Balance of Power

[Bytor]

The Settling of French New Holland​

After the embarrassment of the Verona Scandal and the fall of the Villèle Ministry in 1822, the Ultra-Royalists were determined to get back in power and to find a way to show the strength of the French monarchy. With the return of Admiral Albin Roussin from a successful tour of South America an idea started to form, recalling the days of Louis Aleno de St Aloüarn who had claimed the western part of Terra Australis in 1772 for Louis XIV, and of Jean François de Gaup, Count of Lapérouse, who had famously explored and charted the western coasts in 1788.

The second Décazes ministry, however, was just as untenable as the first, and as that of du Plessis has been, and faced with constant attacks by both the Liberals and the Ultra-Royalists it soon fell. With the Ultra-Royalists back in power, they began to pressure Louis XVIII that a colony in the western half of Terra Australis, claimed in the days of his grandfather, would elevate France to a position of respect in Europe and help solidify the monarchy once more.

On April 22, 1824, to the dismay of the British, Admiral Roussin sailed for Terra Australis with a fleet of 12 ships and 1,100 sailors, convicts and family members. Roussin named his ship Astrolabe after the ship of Lapérouse and the main stores vessel Gros Ventre after St. Aloüarn’s ship. Vincent-Marie Viénot, Count of Vaublanc was chosen to the be the governor of Nouvelle-Hollande for his long acquaintances with Louis XVIII and Charles Philippe, comte d’Artois, the expected heir since the assassination of the Duke of Berry in 1820.

The Astrolabe arrived at what the Count of Vaublanc named the Bay of Orléans on the 28th of September, 1824, followed on the 30th and the 1st by the Gros Ventre and the rest of the fleet. On October the 1st, Vaublanc declared

Au nom du roi Louis XVIII, je renouvelle la revendication de souveraineté sur la moitié ouest de la Nouvelle-Hollande et les îles au large de ses côtes, faite du temps de son grand-père, Louis XV, en tant que colonie du Royaume de France.

About two months later, ships from Sydney in the British colony of New South Wales arrived in Bay of Orléans under the command of Major Edmund Lockyer and were perplexed to find the French settlement of Versailles already well under way. While it had been believed by the British that their ships were faster and that they knew the clipper route better than the French did, Admiral Roussin was a world-class navigator, and the rumours had not made it to the Lords Castlereagh and Bathurst until the project was well under way. In addition, the Governor of New South Wales was dealing with factional infighting in the colony and that the Colonial Secretary had been withholding documents from him which delayed the dispatching of Major Lockyer.

Unknown to de Vaublanc, Roussin and the others, Louis XVIII, health already failing when the fleet had left Toulon, had died a mere 16 days before the proclamation of the colony. A second fleet with more convicts arrived in May of 1825 with the news of his passing.

Like the British in New South Wales, Charles X used New Holland as a convict colony as an attempt to deal with the unrest and , sending an average of 2,000 convicts a year to the settlement at Versailles. This included members of the Paris National Guard in 1827 when he tried to disarm them. Many ships were sent to map the coasts of New Holland and to look for precious and useful minerals. Tiny flecks of gold embedded in rocks on the beaches were found at places that later became New Savoy, Montpelier, Louisville, Espérance and Le Corbeau, as well as evidence of iron, tin, lead and copper. Owing to the round trip time for the samples to be taken back to France for verification and how long it took to find the actual sources of the various minerals, only New Savoy was settled before Charles X was deposed. When de Vaublanc was recalled to France to meet with the new king, Louis Philippe, he took with him bottles of the first wine produced in a New Holland vineyard planted in 1825.

Louis Philippe, originally intending to end convict transport to New Holland, ended up following his predecessor's system. As he and his government turned more conservative and monarchicha, and the income gap between bourgeoisie and commoners widened considerably, crime continued to increase throughout his reign. As a result he felt compelled to maintain New Holland as a penal colony to try and maintain social order. In the words of Victor Hugo:

What is there against him? That throne. Take away Louis Philippe the king, there remains the man. And the man is good. He is good at times even to the point of being admirable. Often, in the midst of his gravest souvenirs, after a day of conflict with the whole diplomacy of the continent, he returned at night to his apartments, and there, exhausted with fatigue, overwhelmed with sleep, what did he do? He took a death sentence and passed the night in revising a criminal suit, considering it something to hold his own against Europe, but that it was a still greater matter to rescue a man from the executioner and, instead, send him to New Holland to work off his debt and gain a better chance in life.

