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The Emperor and the Irishman: Napoleon and Dr Barry O'Meara on St Helena [Hardback], Dr. Hubert O'Connor

The Emperor and the Irishman: Napoleon and Dr Barry O'Meara on St Helena [Hardback], Dr. Hubert O'Connor

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Utilising a wide range of sources and focusing largely on Dr O'Meara's diary entries which recount conversations with Napoleon on a day-to-day basis, the book is an insight into the private face of Napoleon and the conflict of interest O'Meara felt as an officer in the British navy, and a physician to his country's enemy. -- In 1815, after an adventurous war, the young Irish doctor Barry O'Meara accepted the opportunity of a lifetime to look after Napoleon in his banishment on St Helena. In one of the most isolated places in the world, Napoleon and his entourage fought a constant battle with the security-obsessed British military who were his jailers. Terrified lest Napoleon escape, they piled petty restriction on petty restriction, and at one point asked O'Meara to spy on his great patient. He refused, and was eventually evicted from the island. Back in London he told the story, despite social and political pressure. He was sacked from the Navy, and was obliged to start from scratch. The core of 'The Emperor and the Irishman' is the diary O'Meara kept, at Napoleon's suggestion, while on St Helena. He records in lively detail many hours of Napoleon's conversation, ranging from his views on class, religion and slavery, to his love for Josephine and why Waterloo was lost. Napoleon was only fifty-one when he died on the island. The book ends with a detailed solution of the question - was he poisoned by his British jailers?

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