…FROM ST HELENA
"At 4pm on 25 July 1818, when the soldiers came to prise Barry O'Meara out of Longwood House on St Helena, Napoleon's Irish doctor excused himself saying he had to go to his room to collect his papers. Four hours later, he emerged and was escorted manu militari from the island. In those four hours (much bemoaned by the governor Hudson Lowe), O'Meara received from Napoleon inter alia a letter for Marie-Louise. How do we know this?
Barry wrote a letter to Napoleon's brother, Joseph, in Point Breeze (US) in February 1820 (the minute of this is held in the Wellcome Institute in London), informing the ex-king of Spain that he had performed several missions on imperial business across the European continent in late 1819/early 1820. His first port of call? Frankfurt and Eugène de Beauharnais for financial reasons – Eugène processed many of Napoleon's European expenses during the captivity on St Helena. The Emperor had given Barry a note for Eugène in which he begged his "family and friends to believe all that the Doctor O'Meara will say regarding my situation". Naturally, Barry was (partially) to quote this affidavit in the front matter of his 1822 book, Napoleon in Exile as a sign of his own credibility. On the same page in Napoleon in Exile, above this note, he added a facsimile of Napoleon's own handwriting reading: "s'il voit ma bonne Louise je la prie de permettre qu'il lui baise la main. Napole.' [if he sees my dear Louise I beg her to allow him to kiss her hand. Napole.]
After the visit to Eugène, Barry was to see the imperial family in Rome (notably Madame Mère, Cardinal Fesch, Pauline and Lucien), and then go back to Florence. This third, much more mysterious (and dangerous), part of the mission is cryptically described in the letter to Joseph as follows…"
link
Armand
paints the Dogman from the Flintloque starter set.
