"Atrocities in the Napoleonic Wars" Topic

Chouan

You seem more willing to accept that women and children were killed after they had surrendered, rather than the possibility that they may have been killed during the storming and pillage of Jaffa?

You also seem to ignore the fact that the commandant of Jaffa had already set the stage by cutting off the head of the French emissary sent to request he surrender. It could be said that it was his actions that caused the women and children's to end up suffering equally alongside the soldiers. He had no need to chop off the emissary's head and enrage the besiegers. Sadly, the poor civilians ended up suffering because of his brutality.

And atrocities are not just restricted to the Napoleonic period-here's one from the English Civil War – and it is very interesting hearing the view of the English King on the atrocities that occurred.

link

Actually, no. The two are not mutually exclusive. I'm not doubting that people were killed in the sack following the storm. However, the source cited earlier describes the subsequent execution of non-combatants and surrendered disarmed combatants, who'd surrendered on terms. The execution of those who revoked their parole, though harsh, can be justified. The execution of other combatants, is less easy to justify, but can be. The execution of surrendered non-combatants subsequent to the storm is, as I suggested elsewhere, nothing less than an atrocity. That non-combatants were killed immediately after the storm, which I'v never denied, doesn't change that.

Chouan

That suggests you have readily accepted any source that mentions women and children being killed after they surrendered, but dismissed any source that does not mention it.

I prefer to be open minded about the affair, in that I am not 100% convinced it did happen but also not 100% convinced it did not.

Chouan,

For me, the problem here is that I cannot see proof that there was an organised and planned execution of non-combatants after the capture and looting of Jaffa.

I fully accept that some non-combatants may have been killed after the capture and looting, but, as I have said before, I can see how that might have happened in a way that would make it neither organised nor planned.

Rather than just restating that an execution of non-combatants happened because a source states that bodies of non-combatants were found (which is not the same thing at all), it is incumbent on those who claim that it did to prove it.

I also feel that it is rather dangerous to apply modern Western standards and values to an event which took place over 200 years ago in a war between two cultures which had experienced many centuries of conflict with little quarter being given on either side.

Jurgen

We have had cited a contemporary French source which describes the executions. Do we dismiss it as inaccurate, or wrong? On what grounds?
Gazzola, "That suggests you have readily accepted any source that mentions women and children being killed after they surrendered, but dismissed any source that does not mention it."
Again, you're presenting an argument as mine that I haven't used. I've accepted both sources, that deaths occurred during the sack, and that executions were carried out subsequently. The two events aren't mutually exclusive, as I noted above. Where is the problem? Both could have occurred.

Chouan,

The problem with your argument, at least as I see it, is that the contemporary French sources that were listed by von Winterfeldt are explicit about the execution of surrendered soldiers, although they vary in regard to which soldiers and how they were killed.

However, none of them are explicit about executions of civilians; they mention that civilians were killed at some point but are not explicit about how or where this happened. It is possible that the children were deliberately executed; if so, that would be terrible and certainly an atrocity by modern standards but, by the standards of warfare between Westerners and Muslims at that time, possibly not unusual. However, it is also possible that they were not killed as part of some evil plan, but because they refused to leave their fathers and, therefore, were caught up in the executions.

However, having translated Peyrusse into German (as that is easier for me than English), it seems that he describes the children as "dying" (en mourant) when they were found with the corpses of their fathers; this seems to suggest that they were not bayoneted but possibly that they were still alive but dying, possibly from thirst or exposure.

As for the elderly and women, the sources do not indicate if they were killed in the siege and storm or afterwards.

Regardless of the issue as to what Peyrusse meant, you seem quite happy to accept these sources as being accurate.

In opposition to that acceptance, I would also point out that a source being French does not automatically mean that it is pro-Bonaparte. Also, the eye witness sources vary on what happened; some state that all of the prisoners were shot while others state that some were shot but that most were bayoneted; Jacotin, for example, states that "ils ont ete tous fusilles" in relation to the entire garrison, which is in direct contradiction to Peyrusse.

I am not arguing that there was not a massacre of civilians at Jaffa, merely that the evidence that has been presented does not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that there was. It is up to those proposing something to provide the evidence to support it and it appears that has not happened yet in this case.

