The First Terrorist? Felice Orsini - The Man Who Tried to Kill Emperor Napoleon III

In this episode of HISTORY’S DEVILS, host James Crossland is joined by Lisa Traynor (Royal Armouries) to uncover the story of Felice Orsini—the little-known figure behind the first modern terrorist attack.

A radical Italian nationalist, Orsini changed undertandings of political violence with his 1858 assassination attempt on Napoleon III in Paris. Using a unique improvised explosive device known as the Orsini Bomb, his actions inspired a generationa of radicals and pioneered the tactic of terrorism for the modern age.

This episode explores the origins of terrorism, revolutionary politics, and the rise of political violence in 19th-century Europe. How did Orsini’s attack influence future extremists? And why has his legacy been largely forgotten?

Check out James’ book on the subject: The Rise of Devils: Fear & The Origins of Modern Terrorism

See what Lisa and her team are up to at Britain’s Royal Armouries Museum in Leeds

Further Reading

Michael St John Packe, The Bombs of Orsini

Carola Dietze, The Invention of Terrorism in Europe, Russia and the United States

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Modern Terrorism

02:46 The Life and Times of Felice Orsini

05:38 Political Context of 19th Century Italy

08:28 The Rise of Italian Nationalism

11:12 Orsini's Revolutionary Activities

14:14 The Daring Escape from Prison

17:01 Orsini's Celebrity Status and Impact

19:43 The Shift to Terrorism as Tactic

22:36 The Availability of Weapons in the 19th Century

26:17 The Velodog and Personal Protection

28:32 Orsini's Revolutionary Ideals

29:31 The Design and Function of the Orsini Bomb

35:20 The Spectacle of Terrorism

41:32 The Aftermath and Political Repercussions

49:19 Legacy of Orsini and the Concept of Terrorism

Thanks to SOULFULJAMTRACKS for their tune "Dark Halloween"

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History's Devils is a history podcast exploring the lives of murderers, charlatans, psychopaths, dictators, war criminals, tyrants, demagogues, revolutionaries, cult leaders, conquerors, fraudsters, and other controversial figures.

History's Devils is hosted by James Crossland, professor of international history and author of:

Rogue Agent: From Secret Plots to Psychological Warfare, the Untold Story of Robert Bruce Lockhart

The Rise of Devils: Fear and the Origins of Modern Terrorism...

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:16

Hello, folks, and welcome to History's Devils, a podcast journey through the lives of murderers, charlatans, psychopaths, and shithels. My name is James Crossland, and as a historian, I'm pretty laid back. Like I don't I don't have unshakably strong opinions about stuff. I'm a kind of live and let debate kind of guy. If I'm at a conference and there's some professors who are arguing about whether the T-34 tank was really superior to the Panzer Mark IV or whatever it is, I'm the guy at the back of the room with the popcorn having a laugh. That said, there is one viewpoint of history upon which I can be pretty goddamn firm. And that is the opinion that modern terrorism, which to give it a definition, because everyone's got to have a definition, terrorism, you can define it in God knows how many ways. My definition is that terrorism is a non-state actor using violence or the threat of same to publicize a political grievance to effect political change. I will argue that that tactic was pioneered on a freezing night in Paris in 1858, the 14th of January, to be precise, when an Italian nationalist, a man by the name of Felice Orsini, someone who very few people have heard of, he's kind of lost their history. Him and three cohorts hurled improvised explosive devices at a carriage containing the Emperor of France, Napoleon III, and importantly, not just the Emperor, but the couple of hundred or so admirers around the carriage. The explosions that ensued killed eight of those people, wounded 150 others. There was a mass panic across France. There was a clampdown by the authorities, a suppression of dissent against the emperor. There was international fallout. There was a war in Italy. There was press coverage all over the world of this attack. It was a big, big deal. I will argue that that's our first act of modern terrorism, and that the author of that act, Felice Orsini, could be considered to be the world's first terrorist. And helping me to discuss this today, I am very happy to introduce the curator of firearms at the United Kingdom's Royal Armory in Leeds. She knows more about things that fire bullets and stuff that explodes than anyone I know. She is Lisa Trainer. Lisa, welcome to History's Devils.

SPEAKER_00 2:43

Thank you for having me. Hello.

SPEAKER_01 2:46

So, Lisa, today we're talking about a guy, and I should note, just to do some cheap plugging at the start here, we're talking about a guy. We're talking about him on Apple, on Spotify, wherever you download podcasts, as well as for those who are inclined to look at this sort of stuff. We are on the YouTube machine at History's Devils. You can watch videos there. We are talking about a guy who was a revolutionary. He was a would-be assassin, as mentioned, of Napoleon III. Possibly the world's first terrorist. Big deal. And yet, very few people know who Felice Orsini was. So my first question is: when did you hear about this guy? And in what in what context did you hear about him?

SPEAKER_00 3:27

Um, it's about nine, ten years ago now. So, and I discovered him, as you said, by accident, really. I was looking for something else. So I was looking up um the infernal machine attack on uh Louis-Philippe in 1835 by Fichi. So can you you remember the the machine that was like on a frame? It's about 25 barrels.

SPEAKER_01 3:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:51

You set it off pointing at him.

SPEAKER_01 3:53

Fascinating contraption.

SPEAKER_00 3:55

Yeah, and and lots of it, lots of the barrels blew up in his face. And then I think the French authorities actually they actually sewed him up to guillotine him.

SPEAKER_01 4:07

So his head was in time before they guillotined him.

