Napoleon Bonaparte was born at Ajaccio, Corsica, on 15 August 1769. On 2 June I764 Carlo Buonaparte of Ajaccio, an eighteen-year-old law student, married the fourteen-yearold Marie-Letizia Ramolino, also of Ajaccio. Both families were descended from Italian mercenaries in Genoese pay who settled in Corsica at the beginning of the sixteenth century. Buonaparte family, a lawyer, as a member of the Council of Ancients in Ajaccio in I6I6; several more Buonaparte lawyers served on this council in the eighteenth century. The Buonapartes like the Ramolinos were part of the Corsican nobility, but it must be remembered that Corsican 'nobles' were as common as 'princes' in Czarist Russia.
Carlo Buonaparte, born on 27 March I746, had been studying law at Pisa University but left to marry Letizia without taking his degree.The Ramolinos were a cadet branch of the distinguished Collalto family, well entrenched in Lombardy since the fourteenth century; the Ramolinos themselves had been established in Corsica for 250 years. Where the Buonapartes were a family of lawyers, with the Ramolinos the tradition was military: Letizia's father was an army officer with expertise in civil engineering, who commanded the Ajaccio garrison and held the sinecure office of Inspector-General of Roads and Bridges. The newly-weds' fathers had died young. Carlo's father, a lawyer, died in 176o when his son was fourteen.
Marie-Letizia Ramolino born in early 1750. Her father died when she was five, after which her mother Angela Maria turned for consolation to Fesch, a Swiss captain in the French garrison forces at Ajaccio. Angela Maria married Fesch in 1757 and persuaded him to convert to Catholicism, but his father, a banker in Basle, responded by disinheriting him. From the marriage of Fesch and Letizia's mother came Joseph born 1763, the future cardinal and Napoleon's uncle. Unfortunatily Fesch died in 1770, gave Letizia away; her dowry comprised thirty-one acres of land, a mill, and an oven for baking bread.
Carlo, a tall young man and Letizia gave birth to thirteen children in all, of whom eight survived. A son, named Napoleon, was born and died in 1765. Pregnant again almost immediately, Letizia next brought forth a girl who also died. Carlo again impregnated Letizia, who this time bore him a lusty son in the shape of Joseph originally named Giuseppe, who was born on 7 July 1768.
Carlo spoiled his children, but Letizia was a fearsome mother and had a natural love of power. A stern task mistress who always punished for the slightest fault. Letizia laid about her with gusto when her second son misbehaved. She drove him to Mass with slaps and blows, whipped him when he stole fruits. Letizia was also cunning and devious. When her son was eight and an altar boy, she vowed to mete out punishment for his less than reverent behaviour on the altar, but faced the problem that she would find it hard to lay hands on the agile and fully-clothed Napoleon. To lull his suspicions, she told him she would not beat him for his offence. But when he took his clothes off she pounced on him with the whip.Napoleon never cried out under the lash, but fear and respect for his mother replaced genuine love.
In February 1771 Carlo was appointed assessor of the Royal Jurisdiction of Ajaccio, one of eleven on the island. Certainly not coincidentally, in the same year, on 13 September 1771, Carlo obtained patents from the authorities declaring the Buonaparte family noble. Corsican nobility did not confer many advantages: there were no feudal privileges, no exemption from taxes, not even any particular deference from other classes; but the advantages of the declaration of nobility for the Buonapartes were significant in the long term.
On 19 July 1778, granting Napoleon a place at the military academy at Brienne and Joseph his indentures at the Aix seminary. However, there were conditions: the two Buonaparte sons had to be clear that they could not both be trained for the same profession; they had to pass the entrance examinations; and final confirmation had to await a new certificate of nobility from the royal heraldist in Versailles. Final confirmation of Napoleon's place at a military school was not received from the Minister of War until 31 December 1778.
Three weeks after Carlo's sons had started school, Carlo was notified by the War Ministry that Napoleon had, in principle, been assigned to the military school at Tiron, but that some final formalities concerning the title to nobility had still to be cleared up. However on 28 March 1779 Montbarrey informed Carlo that Napoleon was actually being sent to the military school at Brienne in Champagne. Since Carlo was by now in Versailles and detained on business, he asked Marbeuf, the Bishop of Autun, to take Napoleon up to Brienne to begin his education proper. Napoleon did not actually commence his schooling at Brienne on 23 April, official school records notwithstanding. A certain captain Champeaux, on leave from his regiment in Nice, arrived in Autun to convey his son from the school to Brienne. Learning that the Champeaux boy was going to the same place as the young Buonaparte, bishop Marbeuf decided to save himself a journey and prevailed on Champeaux to take Napoleon with him .