Jurgen

Among other comments:

'And I neglected the three most obvious ones:
- In the period 1790-1815 Prussia and Austria didn't conscript anywhere near as many Germans from these small states as France did, nor eave them dead from Madrid to Moscow. The French blood tax on the Germans was massively higher than anything they'd experienced since the 30 Years War. (In Westphalia, one out of every 15 males died in Napoleon's service.)'

'- Neither Prussia nor Austria had anything on the scale of the French "contributions" from the people of the small German states, in the form of special war taxes, community taxes, forced French war bonds, and all the other ways that Napoleon squeezed them for money to be sent back to France.'

'- Neither Prussia nor Austria dictated religious policy to the Germans the way that France did, with the state control of churches, the closing down or amalgamating of religious organizations, the impositions of taxes on them, the imposition of rules on everything down to the precise words a Rabbi or priest or preacher was to say in the weekly service.'

'That level of control was achieved only by France.'

The French didn't conscript Germans from the German states of the Confederation of the Rhine. Conscription was imposed by the German rulers themselves for their own armies. They were obligated by treaty for a certain level of military participation just as was France (whose contribution to the common defense was 200,000).
The German Bund formed by Vienna in 1815 allowed the German states less autonomy than they had as part of the Confederation of the Rhine.

Freedom of religion was in force in the French empire. If there were religion problems in the Confederation, that was done by the rulers of the individual states.

The idea that treasure was being carted back to France from the Confederation is a myth. If taxes were raised in the Confederation, again it was done by the individual rulers. France did not tax in the Confederation though the states of the Confederation were required to pay for the upkeep of French troops billeted in on their territory. The caveat to that, though, is that French troops spent their money in those states.

Lastly, the allies in 1813-1814 when they overran the Confederation required more in men and supplies from them, with the exception of Bavaria, than Napoleon ever had.
The bottom line with the German states, and this conclusion can be reached quite readily reading Brendan Simms' excellent The Struggle for Mastery in Germany, 1779-1850 as well as other excellent books such as Austria, Prussia, and Germany 1806-1871, is that the smaller western German states were attempting to maintain their independence from Prussia and/or Austria and they chose France in order to achieve that goal.

And Prussia gained immensely in western Germany in 1814-1815, whether or not they had previously ‘owned' any of the territory. The idea of previous ownership is to my mind irrelevant. Rhineland Germans were not used to harsh Prussian rule from 1814 onwards and enjoyed more equality and liberty under the French, as did the Westphalians and that has already been demonstrated in threads under this general subject.

It appears to me that you will champion Prussia and condemn France, especially Napoleon, no matter what is shown to you. Your fascination with things German is duly noted, but that does not mean that your opinions on German issues of the period are either valid or correct. And your errors as noted above tend to support that view as your oft-stated opinion years ago that you believe Napoleon to be corrupt, which is absolute nonsense.

B

The French didn't conscript Germans from the German states of the Confederation of the Rhine. Conscription was imposed by the German rulers themselves for their own armies. They were obligated by treaty for a certain level of military participation just as was France (whose contribution to the common defense was 200,000).
The German Bund formed by Vienna in 1815 allowed the German states less autonomy than they had as part of the Confederation of the Rhine.

The Confederation of the Rhine troops fought in Napoleon's campaigns for the Confederation which he created, they weren't fighting their own wars, so to say they weren't conscripted by Napoleon is just artful. And even then it doesn't apply to those conscripted into the French Army from Amsterdam or Hanover or the Rhineland…

If the Confederation of the Rhine was 'obligated' who 'obliged' them?…Napoleon.

How could the Confederation of the Rhine states have 'less' autonomy in the German Bund, when they had none in the Confederation of the Rhine?

The idea that treasure was being carted back to France from the Confederation is a myth. If taxes were raised in the Confederation, again it was done by the individual rulers. France did not tax in the Confederation though the states of the Confederation were required to pay for the upkeep of French troops billeted in on their territory. The caveat to that, though, is that French troops spent their money in those states.

Well this is easy, isn't it? If the amount spent by French troops in the German states was equal to or greater than the cost of the upkeep of the French troops, then that wasn't too bad. I suspect however that this wasn't the case…But either way, we need figures.

Lastly, the allies in 1813-1814 when they overran the Confederation required more in men and supplies from them, with the exception of Bavaria, than Napoleon ever had.

Well this is an interesting factoid, but only interesting with figures to back it up. But it also conflates the situation of the Allies' treaties with the German states at a time of total war, to Napoleon's demands in peacetime.