SPEAKER_00 4:11

So and then from there, from the infernal machine in 1835, we went back to the infernal machine involving Napoleon the first, when he was on his way to a the opera, which was just that was kind of just like a keg of powder, wasn't it, on a card for when Napoleon and Josephine came past. And then I think it was just like a slap by a sleight of hand or a mistake, I managed to get Napoleon III up. And then I was like, hello, what what this is what's this? This isn't an infernal machine, this is something called an Orsini bomb, which I'd never heard of. And so then I went into it and and found found our friend uh Felice Orsini and his co-conspirators hurling the bomb at uh at the carriage, yeah. So yeah, on their way to the opera.

SPEAKER_01 4:58

Well, that's the thing, it's it's it's not out of the blue. This, as you say, it's it's it's there's a line of of there's a tradition almost of this kind of assassination happening. But he's different because, well, for reasons we'll get into that the context in which he's doing this is different. The bomb itself is very revolutionary. But before we get into all that, I do have to I do have to say from the start, we need some background. This stuff is important to understand where this guy comes from, what his motivation is, and what he's trying to achieve by killing Napoleon. Because it's it's not just a regicide. That's the thing about this. He's not just trying to kill a guy, he's trying to achieve something bigger, something more political. To explain where Arsini comes from, what his gripe is with Napoleon III, we have to understand that Italy in the mid-19th century is not Italy as we understand it today. To get to that point, we have to go back to the story of the first more successful Napoleon, who you just mentioned survived his own assassination attempt. Napoleon Bonaparte kept Europe in a state of perpetual war from the early 1800s, you know, 1803 to 1815. He's defeated at the Battle of Waterloo there uh on the 18th of June. He's then exiled to St. Helena, this godforsaken rock in the uh southern Atlantic Ocean. He dies in 1821, and that's the end of him. What he leaves behind geopolitically is very important for our story, though, because before the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars that happened, Italy, that you know, the big stiletto boot kicking into the Mediterranean, it's not a country, it's a bunch of different kingdoms, principalities, it's fragmented. But then when Napoleon conquers Italy, he sets up this thing that's gonna become the called the Kingdom of Italy, which is in in northern Italy mostly. And it's it's the first time that there's the first iteration of what's going to become the Italian flag with the colours red, white, and green used. And it's during this period, and I think it's his stepson he puts in charge of the Kingdom of Italy. Yeah, yeah, big big on the nepotism, Napoleon putting family members all around Europe. And it's there that this idea of an Italian nation really starts to take root with a generation of Italians looking around, going, well, why why can't we, you know, have a have this entire peninsula unified? And here's the thing about the French Revolution and this whole period of the Napoleonic Wars, a whole bunch of isms come out of this, you know, big ideas, the the isms of socialism, republicanism, liberalism, they all get they all get supercharged by this event. And one of those isms is nationalism. So at the end of the, at the end of the Napoleonic Wars, you've got a bunch of people across Europe saying, well, we we'd like to have our own nations, please, not be governed by by emperors. The problem is that the peace conference that's called in 1815, after Napoleon's defeat, this thing called the Congress of Vienna, the the people at that conference, they want to pretend like none of this has ever happened. They want to pretend like the French Revolution never happened. They want to reset Europe and the map of Europe back to the way it was. And for Italy, that means fragmenting it into this thing called the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, which is in southern Italy. Northern Italy is controlled by the Emperor of Austria. And then in the middle, the Pope controls what becomes the Papal States. So that, roughly speaking, is the Italy, this mutilated Italy into which Orsini is born in 1819. And he's born in the Papal States. Now, his father, Andrea Orsini, he is a revolutionary. He's one of these guys from that generation who is thinking about the Napoleonic era and saying, well, why couldn't we continue just having a kingdom of Italy? Why is the Austrian Emperor here? Uh, why why is that why is the Pope in charge of anything? Why can't we have a nation state that is, and this is the other thing about nationalism in this period, it's not nationalism as we think of today, it's actually more of a left-wing ideology. So these people they want a republic, they want liberalism. Some of them are socialists, but they all see this idea of a unified Italy as the only way to do that. An Italy without popes and without foreign emperors in charge. Now, where Napoleon III comes into this is that the Pope does not have an army, but he does have Catholic supporters. And France, big Catholic country, largest land army in Europe, Napoleon III is going to become the Pope's backer, basically, his military backer, the guy who, the guy who keeps him where he is. And so that that puts Napoleon III up against this generation of Italian nationalists. And Orsini, as mentioned, is one of these guys. He's raised into it by his father. He falls in with the the sort of leader of the Italian nationalists, a guy called Giuseppe Mazzini. And Mazzini, he is an old school revolutionary. He wants another French revolution. He wants blood on the streets, barricades, heads on spikes, that sort of stuff. And he's not the only one in Europe who wants this. In 1848, you get an explosion of revolutions across Europe, not just in Italy, but in Spain, in Germany, in the Eastern Europe, in the Austrian Empire, all kinds of places. And it's all, it's basically all nationalists wanting what the Congress of Vienna has deprived them. And Orsini is part of this, and this is really where he first kind of bursts onto history scene. He gets involved in what becomes known as the uh Republic of Rome, which is a very short-lived uh uh triumph, I guess, of sorts by the revolutionaries. They seize Rome, they hold it for, I think it's only about six months or so in uh 1849, and they kick out the Pope. The Pope actually uh escapes the city, disguised as a lowly monk, um, manages to get out before the revolutionaries get him, and he puts a call out to Catholics across Europe, you know, come and reclaim the eternal city for me. So all the Catholic states they rally to the Pope's banner. The Spanish send troops, the Austrians send troops, and Napoleon III sends troops. Um at this point he makes himself a certified enemy of people like Giuseppe Massini, Felice Osini, and the other Italian nationalists. Something to say about Napoleon III right now. I really hate Napoleon III. I think he's a terribly weak-willed, horrible man. Um uh so I have something in common with Osini. Uh but but the the reason why is this. So Napoleon III, when he comes to power after the 1848 revolutions, he he sets himself up as this liberal, reformist, progressive leader of France. You know, he's gonna basically positions himself like he's one of these nationalists who wants to, you know, have a republican-democratic Europe, blah de blah. But then when he gets the call from the Pope, he gets pressure from Catholics in France. And as I say, he's a very weak man, he's very weak-willed, he's desperate to get out of the shadow of his glorious ancestor. You know, he wants to be loved by his subjects, but he also kind of hates them and resents them. He's very thin-skinned. He wants to be a tough guy and be respected. Like there's all kinds of neuroses going on with this guy. And basically, what he he decides you know what? Sod my principles, sod this idea that I'm a liberal reformist. I'm gonna go with the Catholics, I'm gonna go with the Pope. That'll that'll make me a strong man. And so at that point, he he sends troops to Rome. That's the end of the short-lived Rom Republic. Orsini is part of the siege that follows. He doesn't do a lot of fighting, it must be said. He seems to be kind of in the background a bit. He's being overshadowed a lot by another notorious revolutionary of this era, a guy called Giuseppe Garibaldi, very, you know, impossibly dashing revolutionary celebrity in surgeon, basically the Shaguevara of this era. Um, but even he cannot hold Rome. Uh, so eventually that these nationalists have to scatter. And that's really the end of this first great attempt to to create this this nationalist uh Italy. And that should have been perhaps the end of Orsini's story, but but something really important happens here where he he goes from out of the shadows and he starts to become a celebrity, a celebrity insurgent a bit like Garibaldi. And that's mainly because he uh gets sent to Austria in the 1850s by Massini. His job is to subvert Austrian troops to tell them, you know, turn on your emperor, you can rise up like us. Because a lot of these guys are Hungarians, they're Czechs, they're Serbs, they're Croats, you know, people with their own nationalities who don't necessarily want to be under Austrian yoke. He's very naive, though. He gets betrayed by one of these guys, he gets thrown into prison, and he ends up uh being uh imprisoned in a um uh what is it, the castle of St. Giorgio, I think it is, in uh uh northern Italy. And it's here that he pulls off this incredibly daring escape. Have you read about this escape by Orsini?

