When royalist troops deployed to stop the march of Napoleon's force at Lyon, Napoleon stepped out in front of them, ripped open his coat and said “ If any of you will shoot your Emperor, shoot him now .” The men all joined his cause.

In April 1864 Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian stepped down as Commander-in-Chief of the Navy and accepted the throne of Mexico from Louis Napoleon, becoming Maximilian I of Mexico.

In December 1851, the town was home to a movement of republican resistance towards Napoleon III's coup.

In 1805, Napoleon planned to invade Britain, but a renewed British alliance with Russia and Austria ( Third Coalition ), forced him to turn his attention towards the continent, while at the same time failure to lure the superior British fleet away from the English Channel, ending in a decisive French defeat at the Battle of Trafalgar on 21 October put an end to hopes of an invasion of Britain.

When French emperor Napoleon I completed his conquest of Northern Italy and began to push his armies towards the edges of the northern territories of the Papal State, San Marino found itself forced to choose between maintaining the alliance with the Papal State or creating a new one with France.

In 1812, the city was taken by Napoleon on his push towards Moscow, and again during the disastrous retreat.

Defeated by Napoleon at Ligny, he re-buffs advice by General Gneisenau, who says he does not trust " the English ", to retreat eastwards towards Germany, and instead retreats north to Wavre so as to maintain contact with Wellington.

In 1805, Napoleon planned to invade Britain, but a renewed British alliance with Russia and Austria ( Third Coalition ), forced him to turn his attention towards the continent, while at the same time failure to lure the superior British fleet away from the English Channel, ending in a decisive French defeat at the Battle of Trafalgar on 21 October put an end to hopes of an invasion of Britain.

While the French hailed the invasion as the first step towards the Rhineland and later Berlin, General Le Bœuf and Napoleon III were receiving alarming reports from foreign news sources of Prussian and Bavarian armies massing to the southeast in addition to the forces to the north and northeast.

With Napoleon III personally leading the army with Marshal MacMahon in attendance, they led the Army of Châlons in a left-flanking march northeast towards the Belgian border in an attempt to avoid the Prussians before striking south to link up with Bazaine.

During this time Napoleon fought his Six Days Campaign, in which he won multiple battles against the enemy forces advancing towards Paris.

The European powers, including Austria, resumed hostilities towards France in the War of the Sixth Coalition, which ended with the abdication of Napoleon and his exile to Elba.

The War of the Third Coalition brought Austria to the brink of ruin, which increased Marie Louise's resentment towards Napoleon.

At first he had some hope Louis Napoleon might be a good leader in France but he soon began to share the opinion of Marx towards him as the new emperor began to crack down on liberalism and socialism.

Once these divisions were ready, the rest of the corps would withdraw towards them, luring the allies to attack, while Napoleon, leading the main 110, 000 strong French force, would come around the allied flank and counter attack.

The British were uncertain of their policy towards Malta, as with Napoleon on the rise they could not afford problems with their allies.

A little further along, towards the Place de la Concorde, the rue de Castiglione leads to the Place Vendôme, with its Vendôme Column surmounted by the effigy of Napoleon Bonaparte.

Early on March 20 Napoleon set out for Arcis-sur-Aube ( believed to be weakly held by the Austrians ) in order to break out towards the Marne.

Following his successes with the Six Days Campaign ( 10 to 14 February 1814 ) in smashing the Allied drive on Paris, Napoleon headed southward towards Seine River where the main Austrian Army under Karl Philipp, Prince of Schwarzenberg, was threatening Paris from the southeast.

This allowed the Austrians to continue the war but, towards the end of May, Napoleon abruptly resumed the offensive and suffered a tactical defeat at the Battle of Aspern-Essling.

Arriving with his other two divisions in the vicinity of Aderklaa towards 07: 30, Masséna was spotted by Napoleon, who got into the Marshal's phaeton to consult with him about the situation they were facing and, after a brief discussion, the Emperor ordered the recapture of Aderklaa.

Despite the considerable distance, towards 13: 00, Napoleon could see through his spyglass that the smoke line in Davout's sector was by now well beyond the clearly-visible tower at Markgrafneusiedl, a sign that his men had managed to roll back the enemy's flank.

Napoleon had other intentions: 210, 000 French troops would be launched eastwards from the camps of Boulogne and would envelop General Mack's exposed Austrian army if it kept marching towards the Black Forest.

