Empire of Freedom: The History of the American Empire

Kaiser of Brazil · Oct 27, 2019

XX: THE WAR OF THE FOURTH COALITION

Map of Prussia, 1805

King Ludwig I

After the death of Frederick II "der Grosse" (The Great), the Prussian Army stagnated, becoming arrogant and overestimating it's own abilities. It didn't help that the successor of "Old Fritz" was a man that didn't care about the state of the Army at all, giving his duties to the more competent Duke of Brunswick. As result, the Prussians lost the Battle of Valmy and the territories in the Rhineland, to make matters worse, Prince Frederick Wilhelm died of tuberculosis, followed by the death of Frederick Wilhelm II in 1797, the throne was passed to the 24-year old Prince Frederick Ludwig. But Frederich Ludwig I (or Ludwig I) would have a more militaristic outlook, and would put his hands in the dirt to start reforming the Prussian military.

Ludwig looked at the failure of the Army in the First Coalition War as a chance to reform the Prussian military. But he soon would discover that it was almost impossible, the military establishment blocked the army reforms in order to keep aristocratic privileges. The resistance would soon prove fatal when Prussia and France went to war once again. Inside of Prussia, the "War Party" desired to join a coalition against Napoleon, invading Germany while the Emperor was in the Irish campaign. The King was part of the "Peace Party" who desired to keep the peace, in the King's case, because he knew the army was in no capacity of fighting the French. Two events would pressure the King into war: The Dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire and Hannover.

After almost 900 years of existence, the Holy Roman Empire was dissolved by Napoleon. The last Emperor, Francis II, abdicated his title in order to prevent Bonaparte from claiming it, instead of that, Napoleon dissolved the Empire. In it's place, before going to Ireland, Napoleon created the "Confederation of the Rhine" with himself as Protector, uniting the German States into a massive buffer Confederation to serve as a buffer with Prussia and Austria. The dissolution of the centuries-old German order and the creation of a third power in Germany to serve as a French puppet was outrageous for Prussia.

Napoleon had given Hannover to Prussia after annexing it during the Third Coalition War, as a way to placate the War Hawks in Prussian nobility and keeping peace with Ludwig. But when the French Emperor made peace in Belfast on the 15th of December, he exchanged Hannover for Ireland, and that would mean Prussia would lose its benefit. Hoping to strike a victory before Napoleon came back from Ireland, the War Party finally pressured the King to go to war, one that Ludwig knew that they would lose. An ultimatum was sent to Napoleon retreat from the East bank of the Rhine, of course he refused, and War started on the Christmas of 1806.

The plan by the Duke of Brunswick was to push the Prussian army south to Stuttgart, cutting off the French army and marching west to fight Bonaparte's forces. Initially, the push by the Prussian army was a success, taking Saxony and advancing into Thuringia. The Prussian and French armies had roughly equal numbers, but the French were underestimated by the Prussian Generals, and they would pay heavily for that. Napoleon came back from Ireland, leaving a small force under King Michael I, and organized the Grand Army, marching to meet the Prussians. 120,000 Prussians meet 78,000 French in the Battle of Erfurt, and the Prussians hoped to end Napoleon's reign right there.

That didn't happen, instead, the Prussians were beaten so badly that the entire army organization collapsed, even the Duke of Brunswick died and Ludwig was forced to retreat with the rest of the army to Eastern Prussia. French troops took Berlin in 2 weeks and reached the Vistula by the 6th of February. With the Prussian army collapsing, the Polish population of the Prussian part of the partition rebelled, Napoleon marched into Warsaw as a liberator, even having an affair with Countess Walewska. The Russian army intervened, 80,000 troops under General Benningsen marched to the protection of their ally in Eastern Prussia. Napoleon's army didn't waste time and went into campaign against the Russians in East Prussia, meeting them on the 17th of April in the city of Eylau. After an entire day of battle, Napoleon managed to break the Russian lines with a cavalry charge supported by the Grand Bombard in the center of the Russian lines, 12,000 cavalrymen (including over 2,000 poles) broke the Russian lines and forced them to retreat. The Tsar Alexander asked for a Peace Treaty in Tilsit, ending the 4th Coalition War.

Prussia was forced to give most of its territory to France, with the French carving out the "Duchy of Warsaw" out of the Prussian partition (not including Danzig) as a client state. Tsar Alexander and Napoleon ended up signing an alliance treaty, entering a mutual defense agreement against Great Britain. The Prussians also had to pay heavy reparations, with the destruction of their army and half their territory taken, King Ludwig would finally have the chance to reform the Prussian State deeply. With the help of Gnesienau and Scharnhorst, Prussia would soon make revolutionary changes into the army and administration of the country, preparing themselves to one day have their revenge against Bonaparte.

Map of the Duchy of Warsaw after 1807

Kaiser of Brazil · Oct 29, 2019

XXI: CIVIL WAR II

The American Civil War was a short affair, lasting for less than a year, but it would have profound changes in the continent for the next decades. The American society, especially the Northerners, were not ready to throw themselves into a total war after the Canadian War. The country was suffering of a large debt and there were many who questioned if the southerners shouldn't have the right to secede, while the Northerners had the initial enthusiasm to "destroy the republican masons", the reality shock in the Battle of Gainesville was a wake up call for many. There was also Canada, that still needed a permanent military presence to combat the guerrillas, pinning down several thousand men that could've been sent to the south. When the Emperor declared General mobilization, many flocked into arms, but those who remained were certain that the war the government was sending them too was an assurance of death, and they resisted violently when the draft began in January 1807.

The New York riots were the most famous ones, they happened on the 16-21th of January of 1807, with many mobs of young men attacking recruitment stations and assaulting draft officers sent to conscript them. The Governor of the Commonwealth sent the militia to crush the riots, forcefully dispersing the crowds, arresting hundreds, sending them to the frontlines. Penal batallions were formed with the promise of freedom, it was rarely an option to join them, the penal batallions were sent in the first waves. The Imperial Army managed to increase in size to 120,000 men, but with 30,000 being kept behind to keep order in Canada and the cities. In Boston, famous for its republican symphaties, a rebellion broke against the Imperial government, only to be violently crushed after a Naval bombardment and a blockade of the city. This showed just how far the Empire would go to crush the rebellion.

There was also a political change, the majority of the Whig Senators and deputies left for the south, provoking the "Federalist Era", a time where the Federalist Party turned America into a de facto one-party State. After the crisis in October, the Senate's authority was called into question, the Emperor distrusted the Senators after they attempted to "Sabotage the Manifest Destiny" and instead started to delegate more powers to the Congress. The President of Congress, John Quincy Adams, started to accumulate more responsibilities that were once of the Senate. On the 18th of February of 1807, the Emperor amended the Constitution, instituting the position of "Prime Minister", the President of Congress became chief of the legislative power instead of the President of the Senate. The proposal passed into the Congress with ease, and the Senate was pressured to do so in a attempt to save its popularity, there were even rumors that if it failed Thomas I would merge the houses and make the legislature unicameral. The first Prime Minister would be John Quincy Adams of the Federalist Party.