SPEAKER_00 14:14

Yeah, it's amazing. Do we believe it? Do we believe a lot of what's what surrounds this man? But um, yeah, we'll go with it. We'll go with it. Tell the story.

SPEAKER_01 14:27

I mean, it's yeah, it's it's very over it's very over the top, but let's let's just tell it.

SPEAKER_00 14:32

So But he is everything he does is just Yes, it's his brand, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 14:39

He's you know, I again and one wonders to what extent he's sort of looking at Garibaldi and going, Well, why is he getting all the limelight? I should be this, you know, dashing so and so as well. But he does get a chance to to prove his his credentials as this sort of you know celebrity revolutionary because when he's imprisoned in this castle, he acquires some little saw blades. Now, he never quite explains where he gets these from. A pie. A pie, yeah. Smuggled in in a cake. Um, who knows? I uh I get the impression that there's probably some guard who sympathizes with the nationalists and smuggles them to him. I'm guessing that's it. Because he he says in his memoirs something like, you know, the Austrian government will never know how I did this.

SPEAKER_00 15:22

So he's like a like a magician or something.

SPEAKER_01 15:26

Yeah, exactly. He just produced them from thin air. But he's got these little saw blades, and over the course of 24 evenings, this is this is Shawshank redemption stuff. The course of 24 evenings, he slowly soars through the bars on his window. His cell is a good 90 feet up in the air in like this big ass stone tower. There's a ditch underneath. When it rains, the ditch has got water in it, but it's northern Italy, it ain't raining too much at this time of year, so so it's dry. And this is this is the the bit where I'm just like, this man is either very innovative or an incredible bullshit artist. He claims that he unfurls a thread from his shirt, ties walnut shells to it. Again, it's this is this prison rations, walnuts.

SPEAKER_00 16:12

Yeah, I was wondering that about the walnuts.

