerome began to develop a deep admiration for his older brother that he would maintain throughout his life.

education

Napoleon sent his younger brother to Saint-Germain en Laye near Paris in 1795 , where he was tutored in a boarding school by the Irish Mac Dermott. However, the teachers did not manage to curb Jérôme's temperament. Instead of attending classes, he often spent his time in Paris to have fun. In the spring of 1797 he hurried to Lombardy, where the general Napoleon managed to subdue Italy within a year. Napoleon saw in his youngest brother a man who was undisciplined and wasteful, but still faithful to him. Back in Paris, he made sure that Jérôme attended the Collège de Juilly . While Napoleon set out on his Egypt campaign , he entrusted his older brother Joseph Bonaparte with the supervision in 1798. Jérôme was not allowed to take part in the military coup of 18th Brumaire VIII , through which Napoleon rose to a "First Consul" with dictatorial powers, as Napoleon considered him too young.

Jérôme in the Guards Regiment and the Navy

In order to promote the discipline of the 16-year-old, Napoleon ordered Jérôme to join his guard regiment as a lieutenant. In the dispute over a woman, however, Jérôme challenged an officer of the Guard, the brother of the future Marshal Davout , to a duel and got a bullet in the sternum. With a lot of luck he survived the injury. Napoleon raged over this act of disobedience, decided to take tough action and put Jérôme in the Navy. Napoleon's decision was also supported by the fact that the French army had already achieved great successes on the European continent, but not yet on the oceans against Great Britain. If he wanted to build up his brothers to support his rule, he had to see to it that they, like him, gained legitimacy through military success. Jérôme, however, disappointed the hopes his brother had placed in him. He went on an inspection tour to colonies on the North American continent. He left his ship's crew behind and finally traveled to the United States of America in 1803 , where he made the acquaintance of the wealthy merchant's daughter Elizabeth Patterson in Baltimore .

First marriage

Elizabeth Patterson , portrait by Gilbert Stuart 1804

At Christmas 1803, Jérôme and Elisabeth were married by the Bishop of Baltimore. Napoleon did not recognize the marriage, however, because for reasons of power politics he wanted to marry Jérôme to a woman from one of the European dynasties. To get Napoleon to change his mind, Jérôme commissioned a series of portraits that depicted him and his wife, but were never fully completed. Despite the exhortations of Napoleon, Jérôme did not return to France until 1805. Elizabeth, who was already pregnant, was forbidden to leave the ship, so she had to evade to London. Jérôme undertook to annul the marriage. His first son Jérôme Napoléon Bonaparte became the progenitor of the Bonaparte-Patterson line .

Jérôme wrote to assure his wife that as soon as Napoleon had forgiven him, she would come to France immediately. He therefore consented to the next military operation that Napoleon ordered him. On June 2, 1805, Napoleon wrote to Jérôme:

“My brother, I have made you frigate captain. This vote of confidence will lead you to gloriously pursue your career and live up to the great hopes that the nation has in you. Do not rely on the name they carry; It is glorious to owe everything to one's own merits. "

Jérôme took command of the warship Pomone . On the trip to Algiers he succeeded in buying French and Italian prisoners free from pirates for 450,000 francs. Later he had their "liberation" exaggerated in paintings and a theater performance.

At the end of 1805, Napoleon appointed his brother in command of the warship Veteran , which was equipped with 74 cannons and an experienced crew. During the mission to the South Atlantic island of Saint Helena , seven British ships were captured. Overall, however, Jérôme could not oppose the British frigates. Most of the expedition he was on the run from the Royal Navy . With the defeat in the Battle of Trafalgar , in which Jerome was not involved, Napoleon's maritime ambitions became obsolete anyway. Even if Jerome did not receive the hoped-for permission from Napoleon at the end of his career in the Navy to catch up with Elizabeth, he was at least appointed imperial prince for his efforts in September 1805 and included in the regulation of the succession to the throne.

Marriage plans and fourth coalition war

In order to establish a permanent succession monarchy, Napoleon relied on having his family members marry into the system of the old European dynasties. Only then could he give up his status as a usurper . By marrying Jérôme with the daughter of King Friedrich I of Württemberg , and thus in one of the oldest royal houses in Europe, Napoleon hoped to give his rule historical legitimacy . At the same time, he wanted to bind the Kingdom of Württemberg closely to himself in terms of alliance politics. Jérôme's condition regarding a relationship was of no importance to Napoleon. Years later, Jérôme had a portrait of Elizabeth Patterson made - an indication that he was still not finished with his first love. Napoleon, however, brought up Jérôme's head in January 1806 during his visit to Stuttgart about a marriage between Katharina von Württemberg and Jérôme. King Friedrich I was not averse to this plan and agreed in February 1806. However, the marriage, which was scheduled for October 1806 on September 9, 1806, had to be postponed due to the outbreak of the Fourth Coalition War .