Louis Philippe also attempted to convince the Legitimists to accept grants of land in New Holland exchange for the biens nationaux that had been given during the reign of Charles X to nobles who had had property confiscated during the French Revolution, along with the dangling fruit of titles in the French peerage for those who managed to sufficiently develop these lands. During the July Monarchy this only appealed to a few of those who were high in debt and had grown accustomed to working for a pension while putting on airs, but from them came people like the Comte d’Espérance and the Comte de Nouvelle-Bourgogne who played significant roles in the Pacific Theatre in the Great War that ended in 1911.

 

[Bytor]

The First Deseret Rebellion, Part I

Alta California has been an independent country since 1848, and in 1852 the State of Deseret was set up due the agreement between the Mormon Settlers and the Californios for defending against the haphazard Mexican army that had been sent north. Deseret is the only state is not required to operate in Spanish, such as run schools and record government and official business. Residents of Deseret also have the right to federal services in English as well. Deseret was also allowed a small state militia to help with American incursions from the north, as long as the squadron commanders spent a six month rotation in the federal army every 4 years and can speak passable Spanish, but this last is honoured more in the breach than in the keeping.

American gold rush migrants who cannot or will not assimilate into the Hispanic society of Alta California between the Sierra Nevadas and the Pacific coast tend to gravitate to Deseret if they don't return to the USA, CSA, or Texas. As a result in colloquial speech of the times and still often today, everybody is either "Mormón" or "Californio" on the coast or "Mormon" or "Spanish" in Salt Lake City, regardless of what one's native tongue or religion might be.

By the 1870s Mormón settlement had expanded outside of Deseret. Many of these settlements try their best to comply with the requirement of a pueblo charter as defined by the Territorios Administrados Federalmente (TAF), especially if they can attract Hispanic settlers from past the Sierra Nevadas or from Salt Lake City's small but growing Hispanic community, but just as many refuse to do so.

This leads to growing tensions not only between Deseret and the Federal Government but also between Mormóns and Californios. Editorials in the Deseret News have cried foul at the Governor of the Federally Administered Territory ordering a halt on pueblo charters to Mormón settlements after revoking many for not following the laws. Rumours of people arriving from the gold fields after being denied the staking of a claim for not speaking Spanish are circulated as fact. Various groups also exist calling for an enlargement of Deseret or for a second Mormón state with the same privileges, sometimes both. Things are not helped by multiple surveys of Deseret's borders where Californio and Mormón surveyors do not agree.

The creation of the initially indigenous majority states of Yuta in 1872, Nabajoa in 1875, and Yavapai in 1879 are a particular grievance with Los Mormones of conservative nature who refuse to learn Spanish, especially those who have familial and economic ties to residents in Idaho territory where the Snake War is a recent memory.

In the late 1870s, scattered raids between natives and Mormons start happening. The newspapers in Salt Lake City claimed it was started by unprovoked native attacks on Mormón pueblos outside of Deseret and that Los Mormones were only defending themselves. The Chiefs of Yuta, claimed it was roving bands of Mormones padded out with Americans from Idaho who started it, trying to exact retribution on natives who had fled the USA for Alta California over the past 20 years.

Into the 1880s the raids increase in frequency, with Los Mormones still claiming they were unprovoked and any retaliation was only self-defence. The federal government in Monterrey, however, chooses to believe the witnesses and evidence coming out of Ogwaiden and from the alguaciles of the TAF. The alguaciles are spread thin and their presidios few and far between as the prospectors and settlers who came this far inland, but they shift troops towards Deseret and start using local scouts to look into reports of native pueblos being attacked. Attacks increase and by 1883 even the TAF alguaciles are attacked while checking in at the pueblos, first by happenstance, later in apparent planned ambushes as many of the alguaciles are natives or first generation mestizos.

The Deseret State government in Salt Lake denies any involvement, calling them “bandits” or “unsanctioned militia”, even though indigenous witnesses speaking to the Yuta Chiefs Assembly in Ogwaiden say otherwise. Desert newspapers stoking the discontent call them “illiterate Indians who wouldn’t know a captain’s badge from a beaded necklace” as they demand a second Mormón state for their pueblos outside the boundaries of Deseret.

On April 12th, 1886, the TAF’s Presidio Aurora on the Río Severo is attacked by three Deseret militia units, later thought to have been provoked by articles in the Deseret Post about the negotiations happening in the south between TAF alguaciles and the Apache Goyaalé, also known as Geronimo, for him to stop using southeastern Alta California as a retreat from their raids in Texian, Union, and Confederate territories as well as his sporadic raids against prospectors inside Alta California. The attack was repulsed and this time uniformed militia are killed, including the captain of one of the three units. In his jacket pocket are found documents laying out locations of native settlements that have yet to be attacked and orders to coordinate with other militia units to prevent more new presidios from being built and to assist the bandit groups in harassing the natives, signed by the head of the State Militia Department, Judge Daniel H. Wells “under the authority of the office of Governor John Taylor of the State of Deseret”.

