What did French marshals say when napoleon died?
Many Frenchmen who had admired or even participated in the American Revolution were casualties of its bloody Gallic sequel. After testifying in favor of Marie-Antoinette, the former Count d’Estaing was beheaded. The erstwhile Count de Rochambeau, locked up in the Conciergerie in Paris, was condemned to the guillotine and survived only because
... See moreRon Chernow • Washington
He died December 14, 1873. Eight days earlier he had returned from the museum feeling tired and had lain down on the couch to rest awhile. He never spoke again. Obituaries were carried in every paper. Learned societies held special meetings to pass memorial resolutions. No death since that of Lincoln, wrote the editors of Harper’s Weekly, had
... See moreDavid McCullough • Brave Companions
The basic rule of Roman history is that those who were assassinated were, like Gaius, demonised. Those who died in their beds, succeeded by a son and heir, natural or adopted, were praised as generous and avuncular characters, devoted to the success of Rome, who did not take themselves too seriously.
Mary Beard • SPQR
“in murdering caesar, brutus yielded to a prejudice of education which he had absorbed from the schools of greece…he refused to recognise that caesar's authority was legitimate because it was necessary and protective, because it preserved the interests of rome, because it sprang from the opinion and the will of the people.”