Napoleon took Jérôme with him on his campaign against Prussia. The armed conflict was not inconvenient for the French emperor, because Prussia and its allied states in central and northern Germany had not yet been ready to join the French alliance system, the Confederation of the Rhine . Napoleon was already planning the formation of a new kingdom from the parts of the north and central German principalities, which he wanted to hand over to Jérôme. In order to justify Jérôme's appointment as king, he should be allowed a role in the military victory over Prussia. Therefore Napoleon appointed him general and subordinated to him one Wuerttemberg and two Bavarian divisions, with which he was to conquer Prussian Silesia . To ensure the success of the operation, Jérôme was assigned experienced officers such as Dominique Joseph Vandamme . On January 8, 1807, Jérôme actually accepted the surrender of the fortresses Glogau and Breslau . Jérôme expressed himself dissatisfied with Napoleon, however, because he was not allowed to take part in the actually decisive battle of Jena and Auerstedt .

King of Westphalia (1807-1813)

Coat of arms of the Kingdom of Westphalia
Gold coin of the Kingdom of Westphalia with the image of Jérômes
The Jérôme pavilion on the Göttingen Schillerwiese, where Jérôme is said to have often been accompanied by women

In the course of the French expansion policy , which after 1804 also extended to the German states on the right bank of the Rhine, Napoleon established new states loyal to France by edict . Their highest representatives and supreme administrators were mostly devoted confidants or relatives of the emperor ("crowned prefects").

After the Peace of Tilsit (1807) , the Kingdom of Westphalia was created for Jérôme from the former Duchy of Braunschweig , Electorate of Hesse and formerly Hanoverian and Prussian areas. Kassel , previously the residence of the Electors of Hesse-Kassel , was designated the capital , and King Jérôme (Hieronymus) ruled from here. After the Kassel city palace of the Electors and Landgraves of Hesse, inhabited by Jérôme and his court, burned down in 1811, he resided in Bellevue Palace . The court also used Wilhelmshöhe Castle in the Bergpark , which was called "Napoléonshöhe" during Napoléon's rule over Europe.

The citizens of Kassel referred to the king as "König Lustig" or "König Lustik" because his knowledge of German was expressed in the sentences " Tomorrow again funny!" "And" lustik, lustik demain encore lustik "should have exhausted them; this name is also said to have characterized his style of government. His first name has become verballhorn in the North Hessian dialect as a term for a rogue or Schürzenjäger ("Schrohm"). Jérôme also stands for the first parliament on German soil, set up in the Fridericianum in 1810 as the Palace of Estates , for the Code civil (among other things printed in Kassel in German) and for the oldest German constitution, the Constitution . Jérôme had three children with Katharina von Württemberg .

The plan to develop the new kingdom into a model and reform state was based on Napoleon's ideas. So he abolished serfdom by law and introduced religious freedom .

The 1809 Homberg (Efze) outgoing uprising led by Wilhelm of Dörnberg against Jérôme as 1809 failed the raids Prussian officers (z. B. Ferdinand from Schill , that of Jérôme war Minister Philippe François Maurice d'Albignac was repulsed) and the incident the black crowd .

Castle me

As the commander of a corps of the Grande Armée , the militarily inexperienced Jérôme took part in the Russian campaign in 1812 . The slow advance of his corps was one of the reasons why an early containment of the Russian 2nd Western Army under Pyotr Ivanovich Bagration failed. Napoleon then said that Jérôme should have been on July 3rd where he was only on July 6th. After the Battle of Mir and differences with his brother, Jérôme withdrew from the Grande Armée. He lived a short time in Mir Castle , but then left Russia and returned to Westphalia. Most of the 28,000 strong Westphalian contingent was destroyed in the battle of Borodino .

After the Battle of the Nations near Leipzig (1813), the Kingdom of Westphalia dissolved. As early as October 1, 1813, an advance detachment of Russian Cossacks of General Tschernyschow had taken Kassel and declared the kingdom dissolved. At the head of a handful of French people, however, Jérôme returned from October 16 to 26, before he had to flee to Paris for good. After Napoleon's abdication, the Congress of Vienna in 1814/1815 largely restored the old government structures.

Rule of the Hundred Days and Exile (1815–1848)

Jérôme Bonaparte in later years, photograph by Pierre-Louis Pierson

After Napoleon's return from Elba in March 1815, Jérôme made himself available to his brother during the Hundred Days . He took command of the 6th Division of the 2nd Corps under General Honoré Charles Reille . During the Battle of Waterloo (May 18) he led several loss-making assaults on the left wing against the British positions at the Hougoumont homestead.

