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W. Britain
On 6 April 1814, Napoleon Bonaparte abdicated his throne. After some 15 years of armed conflict, the Emperor of France – and conquerer of a large portion of Europe – was exiled to the tiny island of Elba.
He spent only 9 months and 21 days there.
With the aid of a meager partisan fleet of seven ships and 1,000 men, Napoleon escaped his island prison on 26 February 1815. He landed again on French soil to a warm reception. The royalist nobility had resumed their mistreatment of the proletariat in general and the veterans of the Grande Armée in particular. These were a few of the factors that helped swell the number of Napoleon’s troops until they became an army. And then even more men followed.