Editing Napoleon III (section)

===Activities===
The register of the fortress Ham for 7 October 1840 contained a concise description of the new prisoner: "Age: thirty-two years. Height: one meter sixty-six. Hair and eyebrows: chestnut. Eyes: Gray and small. Nose: large. Mouth: ordinary. Beard: brown. Moustache: blond. Chin: pointed. Face: oval. Complexion: pale. Head: sunken in his shoulders, and large shoulders. Back: bent. Lips: thick."<ref>Quoted in {{Harvnb|Séguin|1990|p=81}}.</ref> He had a mistress named {{Ill|Eléonore Vergeot|fr}}, a young woman from the town of Ham, who gave birth to two of his children.{{Sfn|Séguin|1990|p=83}}

While in prison, Louis Napoleon wrote poems, political essays, and articles on diverse topics. He contributed articles to regional newspapers and magazines in towns all over France, becoming quite well known as a writer. His most famous book was ''L'extinction du pauperisme'' (1844), a study of the causes of poverty in the French industrial working class, with proposals to eliminate it. His conclusion: "The working class has nothing, it is necessary to give them ownership. They have no other wealth than their own labor, it is necessary to give them work that will benefit all....they are without organization and without connections, without rights and without a future; it is necessary to give them rights and a future and to raise them in their own eyes by association, education, and discipline." He proposed various practical ideas for creating a banking and savings system that would provide credit to the working class, and to establish agricultural colonies similar to the ''[[kibbutz]]im'' later founded in Israel.<ref>{{Harvnb|Séguin|1990|p=89}}. Translated by D. Siefkin.</ref> This book was widely reprinted and circulated in France, and played an important part in his future electoral success.

Louis Napoleon was busy in prison, but also unhappy and impatient. He was aware that the popularity of his uncle was steadily increasing in France; Napoleon I was the subject of heroic poems, books and plays. Huge crowds had gathered in Paris on 15 December 1840 when the [[Retour des cendres|remains of Napoleon]] were returned with great ceremony to Paris and handed over to King Louis Philippe, while Louis Napoleon could only read about it in prison. On 25 May 1846, with the assistance of his doctor and other friends on the outside, he disguised himself as a laborer carrying lumber, and walked out of the prison. His enemies later derisively called him "Badinguet", the name of the laborer whose identity he had assumed. A carriage was waiting to take him to the coast and then by boat to England. A month after his escape, his father Louis died, making Charles Napoleon the clear heir to the Bonaparte dynasty.{{Sfn|Séguin|1990|p=93}}