Lot Essay
This beautifully executed watercolour is a most unusual subject for Kilburne, who is generally known for his costume scenes set in the Regency period. A letter from the artist gives the story of this important historical document:
"The iron bedstead is the one the Emperor Napoleon III died on. The room is all just as he left it with the exception of the picture over the bed. It is a life size photograph of the Emperor taken after death. This was hung up while I was there, in place of another which was taken down. One thing struck me as being curious, the screen by the bed is stuck all over with prints cut from the Illustrated London News and the Graphic. Those on the left side nearest the door are all scenes from the late war, for instance at the top the burning of the Tuileries, next firing in streets of Paris, carrying off the wounded from one of the battlefields, stampede at Sedan etc., etc."
After his disastrous defeat at Sedan in September, 1870, Napoleon was held as a prisoner-of-war by the Germans for more than six months. With the signing of the armistice by the French government the Emperor was released and made immediate arrangements to join his exiled wife and son in the house they had taken at Camden Place, Chislehurst in Kent. Queen Victoria had visited the Empress Eugenie soon after she arrived and found the house very small; she referred to "the poor Emperor's humble little rooms", but the Emperor lived there contentedly with a considerable suite of more than fifty persons, only twenty-three of whom were servants.
During his imprisonment Napoleon had been troubled by a kidney stone, and in 1872 it gave him enough pain to make him consult a number of doctors. An operation was decided upon, and the first exploration under chloroform was undertaken on Christmas Day. Early in January, 1873, the doctors began a series of unsuccessful operations, the fourth of which, on the 9th January killed him. The iron bedstead in which the Emperor died was presumably moved into the room for convenience of nursing him, an impossible task in the draped bed beside it. The photograph of him on his deathbed may have been inspired by Queen Victoria'a innumerable images of Prince Albert.
The Emperor's body lay in state in the hall of Camden Place and more than 17,000 people came to file silently past, many of them from France. He was buried at St Mary's Catholic Church at Chislehurst before a crowd of more than 20,000 people
"The iron bedstead is the one the Emperor Napoleon III died on. The room is all just as he left it with the exception of the picture over the bed. It is a life size photograph of the Emperor taken after death. This was hung up while I was there, in place of another which was taken down. One thing struck me as being curious, the screen by the bed is stuck all over with prints cut from the Illustrated London News and the Graphic. Those on the left side nearest the door are all scenes from the late war, for instance at the top the burning of the Tuileries, next firing in streets of Paris, carrying off the wounded from one of the battlefields, stampede at Sedan etc., etc."
After his disastrous defeat at Sedan in September, 1870, Napoleon was held as a prisoner-of-war by the Germans for more than six months. With the signing of the armistice by the French government the Emperor was released and made immediate arrangements to join his exiled wife and son in the house they had taken at Camden Place, Chislehurst in Kent. Queen Victoria had visited the Empress Eugenie soon after she arrived and found the house very small; she referred to "the poor Emperor's humble little rooms", but the Emperor lived there contentedly with a considerable suite of more than fifty persons, only twenty-three of whom were servants.
During his imprisonment Napoleon had been troubled by a kidney stone, and in 1872 it gave him enough pain to make him consult a number of doctors. An operation was decided upon, and the first exploration under chloroform was undertaken on Christmas Day. Early in January, 1873, the doctors began a series of unsuccessful operations, the fourth of which, on the 9th January killed him. The iron bedstead in which the Emperor died was presumably moved into the room for convenience of nursing him, an impossible task in the draped bed beside it. The photograph of him on his deathbed may have been inspired by Queen Victoria'a innumerable images of Prince Albert.
The Emperor's body lay in state in the hall of Camden Place and more than 17,000 people came to file silently past, many of them from France. He was buried at St Mary's Catholic Church at Chislehurst before a crowd of more than 20,000 people