Napoleon’s Fallen Star: Bernadotte’s Rise to the Swedish Throne
After his successful 1805 Ulm Campaign and victory at the Battle of Austerlitz, Napoleon further rewarded Bernadotte and made him Prince of Ponto Corvo in Italy. Things began to sour between the two during the Prussian campaign in 1806. Napoleon severely criticized Bernadotte for his failure to bring his corps to the fight at the hard-fought battles of Jena and Auerstadt, and barely refrained from court-martialing him for dereliction of duty. The relationship was sundered at the 1809 Battle of Wagram, after which Napoleon relieved Bernadotte of command for his poor handling of his troops during the fight. Bernadotte was sent back to Paris under the face-saving guise of “health reasons”. Things soon looked up for Bernadotte, however. The childless and unwell King Charles XIII of Sweden, a French ally and client state, adopted him in 1810 and made him Crown Prince and heir to the throne.
Bernadotte assumed the regency and governance of Sweden, and cast about for an accomplishment to solidify his authority and future dynasty. The opportunity came when Napoleon was weakened after the destruction of his Grande Armee in his catastrophic invasion of Russia in 1812. In 1813, in a betrayal of his former country and patron, Bernadotte switched sides, signed a treaty with Britain, and declared war on France. He landed a Swedish army in northern Germany, and in alliance with the Austrians, Russians, and Prussians, got his payback against Napoleon. He helped defeat the French emperor in the war’s biggest and bloodiest battle, at Leipzig, in 1813. After the war, he returned to Sweden, where he became King Charles XIV John, and established the Bernadotte Dynasty, which reigns to this day.
