Stephen Girard / Joseph Bonaparte

Joseph Bonaparte

Stephen Girard

14 Stephen Girard is at home on Water Street in Philadelphia, entertaining his friend, a frequent visitor Joseph Bonaparte. The usually taciturn Girard is at his most jovial with his fellow Frenchman as they sit down to a dinner together. Joseph Bonaparte, once named King of Naples and King of Spain by his brother Napoleon is now a private citizen living in America, afraid to return to France after the fall of Napoleon. 

Stephen Girard: I see by the glimmer in your eye that you have come up with another scheme that will cost me much money or the loss of valuable time. No, I will not sell you my property on Market Street.

Joseph Bonaparte: Ah mon ami, you know me all too well. It is a fallen king that comes to your dinner table this evening, realizing that the past is far behind and the presence is menacing for my brother. You have helped me immeasurably in the few years that I’ve been here. I hope you can listen to my concerns with an open mind.

Girard: Tu sais que je suis toujours pret a vous aider. I'll do what I can, you know. I am always ready to be of assistance.

Bonaparte: You know only too well my brother’s rapid rise to become an emperor during the uncertain days of the French Revolution. What a glorious period it was for France to seize the power and excite the imagination of the world. Beginning in 1812, Napoleon began to encounter a slow moving but definite fissure in his efforts. The first significant defeats of his military career came with the disastrous invasion of Russia and the loss of Spain to the Duke of Wellington in the Peninsula War, and enduring total defeat from the combined forces of his enemies by 1814. How tragic it was to see him exiled to the island of Elba. And because he was Napoleon Bonaparte, he managed to revive hope by escaping to France in early 1815 and raising a new Grand Army that enjoyed temporary success before its crushing defeat at Waterloo against forces under the formidable Wellington on June 18, 1815. Napoleon was subsequently exiled to the island of Saint Helena off the coast of Africa. Et nous sommes voilà.

Girard: Tu sais, je suis très au courrant de tout cela. I have followed his career with enthusiasm at first and then with concern. He has risen higher that any person in the history of France and because of such a phenomenal rise, the fall had to indeed be as great. My heart goes out to you my friend for so must you suffer personal disappointment. Here in my home, we have had many of laughs. A few tears must now seal our friendship.

Joseph: Eh oui. But the tears must wait a while longer. Napoleon is ill. I want to ask you one final favor which to me is much greater than I have the right to ask. I want to have him rescued from Saint Helena so that he may die in peace among his family and countrymen. Your ships have traveled as far as Russia and China. Would you consider the dangerous mission to bring Napoleon out of his prison?

Girard: I have the ships and the means, but I must reflect on such a mission.

Joseph: You have proven yourself a great American patriot. Your millions have financed a war with Great Britain and won a lasting peace for your adopted country. You have aided Bolivar in South America. Hundreds of Frenchmen have come to Philadelphia to be received with your generosity. I ask you one last favor. Please help my brother.

Girard:  Although my business now is mainly coal mines and banking, I may be able to assist you. First, we must supply a ship for a long sea voyage. It must be done in complete secrecy. Not even Napoleon can know what is being planned. We will decide later under what flag the ship will sail; allegiances change often. I still have friends from my early days of privateering that can put together a crew.

Joseph: God Bless you, Etienne. 

According to biographers of the Bonapartes, a ship owned by Stephen Girard was being prepared for a long voyage to a faraway island in 1821. These preparations were halted when word was received that the fifty-one-year-old Napoleon had died. In 1840 his body was returned to Paris, where it was interred in the Hotel des Invalides.