John Q. Adams, First American Prime Minister

In the South, President Jefferson was suffering due to the very nature of the government he wished. The weakened presidency and decentralization of powers was actively sabotaging the war effort, with several States resisting the urges of the government to pay for the Grand Army of the Republic. It was ironical, the southern republic suffered of the same issues of the old Articles of Confederation that many romanticized. General Harrison's Army suffered with lack of recruits and resources, being forced to live off the land in Virginia itself, invading farms and conscripting recruits to ressuply their numbers. Even slaves were being forced into arms, with many instead using the weapons to turn on their commanders and flee to the North, the "Negro Batallions" were infamous for being unreliable, often being sent to die first in battle against the Northern penal batallions, ironically, the first deaths in a battle were usually from conscript regiments that hated their governments.

Then came the Slavery question: Slavery was a question not resolved since the independence, with growing abolitionist movements in the North while the South became more Reactionary in return. The war caused an explosion of those feelings, with the support of the Emperor, the war was also sold as a war to free the southern slaves, with the propaganda machine working in the North to boost abolitionism. Thomas declared that every Southron slave who escaped to the North would automatically become a freeman, creating the "Underground Railroad". Abolitionist groups would help escaped slaves to flee North and encouraged them to join the Army. In response, the southerners started seeing Slavery as part of the "Dixie way of life", with experditions being sent to the North to capture negroes and force them into slavery, those were the "Knights of the Golden Circle". Maryland was another problem for the Empire, the Commonwealth remained loyal to the Empire, but that threatened to change with the growing anti-Slavery tendencies of the government. On the 15th of April of 1807, the Congress passed the abolition of Slavery, with every slaveowner loyal to the Empire being paid 500 dollars per negro. The paid emancipation was accepted by the Marylanders, mostly because the Army of the Potomac went to each farm and forced them to accept. The great impulse to the Abolitionist movement was in large part to the own desire of the Emperor to end slavery, as he saw it as one of the greatest evils of mankind, he used his popularity and charisma to rally the Northerners, including even Canadians, to oppose slavery.

In military terms, the main offensives would happen in Louisiana and Virginia. The Louisiana campaign was launched by an army of militias of Georgia and Mississippi in a attempt to close the mouth of the Mississippi by taking New Orleans. The campaign was led by the Senator and General Charles Lee, commanding 12,000 men in a surprise attack against New Orleans. Opposing them, the city militia (composed mainly by French and freed blacks) mobilized to meet them in the "Battle of the Bayou swamps", a series of skirmishes and guerrilla attacks against the Republicans and their overextended supply lines. When the Republicans reached New Orleans, they fought a brutal battle in the city to capture it, only to discover that they were surrounded by the local militias. General Lee was forced to negotiate as the Imperial Navy blockaded them by sea and the militias by land. The campaign lasted from the 16th of February to the 3rd of May, until the Republicans managed to negotiate their retreat by threatening to burn the city to the ground, allowing 7,800 Southerners to retreat back after a humiliating defeat against guerrillas of negroes and Catholics, ironically.

The Virginian campaign continued, after the shock of Gainesville, the Army of the Potomac reformed itself, expanding its numbers and adopting many Napoleonic tactics. The GAR adopted a defensive strategy, planning to exhaust the North. On the 17th of February of 1807, a second offensive was launched with 84,000 men of the Army of the Potomac crossed into Virginia once again, meeting the 68,000 men GAR in the North Anna River. The Battle of North Anna was a massacre as the Imperial conscripts crossed the river to their deaths. After two days of battle, the Republicans retreated back to Richmond, with an exhausted Army of the Potomac halting in the river to rest and ressuply. After both sides suffered 24,000 casualties in the largest battle in American soil yet, the Imperial forces marched towards Richmond on the 1st of March of 1807.

Kaiser of Brazil · Nov 1, 2019

XXII: IBERIA ON FIRE

After the Treaty of Tilsit, Napoleon turned his focus back to internal issues, mainly Economy. The French industry was small, but it was a growing sector, especially with the resources of Europe at its disposal, but it lacked the customers to grow. British products made by an already established industry were flowing into Europe cheaper than the French ones, sabotaging the French attempts at industrialization. A regular sovereign would have imposed tariffs, but Napoleon went a step further: He declared the Continental blockade, prohibiting European nations from purchasing British products. While most of the nations complied, there was one that was too dependent of British trade to cut it: Portugal. The historical friendship since the Middle Ages between Portugal and Britain aligned the nation with the British sphere of influence, even coming into conflict with Spain (France's reluctant ally) in 1801. The Portuguese Kingdom was led by Queen D. Maria I, but her insanity put the country into the Regency of prince D. João VI, and he had a plan. Portugal refused to accept the French blockade and made a secret pact with Britain, hearing of that, Napoleon's Army under Marshal Junot would head south, passing throughout Spain and invading Portugal in 1808.

The Portuguese Court and Royal Family escaped the country, going to their Brazilian colony and making Rio de Janeiro the capital of the Lusitanian Empire. Upon hearing that, Napoleon was furious, especially that the British fleet was escorting and supporting the Portuguese, the defense of the country even fell to British General Beresford, Napoleon demanded that the British recall the General and cut the support for Portugal, inching for a war, William Pitt refused, restarting the war after 2 years of Franco-British peace.

In Spain, the French army was pouring in, suspiciously garrisoning cities and disarming Spanish troops. King Carlos IV was called to Fontainebleau by Napoleon, but Prince Carlos smelled something suspicious in the French invitation, going against his father and brother, he went to Cadiz with a force of 6,000 men, boarding the fleet to the New World. He was the smartest amongst his family, and was proven right when Napoleon ursurped the throne of Spain from the Bourbons and appointed his brother Joseph as King of Spain. Napoleon was tired of Spanish reluctance, with rumors that Prime Minister Godoy planned to form a 5th coalition against him, he decided to act first and installed a client state in Spain. By the time that Napoleon set the trap, Prince Carlos was landing in Cuba, declaring himself King of Spain after the imprisionment of his family, he would then land in Veracruz on the 18th of May of 1808, setting up Mexico City as the new capital of the Spanish Empire similarly to Portugal.

The Portuguese Court

The French army in Spain quickly overstayed their welcome, the Spanish people were not particularly keen on having a foreign King supported by a foreign army that treated Spain like a puppet of Napoleon (Which it was). On the 2nd of May of 1808, Madrid rebelled against the occupying French troops resulting in a massacre against the civilians, sparking outrage in Spain. After Carlos V's proclamation, the cities of Spain broke in open revolt, from Barcelona to Cadiz, engaging in guerrilla warfare against the French occupiers. In Portugal, General William Beresford reformed the Portuguese army into a formidable force, holding the French Invasion in Lisbon, Marshal Junot could not overextend his forces, and the guerrillas in Spain threatened the supply and communication lines with Paris. The French army was trapped in Spain, losing control of entire provinces in the south and north, only securing control of Aragon and Madrid.