These documents are immediately sent by courier horse to Pueblo Ola, a stop on the railroad linking Salt Lake City with the capital of Monterrey, taking 5 days to get there. From there, telegrams are sent to the Interior Ministry and the President’s office and the courier boarded the train for Monterrey. In 20 hours he was at Winnemucca, the TAF headquarters on the Deseret side of the Sierra Nevadas, and in Monterrey 30 hours after that.

When the news was read before a combined meeting of the Chambers of Senators and Deputies the result was an uproar. The TAF had already requested federal troops to help them deal with the then presumed bandit activity but more were clearly needed with a state in seeming rebellion. Telegrams were sent out and militias were quickly gathered from along the railroads by the presidios and sent to muster at Presidio Sacramento, along with federal army troops from each presidio in command.

The first federal troops, 25 of them led by Coronel Napoleon Vallejo y Carrillo, son of Senator Manuel Guadelupe Vallejo, arrived in Salt Lake City on April 21st, after the Presidio Gran Lago Salado did not answer urgent telegrams from Presidio Sacramento sent on the 18th.

 

[Bytor]

The Republic of California in 1892 before the final resolution of the First Deseret Rebellion

 

[Bytor]

Flag of the Alyaskan Confederated Republic

The Fur Trade revenue from Alyaska had been declining for decades, ever since Baranov died in 1819 and the naval officers took over and started to mismanage everything. The constant Tlingit rebellions were also a real pain the the zadnicha.

The Americans were not interested in buying Alyaska, though they had good relations with Russia. Ever since Clay won the presidency in 1844, made peace with Mexico and settled the boundary between American Oregon and British Columbia, the USA had looked inward and focused on economic rather than territorial expansion. They did not want a second Louisiana Purchase, though they could well afford it. New territories brought too many new disputes.

The British probably would have bought it, but there was no way the Tsar was going to help them expand the English influence give their rivalry in Central Asia. They were too powerful already!

So the Tsar, deciding it was not worth the expense, cancelled the subsidies to the Russian-American Company which pulled up stakes and left. Those who stayed behind were mostly Company officers, sailors and priests who had married into the Aleut communities, along with a few intrepid businesses servicing the trader ships, plus a small but steady trickle Russians, Ukrainians and others seeking to get outfrom under the thumb of an authoritarian regime.

Trade at first was minimal, but the Russians and Aleuts, when left to their own skills, managed things much better than the greedy naval officers in charge of the RAC ever did. The Tlingit tribes were a big part of this trade and acted at first as intermediaries with the Hudson's Bay Company and with the Athapaskan tribes of the Alyaskan interior thanks to their proximity to the headwaters of the Yukon River. The first trade was with the British in New Caledonia and Columbia, the Americans in Oregon and the vibrant Alta Californians. Within a decade new ships were arriving every week at the towns of Shee At'ika, formerly Novo Arkhangelsk, and Kodiak where the first proper ports were built. Eventually trade expanded to China, Japan, Korea, the Philippines, Hawai'i and even as far south as Chile.

Disputes over trade with the interior Athapaskan tribes caused numerous bloody skirmishes that were often long-standing tribal grievances given new life by economic prospects, but life was generally good and getting better. Since smallpox and other European diseases had swept through Alyaska almost 40 years earlier and the Russian Orthodox Church had a tradition of providing vaccines, indigenous populations, already on the rebound two generations later, experienced a population boom unmatched throughout the rest of the Americas.

In 1885, the Alyaskan Confederated Republic (Аляскинская Конфедеративная Республика “Alyaskinskaya Confederativnaya Respublika”) was born out of an economic agreement primarily between the Russified Aleuts and their Tlingit partners but also all the other coastal and island tribes that had benefited from the trade. It was prompted by increasing European and Asian trader settlements popping thanks to the success of the Aleut maritime trading network and the numerous small gold rushes that were happening. The new confederation claimed everything south and east of the Yukon River and the former Russian claims down to 54°40' N. Some Athapaskan interior tribes joined the Confederation but many did not, continuing the on-again, off-again petty wars with the interior and northern tribes. There were also territorial conflicts with the Hudson’s Bay Company and the young nation of Canada over the Yukon River boundary as the Tlingit trade network had grown from being reliant on the HBC to being a major competitor. However, with Skagway as the start for the Chilkoot Trail, the Yukon Gold Rush of 1898 meant that Alyaskan control of the territory became undeniable

The Naami Gold Rush in 1899 prompted the Confederation to annex everything south of the Kobruk River which touched off a new round of skirmishes with the interior tribes, though by this time trade networks had become so strong throughout all of the former Russian America that there was as much inter-Athapaskan conflict over its control as there was Athapaskan-Confederation conflict. Over the next 50 years, all the rest of the tribes of the former Russian America joined the Confederation.

