Louis, the last Prince Imperial of France, son of Napoleon III and the Empress Eugenie, was the subject of a research trip to Dundee, by the French-language National Geographic. The Prince, great-nephew of the famous French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, met his death during a skirmish with Zulu warriors on June 1, 1879. 

The prince and his father were exiled from France during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, and he eventually completed a course at the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich, where he made many friends. He could not be commissioned into the British Army, and his mother later petitioned Queen Victoria to get him assigned to Chelmsford’s staff during the Anglo-Zulu war of 1879.

He was eventually assigned to Colonel Harris for map-making duties, and it was on one of these patrols, on June 1, 1879, that he met his death during a contact (which led to much controversy later) at the hands of a Zulu warrior in a donga on the banks of the Ityotyozi River, in Zululand.

Claire Cousin, the French reporter, and photographer Yahn Macherez, was treated to a period costume and weaponry presentation by Gavin Slater, Peter Jones and several other members of the Dundee Diehards. They showed British and Boer period uniforms, rifles and a Zulu warrior, complete with weaponry and traditional garb. Several other visitors also attended the proceedings at Chez Nous B&B.

The National Geographic plans to present KwaZulu-Natal as a destination to French people in particular, and Europeans in general, as very little is known in Europe about the Prince Imperial, or KZN for that matter. Maybe our tour guides should now be on the lookout for an increase in French visitors, non…