Mack instructed Kienmayer to draw Napoleon further east towards Munich and Augsburg.

Accordingly, Napoleon sent the corps of Soult and Marmont towards the Iller, meaning he now had four infantry and one cavalry corps to deal with Mack ; Davout, Bernadotte, and the Bavarians were still guarding the region around Munich.

French artillery pounded towards the men, but Napoleon redirected his gunners to fire at the ice.

It failed but in August 1840, Prince Louis Napoleon tried another coup at Boulogne with hired soldiers.

After Napoleon imposed the Convention of Artlenburg ( Convention of the Elbe ) on July 5, 1803, about 30, 000 French soldiers occupied Hanover.

In the Greater Poland Uprising of 1806, Polish soldiers and civilian volunteers assisted the efforts of Napoleon by driving out Prussian forces from the region.

* 1870 – Franco-Prussian War: Battle of Sedan – Prussian forces take Napoleon III of France and 100, 000 of his soldiers prisoner.

" Ney is instantly swayed and marches with Napoleon and his former soldiers.

* September 2 – Franco-Prussian War – Battle of Sedan: Prussian forces defeat the French armies and take emperor Napoleon III and 100, 000 of his soldiers prisoner at Sedan.

* Napoleon annuls the 10-day week of the French Revolutionary Calendar ; he also orders his soldiers to be vaccinated.

Upon learning from captured Prussian soldiers and a local area police chief that the Second Army was just from Saarbrücken near the town of Wissembourg, General Le Bœuf and Napoleon III decided to retreat to defensive positions.

By the next day, on 2 September, Napoleon III surrendered and was taken prisoner with 104, 000 of his soldiers.

Britain maintained a standing army of just 220, 000 at the height of the Napoleonic Wars, whereas France's strength peaked at over 2, 500, 000, as well as several hundred thousand national guardsmen that Napoleon could draft into the military if necessary ; however, British subsidies paid for a large proportion of the soldiers deployed by other coalition powers, peaking at about 450, 000 in 1813.

In 1812, at the height of his power, Napoleon invaded Russia with a pan-European Grande Armée, consisting of 650, 000 men ( 270, 000 Frenchmen and many soldiers of allies or subject areas ).

Until the time of Napoleon, European states employed relatively small armies, made up of both national soldiers and mercenaries.

In response to the restoration of Napoleon I of France in 1815, Alsace along with other frontier provinces of France was occupied by foreign forces from 1815 to 1818, including over 280, 000 soldiers and 90, 000 horses in Bas-Rhin alone.

Larrey was present at the battle of Spires, between the French and Prussians, and was distressed by the fact that wounded soldiers were not picked up by the numerous ambulances ( which Napoleon required to be stationed two and half miles back from the scene of battle ) until after hostilities had ceased, and set about developing a new ambulance system.

Napoleon then accused Louis of putting Dutch interests above those of France, and removed most of the French forces in Holland for the coming war in the east, leaving only about 9, 000 garrison soldiers in the country.

These soldiers were in their mid-teens and performed heroic acts under the personal direction of Napoleon, but could not stem the tide of the Allied advance.

The Iron Cross was awarded to soldiers during the Wars of Liberation against Napoleon.

Russell urged Palmerston to send a fleet to Copenhagen and persuade Napoleon III that he should mobilise his soldiers that were placed on the borders of Prussia's Rhineland provinces.

By contrast, Napoleon withdrew many French soldiers to rebuild his main army after his disastrous invasion of Russia.

In 1809, the French military presence in Germany was diminished, as Napoleon transferred a large number of soldiers to fight in the Peninsular War.

Physical Air ,— or — Britannia recover'd from a Trance ;— also, the Patriotic Courage of Sherry Andrew ; & a peep thro ' the Fog ( 1803 ) by James Gillray, showing Sheridan as a Silenus-like and ragged Harlequin defending Henry Addington and Lord Hawkesbury on the Dover coast from the advancing French rowboats filled with French soldiers, led by Napoleon.

During the Franco-Prussian War, on 2 September 1870 the French emperor Napoleon III was taken prisoner with 100, 000 of his soldiers at the First Battle of Sedan.

When Krieblowitz was conquered by the Red Army in 1945, Soviet soldiers broke into the Blücher mausoleum and scattered the remains — despite the fact that Blücher had been instrumental in the final defeat of Napoleon, the would-be conqueror of Russia.

French soldiers rally around Napoleon with heightened spirits.