November 7, 2025 • 10 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, when Napoleon’s brother Jérôme Bonaparte met a young Baltimore woman named Elizabeth Patterson in 1803, it seemed like a love story that could never last. Their marriage was annulled by the emperor himself, but it sparked a family line that would take root in America and quietly reshape its future.
Their grandson, Charles J. Bonaparte, carried the ambition of his lineage in a different direction. Educated at Harvard and driven by public service, he became U.S. Attorney General under Theodore Roosevelt and went on to establish a small investigative office within the Justice Department, an office that would later evolve into the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The History Guy traces how Napoleon Bonaparte’s legacy reached across oceans, blending old-world nobility with new-world purpose.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is our American Stories, and our next story comes
to us from a man who simply known as the
History Guy. His videos are watched by hundreds of thousands
of people of all ages on YouTube. The History Guy
has also heard here at our American Stories. If at
the height of his power in eighteen ten, someone had
approached Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte and told him that in about
(00:34):
one hundred years his great nephew would be the Secretary
of the United States Navy and be responsible for setting
up arguably the most successful law enforcement agency in the
world in the new country of America. He probably would
have laughed or had you sent to an asylum. Here's
the History Guy with the story of the American Bonapartes.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
On June eighteenth, eighteen fifteen, one of the most important
and well known battles in history was fought in Belgium
between the French army of the Emperor Napoleon and armies
of the Seventh Coalition commanded by the Duke of Wellington,
the Battle of Waterloo. A significant part of that storied
battle occurred on Napoleon's left, at a walled farmhouse called Yugomont.
(01:30):
Napoleon sent a division to attack the farm, which Willington
knew he must hold. Historians today disagree or whether that
attack was merely a diversion intended to draw Willington's reserves
away from his center, whether Napoleon thought that Yugomont must
be taken, but in either case, the battle started at
the walls of Yugomont, and by many accounts, was lost
(01:50):
there as the farm, although nearly destroyed, never felt. Willington
observed after the battle that the success of the battle
turned on the closing of the gates at Hugomont. The
French commander whose division was to take the farm was
Jerome Bonaparte, Napoleon's youngest brother, and Jerome Buonaparte had a
(02:12):
little known connection to his opponent, the Duke of Wellington,
through the nearly forgotten American Bonapartes. It is a story
that deserves to be remembered. Jerome Bonaparte was born in
Corsica in seventeen eighty four, the youngest brother of Napoleon Bonaparte.
His father, Carlo Bonaparte, died when Jerome was just three
(02:32):
months old. His mother struggled after the death of his father,
and he grew up an unruly child. While his brother,
now the head of the family in a rising general
in the French army, sent him to a Catholic university.
Jerome was a lack student, more interested in the ladies
than his studies. Exasperated, Napoleon sent Jerome to join the
navy in the hopes that the military would straighten him out.
(02:55):
While he was a successful naval officer, Jerome was still
not quite straightened out. In eighteen o three, at the
age of nineteen, Drum was serving with the French Navy
in the Caribbean when he decided to visit the United States.
It seems that he had inadvertently fired on a British ship,
and given that his brother was the first consul of
France and France and England had sign a peace treaty
(03:16):
in eighteen oh two, Drum had to lay low for
a while to avoid an international incident that might start
another war. While in America, a friend at buys Jerome,
who always said that he just loved beautiful things, that
the most beautiful women in America were in Baltimore. William
Patterson was born in Ireland and came to America before
the Revolution. He ran guns during the War, and after
(03:39):
became a successful and very wealthy businessman in Baltimore. He
married and raised a large family, including a daughter, Elizabeth Patterson,
affectionately called Betsy. In eighteen o three, Betsy Patterson was
seventeen years old, very wealthy, and generally regarded as the
most beautiful woman in America. It's not clear whaere Betsy
(04:00):
Patterson and Jerome Bonapartners met, likely at some ball or
social gathering, but they fell madly in love. For Jerome
it may simply have been his love of beautiful things,
but for Betsy was a chance at fame, an independence,
and a way out of a dreary American marriage. They
married on Christmas Eve, eighteen o three, but that was
(04:21):
a problem for Jerome's brother Napoleon. He wanted his brothers
to have marriages that served his ambitions and expected to
marry Jerome to European royalty. Marriage to an American, even
one of the wealthiest in the nation, was not acceptable.
Napoleon ordered Jerome to leave Betsy and returned to France.
In the fall of eighteen o four. Jerome took Betsy,
(04:42):
now pregnant, with him, to visit France. In the hopes
of changing his brother's mind, but Napoleon forbade her landing
in France or even on the continent. While Jerome went
to France to pleay their case, she went to England
and in July eighteen oh five had a son, whom
they named Jerome Napoleon, affectionately called Beaux. But Napoleon Bonaparte
(05:04):
was a man who did not take no for an answer.
