Joseph Bonaparte

Joseph Bonaparte

Joseph Napoleon Bonaparte, King of Naples, King of Spain (January 7, 1768 – July 28, 1844) was the elder brother of French Emperor Napoleon I, who made him king of Naples (1806–1808) and later king of Spain. He was nominally king of Spain from July 6, 1808 to December 11, 1813, but from June 13, 1812 he was back in France.

Bonaparte was born Giuseppe Napoleone Buonaparte to Carlo Buonaparte and Letizia Ramolino at Corte in Corsica. As a lawyer, politician, and diplomat, he served in the Cinq-Cents and was the French ambassador to Rome. He married Julie Clary on August 1, 1794 in Cuges-les-Pins, France. The couple later had two children, Zénaïde and Charlotte.

The Château de Villandry had been seized by the French Revolutionary government and in the early 1800s Joseph's brother, Emperor Napoleon, acquired the château for him. In 1806, Bonaparte was given military command of Naples, and shortly afterward was made king by Napoleon. He became King of Spain two years later after his sister's husband, Joachim Murat, was made king of Naples. The Spanish people nicknamed him Pepe Botella ("Bottle Joe") pointing to an alleged tendency to drunkenness. His supporters were called josefinos or afrancesados (frenchified). During his reign, he ended the Spanish Inquisition's reign of terror, partly because Napoleon was at odds with Pope Pius VII at the time.

Despite such efforts to win popularity, Bonaparte's foreign birth and support, plus his membership in a Masonic lodge , virtually guaranteed he would never be accepted as legitimate by the bulk of the Spanish people. During his rule of Spain, Venezuela declared independence (1810) from Spain, the first nation to do so. During the Peninsular War, his command of French forces in Spain proved to be only nominal, as his commanders insisted on checking with the king's younger brother before carrying out Joseph's instructions. These facts, combined with the constant threat of assassination, made his reign an exceedingly unpleasant experience for him.

Bonaparte abdicated and returned to France after defeat at the Battle of Vitoria. He was seen by Bonapartists as the rightful Emperor of the French after the death of Napoleon's own son Napoleon II in 1832, although he did little to advance his claim. He lived for a time in the United States, in a home at Bordentown, New Jersey. Joseph Bonaparte died in Florence, Italy and is buried in Les Invalides building complex in Paris.

The Joseph Bonaparte Gulf in the Northern Territory of Australia was named for him.

He is often cited as a fluent Spanish speaker, but in fact his preferred language was French. He reluctantly learned Spanish when he became the King of Spain and even then, he could only speak broken phrases.

External links

• Joseph Bonaparte at Point Breeze
• Joseph Bonaparte and the Jersey Devil