The Keeper of the Empty Tomb - new book by Michel Dancoisne-Martineau

Michel Dancoisne-Martineau has just produced another book. This time an account of his life since he left France for St.Helena at the age of 18.

It is just over a year since Michel told us that he had signed a contract for this book. I wondered whether it was a good idea: he is a very private person, and doesn't welcome the intrusions into his life by the press and by tourists on St. Helena. He hopes that this book will still the interest in him, and enable him to focus on the Napoleonic heritage which has been his life's work. I hope he is right.

The book's title is a fairly typical expression of Michel's dry sense of humour and his self-deprecating manner. A remarkable, energetic and multi-talented man, he has led an unusual but very productive life on St. Helena. When he eventually retires, it will be a very hard act to follow. I look forward to reading this book when it becomes available on 10th May.

Patagonia: Napoleon Reaches Parts that Others Cannot Reach

Pizzeria in El Calafate, Patagonia

Earlier this year I spent a wonderful month in Argentina. I was vaguely aware that Buenos Aires like New Orleans had been a haven for exiled Bonapartists after Napoleon's fall, and since my return I have learned that Isabel Walewski Colonna, Napoleon's illegitimate grandaughter, who died at the age of 6 in 1847, was buried in the amazing Recoleta cemetery.

A Street Sign in El Calafate

All this was far from my mind, but during my stay I visited El Calafate in Patagonia to see the amazing Perito Moreno glacier. There I found a strange street sign. Nobody I spoke to had any idea of its origin, but apparently it was named after Lieutenant Colonel Napoleón Argentino Irusta, who bcame Director of the National Parks in the Peron era, and formally received the body of Perito Moreno when it was excavated in Buenos Aires and returned to Patagonia. (1)

Totally unconnected I imagine was the Napoleon Pizza restaurant in the same town. A simple google search reveals that there are a few others in the world - including Parma, Ohio, Timisoara in Romania, and Fredrikstad, Norway, a town that I know rather well!

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1. Apparently Irusta miraculously escaped in a car accident in August 1945, on the day of the feast of the Virgen de las Nieves, and in thanks placed a copy of Buenos Aires' image of the Virgen de las Nieves in a natural cave 15 kilometres from San Carlos de Bariloche. It is now a major tourist attraction.