SPEAKER_01 16:13

It's a curious one. But it's a good little detail that is specifically walnut shells that he ties to this thread at three-foot intervals. He then throws the thread over the window and he judges based on which of the walnut shells is collected dirt, basically how far he's got to drop. Which is, you know, this guy's a planner, if nothing else. Having calculated this drop, he then proceeds to cut strips of bed sheets and weaves them into a rope, you know, sort of old old school prison escape stuff. Maybe he's the one who invented, I don't know. Um, he convinces the guards. This is again, this is another bit in the story where I'm like, doesn't anyone notice that his his bed sheet's getting smaller every day? It's a bit weird. Apparently, though, he convinces the guards, oh yeah, that I've just taken the bed sheet to the laundry or something, and and and all this. Meanwhile, he's hiding strips underneath his bed. So he takes him to the laundry, says, I need new sheets. I bring him new sheets, he met, he mangles those, all this. Again, sounds a bit far-fetched. Anyways, he eventually ties this thing off, gets the right footage on the on the rope, and then on the 27th of March, 1854, ties the sheets to the bed, squirms through the hole, he's cut in the bars, lowers himself down into the ditch, makes a daring escape. And he's pretty goddamn happy with himself, and rightly so if this is true. Yeah, because he screams this story from the rafters. He wants everyone to know. And in 1856, he publishes uh The Austrian Dungeons in Italy, a narrative of 15 months imprisonment and final escape. I loved book titles back then. No ambiguity. It's just this is the story. Um and he he he produces this book, this memoir of his time and his escape. It's a big hit. It's a big hit, principally amongst A, people who don't like Austrians, B, people who don't like Catholics, and C, people who don't like emperors, dictatorships, uh, autocratic governments, people who see themselves as progressive, democratic, freedom-loving types. And at the nexus of these people who like this are English middle class liberals. They love Orsini. These are the these are the guardian readers of this era. They absolutely fawn over Orsini. And so he's welcome with open arms to England, where he goes in in 1856 to peddle his book. And he he has this very successful book tour. He's he's lauded by people, he does all the big dinners and everything. He becomes a celebrity. And it should be said at this point that you know, this is this is not uncommon. Britain, uh, there are two places. If you're a radical in this period, there are two places you want to go. You want to go to Britain and you want to go to Switzerland. Because these are the two places that will accept radical asylum seekers. These are places that have got democracies. Uh, there's freedom of speech guaranteed to a certain extent. It's a different vibe to Napoleon III's France, let alone the Tsars of Russia, right? Uh so he he knows where his bread is buttered, goes to England. And but this is this is the key point about Orsini. So he's he's created this reputation, he's got a rep, but he's not satisfied being this celebrity rebel. He actually wants to make a difference. And this is where a key point happens in his development, which leads him to the path of taking or choosing terrorism. Because he realizes that the 1848 revolutions, these sort of old school, let's take to the streets, mass of you know, the people as armies, right? He realizes that that was futile, it didn't work. He also realizes that taking Rome and trying to hold that against armies, they're never going to be able to do that, the revolutionaries that don't have enough men, enough guns. So a new revolutionary tactic is needed. And that tactic is going to be terrorism. It's going to be what today we would call asymmetric warfare. And it should be noted that at the at this time, Orsini is probably reading uh a really interesting book that comes out in this era. It comes out in 1853, in fact. It's penned by a German radical called Karl Heinzen, and it's called Murder and Liberty. It's a fantastic title. I'm just going to have a quote here from this. This is Carl Heinzen, a fellow revolutionary of this period, more socialist than nationalist. But Heinzen says it is the duty of society when directed against a professional murderer, such as an emperor or a king, to use science to further their aims. He goes on. Physics and chemistry may become all the more important to the revolutionary than all your gallantry and military science. Heinzen is credited with coming up with the term um freedom fighter, Freiheitskamper. So we can credit him with that. And he's got a wonderful, you know, and again, it murder and liberty is full of great quotes, but but the real sort of you know dead-eyed stare one is it is the duty of the freedom fighter to murder the murderers. So what he's advocating for is murdering kings, murdering emperors, and using chemistry, you know, science, explosives, whatever, to do so. This is this is terrorism. This is terrorist theory right there in the mid-1850s. So I guess the question is, in this time period, how easy is it for someone like a Karl Heinzen or a Felice Orsini to throw together an improvised explosive device? How how easy is it to get hold of explosives, weapons? What's available at this time?

SPEAKER_00 21:42

Well, your weapons, your your um, your pistols are around at this time. We're at a time where there's there's no there's no firearms laws. I mean, you don't get in this country in Britain, you don't get anything until about 1903. And it's not a proper firearms law. It's it's for it's uh it's a pistol act and it's for it's for things on a game license so it's so you can kill game basically um and it's not recorded anywhere it's just kind of noted down by the I think it's my fellow hunters no the post office you go to the post office to buy this you know so it's just it's not it's there's no restrictions there's no real restrictions to till 1920 um in this country and europe is you know a completely different matter but I think what's important really about about our assassins of this period is because there's just the 19th century is is just a plus it's just an amazing time for firearms development that if everything is developing so quickly things fall out of fashion and they'll wind up in the pawn shop and let's say if you're you know industrialization has happened in Britain you live in one of the big cities they're not particularly nice do you know what I mean we have in our collection an anti-garotting gun that you wear in the small of your back to stop he cell getting in garotted so this is because there's a garrotting pan panic isn't there there is a garrotting panic there is and we have a we I think we have two of them they're just very small very small um percussion percussion um lines that you wear on a belt in the small of your back and like a kid's kind of you know the gloves with the string and so if someone comes behind you to try to try to strangle you you can activate it and you can shoot them in the groin shall we say amazing amazing yeah so they're not nice places and you know if you don't have the money to buy an anti-garotting gun which many people wouldn't you know your Saturday night special that you can buy from the local porn shop that's that yes by this point in time it is 20 30 years out of date but it'll still protect you. Yeah and so you have you have all these things falling onto the market um if we look at Queen Victoria for example like not a not many people know that there were I think it's it's down as eight attempts on a life but it's actually seven because one guy tried twice but actually didn't try just was there one day with the gun so I don't count that one yeah so I'd say seven and out of the seven six of them are done with pistols. The fifth one um actually he knocks her on the head with a cane but they're all pistols so you've got I think the first one in 1840 is a pair of percussion pistols that Edward Oxford actually uses at a shooting gallery he likes to shoot but they've come they've come from a general store in Blackfriars.

SPEAKER_01 24:44

The second one he's got his from a pawn shop in Westminster and although that one's not around anymore Prince Albert did actually did a sketch of it it's in the it's in the Royal Collection archive and it's a really early flint lock box lock turn off pistol so there's there's all these various types I mean none none of these things are there's no sort of standardization is there like like there's so many different types everything from the you know these these kind of bespoke pistols to things like the anti-garotting gun all this and I guess that the thing is the the availability of this if you if you're talking you know seven assassination attempts on the the Empress of the British Empire um these are just people picking this stuff up as you say at pawn shops and that yeah one of them as well I mean the thing with Victoria is no one really intends to kill her but it the first one yes his his gun is loaded um the rest of them I don't know they couldn't afford the ammunition or they just wanted to you know make it known they're not happy and they're gonna have a go at her I think is it the fifth one the fourth one the fourth one I think is is he a lodger and he uses one of the kids' toy pistols or something or it's an antiquator pistol that's really rusty it's not gonna fire it's not gonna fire is it it's it's or it it needed is it did it need some work and he was having to go at and actually broke it these people are not are not professionals clearly they're not no they're not if if if you go if you go to Europe you know they're they're they've got there there's more knowledge and they're a bit better.

