I recall that about 15 years ago my grandfather took me to an old church graveyard which contained the grave of what he claimed was a Napoleonic general who had ended his days as a schoolteacher in Rowan County, North Carolina. I recall the tombstone was faded to the point of being illegible, but had since been encased where it stood. Being much more historically aware now than I was then, I’d like to know more about this fellow. Can anyone tell me who he was, and what he was doing in rural North Carolina?
Its a legend.
The legend goes that Marshal Ney - Napoleon’s “bravest of the brave” escaped execution for treason in part due to the secret intervention of Wellington (a mason).
So whilst the world thought he had died, he had in fact fled to America and after admitting on his deathbed to being Ney, was buried in a cemetary in Rowan County.
I think thats the story anyway…
It’s true up to a ceratin extent, there was an American schoolteacher who CLAIMED to be a Napoleonic general. However if IIRC his claim was debunked.
So now that I’ve got a name I’ve been able to find some more info on Ney and his link to North Carolina.
http://www.geocities.com/grandmajudy23/church2.html
This is the church where I saw his grave. You can see and old picture of the original tombstone and the plaque which is now on that spot.
http://franklaughter.tripod.com/cgi-bin/history/napoleon.html
The very bottom of this page features some more details on the mystery.
http://members.tripod.com/~alvastudio/html/salisfr.html
This tripod webpage about Liddy Dole mentions Ney, so it must be true!
Now, does anyone know of a more scholarly reference to this case? Have there been any theses written on the subject of the schoolteacher claiming to be Marshall Ney?
There were some Napoleonic figures who dropped by the United States for awhile.
Napoleon’s older brother, Guiseppe (later Joseph) Buonaparte, was King of Naples and the Two Sicilies, then appointed King of Spain in 1808.
After the war he took off and showed up in Philadelphia as the Comte de Survelliers. He later purchased an estate in New Jersey.
Talleyrand also spent a couple of years in exile in the US–though this was before Napoleon, not after.
Joseph Bonaparte, Napoleon’s brother and appointee as King of Naples and Spain, and loser of the Peninsular Wars, lived in exile for many years afterward in Bordentown, New Jersey.
In 1796, Louis Philippe (later King of France) lived in Boston in what is now the Union Oyster House restaurant, supporting himself as a teacher of French until it was safe for aristocracy to return.