The declaration of independence in 1885 and the progressively expanding claims over what used to be Russian Alyaska set off 26 years of border skirmishes with Canada, but while Alyaska claimed cities like Whitehorse and Dawson, they never controlled beyond the old border agreed to by the Russian and British Empires in 1821. When the boundary dispute was resolved in 1911 as part of the Darmstadt treaties which also ended the Great War, the old boundary of 143°20′14.02500″ west of Paris, (141°0′0″ west of the now outmoded Greenwich, UK meridian) was retained and the vague "summit of the mountains situated parallel to the coast" with a line demarcating the change in watershed from the Pacific Ocean to that of the Yukon River and it's tributaries.

Today, the Alyaskan Confederated Republic is a mostly lightly populated country with a resource-based economy and supplying natural gas used to the Canadian provinces of New Caledonia and Columbia, the American states of Oregon and Idaho, as well as the Republic of Alta California. Beaufort Sea Oil also powers much of western North American industry. Mining, logging and tourism are also important. Because of the maritime trading history it is also a neutral flag of convenience for many ships trading between nations otherwise hostile to each other.

The modern government is a fusion of traditional native councils and European bicameralism that has evolved over the past one hundred years. Bills are created and introduced in the lower house called the Peoples Forum and then move to the upper house known as the Council of Chiefs. The largest or most important cities are Kodiak (the capital and location of the Chief’s Council), Skagway (home of the Ministry of Trade, Ministry of Immigration), Fairbanks, Shee' Atika (home of the Peoples Forum) Ketchikan and Dzánti K'ihéeni. Russian is the traditional language of government and inter-tribal commerce, though most people are bilingual and many non-Aleuts and non-Tlingits speak one of those languages as well. Use of English and Spanish are heard more and more due to the Anglo-American and Alta Californian communities that have sprung up along with the oil industry, and Korean, Japanese, and Chinese are common minority languages thanks to the initial trading links set up by back in the nineteenth century before independence.

 

[Bytor]

The first Deseret Rebellion, Part II
When Coronel Vallejo and his two dozen soldiers got off the train late in the evening on the 21st of April, 1886, they found themselves to be outnumbered by Deseret Militia and other armed men waiting for them, about 50 men. There are many contradicting stories of this meeting, with some saying the Deseret militia company had their guns pointed at the federal platoon as it got off the train, though the most credible state that the militia’s weapons were out but pointed at the ground. Others say that the soldiers were surprised by the militia as they disembarked from the train, while other rumours say that they had their rifles out and up.

What we know for sure is that the militia colonel greeted Vallejo on behalf of Deseret’s government and his company was there as an honour guard to escort them to the presidio with the implication that a refusal would not be accepted. Vallejo responded gesturing towards the telegraph office attached to the train station that he needed to check in with his superiors back in Sacramento, reportedly quipping resignedly “Alas, as a fellow soldier I am sure that you are all too familiar with the unreasonable demands made by our political overseers” as he walked towards the door.

It is known that someone fired a shot at Vallejo as he walked to that door, missing him by inches and striking the door frame instead, but whether it was one of the militia men or one of the accompanying armed men is unknown. Vallejo turned around and made eye contact with the militia colonel who had his right hand in the air at the level of his head. While maintaining eye contact, the colonel is reported to have said “If anybody else decides to fire their weapon without my permission, there will be consequences,” and nodded to Vallejo.

When Vallejo came out from the telegraph office he formed his platoon into marching order and they allowed themselves to be escorted to the presidio. As they approached the presidio gates it became clear why Presidio Gran Lago Salado had stopped responding to telegraph messages. The lines to the presidio had been cut just outside and there was an unmistakable armed guard surrounding the fort.

Inside Presidio Gran Lago Salado Coronel Vallejo discussed the situation with local comandante, Coronel José Ascención Yorba. The telegraph line to the fort had been cut three days before, in the middle of a conversation about the situation and what Yorba knew about the Deseret Militia’s size and capabilities. Yorba had reported an estimated size of 250 men, divided between five forts all of which he had visited, and 20 smaller satellite camps. 5 of which he had visited, in line with official reports by previous Presidio Gran Lago Salado commandantes. Both experienced officers agreed that the 50 men that met Vallejo at the train station plus two dozen more they had met guarding the presidio would have been a significant draw down were they all official militiamen and that the bulk of the rest must still be at their forts or camps to protect their citizens, and that the attack on the TAF’s Presidio Aurora must have been the rebel militia men feeling lucky. Both men conceded, however, that the reports by natives of only some of the banditos wearing militia clothing was concerning.

