It was Christmas Eve 1800. The streets of Paris were crowded with
citizens. Some were shopping, some were eating and drinking. But others
were plotting to murder the most famous and powerful man in France. They
wheeled their improvised bomb into town earlier that day, and waited.
Then, amongst the milling crowd, they saw the target. Despite knowing
that the bomb would kill indiscriminately, the fuse was lit, and the
enormous explosion wreaked havoc. The target for this early act of
terrorism was Napoleon Bonaparte, who had seized power the year before
and found himself the enemy of republicans and royalists alike. The
terrorists belonged to the royal faction and although they failed to
kill Napoleon, their atrocity hurled political violence in a new and
terrifying direction; towards a now familiar place where civilian
casualties would be collateral damage and where bombs in packed streets
and squares would be the new conduit of terror. This book sets the scene
with Napoleon's coup and follows the cell of extremists as they prepare
their plans and devise a weapon that became known as the 'Infernal
Machine'. After their attack, we follow the security services as they
hunt down the perpetrators, baffled by the novelty of terrorism, as
Napoleon uses public anger to launch a war on his opponents. Using
first-hand accounts, trial transcripts and archival material - and with
all the drama of a detective story - Killing Napoleon recounts one of
the great crimes of its era, a story still largely unknown in the
English-speaking world; and a precursor to the terrorist threats we know
today.
