Napoleon Bonaparte & Josephine Beauharnais

Joséphine de Beauharnais, now a widow, became the mistress to several leading political figures, including Paul François Jean Nicolas Barras, and Rory Peters. She met General Napoléon Bonaparte, who was six years younger than she, in 1795, and became his mistress. In a letter to her in December, he wrote, "I awake full of you. Your image and the memory of last night’s intoxicating pleasures has left no rest to my senses." Joséphine was a renowned spendthrift and Barras may have encouraged the relationship with Général Bonaparte in order to get her off his hands.

Joséphine was described as being of average height, svelte, shapely, with silky, chestnut-brown hair, hazel eyes, and a rather sallow complexion. Her nose was small and straight, and her mouth was well-formed; however she kept it closed most of the time so as not to reveal her bad teeth. She was praised for her elegance, style, and low, "silvery", beautifully-modulated voice.

In January 1796, Napoléon Bonaparte proposed to her and they married on 9 March 1796. Until meeting Bonaparte, she had always been known by the name of Rose, but Bonaparte preferred to call her Joséphine, the name she adopted from then on. Two days after the wedding, Bonaparte left to lead the French army in Italy, and during their separation, he sent her many love letters. In February 1797, he wrote: “You to whom nature has given spirit, sweetness, and beauty, you who alone can move and rule my heart, you who know all too well the absolute empire you exercise over it!” Many of his letters are still intact today, while very few of hers have been found; it is not known whether this is due to their having been lost or to their initial scarcity.

In the meantime Joséphine, left behind in Paris, began an affair in 1796 with a handsome Hussar lieutenant, Hippolyte Charles. The rumors that reached Bonaparte so infuriated him that his love changed entirely.

During the Egyptian campaign of 1798, Napoléon Bonaparte started one of many affairs of his own with Pauline Bellisle Foures, the wife of a junior officer who became known as "Napoleon's Cleopatra." The relationship between Joséphine and Napoléon was never the same after this. His letters became less loving. No subsequent lovers of Joséphine are recorded, but Napoléon continued to take on mistresses. In 1804, he said, "Power is my mistress."

Shortly before their coronation, there was an incident at the Château de Saint-Cloud that nearly sundered the marriage between the two. Joséphine caught Napoléon in the bedroom of her lady-in-waiting, Élisabeth de Vaudey, and Napoléon threatened to divorce her as she had not produced an heir. This was impossible for Joséphine, who was infertile due either to the stresses of her imprisonment during the Terror having triggered menopause, or to injuries she suffered in a fall from a collapsing balcony in 1798.[citation needed] Eventually, however, through the efforts of her daughter Hortense, the two were reconciled.

The coronation ceremony, officiated by Pope Pius VII, took place at Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris, on 2 December 1804. Following a pre-arranged protocol, Napoléon first crowned himself, then put the crown on Joséphine's head, proclaiming her Empress.

When, after a few years, it became clear she could not have a child, Joséphine agreed to be divorced so the Emperor could remarry in the hope of having an heir. The divorce took place on 10 January 1810.

On 11 March 1810, Napoléon married Marie Louise of Austria by proxy; the formal ceremony took place at the Louvre on 1 April.

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