After the Restoration of the Bourbons , Jérôme left France and initially went into exile in Austria , where he was assigned his place of residence at Schönau Castle an der Triesting (Lower Austria, pol. District Baden). Later he lived in Trieste .

Queen Katharina refused the suggestion of her Württemberg relatives to get a divorce. She remained married to Jérôme - despite his amorous adventures - until the end of her life. His father-in-law, the King of Württemberg , granted Jérôme the title of Prince of Montfort. Katharina died on November 28, 1835.

Jérôme in the Second Republic and the Second Empire (1848–1860)

Château de Vilgénis, place where Jérôme Bonapartes died

When his nephew Prince Louis Napoleon became French President in 1848 , he appointed Jérôme governor of the home for invalids . In the empire of Napoléon III. he became Marshal of France and President of the Senate . In addition, his title as Imperial Prince was confirmed. Around him an antipole of the liberal wing of the Bonapartists established itself .

On February 19, 1853, Jérôme married Giustina Pecori-Suárez, the widow of the Italian nobleman Luigi Bartolini-Baldelli, in Florence . In 1860 he died in the Château de Vilgénis in Massy . He was buried in the Paris Invalides .

The descendants of his sons are the only ones in his family who still bear the name Bonaparte. After the fall and death of Napoleon III. (1870 and 1873) and the death of his son Napoléon Eugène Louis Bonaparte (1879), Jérôme's son Napoléon Joseph Charles Paul Bonaparte became head of the Bonapartists.

progeny

The children of Jérôme Bonaparte , portrait by Michel Ghislain Stapleaux, Palais Fesch in Ajaccio

First marriage: Jérôme Bonaparte married Elizabeth Patterson in 1803 .

Second marriage: Jérôme Bonaparte married Katharina von Württemberg († 1835), daughter of Friedrich I , King of Württemberg in 1807 .

From a premarital relationship with the wife of the French officer Jean-Jacques Lagarde, Adélaïde Mélanie, née Denizot:

From the extramarital connection with Diana Rabe von Pappenheim , née Freiin Waldner von Freundstein (1788–1844), wife of the chief master of ceremonies Wilhelm Maximilian Rabe von Pappenheim :

  • Jeromée Catharina Rabe von Pappenheim (1811–1890), grandmother of the politician, suffragette and writer Lily Braun (1865–1916)
  • Marie Pauline von Schönfeld (1813–1873), from 1832 as a nun mère Marie de la Croix in the Notre-Dame des Oiseaux monastery in Paris

The Fürstenhagen local family register by Klaus Kunze and the local family register Dassensen / Wellersen / Rotenkirchen by Rolf Nowak report an illegitimate relationship with Johanne Dorothee Caroline Lüdeke (* around 1790; † March 23, 1845 in Fürstenhagen ; daughter of Johann Peter Lüdeke and Engel née Dettmers ; also Lüdecke ), from which a common son, Hieronymus Lüdeke (born November 15, 1808 in Göttingen , † March 18, 1890 in Dassensen ; also Lüdecke ) emerged. The later pastor married on September 3, 1844 in Hann. Münden Catharina Wilhelmine Amalie Lütkemann († July 13, 1848 in Fürstenhagen ; three children together) and in second marriage on August 12, 1849 in Göttingen, Henriette Margarethe Eggers (* November 6, 1828 in Göttingen, † February 1, 1907 in Dassensen; eight common children). His mother later married the widowed coachman Johann Friedrich Klemme from Heisebeck .

Another illegitimate son was the Württemberg geologist and cartographer Heinrich Bach .

estate

Honors

His name is entered on the triumphal arch in Paris in the 5th column. In addition, King Friedrich Wilhelm III had him . awarded the Order of the Black Eagle by Prussia on October 27, 1810 .

