Hippolyte Lecomte, The French Army Enters Rome, February 15, 1798 (1834): This painting, produced some years after the fact, shows General Louis-Alexandre Berthier entering Rome at the head of a French army. Berthier had invaded Rome after the French ambassador there, General Mathurin-Léonard Duphot, had been murdered by Papal soldiers (Pope Pius VI has been forced to accept an ambassador from France by treaty in 1797). Berthier invaded the Papal States, declared a Roman Republic, and demanded that Pius VI surrender his temporal authority. The Pope refused, and Berthier dragged the 80-year-old pontiff to Valence where he died the next year. The Roman Republic only lasted until 1799 when a Neapolitan force recaptured the city and it was eventually conveyed to Pius VII. The French got around to reconquering it in 1808 and divided the Papal States between France and the new Kingdom of Italy, a satellite state. Berthier, by the way, eventually became Napoleon’s trusted chief-of-staff under the empire.
Reading
Please read Hunt and Censer, pp. 149-158, Second Propagandist Decrees (1792) (Canvas), and the Treaty between France and the Cisapline Republic (1798) (Canvas). Please also listen to Canvas Lecture: What Was the Role of War in Revolutionary Foreign Policy?
What We are Doing Today
We have followed events in France for some time with a brief interlude during which we contemplated the cultural changes associated with the revolution. It is now time to consider the war that France had been fighting for some time. Remember that? The conflict that had contributed to a sense of crisis in 1792 and toppled the monarchy? That fighting against counterrevolutionaries abroad that, along with the struggle against counterrevolutionaries at home, justified the Terror? Yes, that war.
The reason we will discuss it today is because France had started to make great gains against the multitude of states arrayed against it. We have already mentioned France’s success in seizing the Netherlands and installing a new, revolutionary Batavian Republic. Under the Directory, France also captured the Rhineland, much of Switzerland (which led to the Helvetian Republic), and parts of Italy (where the Cisalpine, Ligurian, Piedmontese, Roman, and, briefly, the Parthenopean, Republics were erected). These conquests, and the war that led to them, form a natural part of our story concerning the revolution; the revolution influenced the war, and the war influenced the revolution.
Horace Vernet, The Battle for the Bridge at Arcole (1826): This painting captures (and romanticizes) a key moment during the Battle of Arcole (1796) during which Napoleon’s Army of Italy defeated an Austrian force attempting to relieve the siege of Mantua. It was victories and heroic acts like these that made a number of generals household names in France. Napoleon made the most of his bravery at Arcole for the sake of advancing his career. If you must know what really happened, Napoleon did not actually lead his men across the bridge at this battle (known as Arcola in Italy). Instead, he stood just over 50 paces from the bridge waving a regimental standard as he urged his men forward. This act was dangerous enough; as Napoleon stood in the open, waving the flag, several of his staff nearby were wounded and his aide-de-camp was killed.
Potential Quiz Questions
1) According to the textbook, the Directory considered two clashing positions on the military objectives France ought to pursue. What were these two? What did the Directory eventually decide to do?
2) Having won a series of victories in northern Italy, Bonaparte erected the Cisapline and Ligurian Republics. What important changes occurred for the people who lived in these republics?
3) What appear to have been the strategies and personal qualities that allowed Bonaparte to conquer territory in Italy? And why did he capture the popular imagination in France?
4) What were the most important terms of the Treaty of Campoformio between France and Austria? What were the most important consequences of the treaty?
5) Where did Britain focus its military efforts against France during this period? Where did France’s only significant military initiative against the United Kingdom take place?
6) How and why did the French face ferocious resistance in occupied areas of the Rhineland and Italy?
7) How does the textbook explain the sources of French military success during this period?
8) Finally, read The Second Propagandist Decree (1792) and the Treaty between France and the Cisalpine Republic (1798). Of the provisions in both documents, which ones do you think presented the French with opportunities for political and economic exploitation?
9) When Brissot first argued on behalf of war in 1792, what did he claim the fighting would accomplish? As the 1790s continued, what did war actually lead to in both France and the rest of Europe?
History 114: The French Revolution and Napoleon 