Napoleon Buonaparte was born on August the 15th, 1769 in Corsica. It is told, that he was born so quickly, that his mother, Letizia Ramolino didn't even have time to get to bed, she was returning from mass at Ajaccio. He was the second son of Carlo Buonaparte and Letizia Ramolino, and he was given the unusual name "Napoleon", because of the floormat on which he was born, this depicted the heroes of Homeros. Buonapartes were of lower class nobles, and by no means rich. Corsica had a few months earlier been turned over to France from Genova, so this presented young Napoleon with a mighty new homeland to serve. One can readily imagine, that the army had an allure to him even at an early age, army was one of those professions, in which you had no need for special gifts, young Napoleon had them, however.. His father managed to get him enrolled to military academy at Brienne, from where Napoleon transferred to ecole de militare de Paris, the military academy of Paris.
He graduated as an artillery officer at 28th of October, 1785. His career had started. At some point he changed his name from Buonaparte to Bonaparte.
However, the times were not good for France. It was the time for the Great Revolution, the country was at turmoil. Napoleon was young and idealistic, he was deeply moved by the cause, and returned to Corsica to gain independence for his small homeland. Soon, however, he turned his back to Corsica and gave himself to France. This happened after he participated on an unsuccessful attack on Sardinia, which belonged to prince of Savoij.
At 1793, Napoleon had his first true military success. This happened at Toulon, which had been captured by the British, because of Toulon's citizens were royalists...