Table Of ContentWar,CultureandSociety,1750–1850
Series Editors: Rafe Blaufarb (Tallahassee, USA), Alan Forrest (York, UK), and
KarenHagemann(ChapelHill,USA)
Editorial Board: Michael Broers (Oxford, UK), Christopher Bayly (Cambridge,
UK),RichardBessel(York,UK),
SarahChambers(Minneapolis,USA),LaurentDubois(Durham,USA),Etienne
François(Berlin,Germany),
JanetHartley(London,UK),WayneLee(ChapelHill,USA),JaneRendall(York,
UK),ReinhardStauber(Klagenfurt,Austria)
Titlesinclude:
RichardBessel,NicholasGuyattandJaneRendall(editors)
WAR,EMPIREANDSLAVERY,1770–1830
AlanForrestandPeterH.Wilson(editors)
THEBEEANDTHEEAGLE
NapoleonicFranceandtheEndoftheHolyRomanEmpire,1806
AlanForrest,KarenHagemannandJaneRendall(editors)
SOLDIERS,CITIZENSANDCIVILIANS
ExperiencesandPerceptionsoftheRevolutionaryandNapoleonicWars,
1790–1820
KarenHagemann,GiselaMetteleandJaneRendall(editors)
GENDER,WARANDPOLITICS
TransatlanticPerspectives,1755–1830
Marie-CécileThoral
FROMVALMYTOWATERLOO
FranceatWar,1792–1815
Forthcoming:
MichaelBroers,AgustinGuimeraandPeterHick(editors)
THENAPOLEONICEMPIREANDTHENEWEUROPEANPOLITICAL
CULTURE
AlanForrest,EtienneFrançoisandKarenHagemann(editors)
WARMEMORIES
TheRevolutionaryandNapoleonicWarsinNineteenthandTwentieth
CenturyEurope
LeightonS.James
WITNESSINGWAR
Experience,NarrativeandIdentityinGermanCentralEurope,1792–1815
CatrionaKennedy
NARRATIVESOFWAR
MilitaryandCivilianExperienceinBritainandIreland,1793–1815
KevinLinch
BRITAINANDWELLINGTON’SARMY
Recruitment,SocietyandTradition,1807–1815
War,CultureandSociety,1750–1850
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Basingstoke,HampshireRG216XS,England
From Valmy to Waterloo
France at War, 1792–1815
Marie-Cécile Thoral
SeniorLecturer,ModernEuropeanHistory,SheffieldHallamUniversity,UK
Translationby
Godfrey Rogers
©Marie-CécileThoral2011
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10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11
Contents
Acknowledgements vii
Introduction 1
1 BattleExperience 13
I Thechangingfaceofbattle 14
II Battleexperienceandindividualidentity 20
III Modernwar:siteofmassmortality 31
IV Theenemy:perception,representation,andtreatment 36
V Conclusion 44
2 TheWaratSea 45
I TheFrenchNavyintherevolutionary
andNapoleonicwars 47
II Dominanceovertheoceans,controlofthetrade
routes:thewarintheMediterranean 60
III Thereturnoftheprivateers 64
IV Conclusion 71
3 TheBodyinWar 72
I Fromthebodyofthesoldiertothebodyofthe
nation:warandthebodypolitic 73
II Thehumanexperienceofwoundsandillnessinwar 80
III Healingmars:medicalservicesandmilitarymedicine 89
IV Conclusion 97
4 TroopMoraleandMilitaryUnity 99
I Troopmorale:thehistoricalandtheoreticaldebate 100
II Theimportanceoftheprimarygroupand
comradeship 102
III Politicalideology,patriotism:theroleofvalues
introopmorale 107
IV Thequalityofleadership 111
V Theroleofreligion 113
VI Warasanindividualexperience:theroleof
self-concernintroopmotivation 115
v
vi Contents
VII Externalandmaterialsupportsfortroopmorale:
theexampleofalcohol 117
VIII Conclusion 120
5 FromIndividualExperiencetoCollectiveIdentities 121
I Localandnationalidentity 122
1 Regionalandlocalidentity 122
2 Nationalidentity 126
II Culturalidentity:membershipofminorityreligions
andsecretfraternities 134
III Militaryidentity 139
IV Conclusion 145
6 WarandtheEconomy 147
I Agriculture 148
II Commerce 152
1 TheAtlanticsector 153
2 TheMediterraneansector 158
3 Crisisandreorganizationofmaritimecommerce 163
III Industry 169
IV Conclusion 173
7 CiviliansintheWar 175
I Newsofthewar 177
II WarandthedailyexistenceoftheFrenchpeople 180
1 Waratthecentreofthepublicsphere 180
2 Thedifficultiesofeverydaylife:hardship,scarcity,
andinflation 186
3 Mobilizationandthewareffort 192
III ThewarcomestoFrance 198
IV Conclusion 207
Conclusion 209
Notes 218
SelectBibliography 241
Index 251
Acknowledgements
I wish to express my gratitude and thanks to the Arts and Humanities
Research Council, which funded the research project ‘Nation, Bor-
ders, Identities: The Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars in European
Memories,’ in which I worked as a postdoctoral research fellow at the
University of York from 2006 to 2008. Their funding allowed me to
carry out the research necessary to write this book. I also benefited
hugely from working with the members of this international project,
inBerlin(KarenHagemann,EtienneFrançois,RuthLeiserowitz,Kirstin
Buchinger-Schäfer,WolfgangKoller,LarsPeters,andMariaSchultz),and
in York where I could enjoy long and fruitful exchanges with Alan
Forrest, Jane Rendall, Richard Bessel, Catriona Kennedy, and Leighton
James. I am also indebted to Michael Broers and Alan Forrest, who
kindly accepted to read the whole manuscript through several times.
