Napoleon Louis Josef Jérôme Bonaparte (16 July 1864 – 14 October 1932) was the disputed head of the House of Bonaparte from 1891 to his death in 1932, as well as a lieutenant-general in the Imperial Russian Army and governor of the province of Yerevan in 1905.
He was educated with his older brother Victor, Prince Napoléon, then lived a quiet life in Paris at the home of his aunt Mathilde Bonaparte. His father directed him to a military career. As a relative of Napoleon Bonaparte, he was not allowed to join the French Army, so he became a lieutenant in the Royal Italian Army in Verona, with the approval of his uncle, King Umberto I of Italy. Because of anti-French sentiment in the Italian Army, he left Italy in 1890 and enlisted in the Imperial Russian Army. In 1895 he was promoted to colonel. In 1902 he was stationed in the Caucasus. When riots broke out in 1905 between Armenians and Azeris in Yerevan, he was named governor of the province of Yerevan and ordered to restore order.[1]
In his will, Napoléon-Jérôme designated Louis as the head of the House of Bonaparte, bypassing his first son Victor, who he deemed "a traitor and a rebel". Victor and a majority of Bonapartists disputed this.[2]
^Valynseele, Joseph (1967). Les Prétendants aux Trônes d'Europe (in French). Paris. pp. 226–231.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)