Strasbourg Coup
The Strasbourg Coup was an attempted coup launched on 30 October 1836 by Louis Napoleon in the Eastern French city of Strasbourg. The attempt was rapidly defeated.
Since the death of Napoleon's son Napoleon II in Vienna in 1832, Louis has proclaimed himself the heir to his uncle and leader of the Bonapartist cause. In his planning he was strongly influenced by the dramatic success of Napoleon's return from Elba in 1815 when large swathes of the French Army had defected to him. Based in Switzerland, he had built a network of conspirators in the nearby city of Strasbourg including the colonel of a regiment garrisoned there. He planned that defecting troops would follow him in a march to Paris to topple the July Monarchy of Louis Philippe I.
Beginning at dawn on 30 October,the planned putsch failed rapidly. Although members of the garrison acclaimed Louis Napoleon, the commanding general escaped and within two hours loyal troops had arrested him and refused the coup. Rather than guillotine or imprison the young pretender, Louis Philippe simply had him exiled. He was put on board a ship sailing to the United States.
He returned to Europe and lived in prominent exile in Britain. Following the French Revolution of 1848, Louis Napoleon was elected as President of the Second Republic and the seized power in an 1851 coup, declaring himself as Emperor Napoleon III the following year.