Napoleon Napoleon was a military genius who conquered most of Europe. He was often sickly and weak, and may have had stomach pains. Many older generals often mocked him because he was a general at such a young age. But he often proved them wrong.
Napoleon was born on August 15, 1769, in Ajaccio, Corsica. His original name was Napolean. He had seven sisters and brothers. During his early years he despised the French and thought they were oppressors of the land. Napoleon was educated at the Ecole Militare, in Paris. At 16 he joined the army as a second lieutenant. He was then promoted to lieutenant colonel, and then captain. He was assigned as captain to an army besieging Toulon. Toulon was a naval base in revolt aided by the British fleet. Replacing a wounded artillery general, he took ground where his guns could hit the British fleet, and Toulon fell.
For this Napoleon was promoted to a brigadier general at the age of 24.
In 1796, he was made commander of the French Army in Italy. He defeated four Austrian generals in succession. And each one of the generals had more men! This lead to Austria being forced to make peace and ally with the French. In the northern part of Italy, he founded the Cisalpine Republic, later known as the Kingdom of Italy. He then strengthened his position in France by sending millions of francs worth of treasure back to France.
He also led an expedition to Turkish-ruled Egypt where he conquered, although British admiral Horatio Nelson destroyed his fleet. Undiscouraged, he reformed the Egyptian government, guaranteeing basis rights. French scholars, whom he had brought with him, began to study ancient Egypt. In 1799 he failed to capture Syria, but won a massive victory over the Turks. The...