Carlos V

In Ireland, the restart of the British aggression had a target in Dublin. Wellesley was given a last chance by the increasingly senile King George III, put in charge of the 70,000 men "Army of Ireland" that stormed the emerald island from the North on the 12th of April. Michael I Ney was preparing for that, he fortified the island by modernizing old forts and creating a "Grand Irish Army" (GIA) of 80,000 men. The numbers were close and the British army was much more trained, but he had the countryside at his side, with guerrillas sabotaging the British supply lines, the British army would pay in blood for every step in Irish soil. Wellesley knew that holding every single city would exhaust his forces, instead he baited Ney into attacking, feigning weakness by sending "deserters" into Irish lines telling them that 14,000 soldiers from Northern Ireland would turn on the British in case of an attack. The always aggressive Ney marched his army to Cavan, meeting a reduced British force of 50,000 men, but now Wellesley would fight on his terms. The Battle of Cavan would be a bloody affair, with Arthur Wellesley's mastery of defensive warfare showing, resisting the artillery barrage with the reverse sloop and forming squares to repeal a 7,000 men cavalry charge led by King Ney himself. By the end of the afternoon, the Northern Irish forces showed up behind Ney's line, the King thought that they were joining him into another charge on British lines, but soon the charged the rearguard of the exhausted Irish Army, Wellesley's men soon charged down into Ney's men and broke the Irish forces from the battlefield. Of 72,000 men, Michael Ney lost 37,000, while the British lost only 9,000, Ney barely was able to escape, before his horse was shot by a sniper and he was captured a day later by the British. With the army scattered and the King captured, the Kingdom of Ireland collapsed, with Dublin falling on the 3rd of May, the people watching the British parading like if they saw the funeral of their freedom.

After the fall of Ireland, Wellesley led a 40,000 men force to Portugal, landing in Porto on the 6th of June of 1808. His troops marched south and meet Junot's army at Vimeiro, with the help of Beresford's Portuguese Army, Wellesley managed to rout the French from Portugal, marching the combined Anglo-Portuguese forces to free Iberia. In Spain, the Spanish resistance organized themselves in Provincal Juntas, with the main one in Cadiz being surrounded by 70,000 French troops. King Carlos V raised an army in Mexico, recruiting troops from California to Colombia and sending them to Veracruz, the 60,000 men "Ejército Real de la Libertad" sailed to Spain, arriving on the 30th of September of 1808 in Algarves, Portugal. The Spanish core of soldiers went south and defeated the French forces in Cadiz, securing the largest port of Southern Spain, where King Carlos V landed himself, taking the leadership of the Army. Carlos, Wellesley, and Beresford marched their forces to free Spain, capturing Madrid on the 28th of October and marching their forces all the way to Zaragoza.

But it was at this moment that Napoleon turned their dreams into dust. Leading the Grand Army himself, Napoleon marched over 200,000 men into Spain to help the beaten French forces, breaking the Allied lines in Battles like Talavera and Somosierra. By February 1809, most of Spain was back into French hands, including Madrid. Carlos' Army was beaten back to Cadiz, where a desperate King would flee back into New Spain, leaving General Palafox to lead the Spanish resistance in Iberia. In a few months, Napoleon Bonaparte put Wellesley's efforts back, and now he had to slowly crawl up the Peninsula once again. But in doing so, Napoleon left his rearguard exposed to the Austrian Empire and a new, formidable, opponent: Archduke Charles, the brother of Emperor Franz II.

Kaiser of Brazil · Nov 5, 2019

XXIII: THE WAR OF THE FIFTH COALITION

While Napoleon was distracted in Spain, the Austrian Empire was engaged in reforms to avoid another 1805. Led by the new Commander in Chief, Archduke Charles, Duke of Teschen, the Austrian military underwent a massive expansion and adaptation to Napoleonic Tactics. The Austrians adopted a military tactic known as "Mass", a formation of 6 battalions of depth capable of countering cavalry charges while remaining relatively mobile. He also adopted the French "Nation at Arms", introducing conscription and expanding the army to the impressive number of 340,000 men by 1809. But those reforms proved also to be extremely costly, with the Austrian coffers estimated to be emptied by the Mobilization by late 1809, seeing Napoleon in Spain, Archduke Charles was pressured to invade Bavaria on the 8th of February of 1809, starting the War of the Fifth Coalition.

Archduke Charles

French Marshal Berthier, commander of the Army of Germany, was completely outmatched by the Austrians, but ever since late 1808, spies warned Napoleon of an impending Austrian invasion, and he started mobilizing forces to counter it. The Austrian invasion started badly, the Army of Bohemia was delayed by a bad climate, allowing Napoleon to reach Bavaria with an army of 200,000 men to add the local forces of Berthier and the Bavarians. Charles led his forces in a campaign on Danube valley, managing to surround Marshal Davout's 3rd Corps in Regensburg, only to suffer an humiliating defeat in Eckmühl that allowed Davout to escape. The Danube river ended up dividing the Austrian forces, allowing Napoleon to take back Regensburg and strike the weakened Southern flank, winning the Battle of Ebersberg and capture Vienna on the 13th of May.

Charles' Army of 130,000 men was stationed on the North of the Villages of Aspern and Essling, and Napoleon's "Grand Army of Germany" started crossing the Danube to meet them. But on the 21st of May, Napoleon's army was attacked before fully crossing the river, with Austrian barges destroying the bridges and halting reinforcements. The French came under heavy attack by an Austrian force almost 4:1 on the twin villages, fighting for two days before being forced to retreat. It was Napoleon's first defeat, with the Austrians proving to the whole world that the Emperor of the French was not invencible, and Charles would pay heavily for that. Another event of these battles was the death of Marshal Lannes, one of Napoleon's best commanders and his personal friend, that would enrage Bonaparte, and he would cross the Danube on the 4th of July to enact his vendetta.

On the 4th of July of 1809, while there were celebrations in the American Empire, the largest Battle in European history up to that moment would happen North of Vienna, with a combined force of 300,000 men meeting at the village of Wagram. Charles started the battle by launching an attack that almost broke the French left, only for a Cavalry charge led by the Emperor himself to break the attack. Napoleon would be shot in the leg, but refused to retreat from the battle, luckily the shot missed the arteries and the bleeding stopped before his life was threatened. Napoleon then ordered a Grand Bombard on the Austrian right, the Mass formation proved itself extremely vulnerable to massed artillery, especially Cannister shots that sprayed in depth. Marshal Davout's 3rd Corps got their revenge on the Austrians, shattering their Right flank and causing the collapse of the Austrian lines, the Austrian forces were routed from the field and Emperor Franz II was forced to sue for peace.

