A BOOK REVIEW: To Befriend an Emperor: Betsy Balcombe's Memoirs of Napoleon on St Helena, edits and introduction by J. David Markham, Ravenhall Books, 2005. (Originally published in 1844 as Recollections of the Emperor Napoleon on the Island of St Helena, by Lucia Elizabeth Balcombe Abell.)

 

In 1815, a few days before Napoleon Bonaparte arrived on St Helena, a fast sloop brought the governor news that the island had been chosen for the defeated emperor's exile. The surprised authorities scrambled to find a secure residence for their illustrious prisoner, but the remote South Atlantic island offered few choices. They settled on Longwood House, a set of run-down buildings on an arid plain, but it would take weeks to put the place in order.

 

When Napoleon disembarked, he and Admiral Cockburn, who had charge of his security, rode the five miles from Jamestown harbor to Longwood. After six weeks in cramped ship quarters, General Bonaparte (as the British now insisted on calling the former emperor) had hoped for more comfortable surroundings. Riding disheartenedly back to Jamestown, he and his escort came across a pleasant estate in a valley below a heart-shaped waterfall. 

Heart-shaped waterfall

When they stopped to meet the owners, the Balcombe family offered the emperor their main house, the Briars, as a temporary residence. Not wishing to inconvenience his hosts, he moved into their summer pavilion, a one-room building with an attic.

 

Napoleon stayed with the family for six weeks and often referred to that time as his happiest in exile. The Balcombes' two daughters, who spoke French, quickly overcame their shyness. The younger, a brash thirteen-year-old named Betsy, formed an immediate kinship with the man she'd been raised to think of as "a huge ogre . . . with one large flaming eye." 

Betsy Balcombe

 

In 1844, Betsy published Recollections of the Emperor, a detailed account of their time together. In 2005, Ravenhall Press published a "gently modernized" version. Historians still rely upon the memoir to document the emperor's St Helena exile. To anyone interested in Napoleon, this light-hearted book provides fascinating insight into his character.

 

Napoleon loved children, perhaps because his own childhood had been cut short when, at age nine, he was sent to French military school. During the following six years, he saw his father twice and his mother once. The strict, almost monastic school left little opportunity for play. As an adult, however, he loved rough-housing with his nephews, spoiling his toddler son, and teasing his generals' children.

 

On St Helena, Betsy Balcombe became his favorite. According to the memoir, the emperor encouraged her pranks. Even when she held him at bay with his own sword, stole his official papers, or accused him of cheating at cards, he forgave her audacity. Each tale, told in a precocious child's voice with rich detail, gives the reader a humanizing portrait of a great man whose influence is still felt today.

 

Sometimes, the book turns to more serious subjects, as when Betsy quizzes Napoleon on the rumor about his becoming a Muslim in Egypt. "[She asks] 'Why did you turn Turk?' He did not understand me, and I was obliged to explain that 'turned Turk' meant changing his religion. He laughed and said, 'What is that to you? Fighting is a soldier's religion; I never changed that. The other is the affair of women and priests; as for me, I always adopt the religion of the country I am in.'"

 

When Napoleon left the Briars for Longwood House, Betsy and her family continued to visit him, but association with the Famous can lead to misfortune. British authorities accused Mr Balcombe of aiding Napoleon with unauthorized communications to Europe. Stripped of his lucrative position as provisioner to Longwood, the Balcombes experienced an exile in reverse-banishment from remote St Helena. Despite her family's upheaval, Betsy saved the precious notes from her days with the emperor, supplying us a front-row seat to Napoleon's St Helena exile.

 

The 192-page, hard-cover, 2005 edition, titled To Befriend an Emperor, features charming illustrations and updated spelling. Noted scholar J. David Markham's introduction provides excellent historical context. Alternately, the original Recollections of an Emperor can be downloaded from Google Books for free. I recommend either version of these sweetly-told stories as captivating summer reading with a Napoleonic twist.  

 

 

 

  

Margaret Rodenberg's as yet unpublished first novel, "Little Song,"  won the San Francisco Writers Conference Fiction award and the Good Reads contest from A Woman's Write in 2010. She also wrote an award-winning short story, "Mrs. Morrisette."   Margaret is presently writing a novel told from Napoleon's  point of view. She recently visited the Napoleonic sites on St Helena Island and she blogs at www.findingnapoleon.com .