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he gathered 10,000 troops on the
Boulogne coast and held a major troop review in the famous Terlincthun valley and plain on 30 September 1854 before the newly restored stela or "pierre napoléone" of the monument to the Légion d'honneur (inaugurated by Boulogne's société d'agriculture et des arts on 3
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to Paris on 15 December 1840 and exhibited on the banks of the Seine, leaving Paris for
Wimille on 21 July 1841. It arrived at the Column amidst great celebration on 26 July - old soldiers were seen to weep and touch the statue's hands - and placed on its top by the future Napoleon III on 15 August
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informed the emperor of the army's wish to erect such a column and for its site the town of
Boulogne bought the estate of the old royalist, the widow Delahodde-Fourcroy, who reluctantly ceded her field for a monument to the man she called "the usurper". The commission created for its construction
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on 16 August 1804 and left
Boulogne, work on the column became slow and erratic. On 3 December 1811, with the statue and bas-reliefs still waiting in Paris and the column having reached only 20 of its planned 50 metres, the building site had to close since the project had run out of funds and was
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140,000 francs in debt (1 million francs had already been used up, and another million would be spent before completion). Work stopped completely in 1814 on
Napoleon's fall and the statues and bas-reliefs were broken up and melted down with the bronze of the Napoleon statue from the
329:, having not seen the column since 1805. In a failed coup of 1840 Louis-Napoleon landed a small body of his supporters at Boulogne, and ended up taking refuge in the park around the column and raising the imperial flag atop it, before fleeing to the beach, where he was arrested.
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There is a pavilion to either side of the statue's base, and in the right-hand one is a free museum, housing the 1841 statue, now restored. The bas-relief on one side of the base, by Bra, shows the presentation of the plans for the column to
Napoleon by Soult, with
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on 31 March 1905 and survived the First World War intact. The column and the 1841 statue were seriously damaged by bombing in 1944, with the park around the column being turned into a German naval cemetery (with burials including that of
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Napoleon III and his empress arrived at
Boulogne on 27 September 1853 and he immediately gave orders to build an avenue leading up to the column (though this was demolished in the 1970s). In anticipation of the
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Work restarted in 1819 when the minister of the interior allocated it 30,000 francs, with additional credits granted in 1820. The platform on the top was put in place in 1821 and a royal globe crowned with
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Le site du Général
Schmitz, général premier empire vous présente la ville de Wimille, connue pour la colonne de la Grande Armée (premier empire), ville de la Côte d'Opale, dans le Pas-de-Calais.
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for the bas-reliefs, and the army, flotilla, soldiers, sailors and sous-officiers all gave a half-day's pay to the project (with the officers giving a full day's pay) once a month.
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In the meantime Bosio's statue of
Napoleon in his coronation costume (costing 60,000 francs and weighing 7,500 kilos) was completed in time for the
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behind Soult. The bas relief on the other side, by
Lemaire, shows the first award of the Légion d'honneur on 16 August 1804, and also shows Soult,
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in the presence of 50,000 people, with a special medallion being cast for the occasion (though the bas-reliefs were not added until 1843).
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on 28 August 1841 noted that the new statue had "been turned, by design or accident, with its back to England" and commented:
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In the 1821 edition, this phrase was changed to "their chief", or "leur chef", which was politically correct at that time.
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new bas-reliefs - and in June that year marshal Soult was officially received at the column by the Boulogne
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December 1809, vandalised by ultra-royalists in 1815 and reinaugurated on 24 October 1830).
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Colonne de la Grande Armée à Wimille en NORD-PAS-DE-CALAIS / PICARDIE
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Colonne de la Grande Armée à Wimille - Centre des monuments nationaux
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was charged with casting a new statue of the emperor and Lemaire and
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510:. Alfred A. Knopf. August 10, 1955 – via Internet Archive.
442:) and Hugues-Robert-J.-Ch. De La Tour d'Auvergne Lauragais (the
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and other triumphal columns in Rome) on the Rue Napoleon in
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The Column of the Grande Armée, with its flanking pavilions
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In the 1808 edition he adds that Monsieur Piron then
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The column was intended to commemorate a successful
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1459:Monuments of the Centre des monuments nationaux
368:The top of the Column of the Grande Armée today
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508:"Napoleon III A Great Life In Brief"
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145:https://www.colonne-grande-armee.fr
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522:"Punch, 28 August 1841"
216:to the soldiers of the
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745:Carlo Maria Buonaparte
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225:took on the architect
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480:www.geologie-info.com
448:Jean-Guillaume Moitte
440:archbishop of Cambrai
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319:François Joseph Bosio
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168:) is a 53 metre high
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917:Weaponry and warfare
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229:, the bronze-caster
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115:Completion date
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167:
163:
159:
155:
146:
143:
139:
136:
133:
129:
125:
121:
117:
113:
109:
105:
101:
97:
93:
89:
85:
81:
78:
75:
71:
68:
65:
61:
58:
54:
53:Pas-de-Calais
50:
47:
43:
39:
32:
27:
20:
1393: /
1355:
1271:
1264:
1239:
1124:Hundred Days
1122:
1100:
1088:
1076:
1064:
1052:
1030:
1008:
1001:
989:
899:
872:
780:
757:
749:
741:
727:Charles Léon
723:
719:Marie Louise
710:
614:1°37′06.00″E
604:
560:
543:
534:
526:the original
516:
502:
493:
488:
479:
471:
462:
436:Louis Belmas
420:
395:Klaus Dönitz
387:
385:
382:1901-present
371:
338:
331:
315:Napoleon III
308:
296:
266:Grande Armée
263:
255:
239:
200:
165:
161:
153:
151:
135:Grande Armée
1314:Bonapartism
1215: [
1185:Protestants
961: [
947: [
824: [
737:Napoleon II
626: /
417:Description
405:uniform by
399:Karl Dönitz
375:Crimean War
242:18 Brumaire
1413:Categories
1346:Propaganda
880:Coronation
454:References
277:statue of
188:, France.
172:triumphal
944:2nd exile
927:1st exile
838:Consulate
758:Brothers:
724:Children:
285:1819-1853
275:Pont Neuf
1391:Category
1196:Slavery
781:Sisters:
685:timeline
668:Napoleon
432:Lacépède
403:chasseur
273:for the
214:Napoleon
207:Imperial
99:Visitors
83:Material
63:Designer
45:Location
1400:Commons
1370:Studies
912:Tactics
895:Holland
750:Mother:
742:Father:
555:Sources
197:To 1815
192:History
184:, near
182:Wimille
141:Website
49:Wimille
711:Wives:
703:Family
231:Houdon
174:column
158:French
91:Height
86:Marble
57:France
1363:Penis
1279:Milan
1219:]
1212:Women
1161:Tiara
1144:Views
965:]
958:Death
951:]
828:]
438:(the
340:Punch
1351:Tomb
970:mask
866:1815
861:1804
856:1802
851:1799
233:and
152:The
118:1841
110:1804
73:Type
565:on
164:or
94:54m
1415::
1217:fr
963:fr
949:fr
826:fr
542:.
434:,
281:.
160:-
55:,
51:,
660:e
653:t
646:v
546:.
482:.
156:(
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