During this time, mobilisation of federal troops and new enlistees had proceeded apace. Twenty box and coachcars from various railroad companies across the western part of the nation carrying mostly infantry and some cavalry converged on Güinemuca, capital of Güashishu state and the location of the Territorios Administrados Federalmente (TAF) headquarters since the railroad to Salt Lake City had been built.

With Brigadier General Rómulo Pico in command, the military train left Güinemuca on May 20th, picking up extra TAF cavalry at a handful of stations along the way. 19 hours after starting out at a hamlet named Terminal, a little over 7 millas (six and a quarter miles) from Salt Lake City, the train stopped and offloaded the TAF cavalry and about half of the accompanying Federal Cavalry, who galloped off. Two hours later the train pulled into the station in Salt Lake City. The Deseret Militia had been expecting a response, but the militia colonel who had greeted Coronel Vallejo a month earlier was shocked by the 900 federal troops that swarmed from both sides of coaches and out of the box cars with their mixture of Alta California-made Fusil Grand Modele 1874s and Winchesters purchased from the United States, and even more so by the 50 Federal Cavalry troops that accompanied them.

One Alta California soldier was killed when some men clearly working with the militia started firing and caused a fire fight, but when the smoke cleared 2 militia and 3 banditos were dead, and six more injured, and the rest corralled by the Federal Cavalry. The Militia Colonel had his face in the mud and his hands were being tied behind his back.

At that moment a dozen militia men coming up a perpendicular road to the train station were ambushed by troops who had exited the train on the opposite side from train station buildings and had circled around a couple of blocks to secure the area. It was learned from them that word of the cavalry, but not their true numbers, had reached the Presidio Gran Lago Salado and a warning had been sent to the Governor’s Mansion, the Temple, and the State Capitol.

General Pico immediately sent two companies off to the Presidio as he knew from Coronel Vallejo’s telegram that’s where he and the Presidio’s usual complement were being held. The rest were sent to the Governor’s Mansion and the state capitol. When the troops arrived at the Presidio, they found it guarded by about one hundred and fifty men, with only a third of them seemingly wearing Deseret Militia uniforms. The rebels started the fight with vigour, but nearly all of the banditos and many of the militia were spooked by fire from inside the palisade by platforms the incarcerated soldiers built over the past month. When the Presidio gates burst open and the troops of Vallejo and Yorba came running out, attacking the rebels from behind, the rebel company broke and fled, leaving almost thirty dead and wounded. The federal troops left Vallejo and Yorba to clean up at the Presidio and marched swiftly off to rejoin General Pico.

General Pico’s companies had a much easier time of things as the cavalry company Pico had sent ahead from Terminal station had looped around Salt Lake City to enter from an unexpected direction had managed to occupy the Governor’s Mansion and the State Capitol without any bloodshed and had taken Governor John Taylor and Judge Daniel H. Wells into custody, as well as State Senators Wilford Woodruff, Lorenzo Snow, and Representatives Benjamin Johnson and Franklin Richards I, all of whom had been meeting with the Governor of Deseret when the cavalry swept in. All that was left was the policing of the general chaos.

When the chaos settled a few hours later, General Pico made the following announcement at the state capitol building and then again in the main square of the city:

“On this day, by the unified decree of the federal Chamber of Senators and Chamber of Deputies, the Autonomous State of Deseret is now under Martial Law for conspiring to Acts of War against the citizens of the Republic of Alta California. The federal Senators and Deputies of the State, as well as all state legislators, are now removed from their positions, and all state judges are dismissed from their offices and will have their duties taken up by federal judges.”

(“En este día, por decreto unificado de la Cámara de Senadores y la Cámara de Diputados federales, el Estado Autónomo de Deseret pasa a estar bajo Ley Marcial por conspirar para Actos de Guerra contra los ciudadanos de la República de Alta California. Los Senadores y Diputados de Estado federales, así como todos los legisladores estatales, quedan ahora destituidos de sus cargos, y todos los jueces estatales son destituidos de sus cargos y serán asumidos en sus funciones por jueces federales.”)

 

[Strategos' Risk]

Dang what a continuation gap from when the timeline first started and where it is now. Also good name for a timeline. I'll try to start reading this and comment it, balkanized/alternate North America timelines are always fun.

 

[Bytor]

Dang what a continuation gap from when the timeline first started and where it is now. Also good name for a timeline. I'll try to start reading this and comment it, balkanized/alternate North America timelines are always fun.

What do you mean "a continuation gap"?

 

[Strategos' Risk]

Thread was started in 2016, went until 2018, had a couple of posts in 2019 and 2020, then resumed for good in 2022. I appreciate that commitment to a project. Too many promising ones basically die out after lack of updates for too long.

