• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

While this had been going on, the Spanish government had been making little trouble. Aside from anything else, on 29 August French troops had suddenly invaded the so-called Kingdom of Etruria. Originally the Duchy of Tuscany, Etruria had been ceded to the Bourbons in 1801 in the person of Charles IV’s eldest daughter and her Italian consort. However, Etruria having become a centre of smuggling and espionage, Napoleon had resolved on its annexation. With Spain’s only hope of compensation lying in Portugal, cooperation with the emperor therefore became all the more important. Nevertheless, deeply mistrustful of Godoy, the emperor decided to bind the Spaniards to his plans even more closely. On 25 September he made contact with Godoy’s personal representative in Paris, Eugenio Izquierdo, and agreed the treaty of Fontainebleau. Under its terms, Portugal was split into three with the north handed over to the King and Queen of Etruria, the centre kept under military occupation until the end of the war and then disposed of according to circumstance, and the south given to Godoy. In the meantime Napoleon agreed to guarantee the existing domains of the Spanish Bourbons and to allow Charles IV to style himself ‘Emperor of the Two Americas’. Also settled was the question of how Portugal would actually be occupied, the basic plan being that 28,000 French and 13,000 Spanish troops would march on Lisbon from León, while another 16,000 Spaniards moved across the frontier from Galicia and Extremadura. A further 40,000 French soldiers would be assembled at Bayonne to ward off British raids, although it was agreed that these troops would not enter Spain without the prior agreement of Madrid. And with all this Godoy and his advisers professed themselves to be well satisfied. According to the erstwhile chairman of the Committee of Public Safety, Bertrand de Barère, who had become a close friend of Izquierdo:

At the time of the journey to Fontainebleau, M. Izquierdo . . . called on me and said, ‘I have just concluded the Spanish affair, and I hold a treaty signed by the emperor, but the most remarkable circumstance in connection with the matter was the meeting which preceded the signature. I was present with the imperial court at the court theatre. General Duroc sent for me during the performance and ushered me into a cabinet where he left me alone, requesting me on behalf of his master, to read the draft of a treaty which lay on the table and to insert in it, without leaving the Cabinet and without communicating with anyone, any alterations, additions or modifications which I might consider suitable, and at the same time to state my reasons for such changes. I did not refuse the proposal, and during the play I was engaged in writing on the margin of the treaty my corrections and variations. At the end of the performance General Duroc returned, took possession of my notes, and said that he would immediately submit them to the emperor. At midnight I was conducted into his presence, and after a few unimportant remarks the treaty was drafted afresh. This was soon accomplished and the treaty was then signed. We thereby avoid war and cement our union with France. If you peruse the treaty, you will see whether I have really promoted the interests of Spain.’23

With this analysis Barère begged to differ: according to his own account he saw clearly that Fontainebleau at the very least jeopardized Spain’s freedom of action - but the die had long since been cast. Last-minute efforts at negotiation by the Portuguese had been quashed by threats that, unless they surrendered forthwith, the house of Bragança would be deposed, and on 18 October the first French forces started crossing the frontier. By the time that Fontainebleau was formally ratified on 29 October 1807, French troops were already deep inside Spain. At their head marched the notoriously fiery and ambitious General Jean Andoche Junot, a close associate of Napoleon, who had first met him at the siege of Toulon in 1793 and had since distinguished himself in Italy, Egypt and Palestine,