The Rise and Survival of Joseph Fouché, Inventor of the Modern Police State
Buy on Archway
Barnes & Noble, and Amazon
The MapsAbove, choose from four maps. Hover over the points of interest to learn more about the story. The TimelineScroll this timeline to the right to explore the strange and momentous life of Joseph Fouché Portrait GalleryLook below for the line-up of luminaries whom Fouché manipulated and in most cases eliminated or seriously compromised |
1759Joseph Fouché born in Pellerin, just outside the port city of Nantes
|
1788Fouché sent by the Oratorians to teach in Arras, where he meets Robespierre
|
1792Fouché elected to the National Convention as a representative from Nantes
|
1792King Louis XVI tried for treason by the Convention
|
1793Fouché votes "pour la mort" and the King goes to the guillotine
|
1793Fouché, a revolutionary proconsul en mission, conducts a de-Christianization campaign in central France
|
1793Fouché and Collot d'Herbois massacre Lyonnais insurgents
|
1794Fouché organizes the overthrow and execution of Robespierre
|
1799Fouché, a protégé of the Director Paul Barras, becomes Minister of Police
|
1799Napoleon overthrows the Directory, with Fouché facilitating the coup d'etat
|
1800Fouché cracks a plot against Napoleon which had culminated in a bombing attempt in Paris
|
1802Fouché loses his Ministry portfolio as Napoleon distrusts him and France is briefly at peace
|
1804Fouché's shadowy role in the kidnapping and execution of the Bourbon Duke d'Enghien
|
1804Napoleon crowns himself emperor; Fouché again becomes Minister of Police
|
1809Fouché and Talleyrand intrigue regarding Napoleon's successor
|
1809Napoleon slightly wounded at Ratisbon in Bavaria
|
1809Fouché and Bernadotte thwart a British attack on Antwerp; Napoleon becomes suspicious
|
1809Napoleon names Fouché the Duke of Otranto
|
1810Fouché and Napoleon's brother, Louis, engage in unauthorized peace talks with Britain; Fouché dismissed
|
1810Fouché flees to Tuscany and seeks the protection of Napoleon's sister, the Grand Duchess Elisa
|
1813Napoleon appoints Fouché governor of the Illyrian Provinces
|
1813Fouché visits the King of Naples, Joachim Murat, and encourages him to betray his brother-in-law, the Emperor Napoleon
|
1814Fouché travels to Lyon and suborns the treason of Marshal Augereau
|
1814Napoleon abdicates and King Louis XVIII takes the throne
|
1815Napoleon escapes from Elba while Fouché eludes the Bourbon police in Paris
|
1815Napoleon defeated at Waterloo
|
1815Fouché heads provisional government of France and orchestrates Napoleon's capture and exile to St. Helena
|
1815Fouché works an arrangement with Wellington and Talleyrand whereby Louis XVIII is enabled to return to Paris unopposed
|
1815Fouché collects his quid pro quo and becomes Louis XVIII's Minister of Police
|
1815Fouché proscribes many former politicians and officers of the Empire; Marshal Ney is executed
|
1815King Louis loses confidence in Fouché and Talleyrand; both are dismissed
|
1816Fouché is proscribed as a regicide and exiled within the Habsburg Empire under Austrian police surveillance
|
1820Fouché dies in Trieste; a strange incident occurs as his funeral cortege approaches the Cathedral of San Giusto
|
He was the "butcher of Lyon," mastermind of the plot against Robespierre, Minister of Police under the Directory and Napoleon, treacherous leader of the provisional government of France, and head of Louis XVIII’s police despite his responsibility for the execution of the King’s older brother.
An increasingly disaffected military man, his treason was suborned by Fouché in the face of the enemy at Lyon in 1814.
An early communist prototype, he was compromised and betrayed by his purported friend Fouché.
A Jacobin turned canny and corrupt Director, he was toppled in 1799 by his two erstwhile protégés, Napoleon and Fouché.
Napoleon's spendthrift first wife, she was Fouché's paid informant; he subsequently acted to undermine her marriage to Bonaparte.
Related to the Bonapartes by marriage but also a Jacobin rival to Napoleon, he was Fouché's selection to defend Antwerp in 1809, and later became the improbable King of Sweden and the employer of Fouché's sons.
The Corsican upstart and military genius who came to rule a Continent was brought down by his own unbridled ambition and his blindness to the betrayers in his entourage.
Napoleon's sister and the Duchess of Tuscany, she assisted Fouché during two separate exiles, not realizing his role in the loss of her realm.
The "Iron Marshal," he was duped and out-maneuvered after Waterloo by Fouché and persuaded to withdraw the French Army from the defense of Paris.
A spurned playwright, he exacted a hideous revenge on the people of Lyon, in which he was aided and abetted by fellow représentant en mission Fouché.
The Bourbon monarch was guillotined for treason, thanks to the momentous vote of Fouché and 360 fellow regicides in the Convention in 1793.
The corpulent and benign Bourbon redux, surrounded by vengeful relatives, agonizingly appointed Fouché as his own Minister of Police, despite the regicide's responsibility for the death of his older brother.
Made King of Naples by his brother-in-law Napoleon, the egotistical cavalryman was swayed by Fouché to abandon the Emperor in a time of crisis.
The "bravest of the brave," this headstrong commander was executed by a Bourbon firing squad in 1815 after being proscribed by Fouché – who at the same time futilely attempted to aid Ney's escape.
The "Incorruptible" and architect of the Terror, he aimed to destroy Fouché but instead was eliminated by him and his co-conspirators.
Fouché's rival and sometimes ally of convenience, the clever foreign minister was another consummate manipulator and survivor.
The victor at Waterloo, he found Fouché to be of great value in opening up Paris to Allied occupation and the restoration of Bourbon rule without a struggle.
