"The vacant expression that appears in the eyes of Charles IV's portrait is not a form of mockery by the artist. That is simply how King Charles was."
--Professor Juan Estrada
Spain’s involvement in the Great Dutch War was relatively limited throughout 1788. Outside of supplies and soldiers in the Netherlands, the occupation of Gijón,and the sieging of Gibraltar, the Spanish army was primarily occupied with preparing for a Portuguese entry into the Great Dutch War or a Spanish entry into the French Civil War.
On the seas, Spain wrestled with Britain to keep her colonies and trade secure. Alongside the Dutch Navy, Spain was able to maintain moderate security from the British Royal Navy, only suffering minor raids on trade with her colonies.
With relative stability at home, Spain would have domestic affairs be dominate through 1788. Under reformist Chief Minister, the Count of Floridablanca José Moñino, and the pillar of the Enlightenment Charles III, Spain continued her relative liberal reforms. The ever rising fears of a reactionary Noble uprising in the same style of the French Conseillères spurred on both Moñino and Charles III leading to the abolishment of Navarre and Aragonese autonomy in October. However, as Spain entered 1789 the state’s future was thrown into question as Charles III perished on December 12th and Charles IV succeeded to the throne.
In contrast to his father, Charles IV was a relatively simple man; he preferred hunting to ruling and as such governance of Spain fell to Chief Minister Moñino and the Queen-consort Maria Luisa. While Moñino pushed to continue the reforms, Maria Luisa was more conservative and fought with Moñino over issues quite regularly. In addition, there existed much speculation that Maria Luisa wanted to replace Moñino with one of her lovers such as Luis de Godoy.
The needs of the war however would bring the tensions between the Chief Minister and the Queen to a head. While Spain wasn’t heavily involved in the war, the economy was still strained by the necessary expansion of both the army and navy, as well as the loss of trade with Great Britain. The fighting between Moñino and the Queen also directly affected the war; Moñino wanted to focus on the naval war and eventually intervene in France while the Queen supported a preemptive attack on Portugal. The split attentions of the government by the Queen and Moñino led to Spain receiving their first serious military defeat in the war. Conflicting orders prevented the Spanish fleet from taking proper action during a British attack on the Canaries Islands, thus allowing the islands to fall under British control. With control of the Canaries, British raiding of Spain's trade with her colonies only got worse which threatened to force Spain into bankruptcy yet again if not resolved.
Moñino was fully aware of this and increasingly began to fight with the Queen as Moñino saw the best plan forward to be to liberate the Canaries first, while the Queen wanted to attack Portugal to eliminate one of the largest Royal Navy bases in Lisbon before attacking the Canaries. Fearing that an attack on Portugal would simply end in disaster for Spain, Moñino decided to take a rather dramatic action; on June 13th he told Charles IV on the rumors that Queen has had extramarital affairs and that some of his children were illegitimate. Moñino had intended to simply weaken the Queen's position by pushing the King from her, but this action inadvertently weakened Spain as a whole as the Queen, despite initially denying any illegitimate affairs, would in a fit of rage claim that “not a single child of hers came from Charles IV.”
Charles IV became severely distraught at this revelation. Disinheriting all of his children, Charles IV would fall into a severe depression and the country’s leadership fell entirely to Moñino as Charles would retreat inwards and Queen Maria Louisa fell from grace. The new heir to the throne was initially Charles IV’s brother, Ferdinand IV and III of Naples and Sicily. Ferdinand was much like Charles IV with his wife and prime minister making many of the decisions for him. His wife, Maria Carolina was somewhat Anglophilic and refused to let her husband take the throne of Spain due to the Spanish and British tensions. Meanwhile his prime minister was an Englishman, John Acton, who wanted to remain in his position of power and feared he would lose his influence if Ferdinand left the throne of Naples and Sicily. Furthermore, their eleven year old son, Francis, was unable to take the throne thanks to the meddling of both Acton and the Queen. Thus, the heir to the throne became Charles III’s third surviving son, the Infante Gabriel who had made a surprise recovery from smallpox a few months prior.
The war situation would improve with Moñino no longer having to fight with the Queen. The Canaries would be liberated in September, Gijón on October 3rd, and Gibraltar would fall to Spanish hands on December 12th. Entering 1790 secure at home and under Moñino's competent leadership, the Spanish began to plan an expansion of the Spanish war effort in the rest of Europe. But the best laid plans of man are always fooled by fate. Charles IV would suffer an attack by a rabid dog while on a hunt, ultimately himself becoming infected with rabies. Charles IV would remain healthy for several months, but once infected, few if any in this age would survive rabies.
On July 13th, Charles began to show symptoms of rabies. By July 17th, Charles had begun a torturous descent into insanity. Miraculously, the King would hold on for sixteen days past this point. On August 2nd, Charles would scream “Spain burns! Spain burns! Oh God, why does your fury strike her so!” before falling unconscious. Early in the morning of August 3rd, Charles IV died, and the Infante Gabriel became Gabriel I. The former heir to the throne, Prince Ferdinand, had refused to accept his disinheritance but while he proclaimed himself “Ferdinand VII of Spain,” most considered Queen Maria Luisa’s confession and Charles IV’s disinheriting of him to be legitimate, and he found no support at this time.
Gabriel I proved to be far more akin to his father than either Charles IV or Ferdinand IV and III were. A well educated and intelligent man, Gabriel was similarly a proponent of reform and the Enlightenment and thus backed Moñino’s reform agenda. In terms of the war however, Gabriel wanted to end it as the harm to Spanish trade was in Gabriel’s eyes worse than increased British influence over the low countries. Furthermore, fears of going to war with his wife’s native Portugal and the potential of a Conseillères resurgence in the French Civil War left Gabriel desiring peace with Britain. Planning to honor the Bourbon family compact, Gabriel saw peace with British as necessary so that the intervention in France could be achieved without danger to Spain. And so, only a month into Gabriel’s reign, on September 13th, the Spanish and British made peace with the Treaty of Madrid which brought status quo ante bellum between Spain and Britain. The Great Dutch War ended for Spain, bringing peace to one of the few nations that had a fighting chance of winning. News of the peace wouldn't reach Spain's colonies for months however, and in two of Spain's colonies, it was too late to stop the chain of events that was already in motion.