In 1804 Napoleon created 18 'Marshals of the Empire', to serve as the senior officers of the Grande Armée. He created a further 8 before his abdication. A few were aristocrats, but others were ...

Of all Napoleon’s marshals, Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte’s career was the most unusual. As a young soldier in the French Revolutionary Wars, he rapidly rose up the ranks before becoming part of ...

CONNELLY: One thing the allies had learned was that they had to fight together. They agreed never to fight an army if Napoleon was in command. If one of his marshals was in command, to go at him full ...

Napoleon would have to break Wellington’s center at once. The French cavalry charged on the order of Marshal Michel Ney, known as "the bravest of the brave." Convinced that the British line was ...

After 1808, Napoleon left the Peninsular conflict in the hands of his brother Joseph, and of the marshals and generals commanding the various French armies. No one man was given supreme command of ...

They agreed never to fight an army if Napoleon was in command. If one of his marshals was in command, to go at him full force. And this worked. In the fall of 1813, the Allies caught Napoleon at ...