266 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 151.: 



if born on that day in 17G9, in place of the 5th of 

 February, 1768, is called ahoax, in order to prove 

 him Fi'ench from his birth, which he would not be 

 at the latter date, Corsica not having been annexed 

 to France until June 1769, two months (at most) 

 only before the latter date, which was assumed in 

 order to establish his claim to have been originally 

 French, and combine it with a great church festi- 

 val. Not only did this reasoning appear plausible 

 in itself, but confirmed by, or rather founded on 

 the registry of his marriage, the 9th of March, 1796, 

 the publication of which, in fact, solely gave rise 

 to the disputed dates. It received extensive belief; 

 yet further research wholly contradicted the in- 

 ference. I have myself investigated this registry 

 (Les liegistres de la Mairie du Second Arrondisse- 

 ment de Paris')^ and found it literally conformable 

 with its transcript by Bourrienne, in his first 

 volume, page 348. The earlier date, which would 

 extinguish his pretension to a French birth, is 

 there distinctly apparent, and, sanctioned by his own 

 signature, seemed to defy all controversy, which 

 indeed no one then thought of raising, little known 

 to fame as he was, save by his energetic suppres- 

 sion, or massacre, as it was called, of the Parisian 

 insurrectionists, on the ])revious 5th of October 

 (13 Vendemiaire), Avhich I witnessed. The registry 

 also fixes his wife Josephine's birth as on the 23rd 

 of June, 1767; thus in fact falsifying the ages of 

 both : for Napoleon, then appointed to command 

 the army of Italy, conscious of his inferiority in 

 years, as well as in personal appearance, very slight 

 and youthful to probably every officer of high rank 

 over whom he was thus placed, anxiously desired 

 to reduce the objectionable disparity ; and with 

 this view presented to the officiating magistrate, 

 or mayor of the district, the bnptismal certificate of 

 Lis elder brother, Joseph, instead of his own. 

 Josephine, on the other hand, deducted four years 

 from her age ; for the registry of her native JSIar- 

 tinique most clenrly marked her birth as on the 

 23rd of June, 1763. The baptismal dates were of 

 easy liberation ; and thus the whole was a scene of 

 delusion, not, certainly, in jest — to which the epi- 

 thet of hoax can only apply — but with very serious 

 design. Na])oleon's subsequent adoption of the date 

 which constituted him a born French citizen natu- 

 rally challenged investigation, when the original 

 registry of his birth at Ajacio, his entrance to the 

 Royal School of Brienne in 1778, and to theEcole 

 Militaire in 1783, with every posterior circum- 

 stance that required the statement of his age (as 

 every advancing step in public or military life 

 always does in France), antecedent to his com- i 

 mand in chief, as above, — all unequivocally unite j 

 in naming the 15th of August, 1769, as the day of i 

 his birth ; and that when no possible motive could ! 

 exist for the so-called mystification. These facts j 

 are demonstrably adduced by M. Eekavd, in his 

 Tolume Napoleon est-il ne Fraw^ais? and their j 



result was, as similarly on myself, the conviction, 

 in opposition to his previous belief (as again of 

 mine), tiiat the marriage date Wiis erroneous. It; 

 is so, indeed, beyond all doubt. With respect to 

 Josephine, it was quite natural that she should 

 wish to appear of an age more suited to that of her 

 husband, though she brought with her condemna- 

 tory evidence in the presence of her son, Eusrene 

 Beauharnais. who, born the 30th of October, 1780, 

 was in March, 1796, in his sixteenth year; proving 

 Josephine, if born in June, 1767, to have been a 

 mother when only thirteen, — much too yoimgeveu 

 for a Creole. The Imperial Almanacks, however,, 

 continued to place her birth in that year, as that 

 for 1812, now under my inspection, shows : yet the 

 registry of her first marriage, in January, 1780, 

 makes her born in 1763. 



At the period that the article appeared in The 

 Quarterly, to which the letter of the 28th in The 

 Times signed " Detector " refers, the matter had 

 not underg(me the sifting examination it has been 

 since subjected to.* 



* The following letter from the author of the article' 

 in The Quarterly appeared in The Times of the 6th 

 instant, and shows that the writer subsequently changed 

 his opinion, and the grounds on which he did so. 



"Sir, — As author of the article in The Quarterly 

 Revietv, No. 23., referred to by your correspondent 

 ' Detector,' in The Times of the 28th of August, and 

 again by ' Veritas,' in The Times of the 2nd of Sep- 

 tennber, I think it right, for the sake of historical truth, 

 to say, that though the date of Buonaparte's birth (5tb 

 of February, 1768) there given is in exact conformity 

 with tlie official documents quoted, I had subsequently' 

 some doubts on the subject ; and, on making other in- 

 quiries, I was satisfied that, whatever might have been 

 Buonaparte's object in falsifying, in his marriage con- 

 tract, the date of his birth as being the 5th of February, 

 1768, the real date was, as he afterwards stated it, 15th 

 of August, 1769. This change of my opinion I pub- 

 lished in a subsequent number of the Review, and after- 

 wards in another. Being at a distance from a complete, 

 set of the Review, I cannot give you references to these- 

 subsequent notices, but they exist. 



" The grounds on which I changed my opinion were, 

 — first, that I found, in a list of the young genllemen 

 educated at the Royal College of Brienne, ' Napolione 

 Ruonaparte, we 15 Aonf, 1769.' Though this list pur- 

 ported to be made before the Revolution, yet, knowing' 

 how unscrupulously archives were dealt with by Buo- 

 naparte, I should not have given credit to it without) 

 further examination ; but, secondly, 1 obtained some 

 curious volumes of the Services des Officiers de VArmee, 

 published by the National Assembly in 1790 and 1791, 

 when assuredly Buonaparte could have had no motive 

 for falsifying his birthday, and there I found him as a 

 captain of artillery, ^ Napoleoxc Ruonaparte, tie le 15 

 Aoitt, 1769.' It is, I suppose, impossible that Buona- 

 parte could have had these old official returns reprinted, 

 and my set were bought in an obscure country shop, 

 almost as waste paper. I therefore conclude, on the- 



