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By Root 2551 0

of influence she had carved out in Holland and northern Italy. On the contrary, implicit in the First Consul’s dealings with Spain and Portugal is the assumption not just that Egypt could be held until a general peace settlement was reached, but also that it could be retained thereafter. Nor was France simply to enjoy an oriental empire. On the contrary, Napoleon was also looking to the western hemisphere. Peace with England was quite clearly expected to restore to France her ‘sugar islands’ in the West Indies. But beyond that there was also the question of the vast territory of Louisiana. Ceded to Spain in 1762 at the close of the Seven Years War, this stretched from the Gulf of Mexico to the present-day Canadian frontier and from the river Mississippi to the Rocky Mountains. Although largely unexplored, and colonized by Europeans only in the extreme south, where New Orleans was a major port and the centre of a plantation economy based on rice, sugar and cotton, it was clear that this vast region was potentially of immense importance. A valuable source of colonial produce, it was also a convenient source of food and raw materials for France’s colonies in the West Indies. As for the interior, who knew what wonders it concealed, Napoleon having undoubtedly been much impressed by the gold and silver brought to Spain by her older territories in the New World. And last but not least, there was the issue of global strategy, for a base in the American West would allow Napoleon to put pressure on the British in Canada and to threaten the United States.

In fairness to Napoleon, it should be noted that, as with Egypt, he was not the only Frenchman to look to Louisiana. In 1795 the peace negotiations with Spain that produced the treaty of Basel had seen an attempt to get hold of the territory, while in 1796-7 the Directory had repeatedly sought to persuade Godoy to consider the idea, of which Talleyrand was a prominent supporter. On top of this, the 1790s had shown that the United States was not the friend and ally of France that might have been supposed. Despite the Franco-American treaty of amity of 1778, George Washington had declared the United States to be neutral, and refused point-blank to tolerate the attempts of the French ambassador to use the United States as a base for privateering or, still more dramatically, the conquest of Louisiana by a privately recruited army of frontier toughs. When the British began to impound American ships trading with France and her colonies, Washington responded not by declaring war but by negotiating a treaty that effectively accepted Britain’s right to block all trade with France in exchange for the payment of compensation in respect of any American ships or cargoes seized by the British. In retaliation, the French first declared that they would treat all American ships as fair game themselves, and, second, imposed a code of practice that was even more stringent than that operated by the British. With losses mounting, the French privateers behaving little better than pirates and no compensation forthcoming whatsoever, in 1798 President Adams in effect declared war on France. Plans were mooted for an attack on Louisiana, Florida and France’s remaining islands in the Caribbean, while a small navy was fitted out and sent out to do battle against the Directory’s warships and privateers. Greatly alarmed at the threat to Louisiana, within a year the French were backing away from further conflict. Conciliatory messages were sent to Adams, and Napoleon had scarcely come to power before he had repudiated the decrees that had wrought such havoc with American shipping. Thanks to a variety of political circumstances in the United States, including, not least, the manner in which the war was tending to strengthen the position of Adams’s enemies, the Federalists, these moves achieved the desired effect. Diplomatic relations were restored and a peace settlement was elaborated that effectively annulled the treaty of 1778- thereby cementing the principle of American neutrality - in exchange for the rejection