Josephine de Beauharnais was Napoleon's first wife and the love that haunted his career. They met in Paris in 1795 — she a thirty-two-year-old Creole widow from Martinique whose first husband had been guillotined in the Terror; he a rising twenty-six-year-old artillery officer about to be sent to command the Army of Italy. They married in March 1796; two days later Napoleon left for the Italian campaign and began the series of letters that became the most famous love correspondence in modern military history. Je n'ai pas passé un jour sans t'aimer; je n'ai pas passé une nuit sans te serrer dans mes bras — "I have not passed a day without loving you; I have not passed a night without holding you in my arms." Crowned Empress at Notre-Dame in 1804 alongside her husband, she remained at his side through the height of the Empire — until the absence of a male heir forced their divorce in 1810. Josephine retained the title of Empress and the chateau of Malmaison; she died there in 1814 shortly after Napoleon's first abdication. Napoleon visited her tomb after his return from Elba the following year, and is said to have spoken of her on St. Helena until his own death in 1821.

This King & Country two-figure set captures the Imperial couple at the height of their court life — Napoleon in the green Chasseur à Cheval de la Garde tunic he favored for personal dress, gold epaulettes at the shoulders, the crimson sash of the Legion d'Honneur across his chest, white waistcoat and breeches, black tall boots, the bicorne hat held in his left hand. Josephine stands beside him in a pale blue Empire-line gown richly embroidered with gold motifs, a wine-velvet manteau trimmed with ermine fur and gold lace draped from her shoulders, long white opera gloves, the small red velvet reticule at her wrist that was the fashionable accessory of the Imperial court. Her hair is dressed high in the Empire style with a jeweled ornament. The set is the personal-life counterpart to the campaign-dress Napoleon as Colonel and Napoleon as Colonel of the Imperial Guard figures showing the Emperor in field service, and pairs with the Mameluk Roustam bodyguard who would have stood watch at the Imperial residence at Saint-Cloud or the Tuileries.

Set Number: NA414 / King & Country / 1/30 (60mm) scale / matte finish / 2-figure set