Tennis Court Oath

‘…The hall of the Commons was fixed upon for the purposes of the Royal Sitting, as the largest of the three which were occupied by the three estates, and workmen were employed in making the necessary arrangements and alterations. These alterations were imprudently commenced [June 20] before holding any communication on the subject with the National Assembly; and it was simply notified to their president, Bailli, by the master of the royal ceremonies, that the King had suspended the meeting of the Assembly until the Royal Silting should have taken place. Bailli, the president, well known afterwards by his tragical fate, refused to attend to an order so intimated, and the members of Assembly, upon resorting to their ordinary place of meeting, found it full of workmen, and guarded by soldiers. This led to one of the most extraordinary scenes of the revolution.

The representatives of the nation, thus expelled by armed guards from their proper place of assemblage, found refuge in a common Tennis-court, while a thunder-storm, emblem of the moral tempest which raged upon the earth, poured down its terrors from the heavens. It was thus that, exposed to the inclemency of the weather, and with the wretched  accommodations which such a place afforded, the members of Assembly took, and attested by their respective signatures, a solemn oath, " to continue their sittings until the constitution of the kingdom, and the regeneration of the public order, should be established on a solid basis."* The scene was of a kind to make the deepest impression both on the actors and the spectators; although, looking back at the distance of so many years, we are tempted to ask, at what period the National Assembly would have been dissolved, had they adhered literally to their celebrated oath…’

The Tennis Court Oath was signed by 576 of the French Third Estate on June 20, 1789.  Coverage above comes from Sir Walter Scott’s “The Life of Napoleon”.

Battle of Friedland

‘…Mean while, the bridge and pontoons were set on fire, to prevent the French, who had forced their way into the town, from taking possession of them. The smoke rolling over the combatants, increased the horror and confusion of the scene; yet a considerable part of the Russian infantry escaped through a ford close by the town, which was discovered in the moment of defeat. The Russian centre and right, who remained on the west bank of the Aller, effected a retreat by a circuitous route, leaving on the right the town of Friedland, with its burning bridges, no longer practicable for friend or foe, and passing the Aller by a ford considerably farther down the river. This also was found out in the very moment of extremity,—was deep and dangerous, took the infantry up to the breast, and destroyed what ammunition was left in the tumbrils.

Thus were the Russians once more united on the right bank of the Aller, and enabled to prosecute their march towards Wehlau. Amid the calamities of defeat, they had saved all their cannon except seventeen, and preserved their baggage. Indeed, the stubborn character of their defence seems to have paralysed the energies of the victor, who, after carrying the Russian position, showed little of that activity in improving his success, which usually characterised him upon such occasions. He pushed no troops over the Aller in pursuit of the retreating enemy, but suffered Bennigsen to rally his broken troops without interruption. Neither, when in possession of Friedland, did he detach any force down the left bank, to act upon the flank of the Russian centre and right, and cut them off from the river. In short, the battle of Friedland, according to the expression of a French general, was a battle gained, but a victory lost…’

The Battle of Friedland took place on June 14, 1807.  Napoleon’s French forces won the day, as Walter Scott reports in his “Life of Napoleon”. 

Saint Petersburg

‘…Notwithstanding the personal friendship betwixt the emperors Alexander and Napoleon – notwithstanding their engagements entered at  Tilsit, and so recently revived at Erfurt, it seems to have been impossible to engage Russia heartily as an ally of Napoleon, in a war which had the destruction or absolute humiliation of Austria.  The court of St. Petersburg had, it is true, lost no time in securing the advantages which had been stipulated for Russia in the conference alluded to…’

Quoting again today, from Scott’s “Life of Napoleon”.   St. Petersburg was founded this day, May 27^th, in 1703, by Tsar Peter the Great.

King of Italy

‘Upon the 11^th of April, Napoleon, with his Empress, set off to go through the form of coronation, as King of Italy!  The ceremony almost exactly resembled that by which he had been inaugurated Emperor.  The ministry of the Pope, however, was not employed on this second occasion, although, as Pius VII was then on his return from Rome, he could scarcely have declined officiating, if he had been requested by Buonaparte to take Milan in his route for that purpose…the ministry of the Archbishop of Milan was held sufficient for the occasion, and it was he who blessed the celebrated iron crown, said to have girded the brows of the ancient Kings of the Lombards.  Buonaparte,  as in the ceremony at Paris, placed the ancient emblem on his head with his own hands, assuming and repeating aloud the haughty motto attached to it by its ancient owners, Dieu me l’a donne; Gare qui la touché.  “God has given it me; Let himbeware, who touches it.”…’

From Scott’s “Life of Napoleon”.  Napoleon’s coronation as King of Italy took place on May 26, 1805.

Conquest of Venice

‘…Accordingly, on the 3^rd of May, Buonaparte declared war against Venice, …The terrified state of Venice proved unworthy descendants of the Zenos, Dandolos, and Morosinis, as the defenders of Christendom, and the proud opposers of papal oppression.  The best resource they could imagine to themselves, was to employ at Paris those golden means of intercession which Buonaparte had so sturdily rejected...The Senate of Venice, rather stupefied than stimulated by the excess of their danger, were holding on 30^th April, a sort of privy council in the apartments of the doge, when a letter from the commandant of their flotilla informed them, that the French were erecting fortifications on the low grounds contiguous to the lagoons or shallow channels which divide from the main-land  and from each other the little isles on which the amphibious mistress of the Adriatic holds her foundation; and proposing, in the blunt style of a gallant sailor, to batter them to pieces about their ears before the works could be completed.  Indeed, nothing would have been easier than to defend the lagoons against an enemy, who, notwithstanding Napoleon’s bravado, had not even a single boat. ..At length the Great Council assembled on the 12^th of May.  The doge had commenced a pathetic discourse on the extremities to which the country was reduced, when an irregular discharge of fire arms took place under the very windows of the council-house. ..The terrified and timid councilors did not wait to enquire what was the real cause of the disturbance, but hurried forward, like sheep, in the path which had been indicated to them. ..Boats were dispatched to bring three thousand French soldiers into the city …’

The soldiers did not arrive, according to Sir Walter Scott, in his “Life of Napoleon” (text above), until the 16^th, but Napoleon’s conquest of Venice is considered as complete on May 12^th, 1797.