As Druam pleaded his case and still made promises to Betsy,
she gave up and sailed back to Baltimore. In the
fall of eighteen oh five, Napoleon annulled the marriage by decree.
In eighteen oh seven, Betsy got word that Napoleon had
made her husband king of the newly created Kingdom of
Westphalia and had married Jerome to a German, Princess Catherine
(05:26):
of Wurtemberg. Many argued that he still loved Betsy Patterson,
but could not defy the will of his brother. He
wrote to his brother, Lucian, you know the feelings of
my heart, and you know the well being and benefit
of my family alone forced me to make other ties.
The love affair between Elizabeth Patterson and Jerome Bonaparte was
the subject of two motion pictures, nineteen twenty fours Glorious
(05:48):
Betsy and nineteen thirty six's Hearts Divided. Their son was
not allowed to use the name Bonaparte, although Betsy did
manage to get Napoleon to invite a yearly stipend to
help raise him. After Napole was defeated at Waterloo, Betsy
traveled with her son in Europe and even met his grandmother,
Maria Bonaparte, Napoleon's mother. She had hopes of marrying him
(06:08):
back into the Bonaparte family, but he preferred America. He
returned to Baltimore and in nineteen twenty nine reared a
beautiful heiress and took on the life of a gentleman farmer.
In eighteen forty eight, Drum's cousin Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, the
son of Napoleon's brother. Louis, became President of France and
in eighteen fifty one proclaimed himself in per Napoleon, the
third of the Second French Empire. In eighteen fifty four,
(06:32):
Louis Napoleon restored to his cousin the right to use
the name Bonaparte, although he did not recognize him in
the line of succession, as that doing would invalidate the
claims of Jerome's children by Catherine of Wurtenberg. Beau was
now officially Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte, the American Bonaparte. Beau Bonaparte
had two sons, The oldest, Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte. The second
(06:54):
attended West Point and served in the US Army from
eighteen forty eight to eighteen fifty four, when it was
invited by his cousin, Emperor Louis Napoleon to join the
French Army, where he served in several campaigns and rose
to the rank of lieutenant colonel. The younger son was
named Charles Joseph Badaparte. Born in eighteen fifty one. Charles
was a Harvard trade lawyer who became a political reformer.
(07:15):
One of the Republican progressives of the day, He helped
to found the Reform League of Baltimore, which took on
corruption in Baltimore politics. His interest in civil reform brought
him to the attention of the most famous progressive of
the day, future US President Theodore Roosevelt. In nineteen oh five,
Roosevelt appointed him Secretary of the Navy, where he directed
naval and marine personnel to assist in release efforts following
(07:38):
the San Francisco earthquake. In nineteen oh six, when Attorney
General William Henry Moody was appointed to the Supreme Court,
Roosevelt appointed Charles to replace him as Attorney General. He
was a tireless trustbuster, breaking up the tobacco monopoly and
became known as Charlie the crook Chaser. And in nineteen
oh eight he used Department of Justice expense funds to
(07:59):
hire thirty four employees who had served as an investigative
agency reporting to the Department of Justice. The organization today
is known as the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Yes, the
FBI was created by Napoleon Bonapartes great nephew, So what
happened to the American Bonapartes. Charles had no children, then
(08:21):
died in nineteen twenty one at the age of seventy.
His older brother, Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte the Second, who served
in the French Army, returned to Baltimore after the Franco
Prussian War, married a widow and they had two children.
His daughter, Eugenie, married a German count. They have several
surviving descendants, but being a daughter, she did not keep
the name Bonaparte. His son Jerne Napoleon Charles Bonaparte, the
(08:43):
great great nephew of Emperor Napoleon the First, died without
children in nineteen forty five, the last of the American Bonapartes.
And as for the one who started it all, Napoleon's
brother Jerome, who married the beautiful American and couldn't take
Ugomont at Waterloo. He went into exile after the battle,
returned to French politics after his nephew Louis Napoleon became emperor.
(09:04):
He was made a Marshal of France and served as
President of the French Senate. He died in eighteen sixty.
