So Napoleon's armies occupied Germany for nearly eight years. What were the ramifications to many of these German states from the French occupation? I read in Phillip Dwyer's book, Citizen Emperor, that the French cleaned Prussia out so thoroughly that only 2-5% of the horse population remained (this is the 1806-1807 campaign) and that the number of suicides soared in Berlin. Another source claims that the French and allied soldiers behaved so badly that it was "worse than the war of thirty years." By these gages alone one can see that the French occupation of Germany was incredibly harsh. Obviously there was real incentive in Germany to oust the French, perhaps not due to the nationalistic feelings said by Nazi Germany, but mainly out of hatred of French occupation.

So does anyone have any thoughts, statistics, sources etc about the French treatment of Germany in these years? Were there any atrocities or crimes? Was the occupation milder than many claim? From the info that I learned above the French treatment of many Germans sounds as harsh as the German treatment of France in the later wars. I know the occupation was not as severe as let's say Spain which ranks up there with WWII on the Eastern Front (minus the concentration camps), but was it bad?

Thanks for your thoughts!