It is a changed France that Abraham-Louis Breguet discovers when he returns to Paris after the French Revolution. He develops his foreign clientele and it is in Russia where he is the most successful. He opens an establishment in Saint Petersburg in 1808 which he is forced to close three years later when the Tsar Alexander I forbids the entry of French products on Russian ground, as a response to the politics of Napoleon.
The army, an indissociable element of the regime, provided Breguet with a strong contingent of devoted clients, including imperial generals and marshals such as Michel Ney. All subjected their watches to rough treatment on the battlefield and described their campaigns in letters to Breguet. Whenever they returned to Paris on leave they made a ritual pilgrimage to Breguet, who duly expunged the traces of Austerlitz, Friedland, Wagram and other great battles from their timepieces.