The bottom line with the German states, and this conclusion can be reached quite readily reading Brendan Simms' excellent The Struggle for Mastery in Germany, 1779-1850 as well as other excellent books such as Austria, Prussia, and Germany 1806-1871, is that the smaller western German states were attempting to maintain their independence from Prussia and/or Austria and they chose France in order to achieve that goal.

Thank you for listing some works by authors who agree with you. Are their arguments different from yours?

Sam has repeatedly challenged you to show the primary sources on this and you have shown…none. The German states do not seem to have allied with the French because they were afraid of Prussia and Austria, they were afraid of Napoleon. And witnessing the treatment of Hanover, Hesse-Kassel, Oldenburg and Holland, they were clearly correct to be so.

Rhineland Germans were not used to harsh Prussian rule from 1814 onwards and enjoyed more equality and liberty under the French, as did the Westphalians and that has already been demonstrated in threads under this general subject.

Well the sources quoted in this thread have demonstrated rather the opposite…

It appears to me that you will champion France, especially Napoleon, and condemn Prussia, no matter what is shown to you. Your fascination with things French is duly noted, but that does not mean that your opinions on French and German issues of the period are either valid or correct. And your errors as noted above tend to support that view as your oft-stated opinions show that you believe Napoleon to be perfect, which is absolute nonsense.

^ Fixed for ya!

It would be nice if you actually engaged with the arguments here rather than just repeating the same lines ad nauseam …I don't think anyone is holding their breath though.

"The idea that treasure was being carted back to France from the Confederation is a myth."

I am seriously, genuinely curious as to how you have concluded that. Please cite the sources you have read, that inform you that the French "contributions" and confiscations in Germany were a "Myth."

Seriously. I want to read them. Because that would represent such a massive and important shift in the Historiography of the Napoleonic era that it would be something of an earthquake in Napoleonic scholarship and German history. I don't know how I could have missed such important revisions in the scholarship, but Okay: I'd love to see them.

So please: the precise citations: names of works, with the page numbers, please, in which this "myth" is exposed and explained.

- –

The French contributions are so well-known and so well-documented that it would require a Herculean task of spin-control or just plain delusion to attempt to deny it. In many cases those contributions appeared on the budgets and in the correspondence of the Confederation states. In some cases entire national bond issues had to be floated in order to pay them. Locals often referred to this as "the French tax." I have read the original documents myself. I've even seen the original bond coupons, preserved in their folders, written in both French and German. The documentation is overwhelming.

It's even in Napoleon's own correspondence. For example, when Jerome tried to get them reduced, Napoleon replied:

"The immense expenses that are required to rebuild my fleets and to supply my armies do not allow me to agree to your request. The province of Magdeburg is the richest, and it's contribution has been set already. It must pay me just as the other provinces have."

Napoleon to Jerome, 3 June, 1808.

-

So again: since you are proposing such a massive and important revision to the historiography of this period, something that contradicts even the evidence in Napoleon's own correspondence, I would love to see your sources for this "myth." Please don't obfuscate by tossing out a few vague mentions of unrelated secondary authors and then claiming that "You have already been given the sources."

But rather: the precise citations: names of works, with the page numbers, please, in which this "myth" is exposed and explained.

As for the rest of your post: see Whirlwind's answers above.

Please don't obfuscate by tossing out a few vague mentions of unrelated secondary authors and then claiming that "You have already been given the sources."

You have no chance of him doing as you request, he's always been the same. As they say, 'You can't teach an old dog new tricks'

I have brought many first hand accounts to an argument with him. all he did in return was post a snippet from a Houssaye tome and a line that Mercer agreed with his take on the event when in fact there is no such claim from Mercer. I asked him to post the reverent passage from Mercer's journal (in case for some inexplicable reason I missed it). Suffice to say, I got nothing from him, just more 'prevaricative' ***p.

So all I do now (after a lot of further sword crossing with him) is read & laugh at his diatribes and Susi Seitz type fixation with Nappy.

Paul :)

Paul,

In some ways, Brechtel198 is one of the finest adornments of TMP; his ability to provide amusement is unsurpassed, especially as one can predict with almost total certainty how he will respond in any given situation. To watch him conform to that prediction is always fascinating. In addition, his ability to stick to his own version of reality in the face of all the evidence surely makes him a match for even such as GroFaZ during the last days in the bunker.

TMP would be a far less interesting place without him, although probably a far more pleasant one.

