Chapter 2
Marching For Napoléon
MY EMPEROR! Rose murmured softly, from his side of the Line, feeling the face on the coin he fingered. Napoléon Bonaparte.
Born in France in 1785, Rose was four years old when 80,000 of his country people stormed the Bastille, tearing down with it the Monarchy of France. In its place came a government of the people, dedicated to “Liberté! Égalité! Fraternité!” But within a decade, as it became The Terror and the government of La Guillotine, France called upon General Napoléon Bonaparte to restore the principles of the Revolution.
By the time Rose turned fifteen, Napoléon, now Emperor, had transformed France from a feudal state, governed for the benefit of the nobility, into a modern state adhering to the rule of law. In his reign, he introduced the Code Napoléon and other laws which incorporated the ideals of the Revolution: equal rights for all citizens, religious toleration and the abolition of serfdom. Napoléon developed an unbiased judicial system, fostered education, science, literature and the arts . . . and created an Empire, which for a brief time even included the middle third of what became the United States of America. As a result of his sale of this Louisiana Territory to President Thomas Jefferson, the U.S. eventually became a continental nation between two great oceans.
To enlarge and maintain the French Empire, Rose, and every other able bodied, twenty-year-old French male, was conscripted into the army. From 1805 to 1812, Rose fought in Germany, Spain and Austria as Napoléon became Emperor of all Europe. Like most every Frenchman of his day, Rose revered the greatest military commander in history who had brought stability to France and made his nation the leader of the world.
The General, everyone knew, would make no move, risk no soldier, until he learned the condition of roads and bridges, the estimate of enemy troops and weapons – and at what speed they could travel . . . and much more. However, once Napoléon’s intelligence was complete, his daring knew no limits; a master of time and space, his credo: lose a man, never a moment. Only then would he strike, with overwhelming force against the weakest point of the enemy – artillery blasting, infantry rolling forward, and cavalry moving in for the coup de grace.
By 1812, now a seasoned Napoléonic veteran, Rose joined a force of 600,000 amassed for the invasion of Russia. En route was a triumphant march through Germany, Poland and Prussia, where Rose watched Napoléon leading his troops on horseback, dressed in his famous green coat, bathed in torchlight, church bells peeling, 101-cannon salutes and the cheers of throngs of devoted citizens of his Empire.
Disaster however lay ahead.
On June 24, 1812, Rose, as part of the Grand Armée, began the 600-mile march into the heart of Moscow. But Napoléon failed to account for the Czar’s strategic retreat which drew the invaders deeper and deeper into the interior of Russia, crossing land sparsely populated, badly farmed, barely capable of providing food for such a massive force . . . and on fire. In their retreat, the Russians left their homeland in flames, burning Moscow and destroying grain, hay and cattle. The invaders began to starve; the Grand Armée, crippled by cold and snow, was now nearly immobilized by hunger.
With overextended supply lines, exhausted troops and scarce rations, Napoléon was compelled to order the disastrous retreat from Moscow, through the snow and intense cold of the Russian winter of 1812. Of the 600,000 men who crossed into Russia in June of 1812, of the 140,000 who were still alive to retreat from Moscow, of the barely 25,000 who survived the retreat – one was Moses Rose.
Rose fought alongside his Emperor until Napoléon, utterly crushed in the 1815 Battle of Waterloo, was exiled to Saint Helena, off the coast of Africa. Then, with other defeated Napoléonic veterans, Rose fled to the New World.
THESE VETERANS of glorious victories and devastating defeats were grateful and relieved when the United States of America announced it was offering them sanctuary. The U.S., the exiles believed, “had always been a refuge for all who sought to escape from the tyranny and oppression of the Old World.” Had not their revolution inspired ours?
The U.S. did not disappoint them. By an 1817 Act of Congress, the impoverished followers of Bonaparte were granted refuge and 90,000 acres of land near Mobile, Alabama. The French colony was to cultivate the vine and the olive.
But the true mission of the refugees was not to till the soil but to free Napoléon. This was not a plan their Emperor would ever have approved. It was not well thought out, there was no strategy and there was no reasonable expectation of success. But the exiles, battered by disappointments and hardship, “would indulge in the wildest dreams and imagine the most improbable combinations” in a state of desperation that clouded their minds.
An intrigue was conceived to sell the Alabama land, use the funds to purchase ships and weapons, seize a small part of the Texas mainland (a contested part of the Spanish Empire), and begin negotiations with Mexican dissidents. The French would offer their great military expertise to organize a Mexican army that would “help that country throw off the Spanish yoke.” In gratitude, the Mexicans would surely finance a small fleet with which to storm the island of Saint Helena, carrying off Napoléon in triumph, perhaps to become Emperor of Mexico.
Absurd, thought Louis Rose, aware that no one had even spoken to the Mexicans. Although Rose somewhat resembled the Emperor: a little over 5 feet in height, a swarthy complexion with dark hair (already showing gray), he had little stature with the planners – especially with their new leader, General Charles Lallemand, an officer highly esteemed by the Emperor.
Rose spoke to a few others who voiced doubts but French soldiers followed their officers without question. So, in March of 1818, they set sail on their “secret” expedition. Everything went wrong. The Spanish knew of their plan before the ships were even in the water, and, unbeknownst to the exiles, their expedition interfered with secret negotiations between the U.S. and Spain, which included the land sought by the exiles.
The Frenchmen set sail for their new home: a small area in Texas along the Trinity River, above Galveston Bay. Here, the small group, never more than 200, built their fortress, Le Champ d’Asile – the “Land of Refuge.”
The Spanish, though aware that the exiles were favorites of the Americans, dispatched 1200 Spanish calvary and artillery to peaceably oust them. The commanding officer never attacked, he merely waited three days away “until disease and discouragement should undermine [their] not very formidable body” of 200 men.
In true Napoléonic style, the outnumbered French withdrew to Galveston, and then across the international border to the State of Louisiana, by then a part of the United States.
The Land of Refuge had existed until November of 1818, barely six months. Having acted out their grief, most of the exiles would thereafter settle in the U.S., leading tranquil lives.
But not Rose. Although the plan had been foolhardy, he had already been banished from his native France. He would not be exiled again.
Thirty-three years of age, the Frenchman spent the next eight years performing odd jobs and adapting himself to life in America . . . before he would one day fight to return to Texas. He would not allow the Spanish to control his destiny.