Despite the pleads of the Austrian Chancellor Klemens von Metternich, Bonaparte wanted to punish Austria, making it an example to all Europe. Napoleon planned the dissolution of the Empire, with France annexing the Dalmatia and "Illyrian Provinces", Bavaria took Tyrol, and Poland took Galicia-Londomeria all the way to the Carpathian Mountains. The Austrian Empire was broken in its parts: The Archduchy of Austria and the Kingdom of Hungary, with the Habsburgs keeping the Archduchy but the Hungarian Throne was awarded to Marshal Louis-Nicolas Davout for his impressive display in the campaigns against Prussia and Austria. The mighty Austrian nation was shattered by Napoleon Bonaparte.

Louis-Nicolas I Davout, King of the Hungarians

In 1810, with the British pushed to the sea in Iberia and the fighting reduced to Guerrillas, Europe was in relative peace for the first time since the Peace of Amiens.

Kaiser of Brazil · Nov 16, 2019

XXIV: THE SULTAN AND THE JANISSARIES

(Selim III inspecting Nizam-i Djedit troops)

Ever since the failed attempt to take Vienna in 1683, and the defeat on the “Great Turkish War”, the Ottoman Empire entered an slow decline, with its institutions growing corrupt and backwards compared to Europe. The Sublime Porte was still a formidable Empire extending from Algiers to the Kars mountains, but in reality many provinces (especially in Northern Africa) were de facto independent states. By the end of the 18th century, the Empire was sick and one man was trying to cure it. Selim III was enthroned Sultan following the aftermath of the Disastrous Russo-Turkish War, where the weaknesses of the Empire were exposed as the Russians reached Bucharest and the Janissary troops collapsed. Like Ahmed III before him, he knew that the Empire needed urgent reforms or it would eventually see its end, but he needed to be careful in order to avoid the fate of the Tulip Sultan. In 1797, Selim would create what would become the main strength of his reign: The Nizam-I Djedit, the New Order Army. The army was a stark contrast to the Janissary corps, keeping discipline, dressed in western Uniforms and adopting Napoleonic tactics.

In comparison, the Janissary corps was becoming more and more corrupt, taking control of Serbia after killing it’s Governor and installing a brutal corrupt government in 1801. The Serbs became increasingly hostile, and fear came to the Janissaries that the Sultan would soon purge their ranks and use the Serbians against them. In a “preemptive strike”, several Serbian nobles were killed, sparking a revolt against Janissary rule led by Karadorde Petrovic, a Serbian noble who started the revolt in the name of the Sultan to remove the Janissary domination of Serbia. The rebels managed to defeat the Janissaries and Petrovic was appointed Governor of Serbia in 1806, sparking outrage amongst the Janissaries.

In foreign policy, the Ottomans were caught in the middle of the Napoleonic Wars even having been invaded by Napoleon in 1798. But the Ottoman Empire was a historical ally of the French, indeed the Westernization policies made by Selim were made in order to emulate France. It didn’t take long for their relations to be restored by 1805 after the Battle of Austerlitz, with Napoleon being seen as the new Master of Europe by Selim III and much of the Ottoman nobles. In 1806, Selim approached France in more friendly relations thanks to the efforts of French Diplomat Horace Sebastiani, drawing the ire of Britain and Russia, the Ottomans joined the Continental system and went to war with Russia.

In May 1807, Selim would have to face his greatest crisis yet. When the New Order army (numbering 23,000) marched to Edirne where the local Janissaries refused acess, in response the Army attacked the city and massacred the local Janissary garrison. The “Edirne Incident” was a breaking point for the Conservative forces (Ulema, Janissaries and Feudal aristocrats) who attempted to launch a coup against Selim, surrounding him in the palace and ordering him to dissolve the New Order military units and go back on several reforms. Selim III was no fool, he knew that the New Order units were his greatest asset and the coupists would never trust him to remain with his reformist ideas, they wanted him disarmed to overthrow him. Instead he refused the demands of the coupists led by Kabakçi Mustafa, Mustafa was commander of a group of rebellious Yamak troops, but the reactionary rebels were still in a smaller number compared to the New Order troops quartered in the city. The minister of Interior, Köse Musa, had ordered those troops to stand down, but upon hearing this, the Sultan accused him of treason and ordered his execution by strangling, sending his troops to crush the reactionaries.

Constantinople became a battle zone, with troops clashing in the streets and nobles backstabbing one another over politics, a fire broke out in the Janissary quarters by the Nizam troops and that fire spread to burn half of the city. Between the 25th and the 29th of May, the city burned until Kabakçi was captured and strangled in the presence of the Sultan, who discovered that his brother Mustafa IV was to be installed by the reactionaries in a coup. The old ottoman tradition of Fraticide came back when Mustafa IV was strangled by the order of the Sultan. Selim’s fury spread over the Empire as army units (recently returned from an inconclusive war with Russia ended with the Treaties of Tilsit) and even locals attacked the quarters of Janissary corps around the Empire, with the Emperor calling for the “Dissolution of the corrupted and vile institution”. The purge of the Janissaries lasted for 2 months with loyalists of the Sultan destroying the centuries-old institution corrupted with decadence, estimates of the deaths during this period range from 14,000 to over 120,000, but the latter historians ignore that most of the Janissaries didn’t resist the destruction of the institution. Selim had suspected of their betrayal long ago, and for that he underwent a decade-long process of quietly filling the Janissary command with loyalists to facilitate the future destruction, it was the “Auspicious Incident” as it was called, greatly hastening the downfall of the Janissaries.

Janissary musketeer, c.1800

The reactionary defeat in May 1807 is considered a turning point in the Ottoman history, Selim III would be able to continue his military reforms, and they would soon be useful when the Ottoman troops joined Napoleon in the Russian Campaign of 181. But while the Janissaries were gone, it wasn’t the end of reactionaries in the Sublime Porte, especially inside the state institutions like the Ulemas. Nor would that be the end of the Imperial troubles, especially as two rising Beys in Epirus and Egypt would soon threaten the House of Osman and it’s control over the Empire.

Kaiser of Brazil · Nov 20, 2019

XXV: CIVIL WAR III

On the 1st of March of 1807, the decisive last battle of the American Civil War would happen in the outskirts of Richmond, and the resulting miraculous victory of the Grand Army of the Republic is generally accepted by Historians as where the Empire had its defeat. But that’s not the full history, with many Military Historians supporting that the Empire could never win the war: The Imperial troops were tied down with the occupation of Canada and the Imperial Army of the Potomac was already in dire straits after the heavy losses in North Anna, only going to Richmond due to the stubbornness of Emperor Thomas. But many religious and spiritual leaders, especially during the Second Great Awakening, including Emperor Thomas himself, had another version.

Days before the battle, Thomas came to the south to lead the army, he wanted to be like Bonaparte, a monarch leading in the frontlines. On the night before the Battle of Richmond, while the two armies were sending skirmishers to fight one another, Thomas was leading an escort group to a local farm for supplies, when an artillery shell landed, missing Thomas’ face by an inch, he fell off his now headless horse and the men came under fire by a group of Republican skirmishers, the Emperor was the only one of a group of 4 of his guards that survived. He looked for a way to go back to the army in the middle of the cold night, only coming across a church, he got inside and found that he was alone. He looked for food and found nothing, instead, found only a man dressed as a Priest, he couldn’t recognize his face in the dark.