Jurgen

Kevin wrote:

""The idea that treasure was being carted back to France from the Confederation is a myth."

It took me a while to get one of the actual, original documents in my hand. But I'm in Berlin now, so here it is:

Prussian State Archives, I. HA Rep. 151, Nr. 157 Kommissionsakten über den Domänenvertrag mit Frankreich vom 22 April, 1808

This is the file containing the list of all properties in the future Westphalia that are to be seized and given to French officials. It also contains the additonal "Extraordinary contributions" due to France from Westphalia, as of 1 Jan, 1808. This is "the bill," if you will; the original document in French.

Napoleon pegs Westphalia's initial contribution at: 49,850,205.40 francs.

The "Sums [already] paid" column is divided between "Argent" (cash) and "Fournitures" (physical items, i.e., plunder)

The balance shows @24.8m already paid, with the balance due of: 25,005,441.37 francs.

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To give you some idea of the scope of this, Westphalia's annual total tax revenues were @33-39 million francs.

Thus Napoleon intends to extract about 150% of the new nation's annual revenues. Or to put it another way: for every 2 francs a Westphalian pays in taxes, he also pays 3 francs as French tribute.

Thanks for posting that Sam, very interesting.

Regards

Yep. Standard French policy regarding allies and occupied territories: bleed them white.

All

I'm entering this discussion towards the end and I haven't read all of the previous 6 pages of postings, so forgive me if I cover something already mentioned.

My understanding and belief is that all nations involved in this conflict would have undertaken some kind of "atrocity" at one time or the other, that is would have had individual troops involved in unsavoury activities such as rape, murder, theft etc.

This is unfortunately a side-effect of all conflict and continues to the modern day.

You have young, often poorly educated men with weapons, who possibly have known nothing other than continuous conflict (the Napoleonic wars lasted 20+ years) and they probably make the assumption they won't be caught or punished for any misdemeanours. Also, ethical and moral standards of the day were not comparative to todays standards and so the behaviour may well have been seen as acceptable.

You only have to look at the London Riots in 2011 to see how quickly people will lower their standards and do as they please, if the perception is that they won't be caught or that life as they know it is undergoing a permanent change.

Some events are well documented, others are not. However I believe that all sides were not adverse to some "atrocities"

F

Ferg

Nobody is actually denying that all armies committed atrocities. What made the French 'special' was the deliberate policy of 'freeing' both allied and occupied territories from their revenues and men to feed the French war effort.

Best
A

Another thing, at least in Spain, is that retaliation and brutality against civilians, regardless of their involvement with the insurgency, was part of an official policy from the French command, starting with Napoleon himself. In other words, it wasn't just a few uneducated soldiers robbing from civilians, but a deliberate policy of reprisals. As far as I know it was used in Spain, Portugal, Calabria, Umbria, Parma and in Egypt.

I won't argue that it was just the French who followed such policy. Many other nations did too. However, France was the country which applied it more extensively and thoroughly of all Western nations, if only because she attacked and tried to conquer more territory than any other European nation during the wars.

If you want a detailed study Napoleonic counter insurgency policy I must recommend

Napoleon's Other War by Michael Broers

link

Broers is very good for Italy, not that much for Spain, which he only knows from secondary sources. Still, I disagree on his depiction of insurgency. He takes too strongly at face value the reports from the authorities, missing somewhat the deeper layers of meaning behind rural violence in pre-industrial societies.

Basileus66 – it is insights like that which makes me so thankful you are back on the boards.

For the purposes of our discussion, can we also include sham trials and the resulting executions as atrocities. All the work on the civil and criminal codes, a noble effort, was weakened when Napoleon sought personal revenge and ignored the very system of laws he brought to the people of France. The arrest, show trial and execution of the Duc d'Enghien in 1804 was one such event. Even some on Napoleon's staff were shocked. When pressed for the need of evidence, he is reputed to have said "What need is there of Proof?" Moreau barely escaped the same fate. When faced with a perceived threat to himself or his rule, Napoleon could be ruthless.

ruthless as would be allmost all rulers in that period?

Give us some examples of other rulers of the period who created a Code of universal law, and then it when it suited them, ignored it. Or, another contemporary European ruler who issued the same kind of directives about committing atrocities as Buonaparte did.

"Give us some examples of other rulers of the period who created a Code of universal law, and then it when it suited them, ignored it."