SPEAKER_00 26:24

So I'm thinking around you know if you if you look late 19th early 20th century in that decade you know where is it like is it from um when Sally Carno gets stabbed kind of to President McKinley there's lots going off there. Um and I'm just thinking of um just not just like personal protection have you heard of something called a velo dog no it's a very very small pistol for cyclists there's some lovely advertisements for them in Britain in Britain it says there's a real there's a really famous advertisement I think it says I fear no tramp and I'm thinking hang on isn't isn't this a velo dog on the continent they they that they carried them because there's lots of cycling going on and um there's rabies around so it's to shoot baby dogs to defend yourself. It's a pistol for everything there is the the Velo dog um has a really uh quite powerful quite powerful powerfully designed um cartridge I would not like to fire one but with with all this you get like a bastardization of the velo dog and it doesn't have the original cartridge it's just a small pocket pistol usually with a folding trigger so it won't snag on your pocket.

SPEAKER_01 27:41

You can modify all these things and there and there's plenty of examples in you know around this period 1860s there's a couple of attempts uh in Germany uh on on uh Ottoman Bismarck and others uh the the Kaiser uh uh or he's going to become the Kaiser Wilhelm in 1871 um and these are all modified pistols that don't fire particularly well um but it's these same kind of people it's people like Orsini who are these desperate people who as you say the men don't even have the bullets they just want their their grievances to be known and they've all got access to to guns in some way shape or form and that's what's interesting about Orsini is that even though you know he's he's a professional revolutionary right he can get a gun but he thinks to himself you know what a gun isn't going to do it and uh a mass uprising of people isn't gonna do it I need something else there's some clues in his memoirs the the memoir I mentioned about his daring escape that that let us know a little bit about how his his thoughts on how to actually affect political change are changing at this time he talks about how Napoleon III is presiding over a uh government based upon despotism and treason and that basically if you if you chop off the the head if you like if you get rid of Napoleon this guy who's who's the sort of symbol of everything the nationalists hate then there'll be this domino effect. He talks about how an attack on Napoleon if it's sensational enough would create a war of independence in Italy a revolution in Paris a war of principles and republicanism across continental Europe. So he's he's dreaming big here but a key part of his plan is spectacle and it's interesting that he he never seems to entertain the idea of just shooting this guy we'll do it. He wants to do something else that is going to create fear create panic and and sort of make the the radicals make the nationalist radicals look like a really big deal a force to be reckoned with and he wants something that is also going to be so spectacular that it's going to inspire other radicals to follow in his stead. So a pistol or a knife is not going to cut it and this is where he decides to build a specialist bomb for the purpose. So the Orsini bomb we've mentioned it before this is a fascinating weapon how do how does this work? How does the Orsini how like it I mean it's simple it's a simple weapon but it's worth just explaining the simplicity of it it is simple.

SPEAKER_00 30:10

You know that it it to look at it it is pretty you know it's pretty spectacular it's a weird thing.

SPEAKER_01 30:17

I will put a put our picture up now for the people benefiting those on YouTube so you can see this thing.

SPEAKER_00 30:23

It's like a little border well yeah and it fits with you know Arsini's main character syndrome kind of like you are like what is that? Yeah um but like we have to I think I've read somewhere that Arsini was you know familiar with firearms and and that like the first thing like being a firearms curator I thought about this is when I looked at it I was like are those percussion nipples so for those of you that don't know what a percussion nipple is it it's something from a firearm. So after the flint lock period of the 18th century moving on to the early 19th um the percussion system starts to emerge basically in a nutshell and and basically if if people of a certain age may remember having a cap gun as a child and basically it's something very similar to that. So at this point in time early 19th century things are all muzzle loaded everything goes down the muzzle so you've got the powder the ball and then you need something to ignite the charge now you would have used a flint you know with the flint striking the frizz and creating the spark but the percussion cap um has now come into existence. It's basically it looks like a tiny top hat and within it is um mercury fulminate just a tiny amount so that when it's hit hard by the hammer um it's going to create um a little explosion which is going to be channeled down this nipple into the barrel and it's gonna send your projectile flying out and that that's what I was drawn to like looking at this design looking at Orsini's design for his bomb I think there is a sketch of of one of them that survived that that didn't explode during this attacks in the National Archives and I count 24 nipples on it. Yeah yeah um and it's oval shaped kind of Easter egg shaped I would say but not all of them are they they do vary they come in all kinds of shapes and sizes yeah but this this one that was engineered in engineered um in Birmingham Birmingham was it Birmingham it was Birmingham wasn't it by Taylor yep yeah um it's oval shaped looked like an Easter egg and he engineered them in two halves not in the halves of the Easter egg but kind of if you imagine a babushka doll yeah yeah on the horizontal and so how they work basically is they're weighted at the bottom with the 24 nipples the idea is that you would put 24 cushion caps on these nipples inside you put your explosives something nasty what whatever it is you you can get hold of um you screw it back together um and it's ready to go the idea is you need to throw it there onto something hard to create the effect of that hammer to get your little blast going to get the explosions channeling up through these 24 nipples um into into the into the centre and it's going to explode with with everything that's nasty in it.

