Napoleon - Spilling the Beans Trivia Quiz

Answer: Grapeshot

Grapeshot is anti-personnel ammunition - anti-personnel means one that is designed to hurt people, as opposed to siege weapons, designed to destroy buildings. Grapeshot is composed of a bag of loose pellets (substitutes can also be made from glass, shrapnel, rocks...).

The ammunitions clusters to resemble grapes, hence the name "grapeshot". Upon firing, the pellets spread out, causing devastating damage among densely packed troops. Sometimes bone splinters also fly everywhere, becoming secondary projectiles, magnifying the casualties. Napoleon often boasted of having repelled the royalists with a "whiff of grapeshot" after this battle.

The triumph earned him fame and popularity among the Revolutionists.

Answer: Egypt

Ironically, the Egyptian military campaign finished as a catastrophe, but the French people overlooked that in favour of the other exploits. If only my teacher was as understanding!
Napoleon wanted to invade Egypt, a province of the Ottoman Empire at the time, to protect France's trade interests, and to undermine the English ones. The government agreed, though it was very costly and far-fetched, just to get Napoleon away from the center of power at the time. The first battle was an impressive victory - the Battle of the Pyramids. Napoleon used 'square tactics' to win - that is he placed his cannons in a square in the middle of the battle, with the ammunition and supplies safely in the middle and blasted outwards in all directions. French casualties were around 300, compared to 6,000 Egyptian ones.
During this time, the French fleet was destroyed by English ships, who surrounded and destroyed the French. Napoleon was land-bound, and a sitting target for the Turks, who tried to finish him off. While the Turkish armies were arriving, Napoleon decided that his only chance would be to attack Turkey - which he did unsuccessfully. He retreated to Egypt, speeding the process up by executing all prisoners and stragglers.
In August 1799, Napoleon deserts his army - leaving it under the command of Kléber. After several valiant battles, the French army has no choice but to surrender, and was sent back home in British ships.
An interesting aspect of this war is the number of scholars and scientists that Napoleon took with him - the Rosetta Stone was found, among other discoveries.

Answer: Change the alleged motives because the original ones were false

Napoleon heard news that seemed to connect the Duc to the conspiracy - he was travelling with one of the plotters on a regular basis. The gendarmes seized him, and took him to the Chateau de Vincennes. Soon afterwards, Napoleon found out that the person travelling with the plotters was a harmless old man named Thumry, and changed the accusations for the trial - the Duc was charged with bearing arms against France.

These accusations were slightly more accurate - the Duc had in the past born arms against France.

The Duc was shot in the Chateau de Vincennes, next to his freshly dug grave.

Answer: Establishment of the Napoleonic Trade Union (NTU)

I made the NTU up!
Napoleon made the concordat with the Catholic church to regain the support of the Catholics - it re-instated Catholism as the main French religion, though cleverly not as the religion of France - there is a subtle difference. In the French Revolution the people managed to win the freedom of religion, and Napoleon did not want to challenge their new rights so soon after they were instated.
The Napoleonic code was a whole new law book that included the new rights and freedoms gained in the Revolution - the old laws were now obsolete. It also cleared up a whole load of confusion - the old laws existed in many different versions. It is still used today in France.
Napoleon also established new lycées and reorganized the universities. Other changes made by Napoleon include the introduction of a new tax system, the division of France into départements, a central bank, road and sewer systems...

Answer: 3 cents per acre

Napoleon sold 530,000,000 for 3 cents per acre - which came to 80 million Francs, or $15,000,000. The United States of America eventually paid $23,213,568 including interest. 3 cents per acre may not sound like a lot, but it adds up! Napoleon had signed a peace treaty with Britain in March 1802, and was having an uneasy ceasefire.

The army that he sent to reconquer Haiti (there was a revolution at the time) was hit by yellow fever, and finished of by the fierce resistance. Realizing that he would no longer be able to protect his American land, Napoleon sold it.

The ceasefire with Britain lasted until 1803, when war broke out again over Malta, which Napoleon had captured by a ruse on his way to Egypt.

