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Almost from the moment that Napoleon Bonaparte drew his last breath in May 1821, medical experts and historians have argued about the cause of his death at the age of 51.

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Was it cancer, as officially reported? At least one doctor present at the postmortem examination disagreed, claiming it was hepatitis. Other experts have suggested syphilis or tuberculosis or malaria. Some even believe that former emperor was assassinated – poisoned by an enemy.

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It now seems likely that none of these illnesses caused his death, and there is no evidence that anybody did, or tried to, kill him. In 1982, however, more than 160 years after Napoleon’s death, a respected British chemist unearthed evidence that the great man was indeed poisoned – but by a thing, not a person. And that thing may well have been the wallpaper in his house on St. Helena, where the British had exiled Napoleon in 1815.

Isolation and Despair 

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St. Helena is a hot and humid volcanic rock jutting out of the Atlantic Ocean some 1,200 miles off the west coast of Africa. Longwood House, where Napoleon resided his French officers and servants, was a single-story building so damp that the paper on its walls was moldy and peeling.

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At first, life on St. Helena seems to have been tolerable for Napoleon, who enjoyed gardening and riding horseback. As time went on, however, his custodians permitted him less and less freedom. Increasingly deprived of companions and outdoor activity, he became depressed, spent much of his time indoors, and lapsed into chronic ill health. He suffered from chills, nausea, fevers. At times his legs would swell so that he could not walk without pain, and he had pain in his shoulder and in the region of the liver. In addition, he suffered frequent spells of vomiting and complained of headaches, lethargy, and dizziness. His skin began to take on a yellowish tinge.

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Attendant doctors were puzzled. Medicines occasionally relieved some of the pain and anguish, but Napoleon remained sick, his condition further weakened by each bout of illness. One or two doctors decided that he was, quite simply, a hypochondriac; others diagnosed his ailment as chronic hepatitis.

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Whatever was wrong, it could not be cured. Eventually the former emperor was confined to a small bed in the damp living room of Longwood house. There he slipped into a coma from which he never awoke.

 

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On May 6, 1821 – the day after napoleon died – his body was dissected and the internal organs carefully examined by a group of British physicians. Their report, that the renowned French prisoner had succumbed to a “cancerous ulcer” of the stomach, must have gratified the authorities in London, for it apparently absolved them of any blame or negligence. Cancer than, as today, was considered a killer disease; moreover, Napoleon’s father had died of it.

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The controversy over that diagnosis stems in part from suspicion of a cover-up by the British. But many medical experts are also convinced that the details of Napoleon’s symptoms, as well as the recorded condition of his internal organs at the postmortem, are incompatible, however, with the effects of an accumulation of poisonous arsenic of the human system.

A Lock of Hair, a Scrap of Paper

 

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It was in 1961 that Dr. Sten Forshufvud of Sweden jolted historians with his theory that Napoleon had died of arsenic poisoning. Forshufvud came to this conclusion after analysis of a lock of Napoleon’s hair (believed to have been cut on the day of the postmortem) revealed concentrations of arsenic.

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Even so, this did not prove that Napoleon had been murdered. Limited amounts of arsenic were a common ingredient of medicines in Napoleon’s day. The ailing exile must have taken more than a fair share of tem, which could account for the presence of arsenic in the hair. There is no reason to assume that a clever assassin laced the man’s tonics with additional amounts in order to hasten his demise. But it now seems probable that additional amounts were “supplied.” A British Chemist, Dr. David Jones, has discovered what he calls “a neat chemical answer to a small historical mystery.”

In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, a type of pigment known as Scheele’s green was extensively used to color fabrics, paints, and wallpapers. The pigment contained arsenic, but was generally harmless in fabrics and paint. It was also safe in wallpaper on a dry wall. In a damp room, however, Scheele’s green could become moldy and would release arsenic in the form of vapor, which occupants of the room would unknowingly inhale.

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Like so many Napoleonic relics, sample wallpaper from the Longwood House living room at the time of Napoleon’s residence has been preserved. Nothing its green design, Jones gained permission to submit the sample to laboratory tests; it contained a substantial amount of arsenic.

 

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So was the emperor an unwitting victim of a nonhuman enemy? In view of the extraordinary humidity of St. Helena and the dampness of the room where he died, moldy, green patterned wall-paper cannot be excluded as a prime suspect.

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The poisonous properties of Scheele’s green mere recognized early in 1800’s. The pigment was used much less extensively in room decorations as the century wore on. According to Jones, however, by 1900 Scheele’s green had given symptoms of arsenic poisoning to: hundreds of luckless householders.” In fact, in the 1950’s a bedroom in the palatial Roman residence of Mrs. Clare Boothe Luce, who was the U.S. ambassador to Italy, was redecorated. Why? Because Mrs. Luce felt unwell and her symptoms were eventually attributed to arsenic poisoning from flaking paint on the ceiling, which had been decorated with roses. Her health improved after the ceiling was repainted.

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Death of an Emperor: Did Napoleon die from natural causes, or at the ands of skillful enemy? Or was he the victim of some nonhuman agency? Such speculation has been rife ever since he died in 1821 (above). His tranquil death mark (top) gives us no clues.