SPEAKER_01 33:22

It's what's called a percussion detonated grenade basically and the the beauty of it is I mean the simplicity of the design is basically as you say it's taking the the the premise of how how you how you make a gunfire and and put it and you know multiplying it channeling the energy into a central chamber inside this cylinder inside this this ball that's gonna have explosive material in but here's the other thing about it so it's cheap to make easy to make and the design of it means that when the explosion happens it is going to become a shrapnel grenade like the metal is just gonna it's just gonna burst apart. Exactly and this is by design okay so so you mentioned Taylor before so Taylor is a man called Joseph Taylor he's a metal worker and he's um employed by Orsini when Orsini is in England in 1857 he goes to him and he says look I need you to make me a bomb and they do tests of this bomb in Devon and outside Sheffield. That's right they do it in a quarry don't they yeah yeah because I mean they they're they don't just throw this thing together they want to make sure that it does what they want it to do which is to explode with a shrapnel effect. They are bankrolled by two well-to-do liberals I mentioned before that he's you know the beloved of of of of uh liberals in in in Britain uh George Holyoke and a stockbroker called Thomas Olsop supply the money they get him fake passports so he can smuggle these bombs back to France. He's also got a a uh another liberal a French lawyer named uh Simon Bernard who uh gets involved and the significance is that this is now an international plot you know you got you got Frenchmen and you got Italians and you got and you got British people getting involved designing this bomb they all know what they're doing they all know what the purpose of the bomb is more so when Orsini adds three additional bombers to his team uh they are Charles DeRudio Giovanni Pieri and Antonio Gomez and so he's he's got a team together he's got he's got backing he's got this bomb and the thing about this bomb that struck me from the moment I looked into it and the design is that he knew damn well that this thing explodes with a shrapnel effect. Shrapnel tends to maim not kill if your sole purpose is to assassinate someone why would you choose a shrapnel grenade and why would you throw it into a crowd of people right the only reason you do that is if you want to hurt a hell of a lot of people and this is where I think he's starting he's seeing beyond well if we kill Napoleon that's something but what if we what if we create this spectacle where people are just carpeted across the floor after after an explosion and that and no one knows what these bombs are. No one's seen anything like this before and there's terror and there's fear and and then we can weaponize that he is thinking like a terrorist and the scene he creates after they smuggle these bombs and interesting aside I mean they smuggle these bombs from from uh England to France via Belgium because they just look like bits of metal they're able to unscrew the the things and they they they actually get accosted I think on a train someone says what what the hell are those and they said oh it's plumbing parts or something like that. You know it's innocuous and and so they end up smuggling this stuff easy as anything. They know that on on the night of the 14th of January 1858 Napoleon is going to be attending the Paris Opera to see William Tell there's that play again um and they know that there's going to be a lot of people out there because it's that it's that thing where like today you know a celebrity goes to a movie premiere the fans come out to uh gather around the red carpet that's what's going to happen here. So so they know this is a public place and they've not content with one bomb they've got four in the end only three are thrown though because uh Pieri he has a bit of a meltdown uh just before he he basically the lad in that goes up the alley is he sick well that was actually so one of the one of them one of them freaks out before one of them freaks out after and Pieri freaks out beforehand um and he gets recognized by the by the the cops because he's a known revolutionary and they accosted his he's he throwing his revolver down a drain or something. Well or no Orsini throws his revolver on a street I think they're all I mean they're all again these are not they the planning's good but but the second that the things start exploding they kind of lose the plot a bit um but Pieri he he gets apprehended and he he he gets like 20 seconds into his interrogation and he just goes I'll tell you everything it's it's you know I I don't want to do this anymore so he he kind of spills the beans but by then the other three bombs have already gone off I should note that I I didn't mention this at the start but Napoleon survives this. You know he he is yes he is his hat is damaged that's that's what happens his hat is damaged his wife uh Eugenie she is uh she gets some glass in in the eye a little bit of blood comes out her eye uh the fella next to them the military adjutant I think he gets some shrapnel in the neck the driver of the carriage dies the horses the poor horses they die yeah I think is it do they have a couple of lancers as like what uh yeah yeah there's some lancers who who who I don't know if they're the ones who die but they certainly get wounded I mean that's the thing like a lot of people a lot again to my point about the shrapnel most people are wounded uh very few people die instantly but some die of their wounds later it's a grisly scene and Napoleon you know he he walks away from this quite literally he walks out of this and he walks into the theater to go see the players if not like he's he's again it's that thing where he's got to project the strongman image you know I'm unfazed by this um but the so so the assassinating thing doesn't work but the the spectacle and the fear certainly does um as you mentioned uh pistols are discarded in a hurry afterwards Orsini and this is a funny bit Orsini actually gets some shrapnel from his own bomb in the face and so he gets a wound above his eye so he's and he's probably concussed but I imagine he loved that well it adds to the drama I mean he didn't I don't think he loved what came of it because I I imagine the scene I imagine is he's wandering around Paris concussed bleeding he discards his pistol and a dagger the police are able to follow a literal blood trail as well as witnesses who go there's this guy throwing guns in the street running away from the scene of a crime so they end up finding him um uh he's passed out I think from blood loss or again just concussion whatever he's passed out uh with a rag tag tied round his head and he's got you know uh you know stained pink and everything uh and he's found the next morning in this DOS house wherever it is and then Darudio and Gomez they are also uh they are also uh found out gomez has mentioned he has a bit of a breakdown afterwards he he goes across to the cafe after he's detonated his bomb and he sort of sits in the corner and starts you know trembling and and you know that that draws attention but then Pieri he when