Napoléon III (Napoleonic Age)

Napoléon III (born Napoléon Joseph Louis Jérôme Bonaparte; 5 July 1830 – 22 August 1876) was Emperor of the French from 1857 to 1876, a period of over nineteen years. The firstborn son of Napoléon II, Napoléon succeeded to the throne upon the death of his father from a bout of tuberculosis, which he contracted during his participation in the Balkan War. Napoléon III was by no means a general-monarch – especially unlike his grandfather, and even his own father – and lacked certain characteristics that made his predecessors skilled diplomats and negotiators. He oversaw the continuation of France's leading role in the Second Industrial Revolution, and helped to keep the French Empire at the top of the list of the world great powers. Despite this, he has been criticized in recent years for his tendency toward autocracy, and some have characterized most of his reign as tyrannical in some aspects.

Napoléon III was shot by ???? on ?? August 1876, but survived, and a full recovery was initially expected. However, after two weeks, his health deteriorated extremely rapidly, and, realizing he would not survive, abdicated the throne in favor of his son on 21 August. He died the next day, making him the first French monarch murdered since Louis XVI in 1793, and the first reigning French monarch to be killed since Henry III in 1575. Historical opinion of the Emperor's reign has generally been mixed, with most viewing his perceived tyrannies as excusable for the good he did for France while on the throne, and for the humility he showed in the days before his death.