1872-1880
The violences of 1872 spread throughout the lower south. Democratic paramilitaries, such as the Sons of the South, the Southron League, and the Knights of the Blue Cross emerged. Their fighting did not work as well as expected, and, in the north and upper south, actually encouraged Republican voters. The Disturbances were over by the end of the year, with few of the participants actually punished. However, scorched earth tactics against partisans had ravaged much of the landscape and destroyed the economy. Blacks fled into the cities, where they created their own districts and often maintained control over the city or portions of the state governments. The National Government still continued what they called Reconstruction. Violence still continued to simmer.
This coincided with the outbreak of the Brazilian Civil War. In Brazil, Conservative and Liberal factions had long been opposed, and, in mid-1872, the Emperor Pedro II immediately illegalized slavery. This alienated a good portion of the populace, and war broke out. The Emperors supporters, the Liberals, were well trained, and managed to get the advantage at first, but, Conservative forces hired foreigners, and many Confederates flocked to the side of a slave-holding power. By 1874, the Liberals were defeated and slavery preserved, with the Emperor remaining a figurehead for the military officers who led affairs. Many ex-Confederates had fled and become part of the military class themselves.
Former Confederate officers in Brazil.
In Europe, a new system of alliances emerged. In 1871, the German Empire was declared, meaning Prussian supremacy over all the other states. France signed an alliance with Austria in 1873 after the Emperor Napoleon III managed to fight off Communist and Republican revolutionaries. In 1877, following joint Austro-French Naval Drills in the Mediterranean, the Italians and Germans signed the Rome-Berlin Treaty. When Russia signed with the French and Austrians, forming the Triple Entente, the British, at least in theory, gave their support to the Germans, in hopes of preventing an entente domination of Europe. From these treaties and alliances sprung nationalism, and, Pan-German ideas were spread inside the Empire, French nationalism by the revanchist Napoleon III, and Italian nationalism to help unify the country. These ideas became quite important to Europe.
Outside of Europe, colonization was continuing, the British produced an idea for a Cape Town to Cairo railroad, while the Portuguese wanted dominance from Angola to Mozambique. New players emerged, like the Dutch in East Africa, and later in the decade, the Germans and Italians.
In the US, the tieing of the Democrats with the 1872 Disturbances led to James Blaine, another Republican being elected. Under Blaine, the Federal government took a somewhat harsh tone to the south, but, with continuing military occupation, the military, under John Schofield held most of the power regarding that. Blaine was popular and best remembered for increasing ties with Mexico, as well as beginning involvement in the Caribbean and Central America, where American companies began to gain edges.
The loser of this decade was the Ottoman Empire. A Russo-Turkish War was fought from 1875 to 1877, in which Russian forces alongside European revolutionaries managed to inflict great defeats on the Ottomans. By the end of the war, România, Bulgaria, Montenegro, and Serbia were effectively out of the Ottoman Empire. Greece and taken Thessaly, Austria Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Britain Cyprus. The Ottoman Empire still kept Albania, though it was somewhat unstable, with some chaos surrounding the death of Sultan Murat V in 1879.
Russian forces defeat Ottoman ones somewhere in Anatolia.