The great love of Napoleon’s life was Josephine. Unfortunately, Josephine was unfaithful to him. Letters from his family detailing Josephine’s infidelities and the massive debts she had racked up in his absence arrived while he was on his Egyptian campaign. In a spirit of revenge, Napoleon took his first mistress, Pauline Foures, a young Frenchwoman who had followed her soldier husband into Egypt. Their affair was very open; Pauline was nicknamed “Napoleon's Cleopatra” by the troops.
Once Napoleon returned to Paris, he told Josephine that he was going to divorce her. In floods of tears, she begged his forgiveness. He still loved his wife, despite her extravagance and infidelities. He reconciled with Josephine, who never dared cheat on him again. Unfortunately, he cheated on her with the actress Mademoiselle Georges and others, to Josephine’s dismay. His mistresses meant nothing to him, as he once explained: "power is my mistress".
Napoleon believed that it was his fault that he and Josephine never had children, a belief that was fostered by Josephine and by his siblings, who hoped that he would adopt one of their children as his heir. When one of his mistresses, Eleonore Denuelle, became pregnant, his sister Caroline convinced him that her own husband was the father of the baby. It was not until Marie Walewska became pregnant that Napoleon realized he could father a child.
He still resisted divorcing Josephine, and planned to make the eldest son of her daughter Hortense and his brother Louis his heir, but the child died. Hortense, a chip off the old block, was unfaithful to Louis within a few years of their arranged marriage. Napoleon probably had serious doubts that her other children were fathered by Louis, including the future Napoleon III. Napoleon decided that he needed a child of his own, and reluctantly divorced Josephine.
He married the Archduchess Marie Louise, a great-niece of Marie-Antoinette. Their marriage was a happy one so long as he was in power, though Marie Louise was not the social success that Josephine had been, due to her shyness and haughtiness. Their son was born the year after they were married. Napoleon secretly arranged for Josephine to meet the child.
After Napoleon was defeated, Marie Louise returned to her father, taking their son with her. Marie Louise took up with Adam von Neipperg, whom she later married, moving to Parma and abandoning her son by Napoleon. Marie Louise’s desertion and subsequent infidelity hurt Napoleon, but what devastated him was the treatment meted out to his son, and his separation from him.
Josephine died of pneumonia during Napoleon’s first exile; when he learned of her death he shut himself away for days and refused to see anyone. During his hundred day return to France, he paid a visit to their country estate, Malmaison, and spent hours alone in the room where she died. No other woman came close to replacing the hold she’d kept on his heart. Years later, as Napoleon lay dying, he was semi-conscious, and seemed to believe that he was giving commands to his army. His last words were, “and at the head of the army, Josephine….” He never stopped loving her.
I don’t think Napoleon should be written off as just a good general. He overhauled the French legal system, creating a standardized code of laws that applied to everyone equally, the Code Napoleon. He made certain that promotion in the army and in the civil service was based on ability, not the possession of a noble title. Napoleon encouraged the founding of the Bank of France, improved roads, and built schools and museums. His wars were certainly ruinous for France in the long term, but he did not leave the country in the bankrupt state that the Bourbons did, choosing to consolidate the country’s debt and balance the budget instead. Although he took mistresses, he was by no means as promiscuous as some of the Bourbon rulers of old. His infidelities were private affairs; he did not flaunt his mistresses or give them any political power.
The official website for Malmaison, the museum dedicated to Napoleon and Josephine:
http://www.chateau-malmaison.fr/
