2-489-582 - © Fine Art Images/Heritage Images

Emperor Napoleon III of France on his deathbed, 1873. Charles Louis Napoleon Bonaparte (1808-1873) was President of the French Second Republic from 1849 until 1852, when he restored the French Empire and ruled as Napoleon III. He was forced into exile after France's defeat in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871. He died at Chislehurst in Kent on 9 January 1873 from complications arising from an operation to remove a bladder stone.