Napoleon's 1814 exile to Elba: what the treaty gave him

Napoleon’s first exile was set by the Treaty of Fontainebleau, dated 11 April 1814 in Paris, under which he renounced “all right of sovereignty and domination” over the French Empire, Italy and every other country and accepted the Mediterranean island of Elba as a principality for life; he landed at its capital, Portoferraio, on 4 May 1814.

The dates vary between accounts because several documents were involved. On 4 April at Fontainebleau he offered a conditional abdication, which the allies would not accept. The treaty was negotiated in Paris by his envoys — Caulaincourt and Marshals Macdonald and Ney — with the ministers of Austria, Russia and Prussia, and under it he abdicated unconditionally. The Seine-et-Marne département’s bicentenary history dates its ratification to the 14th.

For a defeated enemy, the terms were remarkably generous:

Treaty article	What Napoleon and his family kept
Article II	Imperial titles for life, for him and Empress Marie-Louise
Article III	Elba, “in all sovereignty and property”, plus 2 million francs a year in French state bonds
Article VI	Estates yielding 2.5 million francs a year for his relatives
Article XVI	An armed corvette, his to keep
Article XVII	A personal guard of 400 volunteers

On 20 April he said goodbye to his Imperial Guard in the Cour du Cheval-Blanc at Fontainebleau, kissing the flag the old grenadiers presented to him:

“Soldiers of my Old Guard, I bid you farewell. For twenty years you have been my constant companions on the road to honour and glory.” — Napoleon, 20 April 1814

On Elba he set about building roads, improving local resources and setting up a small court and government. The arrangement lasted less than ten months. In late February 1815 he escaped from Elba, landing in France on 1 March to begin the Hundred Days that ended at Waterloo — and in a far more remote exile.