he's interrogated he just gives the game away he says yep Darudio and Gomez they're in this hotel room i you know please please let me go basically so they they all get captured um and uh I think Darudio and Gomez they end up on Devil's Island which is kind of like the uh the Guantanamo Bay of this of this period this way you send the the violent radicals yeah whereas Orsini and Pierre they are guillotined so they all die they don't kill Napoleon but as I say it's very successful as a terrorist attack uh because well well a couple of reasons one and this is why I think the timing of this is important for this idea that this is the first terrorist attack if terrorists don't have attention then they're nothing like terrorism needs attention uh people need if if if a bomb explodes in the woods no one hears it then no one's scared right and this is right on this is we are right in the in the shadow of of this period that happens in the 1850s where there's an expansion of media we've got the laying of telegraph cables that are able to take information across the world we've got the lifting of censorship in several places and we've got this this new sort of information age and this is one of the big first international events that happens in the dawn of this information age so the story of a CNI goes across the world then as now the media report all kinds of horseshit about what's happened all kinds of lies uh leaping to assumptions there's more bombers waiting in the wings there's a whole conspiracy there's revolutionaries across europe there's going to be more bombs in in in London in Berlin in Rome in blah blah blah all this all kinds of panic um and Napoleon uh you know leans into this completely he goes he go he reacts precisely how Ossini wants him to he proves the point that he's a despot because he creates this new position called Minister of the Interior which is basically you know radical hunter and this is a guy called uh Shamarie Espanasi he is a he is a professional soldier and a very brutal one he's a veteran of the crime war he spends his he spent time in algeria you know murdering natives he he's a really cruel nasty guy and he's told by Orsini look you know go find my enemies so he rounds up like 2000 I think it is people people who have nothing to do with this bombing just people in uh in France who happen to be adherents to all those isms I mentioned before you know radicals of various stripes socialists anarchists nationalists whatever and they get rounded up you've got the you've got the sort of right wing press talking about how uh there are there are there's a wider conspiracy there we need to clamp down on it they're fanning the flames Britain gets dragged into this there's an accusatory finger pointed across the channel by the French who who say and there's there's this great quote in uh Le Monateur which is a very right wing chauvinistic um uh newspaper in France and they call Britain a laboratory of assassins this is this is a place where you can if you're a radical they will take you in and they will give you money to develop bombs to kill European emperors you know Britain gets a real bad rap out of this now for anyone who can remember the aftermath of 9 11 and the way the Bush administration reacted the sort of chest beating paranoia there are some real echoes here in the way Napoleon Responds. It's very similar. Um, and and it goes so far that that a British newspaper actually calls it out and says that uh the government, being Napoleon's government, used the terroristic attack of the 14th of January to apply harsh harsher legislation on the press and to stretch the sinews of repression even more, which pretty much sums it up. The other 9-11 similarity is that this terrorist attack started a war. Um, not in Afghanistan, but this time starts the war for Italian independence. This goes back to what I was saying about Napoleon. You know, he he has to be the tough guy, and so instead of cowering, you know, in fear, he decides, you know what, I'm gonna I'm gonna take it to my enemies. Well, I'll not take it to my enemies, I'm basically going to accede to their demands. He kind of gives Orsini what he wants. He goes to war with the Emperor of Austria, Emperor Franz Joseph, um, in the War of Italian independence in 1859. Napoleon's thinking is that if I can finally, you know, knock uh Franz Joseph away, not the Pope necessarily, but Franz Joseph, that will that will make the nationalists like me and they'll stop trying to blow me up. That's basically his his thing. Um, and that that goes through to a whole other story of Italy's unification, which is goddamn messy and doesn't really end until 1871. But Garibaldi kind of takes center stage in that. Uh, and Orsini is dead by then anyway. But the point is that he he does leave uh a legacy there in terms of the effect this has. And the thing that I think is really curious is he also becomes a hero to other radicals. Yeah, you know, he he he he's not demonized. People look at him and go, wow, you know, he he the the this bomb, how incredible. Um the the achievements he made, great. The fact that he struck fear into people in America, he's got everyone from John Wilkes Booth, you know, the guy who who likes slavery and is gonna go on to kill Abraham Lincoln, he's saying Orsini's a jolly good chap. Conversely, you've got John Brown, who is an anti-slavery radical, also saying, Yeah, Orsini's a freedom fighter for the cause. And and in 1859, when John Brown um leads a famous attack on a federal arsenal in Harper's Ferry, West Virginia, with the aim to spark a revolt of the enslaved, one of his men actually says, Look, we need to get Orsini bombs. Yeah, and and the quote that he says is because the bomb will frighten a soldier's chivalry and send them into a panic. So it's understood that this is a terroristic weapon. This isn't a weapon you you necessarily deploy to kill people, but it does get the shit out of your enemies and it does send this message. And that's why I often I often think of like perhaps the way the best way to think about the Orcini bomb is it's kind of like the AK-47 of the 19th century, in as much as in the 60s and 70s, the AK-47 is this symbol of you know revolution and revolt, and you know, it's the radar, it's the insurgents' go-to weapon. For radicals of this generation, the Orsini bomb is the terrorist super weapon, you know, it's the must-have. There's a sort of cachet attached to it. And perhaps the the biggest um exemplar of this, and I'll put I'll put a picture up here of um Antonio Gaudi's uh Sagrada Famia in uh Barcelona, and this carving that's put in in 1896, somewhere around there. It's it's it's in that period. It takes him a couple of years to to finish the thing, obviously. But at some point in the carving of this, he he carves this this image of a worker in coveralls, you know, the oppressed worker of the world, uh clutching an Orsini bomb, which is a reference to the fact that in Barcelona in 1893. 93, yeah, there's an anarchist named Santiago Salvador who uses Orsini bombs to kill, I can't remember, it's well over a dozen people at a theater. Um, in in one of the most spectacular terrorist attacks of the 1890s.