All European nations had codes of law. 99% of the time this was stuff that fell far below the radar of an absolute monarch, such as local taxes on dog ownership, or whether or not somebody becomes a legal adult if they marry before the age of legal adulthood, or whether a religious school can purchase the property of a nearby school from an owner of a different religion, and so on.

In just about every case I've found, the absolute monarch has the right to intervene in "his" law whenever and wherever he wishes, but he rarely does. (Because that stuff is tedious and normally doesn't require his attention.)

What sets Napoleon apart, in my opinion, is his far higher level of attention to minutiae, and the pro-active nature of many of his interventions.

For example: issuing orders to arrest or execute such-and-such a publisher *IF* he publishes anything again. (That order not only violates Napoleon's own constitutional guarantee of personal liberty to all citizens, but also creates both a crime and a punishment found nowhere in the Code Napoleon.)

One of the things that I find really striking about the Napoleonic system is that he spends so much effort and expense to create the illusion of rule by law, such as having a Senate whose only purpose is to approve the things the he chooses to give them. Meanwhile the central government (technically, the Emperor himself) issues decrees on incredibly tiny things, like ordering the repair of a garden wall in some small town church, or forbidding some protestant minister in Nowhereville from getting married, or taking over an orchard in some monastery, or arresting some actor.…

Absurdly small, petty things that ought to be handled by local officials, and in any state that was actually under the rule of law, would be.

As I've said all along, on this site for 14 years: Napoleon ruled pretty much like any other absolute ruler or dictator. He just spent an inordinate amount of effort and energy to proclaim otherwise, and that propaganda was effective enough that many people still believe it 200+ years later.

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PS – Apropos of this discussion, I just finished reading the sections of Code Napoleon that deal with childcare, parenting, family law, and the definitions of "youth" and "adulthood." (This is part of my ongoing project on Westphalia; I'm comparing the French laws to the Old Regime German laws they replaced.)

PSS – There's a big debate in French historiography right now about the degree to which Napoleon's Prefects were autonomous. I've been reading some of these works recently, interesting stuff.

Quite. It was the creation of an apparently universal law, to which all are, supposedly, subject, that is then over-ruled as and when desired by Buonaparte. Other regimes didn't seek to proclaim the equality before the law that Buonaparte did so hypocritically. So, he wasn't "ruthless as would be allmost all rulers in that period?", he was more ruthless, more hypocritical and more of a tyrant; if the legitimate European rulers are thought to be tyrants through their autocratic rule, then Buonaparte is more so. through his more effective, potentially, control.

So a ruler who pretends to be benign but acts autocratically is worse than a ruler who just acts autocratically?

How do you arrive at that conclusion Chouan? Note that you are not actually agreeing with Sams position, you appear to be changing it somewhat. Sam said;

As I've said all along, on this site for 14 years: Napoleon ruled pretty much like any other absolute ruler or dictator. He just spent an inordinate amount of effort and energy to proclaim otherwise

Yet you are developing it far beyond the parameters of what he has said, to make it suit your own view;

So, he (Napoleon) wasn't "ruthless as would be allmost all rulers in that period?", he was more ruthless, more hypocritical and more of a tyrant

I am agreeing with Sam's position.
I am also clarifying my own view in response to brunet's assertion.
Was George III more or less ruthless than Buonaparte? Was Franz I more or less ruthless than Buonaparte? Was Frederick William more or less ruthless than Buonaparte? Was Alexander more or less ruthless than Buonaparte? He wasn't "as ruthless" as the legitimist monarchs of Europe, he was far more ruthless. He pretended to observe the rule of law whilst not doing so, which looks like hypocrisy to me.

He wasn't "as ruthless" as the legitimist monarchs of Europe, he was far more ruthless. He pretended to observe the rule of law whilst not doing so, which looks like hypocrisy to me.

You didn't address my point. How does hypocrisy make someone more ruthless? Pretending to observe the rule of law does not make someone more ruthless than someone who does not pretend to observe the rule of law.

So, why was Napoleon "far more ruthless" than the other rulers of Europe that you keep claiming were more "legitimate"? Your claims about legitimacy always amuse me. Care to explain that one too?

TW-You assert that pretending to observe the rule of law does not make someone more ruthless than someone who does not pretend to observe the rule of law. This isn't an objective fact. It is a subjective belief.

