The Rise and Fall of a Dictator
This is about Napoleon. He was a brilliant man and a very successful military leader. He was short, standing at 5 feet 6? inches tall, average height at the time. In his early years he was quite lean and only after 1806 did he become heavy. In his younger years he was often described as sickly in appearance, his skin having a yellowish pallor. He had fine white teeth, which he was proud of.
Now i’m going to give you a chronicle of his life. First he went to military school. As a boy, Napoleon attended school in mainland France, where he learned the French language, and went on to graduate from a French military academy in 1785. He then became a second lieutenant in an artillery regiment of the French army. Later on when he helped suppress a royalist insurrection against the revolutionary government in Paris he got promoted to a general Then he overthrew the government. After successfully doing this Napoleon worked to restore stability to post-revolutionary France.
He centralized the government; instituted reforms in such areas as banking and education; supported science and the arts; and sought to improve relations between his regime and the pope (who represented France’s main religion, Catholicism), which had suffered during the revolution. One of his most significant accomplishments was the Napoleonic Code, which streamlined the French legal system and continues to form the foundation of French civil law to this day. And finally, he got unpopular. First,he was exiled to Elba, a Mediterranean island off the coast of Italy. He was given sovereignty over the small island, while his wife and son went to Austria.
Then he came back and tried to take over again. And it worked, but only for 100 days. Finally,on June 18, at the battle of Waterloo near Brussels, the French were crushed by the British, with assistance from the Prussians.On June 22, 1815, Napoleon was once again forced into banishment. I have given you an apt summary of Napoleon’s rise and fall of power.
But feel free to make your own study of the subject.
