Appendix (3)
Reputed Letters of Napoleon to Josephine. Taken From the Memoirs of Madame Ducrest
The author asked the advice of Monsieur Frédéric Masson about these Letters, to which he at once received the courteous reply, “Il faut absolument rejeter les Lettres publiées par Regnault Varin94 et reproduites par Georgette Ducrest; pas une n’est authentique.” No one who has read much of Napoleon’s correspondence can in fact believe for a moment in their authenticity. They are interesting, however, as showing the sort of stuff which went to form our grandfathers’ fallacies about the relations of Napoleon and Josephine. Madame Ducrest occasionally played and sang for Josephine after the divorce. Her father was a nephew of Madame de Genlis. Madame Ducrest married a musical composer, M. Bochsa, the then celebrated author of Dansomanie and Noces de Gamache. He afterwards deserted her, and her voice having completely failed, she was compelled to write her Memoirs to earn sustenance thereby. Of these Memoirs M. Masson has said,95 that “in the midst of apocryphal documents, uncontroverted anecdotes, impossible situations, are yet to be found some first-hand personal observations.”