Napoleon’s Hundred Days was the second and last period of Napoleon Bonaparte as Emperor of France after his return from his exile on the island of Elba. The Hundred Days of Napoleon took place from March 20, 1815, which was the day Napoleon arrived in Paris from Elba, to July 8, 1815, after Napoleon’s defeat at the Battle of Waterloo (on June 18) and the fall of Paris to the Prussian troops on July 7, 1815.
Background
After losing to the Allied forces at the Battle of Leipzig in October 1813, during the War of the 6th Coalition, Napoleon Bonaparte had abdicated in the spring of the following year as the Coalition armies closed in on Paris. As a result, he had been sent into exile on Elba Island, in the Mediterranean. However, in early March, 1815, Napoleon decided to return to France. On March 14, Marshal Michel Ney and the 6,000 men under his command, who had been sent to arrest the Emperor, joined Napoleon Bonaparte instead, entering Paris on March 20, 1815.
