N & E
Napoleon & Empire

Napoleonic Timeline from 1789 to 1793

1789

1st April 1789 – Napoleon Bonaparte, with a detachment of a hundred men, suppressed a popular riot in Seurre , Burgundy, caused by the famine following the poor harvests of 1788.

19 July 1789 – Yet another riot suppression, in Auxonne , following the announcement of the storming of the Bastille (July 14, in Paris).

21 August 1789 – He was again granted leave for six months.

9 September 1789 – Napoleon Bonaparte left Auxonne to Corsica.

31 October 1789 – During a political meeting at Ajaccio , he drew up a letter to the Assemblée Nationale Constituante (French National Assembly) that he got signed by his assistants.

26 December 1789 – He was denounced as a troublemaker to the Minister for War by Hubert Casimir Rousseau de la Férandière, the commanding officer of Ajaccio.

1790

16 April 1790 – Request for extension of leave for health reasons.

17 July 1790 – Napoleon Bonaparte and his brother Joseph met Pasquale Paoli in Bastia, Corsica.

The Old Port of Bastia
The Old Port of Bastia

1791

31 January 1791 – Napoleon Bonaparte joined his regiment at Auxonne .

1st June 1791 – He was promoted as lieutenant and transferred to the 4th artillery regiment, at Valence, a town upon the Rhône river, southern France.

16 June 1791 – Arrival at Valence.

30 September 1791 – Fresh leave.

1792

1st January 1792 – The name of Napoleon Bonaparte was included in the list of officers absent from their corps.

14 January 1792 – He was appointed as Warrant Officer-Major of a battalion of the National Guard of Ajaccio.

1st April 1792 – Napoleon Bonaparte became second lieutenant-colonel of the same battalion.

8 to 11 April 1792 – Active participation in fights at Ajaccio.

28 May 1792 – Napoleon went to Paris to defend himself against the accusation of having been one of the initiators of trouble in Ajaccio.

10 July 1792 – He was reincoporated into the army, with a captain's rank.

10 August 1792 – In Paris, Napoleon witnessed the Assault on the Tuileries Palace  and the departure of King Louis XVI.

10 October 1792 – He returned to Ajaccio, with orders to resume his command in Corsica.

1793

03 May 1793 – Napoleon Bonaparte, victim two months before of a murder attempt, had to leave Ajaccio.

23 May 1793 – The Casa Buonaparte was ransacked by supporters of Pascal Paoli.

27 May 1793 – Paoli, back from exile, got the Bonaparte family, which had opposed him, banished from Corsica.

10 June 1793 – Napoleon Bonaparte and his family left Calvi , Corsica.

13 June 1793 – They landed in Toulon, Provence.

26 June 1793 – Napoleon joined his regiment at Nice , French Riviera.

25 July 1793 – Napoleon was sent to Avignon to dislodge the federalists from Marseilles. He seized Villeneuve and himself directed the cannons bombarding Avignon, the city of the Popes.

28 July 1793 – He entered Avignon.

16 September 1793 – The representatives on mission Antoine Christophe Saliceti  and Thomas-Augustin de Gasparin sent him to take command of the artillery in front of Toulon.

28 October 1793 – Promotion of Napoleon Bonaparte to the rank of battalion commander.

6 December 1793 – General Dugommier,

who was the commanding officer in front of Toulon, sent to the Convention a letter in praise of citizen Buona Parte.

17 December 1793 – Napoleon Bonaparte was injured by a bayonet during the assault of fort Mulgrave, but kept on fighting, with the help from Captains Jean-Baptiste Muiron and Auguste-Frédéric-Louis Viesse de Marmont.

19 December 1793 – He entered Toulon at seven o'clock in the morning, while the Allied squadrons evacuated the harbor.

Toulon harbor seen from the Tour-Royale
The harbor of Toulon seen from the Tour-Royale

22 December 1793 – New promotion, to the rank of Brigade General.

26 December 1793 – The defence of Marseilles and the Provence coast was bequeathed to him.

Just place the mouse cursor upon any date after September 1793 to display a tooltip showing the date according to the French Revolutionary calendar. Or use our converter between Gregorian dates and Republican dates, working for the entire period when the latter was in application.

Sources

This page has as its main source the Napoleonic chronology established by Gérard Walter for his edition of The Memorial of Saint Helena, in the French classics series La Pléiade, published by the Éditions Gallimard, Paris.