 

[Bytor]

Thread was started in 2016, went until 2018, had a couple of posts in 2019 and 2020, then resumed for good in 2022. I appreciate that commitment to a project. Too many promising ones basically die out after lack of updates for too long.

Oh, OK. I thought you meant a gap in the timeline.

A few years back my NAS suffered a catastrophic drive failure and one of the things I lost was the PostGIS database of my maps. I used to have a set of static map data files for each map but later switched to a database format where the country/province/city/etc… objects have start & end times and I can just drag a slider back and forth to see the changes happen (se the Canada & U.S.A. animations). I had to rebuild that from an out of date backup and the static files as well as manually redo a lot. That took more than a year to rebuild and I nearly gave up a few times.

 

[Manfredatee]

I've just read through this and I love it, especially the maps. One of my favorite parts of alternate history is imagining alternate realities, and messing around with borders and identities. Maps are a big part of that, and your maps are very well done.

 

[Pax_Nihil]

^Ditto

 

[Bytor]

The First Deseret Rebellion, Part III​

After incarcerating Governor John Taylor, Judge Daniel H. Wells, State Senators Wilford Woodruff, Lorenzo Snow, and Representatives Benjamin Johnson and Franklin Richards I in the train station, pending transfer to Monterey for trial, Brigadier General Rómulo Pico’s first task was to make sure no more Deseret Militia members were free in Salt Lake City, confining them to Presidio Gran Lago Salado which had been stripped of armaments. Tracking down the banditos would be more difficult as many of them had fled. Some were later captured trying to attack the one thousand federal troops now in Salt Lake City, but their general lack of discipline and poor weaponry made them easy pickings. About two dozen were shot, half fatally, over the next three days.

Records found at the Governor’s Mansion, the home of Judge Wells, and senator Woodruff indicated that the number of forts, camps run by the Deseret Militia was nearly double what officially existed. There were four more forts than had previously been revealed, and a total of thirty-seven subsidiary camps.

Companies of federal army cavalry were sent out to visit each Deseret Militia fort and camp in turn, accompanied by an inactive militia member from Salt Lake City. The militia member was sent into the base while the cavalry encircled it. The inactive member brought the news of what had happened in Salt Lake City, the government members that had been arrested, and the imposition of martial law across the state. They were also informed that the Deseret Militia was being disbanded, the fort commander and lieutenant were to be arrested along with any non-militia men in the fort. Militia members were told that they were to report to the Presidio Gran Lago Salado by September 1st to receive their militia salary and any who did not do so would have any land they owned confiscated. Fort records were also confiscated and the disbanded militia members left behind were told to pass the word about the penalties for failing to report in along to any smaller militia camps.

Because the cavalry surrounding the fort was usually ten times the strength of those within, things mostly went smoothly. The four unofficial forts, however, had large numbers of banditos within and commanders unwilling to give up on the conspiracy so federal forces were forced to storm them. Thirty-two militia fort and camp officers were arrested, five were killed in gun battles, and eighteen fled with the banditos. More than one hundred unofficial militia members and banditos were captured or killed and an estimated three times that many escaped during the battles. Many of who escaped are presumed to have fled north to Utah and Idaho Territories in the U.S.A. where many Mormons lived.

Governor Taylor, Judge Wells, and the four senators and politicians, who became known in the newspapers as the Perfidious Priesthood because of their positions in the LDS Church government, were put on trial later that fall, following searches of Deserest state offices, their homes, and the homes of all state judges, deputies, and senators.

Stub-books, called «talonarios» by the Alta Californian prosecutor, found at the home of Judge Wells that were analysed and used as evidence for the trial for treason later that fall showed that beyond the 242 officially active Deseret Militia members there were another 188 secret members on the militia payroll, as well as somewhere between two hundred and three hundred banditos. Their pay was hidden as employees of the Deseret & Northern Railway jointly owned by the LDS Church in Deseret and Utah Territory, which was matched up to expenses in the state budget for Deseret Militia, government payments to the six men on trial, and their payments to the railroad supposedly for cartage services for companies they owned.

The trial took seven days, mostly to go over the stub-books and the letters signed by Judge Wells to militia commanders. It also went over how the six men were the leaders of a LDS Church faction that was trying to harness anti-Indian sentiment and national disaffection amongst about the borders of the state in a bid to stay in power as more Californios and urbanised Indios moved to the state following the coming of the railroad in 1874. The first was from the cross-national family ties and anger felt by many conservative Mormón Deseretians over the so-called “Snake War” in the U.S.A. from two decades previous and the giving of safe haven to Ute chiefs like Pahninee, and Wahveveh who were deemed “warmongers” and “violent savages” by the most extreme. The second was about trying to play to the moderates who felt that Deseret had been unfairly ruled against by the federal courts in the court cases that hashed out the ambiguities of the organic law that created the state in 1852.

