Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte — Complete

How it begins

NAPOLEON BONAPARTE was born at Ajaccio, in Corsica, on the 15th of August 1769; the original orthography of his name was Buonaparte, but he suppressed the "u" during his first campaign in Italy. His motives for so doing were merely to render the spelling conformable with the pronunciation, and to abridge his signature. He signed Buonaparte even after the famous 13th Vendemiaire. It has been affirmed that he was born in 1768, and that he represented himself to be a year younger than he really was. This is untrue.