literature

  • Clemens Amelunxen: King and Senator. Jérôme and Lucien - Two brothers of Napoleon . Christians, Hamburg 1980, ISBN 3-7672-0650-1
  • Ernestine von L. (ie Henriette Treusch von Buttlar, nee Henriette von Bosse) (Ed.): King Jerome and his family in exile. Letters and Notes . Leipzig: FA Brockhaus, 1870. VI, 332 pp.
  • Maike Bartsch (Ed.): King Lustik !? Jérôme Bonaparte and the model state Kingdom of Westphalia . (= Catalogs of the Hessen-Kassel Museum Landscape; Vol. 39). Hirmer, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-7774-3955-6
  • Helmut Berding:  Jérôme Bonaparte. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 10, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1974, ISBN 3-428-00191-5 , p. 414 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Matthias Blazek: The Electorate of Hanover and the years of foreign rule 1803-1813 , ibidem, Stuttgart 2007, ISBN 3-89821-777-9
  • Fabian Fröhlich: The King Jérômes Court Theater , in: From theater building to dance hall. The history of the ballroom at Wilhelmshöhe Castle . Staatliche Museen Kassel 2004, ISBN 3-931787-32-X
  • Volker Jacob: King Lustik. Napoléon's little brother briefly ruled the Kingdom of Westphalia . In: Westfalenspiegel, vol. 55 (2006), no. 6., pp. 54-55
  • Friedrich M. Kircheisen: King Lustig. Napoleon's youngest brother . A. Scherl, Berlin 1928
  • Arthur Kleinschmidt : History of the Kingdom of Westphalia . FA Perthes, Gotha 1893 (Reprint: Hamecher, Kassel 1970)
  • Arno Schmidt: Das Musterkönigreich , in: Bargfelder Edition of Arno Schmidt's Works, Vol. III / 3. Haffmans, Zurich 1995, ISBN 3-251-80031-0

Web links

Commons : Jérôme Bonaparte  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ^ A b Johannes Willms: Napoleon: A biography . Pantheon, 2007, ISBN 978-3-570-55029-8 , pp. 15 .
  2. ↑ a b c d e f Jacques-Oliver Boudon: "Jerome Bonaparte - one life" in "King Lustik. Jérôme Bonaparte and the model state of the Kingdom of Westphalia" . Hirmer, 2008, ISBN 978-3-7774-3955-6 , pp. 46 .
  3. ↑ Johannes Wilms: Napoleon: A biography . S. 40 .
  4. ↑ Jacques-Oliver Boudon: "Jerome Bonaparte - a life" in "King Lustik. Jérôme Bonaparte and the model state of the Kingdom of Westphalia". Hirmer. Munich 2008. ISBN 978-3777439556 . P. 47.
  5. ↑ Jacques-Oliver Boudon: "Jerome Bonaparte - a life" in "King Lustik. Jérôme Bonaparte and the model state of the Kingdom of Westphalia". Hirmer. Munich 2008. ISBN 978-3777439556 . P. 47.
  6. ↑ Jacques-Oliver Boudon: The early years. Love marriage and battle fame in "King Lustik. Jérôme Bonaparte and the model state Kingdom of Westphalia". Hirmer. Munich 2008. ISBN 978-3777439556 . P. 265.
  7. ↑ Jacques-Oliver Boudon: The early years. Love marriage and battle glory , in King Lustik. Jérôme Bonaparte and the model state Kingdom of Westphalia . Hirmer. Munich 2008. ISBN 978-3777439556 . P. 266.
  8. ↑ Jacques-Oliver Boudon: The early years. Love marriage and battle glory , in King Lustik. Jérôme Bonaparte and the model state Kingdom of Westphalia . Hirmer. Munich 2008. ISBN 978-3777439556 . P. 267.
  9. ↑ Jacques-Oliver Boudon: The early years. Love marriage and battle glory , in King Lustik. Jérôme Bonaparte and the model state Kingdom of Westphalia . Hirmer. Munich 2008. ISBN 978-3777439556 . P. 269.
  10. ↑ Jacques-Oliver Boudon: The early years. Love marriage and battle glory , in King Lustik. Jérôme Bonaparte and the model state Kingdom of Westphalia . Hirmer. Munich 2008. ISBN 978-3777439556 . P. 269.
  11. ↑ Paul Sauer : The Swabian Tsar . In: The Kingdom of Württemberg: 1806–1918 Monarchy and Modernity. Thorbecke, Ulm 2006, ISBN 3-7995-0221-1 , p. 294.
  12. ↑ Jacques-Oliver Boudon: Jerome Bonaparte - a life in King Lustik. Jérôme Bonaparte and the model state Kingdom of Westphalia . Hirmer. Munich 2008. ISBN 978-3-7774-3955-6 , p. 49
  13. ↑ See also Philipp Meyer, The Pastors of the Regional Churches of Hanover and Schaumburg-Lippes since the Reformation, Göttingen 1941, Volume 1, p. 298.
  14. ↑ List of the Knights of the Royal Prussian High Order of the Black Eagle, page 16, no. 82, Decker, 1851
predecessor Office successor
–– King of Westphalia
1807–1813 		––
personal data
SURNAME Bonaparte, Jerome
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Girolamo de Buonaparte
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Brother Napoléon Bonaparte, King of Westphalia, French general, Marshal of France
DATE OF BIRTH November 15, 1784
PLACE OF BIRTH Ajaccio
DATE OF DEATH June 24, 1860
Place of death Villegenis Castle , near Paris