All six men were pronounced guilty of treason by a panel of three federal judges and sentenced to death which was carried out three days later on the Monterrey docks.

What shocked many was not that the corruption or racism existed, but just how tightly the Deseret government was linked with the LDS Church government as Alta Californian newspapers started doing deeper investigations into the revelations of the trial. The state laws that required any candidates in elections to be “community members in good standing” were often interpreted as requiring a LDS membership letter from the local LDS ward clerk. As a result, the Governor had always been the LDS Church president, there had never been a state senator who was not a member of the Melchizidek priesthood or stake president, and only 3 secular state deputies over the past 34 years. Local municipal councils were also similarly dominated by LDS Church members because of this. It was also extremely difficult to rise in the civilian state bureaucracy as many municipal clerks were also the local LDS Church ward clerks, and LDS Church missionaries and Aaronite priesthood members were often interchangeable with State Capitol staff.

As a result of the trial and execution for treason of six top Deseret State officials and the newspaper revelations of how the LDS Church effectively was the state government, the federal legislature met to amend the organic law for the Autonomous State of Deseret. Firstly, the appellation “autonomous” was removed from the state’s name, placing it on a more equal footing with other states. Second, the right to form a state militia was taken away and all Deseret Militia property was assigned to the Federal Army. Third, active members of the LDS Church government and all former state militia members were prohibited from holding any elected office in Deseret. Lastly, elections for state and national senators and deputies, state judges, and municipal councils were to be held for the month of April, 1887 with martial law being replaced by that newly elected local government on June 1st. Deseret was allowed to keep its special exemptions for English as the language of education and government.

While municipal councils quickly had non-LDS members get elected, especially in places where actual “Mormons” (not Mormón as an epithet for anybody who is not an original or assimilated Californio or native Indio) were in the minority, the state senate and house of deputies were still dominated by Mormón members through demographic weight, but at least Deseret now had a two-party system with the moderate and progressive Mormón representatives usually finding common cause with the small number of Californio and Indio representatives to counterbalance the conservative Deseret Party formed from the ashes of the pre-rebellion government who had resigned their positions in LDS Church government.

A semblance of normalcy returned to Deseret and the nation after more than a year of martial law, but old prejudices and new animosities continued to simmer.

 

[Bytor]

Extra long update there, since it;'s been a while, ending off the story of the First Desert Rebellion. Things are calm on the state for now, but grievances and prejudices both old and new simmer under the surface.

 

[LordCalner]

Real good update!

 

[NedStark]

Quick export of my GIS data for after the Austrian Civil War in my "Balance of Power" ATL

I wonder if the Italian republics (Cispadania, Roman Republic, possibly Lombardy-Venetia) would start unify later down the roads.

As for Rheinland, Westphalia and Baden, there are only 2 ways for Germany to retake them: the first one is by force, the second one is by becoming a republic itself.

 

[Bytor]

I wonder if the Italian republics (Cispadania, Roman Republic, possibly Lombardy-Venetia) would start unify later down the roads.

As for Rheinland, Westphalia and Baden, there are only 2 ways for Germany to retake them: the first one is by force, the second one is by becoming a republic itself.

The Cispandanians aren't going to want to unify with the Roman Republic. About 25% of the territory and population split from the RR over the governments' continuing concessions to the Pope and ecclesiastical power. The nation is *the* hotbed of overt democracy and republicanism in the Italian peninsula. Plus, they've also been absorbing Marxist-Engelist ideals from being part of the "Small Nations Concert", smaller European trying to balance between the French and German economic spheres that hold their own meetings since the 1850 Warsaw Congress to try and present a common front to the Great Powers.

Marxist-Engelist ideals are quite popular in most of the republican members of the SNC.

 

[Bytor]

Europe and the Balance of Power: Marxist-Engelist Politics

When Friedrich Engels left Prussia on a trip through Bavaria to Baden to cover the revolution there, he had no idea how much it would change his life and how much his writings would help change Europe.

When Engels arrived in Baden to report on the revolution, the feeling was both hopeful and grim. The government of the Grand Duchy of Baden was proving to be an easy target with the defection of so many soldiers to the cause of the revolution. However, leaders like Friedrich Heckel, Gustav Struve, Gottfried Kinkel, and others publicly expressed worries that Grand Duke Leopold would call for Prussian or Austrian assistance, which the revolutionaries could not hope to overcome.