SPEAKER_00 48:15

Guess what they're watching?

SPEAKER_01 48:18

William Tell. It's I it's it's a it's astonishing, you know. Yeah, there's a whole there's a whole psychology. Yeah, I know. It's is I mean, there's again, these people are planners. They're the the symbolism is not lost on these people, which again is another thing where we talk about terrorism, you know, terrorism. What was 9-11 if not, you know, you attack these symbols of of American dominance in you know, and finance and and uh you know military power in the shape of the Pentagon, you know, symbolism's a massive part of terrorism, and these guys understand it. So I guess the question is I mean, could he have achieved this just by shooting Napoleon? Do you think?

SPEAKER_00 49:00

No, absolutely not. He shoots Napoleon, he might have got him, but what does that do?

SPEAKER_01 49:08

Like, what what does that change? I'm I'm not sure what that changes, you know.

SPEAKER_00 49:13

Well, that is the that's the question, isn't it? What what does it change when they do get them?

SPEAKER_01 49:19

I mean, I would I would suspect in this case you just get you just get another guy roll in, um, someone else from the family, I would, I would suspect.

SPEAKER_00 49:28

Another nephew, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:29

Grab grab another boat apart somewhere and and throw them in. And and plus a chance, you know, it just it just keeps going. Like, like I yeah, I when you think about the the considering the fact that as you said before, we've got we've got these attacks, these assassinations that happen later in the in the 19th century, with presidents, kings, everywhere the president of the United States is killed. When President McKinley's killed, you get Teddy Roosevelt. Not a whole lot changes. Arguably, it it kicks off a period of American growth and prosperity, actually, in some respects, under Teddy, you know, but but the the the terror that he creates and and the the cult of personality that comes around Orcini and indeed his bomb are pretty significant, and this is why, as I say, to me, he's the first terrorist. Am I am I just talking shit though? I mean, I again like you you you referenced before, we've got infernal machines going back to the early 19th century. Yeah, is this the first terrorist?

SPEAKER_00 50:35

So actually, the Fiji one, the 1835, people are killed as well.

SPEAKER_01 50:41

People are killed in the street, but that media infrastructure isn't there, you know, it doesn't become as big. I mean, it is a it is a big deal, and again, it's an innovative weapon of death that's being used, but I just don't think it has the same international reading.

SPEAKER_00 51:00

No, you're right. Um, Fichi doesn't kind of crave the celebrity that Orsini craves. Again, I'll say it again, he's the main character, he's he has main character syndrome, no doubt.

SPEAKER_01 51:12

Yeah, yeah. No, I'm I'm sure he was quite happy to be beheaded, to be honest. It just it just you know what a way to go out beheaded by your enemies after the courageous, you know, act.

SPEAKER_00 51:22

Wasn't he writing to Napoleon from prison?

SPEAKER_01 51:25

Well, this is this is an interesting twist in the tail. We've got these letters which there's two schools of thoughts on this. So so when he's in prison before he's killed, Orsini sends Napoleon letters, and in these letters he basically says, Look, this is gonna keep happening, right? Like this, there's gonna be more of me doing this, and this is part of why Napoleon says, you know, I'm gonna I'm gonna, you know, start try to shut these people up by giving them what they want in Italy, basically. That's one school of thought. The other school of thought, more conspiratorial, is that Orsini never pens these letters, and it's actually Napoleon who forges these letters, so that he's got a reason to have his little war be the strongman, blah de blah. I don't know about that. I mean, it's it could be either. I mean, you get to the same place, but it's it is interesting that he does have this dialogue, allegedly has this dialogue with Napoleon where he says, Look, you know, and and he says something in there as well about you know, it's nothing personal, basically. Yeah, it you just happen to be a bastard dictator who's you know the embodiment of this whole system that uh me and my like uh bore and and sorry, but you know, it's it's just business, you know, get out of the way, or we're coming for you.

SPEAKER_00 52:38

Yeah, yeah. But also as well, with the isn't there something I'm sure I've read something in some of the newspapers that the empress was begging the emperor that was begging Napoleon, Eugenie was begging Napoleon not to have him guillotined.

SPEAKER_01 52:53

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:54

He's a big, he's a big the ladies love him.

SPEAKER_01 52:58

That could be part of it. That could be part. I also think she was I think she was a slightly sharper knife than uh than uh her husband. I think she probably understood, you know, you you guillotine this man and you you you create a martyr, uh, which is precisely what happened, you know. His name is evoked by everyone from anarchists in Russia to uh nationalists in Poland to, as I say, people both for and against slavery in the United States. You know, he he becomes he becomes this this international figure. Um, and as I say, he's also the guy who arguably sets in train the the logic or the tactic of terrorism, the idea of creating a sensation, provoking a response uh from the authorities, which which justifies your cause and uh leads to emulation, leads to people saying, Yeah, you know, I I like what he did, I'm gonna do that the same. And and so the cycle continues anew. And for that reason, he is most certainly, if he's not the world's first terrorist, he is most certainly a history's devil. Um yes. Thank you so much, Lisa, for joining me for this. Um, do you have anything to plug?

SPEAKER_00 54:11

Oh, yes. Um we at the Royal Armories are currently researching at the moment um what we think might be a very interesting exhibition um on assassinations in the 19th century, the cause of them, the isms, the social history surrounding that, the kits that was available um to these assassins, um, and the aftermath. And so this is this is something that I'm researching at the moment. Um so watch this space at the Royal Armories because hopefully by summer 2028 we shall have something very interesting. It'll be damn good.

SPEAKER_01 54:52

And and even before then, you know, if if you all haven't checked out the Royal Armories, it is a great day out. It is wonderful. Um, it's uh it's it's one of my happy places.

SPEAKER_00 55:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 55:05

It's a fantastic place. Um, thank you so much, Lisa, and thank you everyone for listening in uh to History's Devils. Please make sure to like, subscribe, smash buttons, uh, do nice things on on, as I say, on Apple, on Spotify, on the YouTube, wherever it is you find us. And uh tune in next week for some more History's Devils.