His neighbors presented him with all of his surviving belongings - nothing had been stolen.īonaparte wrote a letter to a local official thanking the townspeople for their efforts. Stroud wrote that it might have been either an accident, perhaps a guest’s fire left smoldering in a hearth, or arson, possibly an attempt to destroy copies of some of Napoleon’s correspondence.īonaparte rushed back to see his roof collapsing as neighbors rushed into the burning building to save as many of his possessions as they could carry, including paintings by Jacques-Louis David, Rembrandt and Goya, as well as the Spanish crown jewels.īonaparte had to restrain some of his neighbors from going back into the house, according to Ms.
Historians are not certain of the cause, but Ms. 4, 1820, as he was returning from a visit to New York. In a biography of Bonaparte, Patricia Tyson Stroud said a visitor in 1819 observed that “only the White House in Washington surpassed it.”īonaparte’s mansion caught fire the night of Jan. Its library contained 8,000 volumes, more than the Library of Congress at the time, and Bonaparte employed hundreds of people.
In Bonaparte’s day, Point Breeze saw many prominent visitors, including John Quincy Adams, Daniel Webster, Henry Clay and the Marquis de Lafayette. Tucci said he hoped that opening the estate would disseminate its history more widely. Many local residents know Bonaparte’s story, and Mr.
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