gratuities and benefices fo r generals, highly placed officials and nobles or
commercial profits fo r manufacturers and traders.
If France under Napoleon seemed at first blush like a paradise for the
notables, why then were they so disenchanted with the regime by
I8Io-II? They disliked his fo reign adventurism and would have been
content with the 'natural fr ontiers'; they were suspicious of the creation
of the new noblesse de /'empire and the Austrian marriage, both of which
seemed to indicate a fo ndness fo r the old aristocracy; and they could see
no point in the war in Spain, which simply looked like a crude attempt to
seize a crown fo r Joseph. But they could no doubt have fo und a way to
'cohabit' with all this, had it not been for the severe economic depression
of I8Io-II which was itself a consequence of the Emperor's Continental
Blockade. The real sticking point fo r the notables, then, was the
Continental System.
Napoleon's economic warfare against Britain began in earnest with the
Berlin Decree of 2I November I8o6, immediately after his victory at
Jena. Although the expression 'Continental Blockade' was first used in Le
Moniteur on 30 October I8o6, the idea did not originate with Bonaparte,
but was one of many he inherited fr om the Revolution, since the
Convention in I793 announced the exclusion ofBritish goods. According
to Miot de Melito, in a speech on I May I803 the First Consul vowed he
would make the British weep for the coming war and tried to close
Channel ports as far as Hanover to British commerce. Yet in the
aftermath of Trafalgar it seemed as though the boot was on the other
foot. On I6 May I8o6 London announced its own blockade of the French
coast- the so-called 'Fox blockade' whereby the Royal Navy closed ports
from Brest to the Elbe - and began searching American ships.
Napoleon was attracted to the idea of economic warfare for several
reasons but there are grounds for thinking that the worthlessness of paper
money, which he had seen fo r himself in the form of the Revolutionary
assignats and which he associated, not entirely logically, with the early
financial struggles of the Bonaparte family, deeply impressed him. Since
Britain by the outbreak of war in I803 had a National Debt of over £soo
million, forcing its leaders to issue paper money, Napoleon thought that a
determined assault on her export trade would lead to economic collapse.
This would have two effects: Britain would be unable to subsidize its
continental allies; and revolution at home would force her to the peace
table. In I 807 the Emperor wrote gloatingly of the prospect of 'her vessels
laden with useless wealth wandering around the high seas, where they
claim to rule as sole masters, seeking in vain from the Sound to the
Hellespont for a port to open and receive them'.
marcin
(Marcin)
#1