Hippolyte Paul Delaroche (1797-1856) was one of the most famous painters of the mid-nineteenth century, with patrons throughout Europe and beyond. Although the first of his portraits of Napoleon was produced over twenty years after his exile from Europe, (and Delaroche was barely an adult at the time of Waterloo) the verisimilitude of his portraits was attested by people who had seen the Emperor in his prime. Nineteenth-century patrons could not believe that the artist had not actually set eyes upon his mighty model, but there is no evidence that he had. Delaroche physically resembled Napoleon, and identified with his plight; the mood of this portrait, a replica of the original, mirrors the artist's mounting personal distress at the death of his wife in 1845.

In 1845 the German merchant Adolph Heinrich Scheletter commissioned Delaroche to paint Napoleon at Fontainebleau (Leipzig Museum). Based on a description in Baron Norvin's Histoire de Napoleon of 1828, it depicts the Emperor on 31st March, 1814, the day Paris capitulated to the invading allied armies. His mud-spattered boots and overcoat bring to mind recent events and symbolise his soiled prestige. This smaller-scale version of 1846 is one of three paintings of Napoleon by Delaroche purchased by the royal couple; Napoleon crossing the Alps (RCIN 404874) is a reduced copy of the life-size original, and Napoleon at St Helena (RCIN 404876), a sketch for a painting that was never produced, was acquired from the sale of the artist's studio. All three were hung at Osborne, together with two further unrelated pictures by Delaroche.

Napoleon sits, facing half to the left, with legs akimbo and his right arm slung over the back of the chair; he wears a military uniform, with his sword resting on a table beside him and his cocked hat at his feet. Engraved by Jules François in 1850, and by Alexandre Manceau, 1852