Answer: Trafalgar

In the Battle of Trafalgar (given its name because it was fought near Cape Trafalgar) a fleet of 27 British ships destroyed a fleet of 33 allied Spanish and French ships without loss of a single ship. Admiral Lord Nelson was the British commander of this operation, who died during the battle. Nelson's whole tactic was a carefully calculated gamble, relying on the fact that the French troops were ill-trained and badly organized. Before the battle he ordered all of his ships to be painted in yellow and black checker (now known as Nelson's Checker) to make them easier to distinguish from the French ships.
Nelson was killed by a musket bullet that entered through the left shoulder and lodged in his spine, and died shortly after the battle that made him an English hero. His famous words about his death (but probably not his last) were : "They finally succeeded, I am dead.".
Nelson's column in Trafalgar Square (London) commemorates his achievements.

Answer: Russia

Napoleon invaded Russia with the Grande Armée of 691,501 men in 1812, aiming for the city of Moscow. Russia, at the time, had an army of 488,000 men. They marched on Moscow after Napoleon's offer of peace to St. Petersburg was rejected (well... he never got a message back... so he assumed that it was rejected...).

The Russian General, Barclay (it wasn't a bank in those days), refused to fight the French in the open, recognizing that it would be his undoing, despite the urgings of the general Pjotr Bagration. Kutuzov, who was also critizing Barclay's actions, replaced him, and carried on doing exactly the same. Moscow was evacuated as the French advance got nearer, and ceded to the French without a battle, after having been looted of all of its supplies. Moscow burned to the ground in a fire (either intentional or not - no-one really knows).

The French carried on advancing, but the Russians cleared the way using "scorched earth tactics" - they burnt all of the crops and supplies that the French needed to survive.

The French started retreating - by now it was winter. And not a French winter, but a Russian winter. The horses started dying, because of lack of vegetation, and also because the French started eating them! Kutuzov was hacking away at the weakest parts of the French train using guerilla tactics. Napoleon got an important letter informing him about an attempt to seize power back in France, and deserted his army on a sleigh. The rest of the French were slaughtered... 22,000 out of the original 691,500 survived.

Answer: 100 days

Napoleon was exiled to Elba by the Treaty of Fontainebleu with a salary of a whopping 2,000,000 francs per year! The Treaty was signed on the 11th April 1814. Elba is a small island in the Mediterranean sea 20 kilometers from Italy.
On 26 February 1815 Napoleon escaped from Elba when his captor aren't looking. The 5th Regiment of the Line was sent to intercept him - this army had served under Napoleon at Russia. Napoleon rode to within earshot of the soldiers, dismounted, and shouted these famous words : "Soldiers of the Fifth, you recognize me. If any man would shoot his emperor, he may do so now". The soldiers, after a brief pause, answered : "Vive L'empereur!".
Napoleon then marched to Paris. He amassed an army of 140,000 soldiers, and 200,000 untrained volunteers (totalling 340,000 men), and reigned for one hundred days. This reign is often called the "Waterloo Campaign", or simple the "Hundred Days".
The Hundred Days ended at the Battle of Waterloo, when Duke of Wellington and Field Marshal Bluecher defeated him once and for all.

Answer: France! The Army! Head of the Army!

After being defeated at Waterloo, Napoleon was exiled to the island of St. Helena, much further away from home than Elba, in the middle of the ocean nearly half way between Africa and America - the Allies definitely didn't want him back again! The exile started on 15th October 1815. He lived in a house called Longwood House, and fell sick soon after.

Answer: Stomach cancer

In Napoleon's hair 38 times the normal level of arsenic were found, and his body was found well preserved (arsenic is a preservative). As he was dying, Napoleon also showed many symptoms of arsenic poisoning. On the other hand, the physician at the time concluded stomach cancer, and recent investigations have also tended to support the stomach cancer idea, concluding from Napoleon's father's death from stomach cancer, loss of weight before death, lack of arsenic in the organs...
We don't really know for sure. Be we did know that he did die, on 5th May 1821.
In his will Napoleon had asked to be buried on the banks of the river Seine, but he was actually buried on St. Helena, in the "valley of the willows". In 1840 his remains were shipped to Les Invalides, where they are on display (in a coffin, of course).