Their precious comments and ideas are greatly appreciated. Many
thanks to both of them. At Palgrave, special thanks to Michael Strang
and his assistant, Ruth Ireland, for their kind, competent, and effi-
cient collaboration. Many thanks as well to the Musée du Louvre and
the Réunion des Musées Nationaux for allowing me to use the pic-
ture of Napoleon on the battlefield of Eylau by Antoine-Jean Gros for the
cover jacket, to Godfrey Rogers for the impeccable translation of the
manuscript, and, lastly, to all the members of the Department of His-
tory, International Relations and Politics at Coventry University where
I enjoyed working in a friendly and congenial atmosphere for 2 years,
and to all my colleagues of the Department of History at Sheffield
HallamUniversity.
Outside of work, I wish to thank my dearest ones for their constant
andinvaluablesupport.
vii
Introduction
The Revolution that began in 1789 produced a far-reaching political,
social, religious, and cultural upheaval in French society. The radical
and comprehensive changes made in the early months and years by
France’s new rulers set up a shock wave that affected countries across
Europe.Infactitsoonbecameclearthatarootandbranchreconstruc-
tion of French society on fundamentally new bases – the image of the
‘tabularasa’–wasnotpossibleinpractice.Butalthoughnumerousele-
ments from the ancien régime survived the turmoil and came through
the revolutionary era intact, the existing foundations of society were
seriously undermined. It was during the Revolution narrowly defined
(1789–1799) and the Consulate and the Empire that the contours of
modernFrancefirstemerged:abolitionofthesocietyoflegallydefined
estates,establishmentofcivilrightsforall,movestowardsnationaluni-
fication(creationofadministrativedepartmentsandasinglesystemof
weights and measures), and introduction of a more rational system of
publicadministrationforthecountryasawhole.
Thetransformationswerenotlimitedtothecivil,political,andsocial
spheres: they also affected the army and military affairs. ‘The Revolu-
tionwaswar,’observedJean-PaulBertaudin1979.‘Foreightyears,with
rifleraisedandpikeerect,theFrenchmanwasacombatant.’1 Therefer-
enceto8yearsofcontinuousconflictisexplainedbythechronological
limits of his study (1792–1799). But the peace that followed the sign-
ing of the Treaty of Amiens on 27 March 1802 was short-lived. From
May 1803 France was again at war, and would remain so for a further
11 years, with an interruption during the First Restoration. Thus the
French declaration of war on Austria on 20 April 1792 in fact commit-
ted the nation to more than 20 years of war. Faced with a coalition of
EuropeanpowersunitedagainsttheyoungRepublic,therevolutionaries
1
2 FromValmytoWaterloo
came up with an original solution to the double imperative of defend-
ingtheterritoryofFranceandthenewpoliticalvaluesoftherevolution:
theycalleduponthecitizenrytoformatrulynationalarmy.Bybreaking
with old-established practices and the monarchical tradition of merce-
nary armies, and relying instead on an army of citizen soldiers, France
entered the era of political and military modernity. Recruitment was
voluntary in the early years, but before long a shortage of soldiers led
totheintroductionofconscription.Initiallyanexceptionalmeasure,it
became systematic after 1798 and the passing of the Jourdan Law, and
assuchwascontinuedandindeedintensifiedduringtheConsulateand
Empire.2 TherevolutionaryandNapoleonicwarswerethefirstnational
warsinwhichthecombatantsweredrawndirectlyfromciviliansociety.
The result was an unprecedented tightening of the bond between the
civilianandmilitaryworlds,betweenwarandnation.
That the conflict would have consequences for the very foundations
ofFrenchsocietywasinevitablegivenitssheerscale,duration,andgeo-
graphical extent (the whole of continental Europe and beyond in the
campaigns in Egypt and Saint-Domingue); its far-reaching impact on
civilian society and trade; and its forcible involvement of hundreds of
thousands of young Frenchmen in year after year of interminable war.
Several generations of young and not-so-young men underwent their
baptism of fire during this 20-year period. Between 1800 and 1815, a
totalof1.5millionconscripts,equalto7percentofthepopulationof
France,wereenrolledinthearmyandsentofftowar.3Throughthecon-
scripts’ experience and what it represented, countless French families
alsodiscoveredtherealityofthewar.Theydidsoatdifferentmoments
andindifferentways:receivingnewsofthefrontfromsons,husbands
and fathers; reading the battle accounts – of questionable reliability –
published in the press; hearing the wild rumours that circulated; or
experiencing higher prices, the scarcity of colonial products, and the
unwelcome changes to ways of life and patterns of consumption and
diet.Theyfacedthedemandsofthewareffort–throughrequisitioning,
forced loans, higher taxes, and financial crises – welcomed new oppor-
tunitiesofferedbyarmysupplyandspeculation,orsufferedtheadverse
consequences of the naval war and blockade, the decline of maritime
commerceandthestringofbankruptciesamongmajormerchantsand
shipowners.
Directlyorindirectly,therefore,onthebattlefieldandwithinfamilies,
the war that started in 1792 and only really ended in 1815 impinged
onthewholeofFrenchsociety.HowdidtheFrenchpeopleexperience
theselongyearsofconflict?Howdidtheyperceive,understand,analyse,