“Father, I need help, how can I get to Elmont ?” Asked the Emperor, trying to find a way to get back to his army camp.

“Worry not my child, the others of your kind are looking for you around here.” Said him in a calm but authoritarian voice.

“My kind ?” Asked the Emperor in a confused expression.

“The kind that worries more about what is in here than what will come after, my angel of death is very occupied with your kind.” The “Priest” was not facing him, he was occupying himself in reading the Bible.

“Your angel of death ? What do you mean, you are not God, are you ?” The Emperor said in a jokingly tone, he probably had just met an crazy hermit.

“Many didn’t believe me when I came down last time, they mocked me all the way till my death, and they couldn’t believe when I resurrected even when I repeatedly told them that such things would happen. Such is the way that your kind works.”

“Yeah right, so do you have any proof of that ?”

“Tomorrow, in the battle that you will lose, a man in horseback by your right side will be hit by a cannon ball in the left arm, he will be crippled but he will live, his name will be George Weston and right now he is praying that I spare his life tomorrow. Tell him I have heard his prayer.”

“Well, that’s... very specific... but why shall I lose the battle tomorrow ? Haven’t you, if you are really who you claim you are, placed me to rule over America ? Isn’t this nation set above all others ?” He was still a bit skeptical, probably this crazed man had chosen a completely random event, but he went with it.

“Because I have not set you to be a Monarch to rule in the conquest of lands or the defeat of your enemies, that was the mistake of Saul, David and Solomon, they thought I have made them King only for the conquests. But you, like George Washington, is set as ruler to lead my new chosen people, while George had set the foundations of the New Jerusalem, you will save the souls of it’s citizens, while your firstborn will not rule, instead your second son will be a great conqueror. For I have set your nation to be my Kingdom on earth until the day comes that I return.”

“Well, I thank you for thrusting me. But I have to go back, if you could use your “omnipresence” to show me the way...” He was still skeptical.

“You will learn the truth soon, for now head into that direction, that’s where your camp is my child.” The figure pointed outside and he left, but soon it started to get colder and colder, with the clock going past midnight, a hungry and exhausted Emperor Thomas fell into the floor exhausted. That couldn’t be it, he was about to crush the rebels and unite the nation, he couldn’t just die so pathetically in the middle of the Virginian forest, he closed his eyes and waited for his fate.

He woke up hours later back in his camp, his men carried him back to the camp, he told them of the story of the church but he only saw confusion in the face of General Jackson when he told him about it. The soldiers found him surrounded by 4 of his guards in the ground, suffering of shell shock after almost being hit by a Republican canister. Thomas would go back into the battle, watching from distance as the Republicans repelled one charge after the other when suddenly a cannon ball came from inches of hitting him. It instead hit an unfortunate soldier to his right, Thomas went down from his horse and checked the boy, he was a bloody mess with much of his left arm gone.

“Calm down soldier. Medic !” He screamed the last part as two men came to carry him. “What’s your name ?”

“G-George W-Weston y-you- Argh !” And in that moment, Thomas remembered the prophecy given by that strange man in the church. As he was in shock, thinking of the revelation, General Jackson sounded the retreat, the rebels had heavily entrenched the city outskirts, managing to repeal 3 charges of the Imperial army.

Thomas and his defeated army crossed the Potomac again, back to Philadelphia, where Thomas sent an official peace offer to the United Republics of America: The Empire of America would recognize the independence of the Commonwealths of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida Territory, Mississippi Territory, and Tennessee, while the Commonwealth of Kentucky would remain subject of the Empire. The hawks of both sides agitated, especially the northerners who felt betrayed by their ex-jingositic Emperor, while the southerners refused to give up Kentucky, but moderates from both sides prevailed. The Empire has just fought a war with Britain and had to keep several thousand troops to fight remaining guerrillas in Canada, there was also the problem of the crippling debt of the Empire and a possible return of Britain. While the Southerners won a great victory in Richmond, Jefferson had no ambition of invading the north and adding millions of urban monarchist Federalists in his southern agrarian Republic, they also knew that it was unlikely Thomas would give him a better offer if he ended the sudden bout of generosity.

On the 12th of March of 1807, the American Civil War was over with the treaty of Columbia, chosen as a neutral ground in the border where Thomas and Jefferson meet to divide America for the next decades. On the very next day, Thomas signed the creation of the Grand Duchy of Quebec, an autonomous region inside the Empire ruled by the Québécois themselves under nominal allegiance to the Emperor.

Kaiser of Brazil · Nov 22, 2019

XXVI: THE RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN I

The French Emperor and the Russian Tsar never really trusted one another even after Tilsit, Alexander I expanded the Russian military to 400,000 men by 1811, while Napoleon continued arming his Polish buffer state. The mistrust was shown in the aftermath of the breakup of the Habsburg Empire, when Napoleon refused to give Galicia to the Russians and instead almost doubled the size of his Polish State. When Russia left the Continental system in 1810, both sides knew that war was coming, for Russia the strategy was the problem, and that’s where the Tsar has to choose between two tactics: The Plan of Barclay de Tolly, or The Plan of General Kutuzov.

De Tolly created a plan to let attrition destroy the French army by forcing it to invade Russia itself, the army would avoid direct confrontation and instead would apply scorched land tactics, burning farms, cities, infrastructure and anything the French could use, and when the army was sufficiently devastated, deliver a killing blow. Kutuzov hesitated to leave the extension of Russia to be devastated by the army, instead he proposed an aggressive plan to invade the Duchy of Warsaw and divide the French forces by using Napoleon’s own tactics against him. The two plans planned to defeat Napoleon, but Alexander had to decide how far to go to defeat the Emperor of the French, but he knew one weakness that Napoleon could exploit if he invaded Russia: Serfdom.

The great majority of the Russian population was composed of agrarian serfs, many of whom that hated their overlords, if the French invaded Russia, Napoleon could apply the French Civil Code and abolish serfdom in the middle of the war. That could potentially turn his population against him, and Alexander decided to do the safer Kutuzov plan, while it was riskier to fight the fully strengthened French Army, Russia could recover from a loss, but couldn’t do so in de Tolly’s plan. On the Spring of 1811, 300,000 Russian troops crossed into Poland divided into two armies, led by Generals Kutuzov and Bragation, set to capture Warsaw and Danzig.

Napoleon expected this ever since the Austrian defeat in 1809, with a large part of his army tied into Iberia, he was exposed to enemy attacks like in the 5th Coalition War. His spies had caught information of a large mobilization of the Russian forces in December 1810, and he quietly started to organize a massive Pan-European force to fight the Russian Hordes, he also contacted his allies to prepare for the war. Hundreds of thousands of men began to move into Prussia and Saxony, the Grand Army was set to march again. On the 12th of April of 1811, Russian troops crossed into Poland headed to Warsaw, and Napoleon marched an army of equal numbers against them.