His detendants, through Catherine of Wurtemberg of the last remaining
line of the Imperial House of Bonaparte, and I mentioned
an odd connection to the Duke of Wellington, who led
the coalition forces of the Battle of Waterloo. Betsy Patterson
had an older brother, Robert Patterson, who married another heiress,
(09:27):
Baltimore Bell named Marian Caton. Robert died in eighteen twenty two,
leaving Maryankaton Patterson a widow. She remarried a British peer
named Richard Wellesley, the first Marquess Wellesley, who was the
great great great great grandfather of Queen Elizabeth Scond and
the older brother of Arthur Wellesley, better known as the
(09:50):
Duke of Wellington. A final twist in the story of
the American bonapartes.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
And great job is always by Greg Hengler and a
special thanks to The History Guy. And if you want
more stories of forgotten history, please subscribe to The History
Guy's YouTube channel, The History Guy colon history deserves to
be remembered. This is our American stories, the story of
the American Bonapartes,
This is our American Stories, and our next story comes
to us from a man who simply known as the
History Guy. His videos are watched by hundreds of thousands
of people of all ages on YouTube. The History Guy
has also heard here at our American Stories. If at
the height of his power in eighteen ten, someone had
approached Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte and told him that in about
(00:34):
one hundred years his great nephew would be the Secretary
of the United States Navy and be responsible for setting
up arguably the most successful law enforcement agency in the
world in the new country of America. He probably would
have laughed or had you sent to an asylum. Here's
the History Guy with the story of the American Bonapartes.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
On June eighteenth, eighteen fifteen, one of the most important
and well known battles in history was fought in Belgium
between the French army of the Emperor Napoleon and armies
of the Seventh Coalition commanded by the Duke of Wellington,
the Battle of Waterloo. A significant part of that storied
battle occurred on Napoleon's left, at a walled farmhouse called Yugomont.
(01:30):
Napoleon sent a division to attack the farm, which Willington
knew he must hold. Historians today disagree or whether that
attack was merely a diversion intended to draw Willington's reserves
away from his center, whether Napoleon thought that Yugomont must
be taken, but in either case, the battle started at
the walls of Yugomont, and by many accounts, was lost
(01:50):
there as the farm, although nearly destroyed, never felt. Willington
observed after the battle that the success of the battle
turned on the closing of the gates at Hugomont. The
French commander whose division was to take the farm was
Jerome Bonaparte, Napoleon's youngest brother, and Jerome Buonaparte had a
(02:12):
little known connection to his opponent, the Duke of Wellington,
through the nearly forgotten American Bonapartes. It is a story
that deserves to be remembered. Jerome Bonaparte was born in
Corsica in seventeen eighty four, the youngest brother of Napoleon Bonaparte.
His father, Carlo Bonaparte, died when Jerome was just three
(02:32):
months old. His mother struggled after the death of his father,
and he grew up an unruly child. While his brother,
now the head of the family in a rising general
in the French army, sent him to a Catholic university.
Jerome was a lack student, more interested in the ladies
than his studies. Exasperated, Napoleon sent Jerome to join the
navy in the hopes that the military would straighten him out.
(02:55):
While he was a successful naval officer, Jerome was still
not quite straightened out. In eighteen o three, at the
age of nineteen, Drum was serving with the French Navy
in the Caribbean when he decided to visit the United States.
It seems that he had inadvertently fired on a British ship,
and given that his brother was the first consul of
France and France and England had sign a peace treaty
(03:16):
in eighteen oh two, Drum had to lay low for
a while to avoid an international incident that might start
another war. While in America, a friend at buys Jerome,
who always said that he just loved beautiful things, that
the most beautiful women in America were in Baltimore. William
Patterson was born in Ireland and came to America before
the Revolution. He ran guns during the War, and after
(03:39):
became a successful and very wealthy businessman in Baltimore. He
married and raised a large family, including a daughter, Elizabeth Patterson,
affectionately called Betsy. In eighteen o three, Betsy Patterson was
seventeen years old, very wealthy, and generally regarded as the
most beautiful woman in America. It's not clear whaere Betsy
(04:00):
Patterson and Jerome Bonapartners met, likely at some ball or
social gathering, but they fell madly in love. For Jerome
it may simply have been his love of beautiful things,
but for Betsy was a chance at fame, an independence,
and a way out of a dreary American marriage. They
married on Christmas Eve, eighteen o three, but that was
(04:21):
a problem for Jerome's brother Napoleon. He wanted his brothers
to have marriages that served his ambitions and expected to
marry Jerome to European royalty. Marriage to an American, even
one of the wealthiest in the nation, was not acceptable.
Napoleon ordered Jerome to leave Betsy and returned to France.
In the fall of eighteen o four. Jerome took Betsy,
(04:42):
now pregnant, with him, to visit France. In the hopes
of changing his brother's mind, but Napoleon forbade her landing
in France or even on the continent. While Jerome went
to France to pleay their case, she went to England
and in July eighteen oh five had a son, whom
they named Jerome Napoleon, affectionately called Beaux. But Napoleon Bonaparte
(05:04):
was a man who did not take no for an answer.
As Druam pleaded his case and still made promises to Betsy,
she gave up and sailed back to Baltimore. In the
fall of eighteen oh five, Napoleon annulled the marriage by decree.