Instead, the new Austrian Archduke, Franz Joseph, was more concerned about Prussian ascendency than the precedent of a republican victory in Baden. He had been able to call General Radetzky home from Lombardy to handle the Hungarian Revolutionaries. Thus, he was open to supporting the other Great Powers in preventing Prussian intervention in the various Rheinland states. This Austrian short-sightedness would have significant repercussions in the following decades.

With the Republic of Baden proclaimed on July 1st, 1849, and the Republic of the Rheinpfalz the next day, Engels learned firsthand how influential The Communist Manifesto, which he and Karl Marx had published the previous year, had become. This was helped by his own actions at Kaiserslautern and in Baden. He became the chief of staff under August Willich, who had fled Prussian Westphalia for Baden after Elberfeld where he was elected as one of the new nation’s Landestag deputies. When the French ambassador, unexpectedly quickly sent by President Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte in fraternal recognition of the new republic, was being welcomed by the Landestag, there was a scramble to find symbols of the state that spoke of Baden but not the old monarchy. Engels brought forth a student protest flag from the conflict that he had used as inspiration while helping to write his pamphlet with Marx last year. Fearing being cut off from the pension his parents still sent him, he introduced himself to the ambassador by his pen name “Friedrich Oswald”.

After the revolution, as life resumed a new normal over the next couple of years, disagreements within the revolutionary movement began to shake them out into different camps. With deputies like Heckel, Kinkel, and Struve joining either the Sozialdemokratische Partei Badens (SPB) or the Badischer Volksverein (BVV), disappointingly to Engels, major figures like Friedrich Bassermann, Karl Mahy, and even President Lorenz Brentano joined the center-right Badischer Demokratische Partei or even the right-wing Freie Badischer Wähler (FBW). So, in 1853, as the Euxine War was looming across Europe, Engels decided to move from political theorizing to political action and won election to the Landestag as a member of the SPB, helping to defeat the coalition of centrist and right-wing deputies that President Brentano had managed to cobble together in this early era of political parties.

Baden, the Rheinpfalz, and Hesse, with continued membership in the German Zollverein required by the Great Powers, were in a unique situation. Their continued existence rather than being swallowed up by Prussia meant becoming puppets of the French Republic and later Empire, along with their proximity to the important trade route of the Rhine River, resulting in an economic boom. The three new republics became at first a covert and later open corridor of trade between France and Prussia, as in this age of new industrialization economics and money competed with political and historical rivalries, just as they do today. Engels, drawing upon his intellectual acumen and unwavering commitment to socialist ideals, emerged as a prominent advocate for the rights of the working class in this time of rapid economic growth.

His engagements within the Landtag were characterized by impassioned rhetoric and strategic maneuvering as he sought to advance policies conducive to social justice and equitable governance. Amidst the political tumult of post-revolutionary Baden, Engels' interactions with his revolutionary peers served to fortify his resolve and refine his political strategies.

Throughout his tenure in the Landtag, Engels remained resolute in his dedication to the principles of socialism. Despite the allure of political power and prestige, he steadfastly championed the cause of the marginalized and disenfranchised, collaborating with like-minded comrades to effect tangible change within the republic. Engels' contributions to the political discourse of Baden were informed by his interactions with fellow revolutionaries, each interaction serving to enrich his understanding of the complex dynamics at play within the fledgling democracy.

As Engels navigated the intricacies of post-revolutionary politics, he maintained a steadfast commitment to the principles espoused by the socialist movement. His interactions with his revolutionary contemporaries underscored the collaborative nature of his political engagements, as he sought to leverage collective wisdom and expertise in pursuit of a more just and equitable society. Despite the challenges inherent in the political landscape of 19th-century Baden, Engels' interactions with his peers served to bolster his resolve and reaffirm his unwavering commitment to the cause of socialism.

During his time as a deputy, the Small Nations Concert was formed. This was an ad hoc group of smaller nations caught between the competing influences of the Great Powers and trying to present a unified front to influence their decisions. At first, it was only the new republics of Baden, Hesse, and the Rheinpfalz, but in 1860 they were joined by Cispadania and the Roman Republic, in 1861 by Navarre, in 1864 by Westphalia, and after the 1874 dissolution of the Austrian Empire by Lombardy, Venetia, Croatia, and Slavonia. Eventually, even smaller monarchist states like Luxembourg, Limburg, and Liechtenstein joined.

The Small Nations Concert, however, was as rife with shifting alliances as the Concert of Europe was between the Great Powers. Marxist-Engelist ideals were popular in many, though not all, of the SNC’s republics but officially disdained in the Roman Republic, Navarre, and the monarchist members.

Despite that disdain, however, there were Marxist-Engelist groups in every nation in Europe. Depending on local laws and forms of government, these ranged from underground clubs to political parties, and by the turn of the century, every one of those nations found itself having to at least give lip service to left-wing ideas to keep its citizens happy.