While the Russians didn’t have the surprise they expected or the numerical advantage overall, the first phase of the invasion proceeded smoothly. Napoleon feared that sending a united army to the Polish border would dissuade the invasion of the Tsar’s armies, instead the Grand army was divided into smaller Corps who would merge upon the invasion, and that allowed the Russians free reign over Poland. The Tsar ordered his generals to not invade East Prussia, perhaps hoping to see a Prussian betrayal, that exposed the flank of his army to the incoming Franco-Prussian forces. Prussians indeed hated the French, and between 1807 and 1811 their army and state underwent deep reforms that made their forces some of the best in the world, but King Ludwig wasn’t suicidal, he saw what happened to his kingdom in 1807 and Austria in 1809, it wasn’t wise to betray the Emperor, so he left part of his forces at French disposal reluctantly.

The local Polish forces, outnumbered almost 6-1, fought valiantly, but were defeated near the village of Siedlce, allowing the Russians to besiege and capture Warsaw on the 18th of April. Napoleon’s army was divided into two forces, one led by Marshal Masséna composed of 210,000 men would strike from the south, and a smaller 110,000 force would be led by Napoleon himself to strike from the North via Eastern Prussia. Kutuzov was aware that the Prussians wouldn’t betray Napoleon, Ludwig was not going to do that until the Emperor was defeated personally. So instead he left Bragation’s half of the army to hold the French forces under Masséna in the south of the Vistula, holding the French larger force while marching his 140,000 men army to meet Napoleon head on, seeking to force him into a decisive battle, in order to defeat him and show the entire world that the Emperor of the French could defeated. (Yes, he was defeated in Essling, but trapping a fourth of his army and attacking it AND STILL get defeated later is not really a victory, is it ?)

And on the 1st of May of 1811, the two armies meet in the fields outside Neidenburg.

Kaiser of Brazil · Nov 27, 2019

XXVII: THE RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN II

Napoleon reviewing his Imperial Guard before the Battle

The Battle of Niedenburg is subject of several books, being one of Napoleon’s largest battles, from military historians to Alternate History fans. It is one of those battles where a change could’ve turned the entire history of the world around, until very recently when some historians like Henry Stinger of the Royal University in Winchester. Stinger claims that even in a defeat, the campaign of Napoleon could be salvaged via the superior forces of the Grande Armee still in the West Bank of the Vistula, and a Russian victory wouldn’t automatically result into a Prussian betrayal like Kutuzov expected, he bases his knowledge on recently discovered correspondence made by King Ludwig I with his Army Staff commander, the Prince of Gneisenau.

The battle in Neidenburg was once described by the Emperor in his memoirs: “I have fought many battles, and the ones I hated the most were the ones that something was out of my control. Like I n Neidenburg, where I had a group of unreliable troops that had a dagger pointed at my back all the time”. Napoleon was referring to a Prussian corps of 30,000 elite soldiers who joined his Grand Army, the Prussians hated the French, and it didn’t start with the Napoleonic Wars, but 50 years before in the Seven Years’ War, and now this whole body of Napoleon‘s men was composed of potential backstabbers who would be delighted to slash his throat. But the Prussians were not stupid either, if Napoleon defeated Kutuzov Prussia would be doomed in case of a betrayal, as much as he hated to admit it, King Ludwig had to bide his time.

Kutuzov pursued a cautious approach, planning to use his superior numbers to slowly push back Napoleon and make him seem to be losing enough to provoke a Prussian betrayal. The battle happened in the forest on the North of the city, where Kutuzov started a general advance towards Napoleon’s position. But in a few hundred feet, the French Grand bombard fires with full strength on the left flank. Kutuzov halted and sent his reserves to prepare for an attack in that area, only to see thousands of French troops charging on the right, a combined assault of Infantry, Cavalry, and Artillery shattered Kutuzov’s right. At that moment where the Russians seemed to be losing, Napoleon sent the Prussians from his reserves, a core of 30,000 elite forces led by General Scharnhorst, throwing them into the mix, essentially preventing any coordination with the Russians since they were now killing one another in the woods. Kutuzov managed to reform his lines after the French charge, sending his reserves to the Right, then night came and both sides settled down.

Napoleon wasn’t planning to sit idle, he ordered his men to sleep hours before the Russians, being woken up at the 3 AM and charging the Russians in the middle of the night. It was a risk to leave his guard down hours before the Russians did, but was one the Corsican was willing to take and it paid off. The Russians woke up after the French started screaming less than a hundred feet away, barely having time to grab rifles as the entire camp went into mayhem, the Russians couldn’t distinguish friend or foe amidst the chaos, as officers couldn’t draw battle lines, the army dissolved into small squares of infantry attempting to survive, while those that tried to escape the woods had to deal with Napoleon’s Polish lancers. Kutuzov woke up in his tent and attempted to rally the men, only to get shot and taken away by French soldiers, his second in command was General Barclay, Prince de Tolly, who was against the whole invasion from the beginning. De Tolly sounded the Retreat, getting his cavalry and personal guard to hold off the French enough for the army to regroup. The “Night Assault” was a extremely risky move by Napoleon, some military historians claim that such move was only possible due to the Russian army being literally drunk on Vodka and Beer. The French casualties reached 21,000, while the Russians suffered astonishing 57,000 including their commanding General and over 150 artillery pieces captured.

The capture of General Kutuzov and the shattering of a superior Russian force in Neidenburg destroyed the morale of the Russian army. General Bragation ordered a general retreat towards Minsk, but before that, he ordered Warsaw to be burned to the ground, the city razed before Napoleon’s eyes once he arrived, his Polish Lancers broke their discipline and massacred over 5,000 Russian prisoners in retaliation. The remaining 200,000 men of the Grand Army arrived in the city on the month of June, and Napoleon was now ready for his revenge, marching against Russia itself. Napoleon’s invasion was divided into 3 forces: One under Marshal Berthier and 180,000 men would head North towards St. Petersburg, the second one under himself would head towards Moscow with 240,000 to attract the Russians into a decisive battle and do to the city the same that was done to Warsaw, and the last one under Marshal Soult with 140,000 men would march into Ukraine to capture Kiev and the breadbasket of Russia. The Ottoman Empire under Selim III, using his newly modernized troops after finally subduing the Janissaries, declared war in support of Napoleon in the end of May, the Sultan promised 200,000 men in a invasion of Ukraine under the promise to restore the Crimean Khanate,. While Napoleon doubted the Sultan would mobilize such a force, he figured they could be an useful distraction. With the plans drawn, Napoleon’s men crossed into Russia on the 14th of July, the anniversary of the French Revolution, beginning Napoleon’s biggest campaign yet: The Russian Campaign.