Take two rulers. One pretends to follow certain rules but disregards them when they are inconvenient. The other behaves in exactly the same manner but does not pretend there are any such rules. To one observer the first may be more ruthless because ignoring the rules compounds the actions. To a second observer the second is more ruthless because he doesn't acknowledge he is bound by any rules in the first place. A third observer may feel both rulers are equally ruthless because only actions matter. ALL THREE OBSERVERS ARE CORRECT.

As a basically cynical person, I don't expect much in the way of great moral examples from monarchs or dictators, and thus I don't have any moral objections that a ruler says one thing and does another. One should expect as much. Their deeds speak for themselves.

My interest as a historian, however, is to make sure that the facts of those deeds are clearly represented, especially when the facts show that what the ruler said he did, was in direct contradiction of what he actually did;

The reason it's important to focus on that, in my opinion, is because dictators and autocrats sometimes get the last word, and their propaganda still has adherents down to the present day.

I also find it fascinating that the adherents of that propaganda still hold fast to it, even when glaringly obvious contradictory facts are presented to them. That says a lot about the enduring appeal of the propaganda, that a person can still believe it even when contradicted by the words and deeds of the Hero, himself.

Sam,
I agree.
It is the actions a ruler performs that count, not what they say.

Bill,
The first two observers are incorrect because hypocrisy or pretending to be something has no real bearing on whether a ruler is acting ruthlessly or not.
Only the 3rd observer is actually thinking logically about what it means to actually BE ruthless.

I take your point about subjectivity but it doesn't change the fact that being an hypocrite is not related to being ruthless in any meaningful way. One could just as easily say that a ruler likes eating candy floss so he is more ruthless than one who doesn't. Its not important.

Might be worth giving the definition of "ruthless" at this point;

having or showing no pity or compassion for others.
"a ruthless manipulator"
synonyms: merciless, pitiless, cruel, heartless, hard-hearted, hard, stony-hearted, stony, with a heart of stone, cold-blooded, cold-hearted, harsh, callous, severe, unmerciful, unrelenting, unsparing, unforgiving, unfeeling, uncaring, unsympathetic, uncharitable, lacking compassion

I can't see anything there about being a hypocrite or an illusionist.

Remember the other ruling houses had climbed to the top of the greasy pole generations earlier,there lagitimacy was well estabished,
Napoleon had done the climbing.
All those how climb the greasy pole to get to the top and wish to stay there have GOT to be ruthless.

I again find myself in agreement with Sam on all points. Taking Sam's emphasis on "deeds" I can only recount the saying of Christ to his disciples that "many would come after him saying they were from him." But he cautioned his followers that they had to test every spirit to see if it actually was from them. He said "By their fruits" ye shall know them- for a good tree produces good fruit and a bad produces only bad fruit" which is fit only to be cut down and burned. He is pretty clear that their deeds will be the yardstick against they must be measured.

Sam's emphasis on deeds remains therefore critical. One can think and say what one wants, but what one does is another matter entirely.

The question of a ruler being a tyrant can be simply seen by the yardstick of deeds. Is there in any system of government some one or agency who can say "no" to the ultimate ruler and he thereby cannot do it? I do not mean say "no" in a figurative sense by battle, but simply saying no. That is against the law, or the morality of God, or whatever and he thereby is prevented from doing it. If there is no such person or law or institution, or there is but it is intimidated and cowed and terrorized by the ruler so that it dare not say "NO" then the deeds prove the tyrant.

Was there anyone in France then who could say to Napoleon "No you shall not execute this man" or "No, you shall not decree this law, or "no, you shall not have this war." Then if there was then there is some evidence that he is not a tyrant. If however no one dares say no, then tyranny it is.

Sam I also find your final paragraph excellent and powerful in framing the question (to which I suspect there is no answer) to the endurance of the myth, the propaganda even when the evidence is all in and plain for everyone to see, that it was all a great big fat lie. It seems as if at times we are listing to the most strained of arguments, like saying that being shot is dying a natural death "for what is more natural then to die when bullets pass through the heart."

With the exception of King George III and the Prince Regent, all European monarchs were pretty much, by definition, tyrants. In this, Napoleon was no worse than any of them.

However, what makes him worse for me is that Napoleon claimed, both at the time and later, to be different from them and that he disguised his tyranny with the trappings of representation and checks on his power.