In eighteen oh seven, Betsy got word that Napoleon had
made her husband king of the newly created Kingdom of
Westphalia and had married Jerome to a German, Princess Catherine
(05:26):
of Wurtemberg. Many argued that he still loved Betsy Patterson,
but could not defy the will of his brother. He
wrote to his brother, Lucian, you know the feelings of
my heart, and you know the well being and benefit
of my family alone forced me to make other ties.
The love affair between Elizabeth Patterson and Jerome Bonaparte was
the subject of two motion pictures, nineteen twenty fours Glorious
(05:48):
Betsy and nineteen thirty six's Hearts Divided. Their son was
not allowed to use the name Bonaparte, although Betsy did
manage to get Napoleon to invite a yearly stipend to
help raise him. After Napole was defeated at Waterloo, Betsy
traveled with her son in Europe and even met his grandmother,
Maria Bonaparte, Napoleon's mother. She had hopes of marrying him
(06:08):
back into the Bonaparte family, but he preferred America. He
returned to Baltimore and in nineteen twenty nine reared a
beautiful heiress and took on the life of a gentleman farmer.
In eighteen forty eight, Drum's cousin Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, the
son of Napoleon's brother. Louis, became President of France and
in eighteen fifty one proclaimed himself in per Napoleon, the
third of the Second French Empire. In eighteen fifty four,
(06:32):
Louis Napoleon restored to his cousin the right to use
the name Bonaparte, although he did not recognize him in
the line of succession, as that doing would invalidate the
claims of Jerome's children by Catherine of Wurtenberg. Beau was
now officially Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte, the American Bonaparte. Beau Bonaparte
had two sons, The oldest, Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte. The second
(06:54):
attended West Point and served in the US Army from
eighteen forty eight to eighteen fifty four, when it was
invited by his cousin, Emperor Louis Napoleon to join the
French Army, where he served in several campaigns and rose
to the rank of lieutenant colonel. The younger son was
named Charles Joseph Badaparte. Born in eighteen fifty one. Charles
was a Harvard trade lawyer who became a political reformer.
(07:15):
One of the Republican progressives of the day, He helped
to found the Reform League of Baltimore, which took on
corruption in Baltimore politics. His interest in civil reform brought
him to the attention of the most famous progressive of
the day, future US President Theodore Roosevelt. In nineteen oh five,
Roosevelt appointed him Secretary of the Navy, where he directed
naval and marine personnel to assist in release efforts following
(07:38):
the San Francisco earthquake. In nineteen oh six, when Attorney
General William Henry Moody was appointed to the Supreme Court,
Roosevelt appointed Charles to replace him as Attorney General. He
was a tireless trustbuster, breaking up the tobacco monopoly and
became known as Charlie the crook Chaser. And in nineteen
oh eight he used Department of Justice expense funds to
(07:59):
hire thirty four employees who had served as an investigative
agency reporting to the Department of Justice. The organization today
is known as the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Yes, the
FBI was created by Napoleon Bonapartes great nephew, So what
happened to the American Bonapartes. Charles had no children, then
(08:21):
died in nineteen twenty one at the age of seventy.
His older brother, Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte the Second, who served
in the French Army, returned to Baltimore after the Franco
Prussian War, married a widow and they had two children.
His daughter, Eugenie, married a German count. They have several
surviving descendants, but being a daughter, she did not keep
the name Bonaparte. His son Jerne Napoleon Charles Bonaparte, the
(08:43):
great great nephew of Emperor Napoleon the First, died without
children in nineteen forty five, the last of the American Bonapartes.
And as for the one who started it all, Napoleon's
brother Jerome, who married the beautiful American and couldn't take
Ugomont at Waterloo. He went into exile after the battle,
returned to French politics after his nephew Louis Napoleon became emperor.
(09:04):
He was made a Marshal of France and served as
President of the French Senate. He died in eighteen sixty.
His detendants, through Catherine of Wurtemberg of the last remaining
line of the Imperial House of Bonaparte, and I mentioned
an odd connection to the Duke of Wellington, who led
the coalition forces of the Battle of Waterloo. Betsy Patterson
had an older brother, Robert Patterson, who married another heiress,
(09:27):
Baltimore Bell named Marian Caton. Robert died in eighteen twenty two,
leaving Maryankaton Patterson a widow. She remarried a British peer
named Richard Wellesley, the first Marquess Wellesley, who was the
great great great great grandfather of Queen Elizabeth Scond and
the older brother of Arthur Wellesley, better known as the
(09:50):
Duke of Wellington. A final twist in the story of
the American bonapartes.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
And great job is always by Greg Hengler and a
special thanks to The History Guy. And if you want
more stories of forgotten history, please subscribe to The History
Guy's YouTube channel, The History Guy colon history deserves to
be remembered. This is our American stories, the story of
the American Bonapartes,
Host
Lee Habeeb
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