Images of the Russian campaign: The Battle of Borodino, Napoleon in Moscow, [REDACTED], Napoleon directing his men in the Battle of Smolensk

Kaiser of Brazil · Nov 27, 2019

You may thank @Confederate Liberal

Light Green: Russia / Blue: American Empire / Light Blue: Grand Duchy of Quebec / Orange: Spain / Green: United Republics of America

Kaiser of Brazil · Dec 2, 2019

XXVIII: THE RUSSIAN CAMPAIGN III

Napoleon invaded Russia proper on the 14th of July of 1811 with an army of around 500,000 men, mainly from France but including soldiers from all Europe. The Tsar’s army suffered a devastating loss at Neidenburg, including Marshal Kutuzov, now the rest of the army was under the command of Barclay de Tolly, who prepared his strategy. Napoleon’s force was divided into 3 with 3 different targets: St. Petersburg, Moscow, and Kiev. Seeking to force the Russian army to engage with his force in a decisive battle like in Neidenburg, targeting the Political, Cultural, and Agrarian centers of Russia. The Ukrainian force would also receive the support of the Ottoman troops, recently modernized by Sultan Selim III after the bloody Janissary purge, in Bessarabia. The Grand Army divided into its three parts and each marched, baiting the Russians to commit a mistake.

And they advanced... strangely quickly, it all seemed a little too quiet like if the Russian army had dissipated in the wind. The only thing the French found in the way were thousands of acres of burned farmland and poisoned water wells. That was Barclay’s strategy, the entire nation was a trap for Napoleon, with the French forces advancing further and further inside, overextending their supply lines that could be attacked by the Russian army and militias. If the militias were included, the Russians could mobilize over a million men, and they did on the Patriotic War that was advertised by the Tsar as a war for the survival of Holy Russia. Many times the farmers resisted having their crops taken and lands salted, as result they were killed as traitors by the Army. But by September, Napoleon’s forces had taken the cities of Minsk and Riga, and the first major engagement of the war would happen in Kiev.

Ukraine was the agrarian titan inside of Russia, the vast lands of rich soil was the breadbasket of Europe, and the Tsar was reluctant to destroy that soil. This hesitation was enough for Marshal Soult to arrive at the gates of Kiev, meeting Bragation’s army on the outskirts West of the city. 100,000 French forces (with the rest staying behind as garrisons to secure Western Ukraine) against 120,000 Russians standing on the defensive. Soult concentrated his forces in a single strike on the Northern flank of the Russians, with a furious attack of combined arms breaking the formation. Bragation retreated by the end of the day. The Battle of Kiev, fought on the 20th of August, left 8,000 French and 14,000 Russian casualties, and the city was taken by Soult, but Bragation didn’t retreat because he couldn’t stop the French, he wished to end the Ottoman threat to Crimea first.

Even if the Sultan promised 200,000 men, he only delivered 70,000 led by Grand Vizir Yusuf Ziya Pasha, the Ottomans crossed from Moldavia into Ukraine, taking Odessa and marching towards the Northeast. Bragation’s army meet the Ottoman force in Mikolayiv, even with the reforms, the Ottomans couldn’t defeat the Russians who outnumbered them 3:5, that resulted in an humiliating retreat of the remaining Ottoman forces. But the Russians had a bigger fish to fry as autumn arrived, while Soult stopped his advance to secure Western Ukraine’s farms, Napoleon and Berthier continued advancing.

Berthier meet his own battle in Nerva, the Russians under Peter Wittgenstein, an German Prince serving under Aleksandr, engaged the French in their march towards St. Petersburg. After spending July and August securing the Baltics, Marshal Berthier marched towards the Russian capital, only to meet the Russian force in the way. The two sides were even on numbers (120,000), but the Russians were expecting the French advance, and instead of going around Pskov, Berthier gave battle there. The repeated French assaults pushed the Russian defenses to their limit for 3 days, until both sides settled down into an stalemate, the two of them digging trenches and spent the rest of September trying to outflank the enemy in the small strip between Lake Peipus and the Gulf of Finland. Berthier settled down for the winter, hoping that the lake would freeze and allow his troops to cross, the Russians lost about 27,000 men in the Battle of Nerva compared to the French 31,000. The two would not fight again as peace would be achieved elsewhere.

As October arrived, Napoleon also would fight his “decisive battle”, when he meet Bragation’s force, added with over a hundred thousand men of the Tsar’s forces. The Battle of Borodino was a last obstacle to reach Moscow: 135,000 men were stopped by 150?000 Russians, both sides prepared for battle, Bonaparte knew his time was running out, so on the 7th of October of 1811, Napoleon’s Grand Army marched to battle, charging the Russian positions, firing a Grand Bombard of 400 artillery pieces (150 of them being Russians). Napoleon watched the battle side by side with the captured Marshal Kutuzov, and as Murat led his cavalry against the Russian left, it is reported by eyewitnesses that Bonaparte said “Admire, Marshal, Admire the beauty of the battle, and see as your armies shatter, their morale breaks, and your Motherland falls. Remember today Kutuzov, that my enemies are many, but my equals are none.” At that moment, the Imperial Guard was sent, breaking the Russian defenses and shattering the Russian forces, to make matters worse, General Bragation was shot during the pursuit, further spreading the chaos among the Russian ranks. Murat returned to Napoleon with a gift: Aleksandr I, Tsar and Autocrat all Russias, who was observing the battle that he expected to be his greatest victory.

The Tsar was forced to accept an humiliating peace treaty, giving large swatches of land to Napoleon and rejoining the Continental System. Not just that, but Napoleon also took his personal Prize: Grand Duchess Catherine Pavlovna, the sister of Aleksandr and now Empress of the French. On the 8th of September of 1811, the Treaty of Borodino was signed, ending the Russian campaign and giving Napoleon unchecked supremacy over Europe.

((Grand Duchess Catherine, in her younger years))

((Post-War Eastern Europe))

Kaiser of Brazil · Dec 5, 2019

XXIX: EL TERROR FRANCO

Spanish painting depicting one of the retaliatory executions ordered by Marshal Bellegarde

Louis Alexandre François Bellegarde, born on the 3rd of September of 1779 in the town of Bellegarde near the city of Orleans, grew up in a violent household with an alcoholic father and envious brothers. After his mother died when he was 5, he was sent to the local catholic school, where he showed an amazing talent in mathematics and history. In 1789, his school was nationalized by the new government and he entered in contact with revolutionary ideas, becoming a Jacobin by the time Robespierre took power in 1793. As the Jacobin government fell, he joined the military school in Paris, showing himself to be absolutely ruthless, claiming that only through the infliction of unspeakable terror would an unwillingly population fall in line. At the age of 19, he left the school and joined the Army that invaded Egypt, entering first in contact with Napoleon, becoming a close friend of his and even offering advice during the conquest of Acre and Jerusalem. He left the army with Napoleon as one of his aides, becoming the commander of an Infantry regiment after the coup of the 18th Brumaire, being part of the Battle of Marengo. He returned to the military school where he finished his graduation by the time of the 1805 campaign. After showing prowess (and getting the favor of the Emperor), the 27-year old Bellegarde became a division commander by the time of the Irish campaign, known for his brutal yet effective actions against rebellious locals in Northern Ireland during the siege of Belfast. Once more he was promoted to General after taking a bullet for the Emperor during the Battle of Dublin, and he started to attract the envy of other commanders, they claimed his aggressive tactics and terror treatment to rebels and deserters gave a bad image to the French Army who were trying to be liberators, besides they believed he didn’t earn his promotions and was only there due to the friendship with Bonaparte. In 1809, he joined Napoleon in the 5th Coalition War, showing great military skill in an skirmish, defeating an Austrian force the double of his size by outmaneuvering and charging the enemy forces, shattering them. General Bellegarde, now only at the age of 32, accompanied Napoleon in Borodino, receiving the honor of leading the 30,000 men of the Imperial Guard in the decisive attack that broke the Russian right. Upon his return, he received his Marshal Baton, becoming Marshal of the French Empire.