Jurgen

TW-The problem with your argument is that you are assuming there is no intersection between hypocritical acts and ruthless ones. I believe there can be substantial overlap between the two. A hypocritical act can itself be ruthless, or a hypocritical act can be taken to advance a ruthless policy.

The problem I have in applying this to Napoleon is that while I believe destroying the illusion of rights can be ruthless, I am not sure that many in continental Europe had this illusion. I will admit that I do believe Napoleon was far more ruthless than the foreign rulers who opposed him, but to a degree that was because Napoleon was largely more successful than those other rulers.

And Mac you are absolutely right. Many of those "legitimate" rulers were themselves the heirs of some rather ruthless ancestors.

"The problem I have in applying this to Napoleon is that while I believe destroying the illusion of rights can be ruthless, I am not sure that many in continental Europe had this illusion."

It would probably depend upon their experience of, and expectations from, the French Revolutionary period. Napoleon was quite explicit, in his conquest of new territories, that he was coming as a liberator. For example, in the constitutions that he promulgated for N. Italy, Holland, Westphalia, and the Duchy of Warsaw, he explicitly and repeatedly emphasized that this was the dawn of a new era of liberty. The official publications like the Moniteur repeated this theme ad nauseam.

Now, one could debate the degree to which anybody took these promises seriously. Or even the degree to which these promises penetrated the minds of average working folk (or whether they cared.)

But I do have first-hand accounts in diaries and memoirs of people from certain groups who were initially quite excited about it, and came to be embittered and disillusioned. For example: jurists in Germany – despite their Angst at having to learn an entirely new law code – were often initially quite enthusiastic about the modern, streamlined new French legal process… only to become very bitter about how it was abused, and how the French arrested people without charge and held them without representation, gave them show-trials and killed them, and then occasionally asked the judges to just rubber-stamp it all. Many German jurists came to feel guilt about their participation in this system, and in old age they wrote memoirs trying to clear their names.

Or the Jews. Many among the educated and assimilated in the conquered territories were initially very excited by the promise of emancipation under French rule. By 1810-11, however, they'd become quite embittered by the reality: their taxes went up, the special "Jewish Fees" returned, they had restrictions placed on their travel that no Christian faced, they were not allowed access to their local government officials as Christians were; they had to deal instead with the state-run Jewish Consistorium which monitored (literally) their every movement and even the rituals in their temples, and so on. (Not to mention that the Old Regime discrimination against them had at least meant that they were exempt from conscription; Napoleon drafted their sons and sent them off to die in Spain or Russia.) And of course, they were hardly "emancipated" from things like forced bond-purchases, arbitrary arrests and searches, and censorship.

"The first two observers are incorrect because hypocrisy or pretending to be something has no real bearing on whether a ruler is acting ruthlessly or not. "

Where do you get the impression from that I, for example, am suggesting that being ruthless is linked with hypocrisy? I've suggested two separate arguments, one that Buonaparte was more ruthless, indeed considerably more ruthless than contemporary rulers, the other, entirely separate argument, that his endless portrayal of his regime as being one of liberty and equality before a uniform system of law was not a true portrayal of the reality. That he repeatedly deliberately ignored or overruled the rule of law whilst banging on about it is the hypocrisy.

This thread is all about atrocities and it has moved a tiny bit on to focus on "ruthlessness". So we are discussing DEEDS. ACTIONS. Not tenuous and almost totally unrelated concepts such as being hypocritical. None of the definitions of "atrocity" or "ruthlessness" say anything about hypocrisy. What is the point of having a discussion if we are not going to use the definitions and meanings of the key words?

Sam & Otto have it right on this. It is DEEDS that count, what rulers actually DO. Chouan and Flecktarn are barking up the wrong tree. No one has been able to explain to me why a hypocrital ruler could be somehow more ruthless than a un-hypocrital one who carries out the same actions. It is this I am struggling with.

