Treaty of Amiens

The Treaty of Amiens (French: la paix d'Amiens, lit. 'the peace of Amiens') temporarily ended hostilities between France, the Spanish Empire, and the United Kingdom at the end of the War of the Second Coalition. It marked the end of the French Revolutionary Wars; after a short peace it set the stage for the Napoleonic Wars. Britain gave up most of its recent conquests; France was to evacuate Naples and Egypt. Britain retained Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and Trinidad.

It was signed in the Hôtel de Ville (City Hall) of Amiens on 25 March 1802 (4 Germinal X in the French Revolutionary calendar) by Joseph Bonaparte and Charles Cornwallis, 1st Marquess Cornwallis as a "Definitive Treaty of Peace". The consequent peace lasted only one year (18 May 1803) and was the only period of general peace in Europe between 1793 and 1814.

Under the treaty, Britain recognised the French Republic. Together with the Treaty of Lunéville (1801), the Treaty of Amiens marked the end of the Second Coalition, which had waged war against Revolutionary France since 1798.

The United Kingdom wanted the peace to enable restoration of trade with continental Europe. It also wanted to end its isolation from other powers, and achieved that goal by a rapprochement with Russia that provided the momentum to negotiate the treaty with France. The peace of Amiens also mollified the antiwar Whig opposition in Parliament.

Napoleon used the interlude for major internal reforms such as the promulgation of the new legal system under the Napoleonic Code, making peace with the Vatican by the Concordat, and issuing a new constitution that gave him lifetime control. France made territorial gains in Switzerland and Italy. However, Napoleon's goal of a North American Empire collapsed with the failure of his army in Haiti, so he gave it up and sold the Louisiana Territory to the United States.

The Democratic-Republican administration of President Thomas Jefferson used British banks to fund the Louisiana Purchase, reduced the American military budget, and partly dismantled the Hamiltonian Federalist financial program. The French West Indies as result of the treaty no longer needed to use American ships to move their products to Europe. Although the terms of the Treaty did not favour his country, British Prime Minister Henry Addington used the interlude to rebuild British strength, so that when fighting renewed in spring 1803, the Royal Navy quickly gained control of the seas. However the isolationist foreign policy of the United States, which was hostile to both Britain and France, and strongly opposed by the Federalist minority in Congress, came under heavy pressure from all sides.

The War of the Second Coalition started well for the coalition, with successes in Egypt, Italy and Germany. The success proved to be short-lived, however; after France's victories at the battles of Marengo and Hohenlinden, Austria, Russia and Naples sued for peace, with Austria eventually signing the Treaty of Lunéville. Horatio Nelson's victory at the Battle of Copenhagen on 2 April 1801 halted the creation of the League of Armed Neutrality and led to a negotiated ceasefire.

The French First Consul, Napoleon Bonaparte, first made truce proposals to British foreign secretary Lord Grenville as early as 1799. Because of the hardline stance of Grenville and Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger, their distrust of Bonaparte and obvious defects in the proposals, they were rejected out of hand. However, Pitt resigned in February 1801 over domestic issues and was replaced by the more accommodating Henry Addington. At that point Britain was motivated by the danger of a war with Russia.