The Island, fostered and cared for in every way by the East
India Company, had, at this time, risen to the very acme of its prosperity.
The great increase in the circulation of money, caused by
the large garrison which came in with Napoleon, was soon felt by
the inhabitants to be to their advantage; but unfortunately this
cause of prosperity, like the lavish expenditure of the Company, only
tended to draw away the attention of the inhabitants from cultivating
the soil to more easy and ready, but less certain, methods of earning
a living. In the history of St. Helena it is much to be regretted
that artificial sources of trade have always led to a neglect of agricultural
industry, and as generation after generation grew up dependent
upon other sources, the inhabitants, not having been forced
to it, have never learnt the true value of the soil around them.
Napoleon, very soon after his arrival, showed a disinclination to
be sociable; doubtless he was aware, even at that time, of the presence
of a disease, which, unsuspected by those around him, was so
silently but surely hastening a termination of his earthly career.
His illness, as it became serious, was of brief duration, and at about
six o’clock in the evening of the 5th May, 1821, he died at Long-
wood Old House.*
* “ The Post-Mortem Examination o f the First Napoleon's Body.—In the exhibition at
present open in the Mechanic’s Hall, Dumfries, there is shown by Major Young, of Lincluden
a lock of hair cut from the head of the Great Napoleon after death, a letter in connexion with
which is of some historical value. Hitherto French writers have represented that the postmortem
examination of Napoleon’s body was an unwarrantable liberty, taken in opposition to
the deceased’s wish. The letter was only discovered, along with the lock of hair, three years
ago, by Major Young, in a secret drawer of an old writing-desk belonging to his father, to
whom the epistle was written by Dr. Short, a native of Dumfries, who held the office of principal
medical officer of the British staff at St. Helena, and who superintended the dissection.
It is as follows:—
“ ‘St. Helena, 7th May, 1821.
“ * M y d e a r Si b ,—You will, no doubt, be much surprised to hear of Bonaparte’s death
who expired on the 5th of May, after an illness of some standing. His disease was cancer in
the stomach, that must have lasted some years, and been in a state of ulceration some months
I was in consultation and attendance several days, but he would not see strangers. I was
officially introduced the moment he died. His face in death was the most beautiful I ever
beheld, exhibiting softness and every good expression in the highest degree, and really seemed
formed to conquer. The following day I superintended the dissection of his body (at this time
his countenance was much altered),—which was done at his own request, to ascertain the exact
seat of the disease (which he imagined to be where it was afterwards discovered to be), with the
view of benefiting his son, who might inherit it. During the whole of his illness he never complained,
and kept his character to the last. The disease being hereditary, his father having
died of it, and his sister, the Princess Borghese, being supposed to have it, proves to the world
that climate and mode of life had no hand in it, and contrary to the assertions of Messrs.
O’Meara and Stokoe, his liver was perfectly sound; and had he been on the throne of France
instead of an inhabitant of St, Helena, he would equally have suffered, as no earthly power could
cure the disease when formed.’ ”—North British Advertiser, 2nd August, 1873.