Let me introduce an hypothetical example;
Take a fictional country somewhere in the Middle East, we'll call it "Fake-istan". The inhabitants of Fake-istan are ordinary people, they have different beliefs about how their country should be but in the main they just want to be left alone to decide their own destiny. They then suffer the misfortune of the series of invasions and foreign occupations enumerated below.
1. A neighbouring Islamic country invades and imposes a strict Religion on Fake-istan. The reason they are doing this is because they genuinely whole-heartedly believe that the world needs to follow this religion. In otherwords they are NOT acting hypocritically. However, the people of Fakeistan react negatively and the invaders have to kill 1000 of them to impose the religion.
2. Later a European Country, call it "Equalia", decides to invade and impose their beliefs that religion is evil and the inhabitants of Fakeistan would be much better sharing in the idelogy of the 'Rights of Man'. The government of equalia genuinely believes they are doing the right thing. But Fakeistan has grown to love their religion now and they resist the new ideology. It has to be imposed using the same ruthless methods and another 1000 inhabitants die.
3. Then a dictator and adventurer, call him the "Corsican ogre", decides to invade and do the same thing. But this guy is a hypocrite. He says he wants to impose the rights of man but he actually wants to further his personal glory. Another 1000 inhabitants are killed.
4. Another country, call it "Perfidious Albion", decides to invade in order to help throw out the Corsican Ogre. They say that they are doing it to help Fakeistan but really the real motive is to expand the empire of Albion and impose a financial system that that will benefit the real rulers. They are hypocrites. A further 1000 folks die in yet another atrocity.
5. Much later another power, call it "Sickle-land", invades and imposes socialism on Fakistan, with the usual 1000 deaths. Sickle-land genuine believes that they are imposing the right social order and they are not hypocrites, but they act in the same ruthless way.
6. Finally, another country, call it "Stars and Stripes" invades and imposes Democracy. Another 1000 of these poor Fake-istanies die in resistance. Stars and stripes say they are doing to help the people but really they are hypocrites, they are just doing it to bring Fakeistan into a New World Order where a tiny bunch of elites know they will control everything.

So, which hypothetical country is more ruthless? They have all killed the same amount of people, but some are more honest about their aims (1,2 & 5), whereas some are liars (3,4 & 6). I would argue that they are all equally bad, none of them can be said to be more ruthless. As Otto and Sam have explained, they have acted in the same way and their deeds tell you everything you need to know in regards to how ruthless they are. The people who have actually been slaughtered are not likely to be splitting hairs about who was more ruthless!
But if Bill, Chouan & Flecktarn are correct, three of the countries listed above must be more ruthless than the others (The Corsican Ogre, Perfidious Albion and Star & Stripes). It is this bit that I don't get.
Why are these more ruthless, using the actual definition of the word ruthless? If we start using our personal preferences and political or philosophical beliefs as a guide to decide which regimes are more vicious, rather than what these regimes actually do, then we won't get anywhere.

Edit; Chouan I just saw your last post. So why was Napoleon more ruthless then?

Actually, I do not believe that Napoleon was more ruthless than any other European monarch. When their authority was threatened, they reacted violently, as long as there wouldn't exist other forces that would kept them in check -Britain comes to mind-.

What differentiate Napoleon was two things: first, the scope of his conquests, which forced to live under their rule -direct or indirect- people of different countries and cultures. Second, that he was very open about using extreme measures to smash resistence. Others made excuses for their actions, but Napoleon never did. He didn't feel any guilt about killing 1,000 people if that served to bolster his policies. Compounded that with the fact that the early XIXth comtemplated an explosion of printed paper, which made Napoleon's deeds and words widely known by Europeans, you have the elements to explain why we perceive Napoleon as more ruthless than other monarchs of his time.

TW,

"But if Bill, Chouan & Flecktarn are correct, three of the countries listed above must be more ruthless than the others (The Corsican Ogre, Perfidious Albion and Star & Stripes). It is this bit that I don't get. "

No, I am not claiming that Napoleon was more ruthless, but that he was a hypocrite.

Jurgen

Flecktarn,

No, I am not claiming that Napoleon was more ruthless, but that he was a hypocrite.

Well, we were talking about atrocities and ruthlessness and then you said;

However, what makes him worse for me is that Napoleon claimed, both at the time and later, to be different from them and that he disguised his tyranny with the trappings of representation and checks on his power.

So if you are not talking about what everyone else was talking about, what on earth do you mean you mean by your comment? What do you mean by "worse", if you are not talking about ruthlessness, when everybody else was at the time?

Hypocrisy is a perfectly valid part of this discussion; rather like the hypocrisy currently being spouted by our political leaders about the late Arial Sharon.

TW,

I was talking about Napoleon in a general sense and was not conflating ruthlessness or tyranny with hypocrisy.

For me, what makes him worse than the other tyrants is that he was also a hypocrite.

Once again, you seem to want the discussion to only be about what you want it to be about.

Jurgen