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Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History (ed. Benson Lossing), Louisiana, (search)
ear, by which his Catholic Majesty accepted that cession. When Bonaparte became actual ruler of France as First Consul he felt an ardent diew he obtained from Spain (1800) the retrocession of Louisiana. Bonaparte had formed a plan for taking immediate possession of New Orleans panish intendant at New Orleans, as if anticipating the wishes of Bonaparte, had issued a proclamation interdicting the privilege secured to e surprise of the American minister, it was announced by Marbois, Bonaparte's representative, that he would treat for the sale of the whole of Louisiana. Bonaparte had already experienced serious difficulties in the way of securing French colonial dominion, especially in the West luence in the affairs of America. With equally prophetic vision, Bonaparte said to Marbois, a few days after the negotiation was signed, I wngland, and the prostration of her maritime superiority, was then Bonaparte's pet project. This accession of territory, he continued, exulti
Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History (ed. Benson Lossing), Marbois, Francois de Barbe, Marquis de 1745-1837 (search)
in the most important operations of the embassy while Luzerne was minister. After the return of the latter Marbois remained as charge d'affaires, and resided in America until 1785, arranging all the French consulates. He was afterwards appointed Intendant of Santo Domingo, and returned to France in 1790, when he was sent as ambassador to the German Diet. Having offended the ruling party in the course of the fierce French Revolution, he was condemned to exile at Cayenne. On his return, Bonaparte, then First Consul, nominated him as the first councillor of state, and in 1801 he was made secretary of the treasury. He successfully negotiated the sale of Louisiana to the United States in 1803. He served in conspicuous posts in civil life, and was among the first of the senators who voted for the deposition of Napoleon in 1814. Louis XVIII. created him peer and made him keeper of the seals in 1815. Soon after that he was created a marquis. On Napoleon's return from Elba, Marbois
Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History (ed. Benson Lossing), Neutrality. (search)
e with American vessels; but after the peace of Tilsit (July 7, 1807), Napoleon employed the released French army in enforcing his Continental system. According to a new interpretation of the Berlin decree, given by Regnier, French minister of justice, American vessels, laden with merchandise derived from England and her colonies, by whomsoever owned, were liable to seizure by French cruisers. This announced intention of forcing the United States into at least a passive co-operation with Bonaparte's schemes against British commerce was speedily carried into execution by the confiscation of the cargo of the American ship Horizon, which had accidentally been stranded on the coast of France in November, 1807. The ground of condemnation was that the cargo consisted of merchandise of British origin. This served as a precedent for the confiscation of a large amount of American property on the sea Already Great Britain had exhibited her intended policy towards neutrals. When she heard
Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History (ed. Benson Lossing), Quincy, Josiah 1709-1784 (search)
result if we consider our embargo in relation to the objects of this belligerent policy. France, by her edicts, would compress Great Britain by destroying her commerce and cutting off her supplies. All the continent of Europe, in the hand of Bonaparte, is made subservient to this policy. This embargo law of the United States, in its operation, is a union with the continental coalition against British commerce at the very moment most auspicious to its success. Can anything be in more direc Heaven to destroy? The people of New England, after eleven months deprivation of the ocean, to be commanded still longer to abandon it, for an undefined period, to hold their inalienable rights at the tenure of the will of Great Britain or of Bonaparte! A people commercial in all respects, in all their relations, in all their hopes, in all their recollections of the past, in all their prospects of the future —a people, whose first love was the ocean, the choice of their childhood, the approb
Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History (ed. Benson Lossing), Rochambeau, Jean Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, Count de 1725-1807 (search)
ounded at the battle of Lafeldt. He was distinguished in several battles, especially at Minden. When it was resolved by the French monarch to send a military force to America, Rochambeau was created a lieutenant-general and Count De Rochambeau. placed in command of it. He arrived at Newport, R. I., in July, 1780, and joined the American army under Washington, on the Hudson, a few miles above New York. He led his army to the Virginia peninsula, and assisted in the capture of Cornwallis at Yorktown, Oct. 19, 1781, when he was presented with one of the captured cannon. In 1783 he received the decoration of Saint Esprit, and in 1791 was made a marshal of France. Early in 1792 he was placed in command of the Army of the North, and narrowly escaped the guillotine when the Jacobins wielded supreme power in Paris. Bonaparte gave him a pension in 1804, and the Cross of Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor. He dictated Memoirs (2 volumes, Paris, 1809). He died in Thore, May 10, 1807.
Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History (ed. Benson Lossing), Santo Domingo, (search)
le island became subject to his sway, and he assumed the government. A constitution was drawn up by which he was named President for life. Toussaint sent it to Bonaparte, who angrily exclaimed, He is a revolted slave, whom we must punish; the honor of France is outraged. He sent out General Leclerc, his sister Pauline's husband, France, and starved to death in prison. Meanwhile, the black and mulatto population of Guadeloupe arose in insurrection, seized the French governor sent out by Bonaparte, declared the freedom of the slaves, and established a provisional government in October, 1801. They were subdued, and Bonaparte re-established slavery in the iBonaparte re-established slavery in the island and authorized the reopening of the slave-trade. The island was divided among several chiefs after the assassination of Dessalines, a self-constituted emperor, in 1806. The principal of these black chiefs was Henri Christophe in the northwest, and Petion in the south-west. The eastern portion of the island was repossesse
Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History (ed. Benson Lossing), Sargent, Herbert Howland 1858- (search)
Sargent, Herbert Howland 1858- Jurist; born in Carlinville, Ill., Sept. 29, 1858; graduated at Blackburn University in 1878 and at the United States Military Academy in 1883; was on frontier duty till the outbreak of the war with Spain; organized volunteers in Washington in May, 1898; and was appointed colonel of the 5th United States Volunteer Infantry the same month; served at Santiago and Guantanamo, Cuba; returned to the United States with his regiment, May, 1899; was promoted captain of cavalry, March 2, 1899, and appointed lieutenant-colonel of the 29th United States Volunteer Infantry in July following. In October he sailed for Manila with his regiment; fought against the insurgents in the island of Luzon; and commanded the assaulting forces during the action in which General Lawton was killed at San Mateo, Dec. 19, 1899. He is the author of Napoleon Bonaparte's first campaign; and The campaign of Marengo.
Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History (ed. Benson Lossing), Spoliation claims. (search)
Spoliation claims. Bonaparte declared, in 1810, that no trade would be allowed with the allies of France in which France herself was forbidden to participate. In the ports of Spain under French control, of Holland, and at Naples, a large number of American vessels and a great amount of American property were seized; also at Hamburg, in Denmark, and in the Baltic ports, it being alleged that many American and many British vessels were employed in bringing British produce from British ports under forged papers seeming to show that the property and vessels were American, directly from the United States. The seizures were, therefore, made indiscriminately, and a vast amount of bona fide American property was thus lost. The seizures at Naples were particularly piratical, for the ships were lured into that port by a special proclamation of King Joachim Murat. These spoliations constituted the basis of claims subsequently made upon, and settled by, France and Naples. The only cou
Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History (ed. Benson Lossing), Wheeler, Samuel 1742-1820 (search)
Wheeler, Samuel 1742-1820 Blacksmith; born in Weccaco, Pa., in 1742; was in the Continental army during the Revolutionary War, and at the personal request of Washington made the chain which was stretched across the Hudson River at West Point to prevent the passage of British vessels. He also manufactured a cannon by welding together iron bars, which did better execution, had a longer range, and was not so heavy as brass ordnance. During the action at Brandywine this gun did such good service that it was regarded as a wonder by American officers, but before the conclusion of that battle it was captured and afterwards sent to England, where it was exhibited in the Tower of London. Later, Napoleon Bonaparte used a pattern of it as a model for the cannon used by his flying artillery. He died in Philadelphia, Pa., May 10, 1820. See Clinton, Fort, capture of.
Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Book and heart: essays on literature and life, Chapter 18: the future of polite society (search)
nd human slavery, but is still struggling with the inequalities of a transition period. We must surely come to a time when no labor will degrade except by being unmanly or unwomanly, and when good manners will be exercised to all upon something approaching a level, and not by looking down from above. We cannot be satisfied with plantation manners or servile manners; they must be humane manners — that is, human. As vocations are gradually refined and elevated by machinery-turning, as Napoleon Bonaparte predicted, trades into arts — it becomes more and more absurd to classify men and women by occupation instead of character. Howells has lately pointed out how pitifully Dickens stultified his own democratic tendencies when he showed himself really and lastingly ashamed of having once put up shoe-blacking as a boy, and was unable to forgive his mother for suffering him to be so degraded. Howells adds, admirably, One perceives that he too was the slave of conventions and the victim of
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