Louis Bonaparte

Biography

Louis Bonaparte was born Luigi Buonaparte in Ajaccio, Corsica, in 1778, a younger brother of Napoleon. He followed his brothers into the French army, where Napoleon's patronage carried him quickly upward: he served as an artillery lieutenant and aide-de-camp, was promoted captain during the Italian campaign, accompanied the expedition to Egypt and Syria, and was a general by twenty-five. He took part in the plot that brought Napoleon to power in 1799.

In 1802 Napoleon arranged his marriage to Hortense de Beauharnais, the Empress Josephine's daughter; the match was unhappy, though it produced three sons, the youngest of whom became Napoleon III. In June 1806 Napoleon turned the Batavian Commonwealth into the Kingdom of Holland and made Louis its king.

Louis tried to rule as a Dutch rather than a French sovereign. He made his court speak Dutch, moved his capital repeatedly, and won the name 'Louis the Good' for his personal handling of relief after the 1807 Leiden gunpowder explosion and the 1809 floods. He resisted Napoleon's demands for Dutch troops and for cuts to French debts held by Dutch lenders, and after the British landing at Walcheren in 1809 Napoleon pressed him to step down. He abdicated on 1 July 1810 and Holland was annexed to France.

Styling himself Count of Saint-Leu, he lived in exile, first in Graz under Austrian protection and later in Italy, writing poetry and prose. On Joseph's death in 1844 he became head of the Bonaparte family. He died of a stroke in Livorno in 1846 and was buried at Saint-Leu-la-Forêt.