After the Battle of Waterloo, which country did Napoleon try to flee to?

After the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon tried to flee to the United States. He hoped to escape from France across the Atlantic after his second abdication in June 1815.

Napoleon reached the Atlantic port of Rochefort in early July and considered several ways to evade the British blockade. One plan involved traveling by a small vessel to a merchant ship bound for America. He also asked Captain Frederick Maitland of the British warship HMS Bellerophon about protection and passage to the United States. The Royal Navy, however, controlled the surrounding waters and made escape extremely difficult.

On 15 July 1815, Napoleon boarded the Bellerophon and surrendered to the British. He was not allowed to go to America. Instead, the British government decided to exile him to the remote South Atlantic island of Saint Helena, where he spent the rest of his life. The common mix-up is answering Saint Helena: that was his destination in exile, not the country he tried to reach immediately after Waterloo.