Napoleon arrived in Brienne on 15 May 1779. The military college there, originally a monastery, stood at the foot of a hill dominated by the chateau. A religious academy from 1730, it had become a military school in 1776, one of ten such schools set up to replace the Ecole Royale Militaire in Paris, which had collapsed on grounds of cost. It was still run by monks and the religious ethos was dominant, the Brienne school was underfunded so could not afford to engage top-class teachers, was the lowest-ranked of all ten military colleges and had the lowest student enrolment as against a top military school like La FU:che. Its aim was to prepare the sons of the nobility for eventual cadetships in the armed services but, apart from a course in fortification in the final year, the education was not remotely military, but rather a variant of the standard training of the eighteenthcentury gentleman. The theory was that the best pupils would be selected for the artillery, the engineers and the navy, and the mediocre ones for the infantry; only those too stupid even for the cavalry would be sent back in disgrace to their families.
Carlo Buonaparte, born on 27 March I746, had been studying law at Pisa University but left to marry Letizia without taking his degree.The Ramolinos were a cadet branch of the distinguished Collalto family, well entrenched in Lombardy since the fourteenth century; the Ramolinos themselves had been established in Corsica for 250 years. Where the Buonapartes were a family of lawyers, with the Ramolinos the tradition was military: Letizia's father was an army officer with expertise in civil engineering, who commanded the Ajaccio garrison and held the sinecure office of Inspector-General of Roads and Bridges. The newly-weds' fathers had died young. Carlo's father, a lawyer, died in 176o when his son was fourteen.
Marie-Letizia Ramolino born in early 1750. Her father died when she was five, after which her mother Angela Maria turned for consolation to Fesch, a Swiss captain in the French garrison forces at Ajaccio. Angela Maria married Fesch in 1757 and persuaded him to convert to Catholicism, but his father, a banker in Basle, responded by disinheriting him. From the marriage of Fesch and Letizia's mother came Joseph born 1763, the future cardinal and Napoleon's uncle. Unfortunatily Fesch died in 1770, gave Letizia away; her dowry comprised thirty-one acres of land, a mill, and an oven for baking bread.
Carlo, a tall young man and Letizia gave birth to thirteen children in all, of whom eight survived. A son, named Napoleon, was born and died in 1765. Pregnant again almost immediately, Letizia next brought forth a girl who also died. Carlo again impregnated Letizia, who this time bore him a lusty son in the shape of Joseph originally named Giuseppe, who was born on 7 July 1768.
Carlo spoiled his children, but Letizia was a fearsome mother and had a natural love of power. A stern task mistress who always punished for the slightest fault. Letizia laid about her with gusto when her second son misbehaved. She drove him to Mass with slaps and blows, whipped him when he stole fruits. Letizia was also cunning and devious. When her son was eight and an altar boy, she vowed to mete out punishment for his less than reverent behaviour on the altar, but faced the problem that she would find it hard to lay hands on the agile and fully-clothed Napoleon. To lull his suspicions, she told him she would not beat him for his offence. But when he took his clothes off she pounced on him with the whip.Napoleon never cried out under the lash, but fear and respect for his mother replaced genuine love.
On 19 July 1778, granting Napoleon a place at the military academy at Brienne and Joseph his indentures at the Aix seminary. However, there were conditions: the two Buonaparte sons had to be clear that they could not both be trained for the same profession; they had to pass the entrance examinations; and final confirmation had to await a new certificate of nobility from the royal heraldist in Versailles. Final confirmation of Napoleon's place at a military school was not received from the Minister of War until 31 December 1778.
Three weeks after Carlo's sons had started school, Carlo was notified by the War Ministry that Napoleon had, in principle, been assigned to the military school at Tiron, but that some final formalities concerning the title to nobility had still to be cleared up. However on 28 March 1779 Montbarrey informed Carlo that Napoleon was actually being sent to the military school at Brienne in Champagne. Since Carlo was by now in Versailles and detained on business, he asked Marbeuf, the Bishop of Autun, to take Napoleon up to Brienne to begin his education proper. Napoleon did not actually commence his schooling at Brienne on 23 April, official school records notwithstanding. A certain captain Champeaux, on leave from his regiment in Nice, arrived in Autun to convey his son from the school to Brienne. Learning that the Champeaux boy was going to the same place as the young Buonaparte, bishop Marbeuf decided to save himself a journey and prevailed on Champeaux to take Napoleon with him .
Napoleon arrived in Brienne on 15 May 1779. The military college there, originally a monastery, stood at the foot of a hill dominated by the chateau. A religious academy from 1730, it had become a military school in 1776, one of ten such schools set up to replace the Ecole Royale Militaire in Paris, which had collapsed on grounds of cost. It was still run by monks and the religious ethos was dominant, the Brienne school was underfunded so could not afford to engage top-class teachers, was the lowest-ranked of all ten military colleges and had the lowest student enrolment as against a top military school like La FU:che. Its aim was to prepare the sons of the nobility for eventual cadetships in the armed services but, apart from a course in fortification in the final year, the education was not remotely military, but rather a variant of the standard training of the eighteenthcentury gentleman. The theory was that the best pupils would be selected for the artillery, the engineers and the navy, and the mediocre ones for the infantry; only those too stupid even for the cavalry would be sent back in disgrace to their families.
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