It became basically a period based on a "first come first served" basis in which the fastest person to take advantage of the situation was destined to become rich and powerful. A clear example and most obvious is Napoleon itself, who went from simple artilleryman to emperor of the French. .
Colonel Chabert is part of these men. Despite the fact that he is an honorable man and a war hero ready to die on the battlefield, his social ascension was fast and questionable like most of Napoleon's highest ranking men. These men, after the fall of the Emperor, will find themselves without a place in the new society: the Restoration. .
This is the time where Colonel Chabert returns to Paris and finds himself in a society that has no room for him, and when he tries to recuperate his assets, he does not realize that the task is a little more complicated than he thinks since there has been a tremendous social revolution from when he left for the war. Despite its name, the Restoration is not a return to the Ancient Regime. The Royalty is not absolute and Louis XVIII had to accept a written constitution. It is a very ambiguous time; the old aristocracy returned with the king but has lost most of their privileges and has not recuperated their lost fortunes. Most of Napoleon's men remained in place, as a reward for their symbolic submission to the king. The fate of Colonel Chabert's wife illustrates perfectly the ambiguity of the era: from street prostitute, she accessed the Empire's highest society thanks to her husband's military career. After the supposed death of her husband, she will marry the Count Ferraud, a supporter of the old aristocracy, who stayed loyal to Louis XVIII during the Empire. Balzac states that reason of this marriage was purely economical because "Countess Ferraud, had extracted such a good part of her husband's estate, that after eighteen months of widowhood she possessed an income of around 40,000 pounds"(57) while "Mr.