Former French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte (also known by his regnal name Napoleon I; August 15, 1769 - May 5, 1821) made an attempt to commit suicide with a pistol after his defeat at the Battle of Leipzig in 1814. His two pistols, including one with which the Emperor tried to kill himself, have recently been auctioned in Paris for USD 1.83 million (210 years later of that incident)!
The two pistols, adorned with gold and silver designs and also an engraved image of the Emperor, were auctioned at Fontainebleau in southern Paris by the local auction house, Osenat. An anonymous bidder bought those pistols during the auction. Fontainebleau is closely associated with the memory of Napoleon I, as the French Emperor tried to commit suicide in the nearby Château de Fontainebleau (or the Fontainebleau Palace).
However, the Emperor survived as his Foreign Minister Armand de Caulaincourt, after noticing the suicidal tendency of the Emperor, had emptied the gunpowder off the pistol in advance! Napoleon I finally surrendered and went into exile on the Italian Island of Elba. Later, he returned yet again to take part in the final battle of his life at Waterloo.
The two pistols, manufactured by Paris gunsmith Louis-Marin Gosset, were stored inside their original case, alongside a powder horn and tamping rods. The pair of pistols, along with their containers and the small metal stick (which used to fill the pistols), were also auctioned on July 7, 2024. However, the auction of such National Treasures has triggered a controversy. Ahead of the auction, the National Treasury Commission of the French Ministry of Culture issued a notice, declaring those objects as National Treasures and banning their export. On the basis of this notice, the new owner of those items is allowed to take those abroad only for 30 months.
Meanwhile, Jean-Pierre Osenat, the President of the auction house, told the press that the pistols represented "the end, the image of the fall". He stressed: "After the defeat of the French campaign, the Emperor was totally depressed." Later, Napoleon I gave the two pistols to General Armand de Caulaincourt.
As usual, items that once belonged to Napoleon I are immensely valuable. In November 2023, one of his bicorne hats was sold for USD 2.1 million. Usually, the French military officers used to wear their bicorne hats front to back, with the wings perpendicular to their shoulders. However, Napoleon I started wearing his sideways, with the wings parallel to his shoulders. This new style, called En Bataille (In Battle), helped the Emperor to remain visible to his troops during combat. In 2021, a handwritten doctor's note describing Napoleon's ill health during his final years fetched USD 2,000 at auction. Earlier in 2007, a single handwritten page from Napoleon I's unpublished novella was sold for USD 35,400!
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