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Introductory Material:
Louis
Philippe
He was
called the Citizen King (1773-1850), king of France (1830-1848). He was
the son of Louis Philippe Joseph, duc d'Orlans and was born in Paris.
Louis Philippe
belonged to the house of Bourbon-Orleans, a branch of the French royal
family. From his birth until 1785 Louis Philippe was known as the duc de
Valois and subsequently as the duc de Chartes until 1793, when his father
was guillotined, and he succeeded him as duc d'Orleans. Like his father
he was in sympathy with the French Revolution, the upheaval in France that
resulted in the establishment of the First Republic, and in 1790 he joined
the Jacobins, members of a French radical political club. Two years later,
at the age of 18, he was given command in the revolutionary army. After
the defeat of the French army by the Austrians at the Battle of Neerwinden,
Holland, in 1793, Louis Philippe was implicated with his superior officer,
in a plot against the republic, and he fled to Switzerland.
After the
execution of his by the French Revolutionary Tribunal, Louis Philippe became
the central figure about whom his supporters, the Orlanist party, rallied;
he did not actively enter into the intrigues for restoring the monarchy,
however, and during the regime of the Directory and that of Napoleon, Louis
Philippe remained outside of France, traveling in Scandinavia, the United
States (where he lived for four years in Philadelphia), and England. In
1809 he married the King of Sicily's daughter Maria Amelia.
In 1814,
after the abdication of Napoleon, he returned to France and was welcomed
by Louis XVIII, who restored to him the Orleans estates. By the late 1820's,
however, under the autocratic rule of Louis XVIII's brother and successor,
Charles X, the last of the Bourbon monarchs, the French middle and lower
classes were growing restive. Louis Philippe was by this time the favorite
of those Republican leaders who feared to arouse the opposition of all
Europe by establishing a republic, and hoped that Louis Philippe would
govern according to popular will. In 1830, by the July Revolution that
overthrew Charles X and the Bourbon dynasty in France, Louis Philippe was
proclaimed king by the Chamber of Deputies.
At first
Louis Philippe was content to rule as " citizen king " and to conciliate
the Republicans who had helped bring him to power; he also dispensed with
many royal privileges. Gradually he became more authoritarian. The last
years of his reign were marked by corruption in domestic affairs and by
lethargy in foreign affairs. Louis Philippe was last deserted by both sides
and deposed by the Revolution of 1848, which led to the formation in France
of the Second Republic (1848-1852) and the rise of Louis Napoleon, later
Napoleon III, emperor of France. After his abdication Louis Philippe lived
with his family in England.
Charles
X
He
lived from (1757-1836) and was King of France from (1824-1830). He was
the grandson of Louis XV and younger brother of Kings Louis XVI and Louis
XVIII. Charles was known as Charles Philippe, comte d'Artois, until he
became king. During the French Revolution he was one of the leaders of
the Imigras. He subsequently lived in Great Britain from (1795-1814). After
the accession (1814) of Louis XVIII to the French throne, Charles returned
to France, where he headed the ultraroyalist party of raction. His favoritism
during his reign toward the Roman Catholic church and the aristocracy aroused
great opposition, leading to the revolution of July 1830. Charles was forced
to abdicate and again went into exile in Great Britain.
Napoleon
III
Charles
Louis Napoleon Bonaparte was born in Paris, on April 20, 1808, the third
and last son of King Louis and Queen Hortense (1783-1837) of Holland, and
thus a nephew of Napoleon I.
Once Louis
Philippe was ousted in 1848, Louis Napoleon renewed his quest by offering
himself as a candidate for the presidency of the new French republic. He
won by a landslide. His triumph was diminished, however, by a Royalist
victory in the legislative elections in 1849 and by the constitution's
limiting him to one 4-year term. He resolved that dilemma by a coup d'tat
on December 2, 1851, assuming dictatorial powers and extending his term
of office to ten years. Despite continued pockets of opposition, clear
evidence of widespread popular support encouraged him a year later to convert
the Second Republic into the Second Empire. The dictatorship persisted
until 1860; thereafter he began a series of liberal reforms that culminated
in a limited monarchy, the Liberal Empire, on January 2, 1870. His success
was overshadowed by a foreign policy that was too often idealistic. The
threat from Prussia, in particular, was perceived too late and caught the
French unprepared in every respect when war came in 1870. Swift defeat
led to Napoleon's capture, and he died in exile on January 9, 1873 at Chislehurst,
England.
.
Edith
Piaf
