1812 in France

Incumbents

• Emperor - Napoleon I

Events

• The Peninsular War
• 12 February - Metric system rescinded for everyday use
• 24 June - 14 December - The French invasion of Russia

Arts and culture

Births

• 4 January - Alexandre Monnet, bishop
• 15 April - Théodore Rousseau, painter
• 13 June - Adolphe Braun, photographer
• 9 November - Paul Abadie, architect
• 15 November – Adolphe Pierre Leleux, painter

Deaths

• 13 February - Jacques Marie Boutet, actor and comic dramatist
• 24 February - Étienne-Louis Malus, military officer, engineer, physicist, and mathematician
• 24 July - Louis Thomas Villaret de Joyeuse, admiral
• 30 August - Gabriel-Marie Legouvé, poet
• 22 October - Alexis Joseph Delzons, general
• 29 October - Emmanuel Maximilien-Joseph Guidal, general
• 22 December - Pierre Henri Larcher, classical scholar and archaeologist

Exact date missing

• Jean Baptiste Eblé, general