While Bellegarde was making his rise and the Tsar surrendered to Napoleon, Joseph Bonaparte, King of Spain and brother of Napoleon, continued his struggle to control his country. The war zone that was once called Iberian peninsula was divided between French and Coalition control, with the French controlling Madrid, North, and Eastern Spain, while the Coalition controlled Galicia, Portugal, Andalusia, Granada and Murcia. King Carlos VI, ruled from Ciudad de México in exile, pouring the resources of the New World into a total war to retake his throne, while Arthur Wellesley led a combined Anglo-Portuguese force picking up the French one by one. Iberia had costed not just lives but also reputation and prestige of the Empire, with Commanders like Junot, Soult and Masséna being humiliated by Wellesley. The French also had to deal with the local population in several areas, where guerrillas fought the French, attacking supply lines and tying down over 200,000 forces, something had to be done to end “Napoleon’s Ulcer”.

As the year of 1812 arrived, Wellesley’s force prepared to finish up the war at once, hoping for a decisive battle under his terms would end the Stalemate in Iberia and hopefully another coalition would be assembled to end the Corsican’s dominion over Europe. The Battle of Salamanca in February 1812 was just what the commander desired, beating the Franco-Spanish force of Joseph Bonaparte and shattering his army, opening the road to Madrid. King Joseph attempted to escape after the battle, only for him and his guard to be ambushed by guerrillas. The guerrilla fighters who killed Napoleon’s brother arrived ahead of Wellesley in Madrid, spreading the news that the French tyrant was dead and parading his head on a pike. Wellesley was disgusted by what happened, but the death of Joseph after Salamanca changed the Iberian balance of power, just not how the British expected.

Napoleon felt his legs failing him, cold sweat and the feeling of nausea covering him as he read every word of the report on the situation in Iberia. His aides had to hold him as he almost passed out, he had just received the News that Madrid was lost and his brother with it. “They... paraded his head on a pike ?” “Yes sire, his body was mutilated and burned in public, his head is decorating the entrance of the city.” Told him the courier. Napoleon was filled first with sadness and desperation, and upon hearing that, with anger and hate, for the Spanish, Wellesley, Carlos, all of them. And as his army of Veterans arrived in Paris victorious, with celebrations happening over the city that was now the center of Europe, he wanted nothing but revenge, he wanted those Spaniards to feel the fury of the French Golden Eagle who had just smashed the Russian Bear. “Call me Marshal Bellegarde.”

On the 24th of March of 1812, Bellegarde was given orders of Napoleon, he would march down into Spain with an army of 200,000 Elite Veterans straight from the Austrian and Russian Campaigns. The death of Joseph gave the Throne of Spain back to Napoleon, who promised it to Bellegarde if he managed to beat back the English. His army arrived in Valladolid on the 1st of May, after marching across Northeastern Spain and brutally putting down militias. Wellesley heard of the incident and refused to allow another 1808 to happen, when Napoleon managed to beat him back from Zaragoza to Portugal, and so he ordered a retreat, only to receive an stern refusal of King Carlos VI. Carlos was on his way to Europe (again) to make an triumphal march in Madrid and better coordinate the Spanish efforts in Iberia. The Anglo-Portuguese army wouldn’t risk destruction due to the whims of a King and retreated back to Portugal, leaving the Spanish to defend Madrid.

José Palafox led an united Spanish force, including from regulars to guerrillas and militias, in the defense of Madrid against Bellegarde’s assault. The 67,000 Spanish force was shattered by the fast and ferocious assault of Bellegarde’s 83,000 in one of the most lopsided defeats in Spanish history, 31,000 Spanish casualties compared to only 5,000 French ones. The situation in Iberia returned to a pre-Salamanca setting, but it wouldn’t remain like that as Bellegarde moved to secure the south, when King Carlos received the news and was forced to evacuate from Spain a third time and further mobilize more resources from the colonies to free the homeland. Córdoba, Seville and Cadiz fell in a quick succession to the French, with Marshal Suchet capturing Murcia on the 5th of July and ending the Spanish control over Southern Spain.

What followed was an intensive anti-guerrilla campaign unseen before in history, with the French acting more as Barbarians than a Professional army. Bellegarde gave direct orders to murder and burn entire villages with rebel sympathizers, if one family had at last one of its members as a “guerrilheiro”, it was enough to for all members receive a quick execution. There were no prisoners when a guerrilla was found, and as retaliation for the killing of Joseph, the city of Córdoba ran out of pikes. Bellegarde took the methods straight from Robespierre’s book, and the guilhotine was working 24 hours a day to handle the executions, including of General Palafox himself. It is estimated that what the Spaniards called “El Terror Franco” killed between 30 to up to 70 thousand men and women, and at least 4,000 children in Granada alone. Entire farms were sacked from their supplies to feed the French army, and Bellegarde now set his eyes on Portugal, preparing his army into a new campaign, he ended clashing with Massena, who called his methods “Jacobin” and wrote to Napoleon requesting his transference, as he didn’t want to associate himself with Bellegarde’s tactics and neither did Marshal Suchet. Napoleon transferred them both back to Paris, as the “Spanish situation” was the only front of the war. When he arrived, Massena asked Napoleon if he heard of Bellegarde’s reign of terror, and if he would do something about it. The furious but calm Bonaparte replied that “That’s precisely why I sent him.” Massena left without saying another word, retiring from his position and living in his Estate.

The news spread to Portugal, where the Portuguese population entered in panic, as the new French Barbaric Horde marched through the south, capturing the Algarves and marching North to Lisbon. Wellesley retreated his army to the city, holding the Impressive line of fortifications North of Lisbon, the Linha de Torres Veras defended by Wellesley was the definition of immovable object, while Bellegarde was the definition of unstoppable force, and they were about to clash in the Battle of Lisbon, on the 18th of August of 1812.

Battle of Lisbon, also called the Battle of Torres Veras

The battle started with massive artillery barrages. The French army of Bellegarde was composed of 123,000 men pulled from all Spain (since much of the resistance was brutally crushed for the moment) and centered around a core of Russian campaign veterans. While the Anglo-Portuguese force of 78,000 was outnumbered, the two defensive lines more than compensated it, with the Royal Navy providing fire support to repeal several charges along the day. The first day of battle was over with the French back to where they started with 18,000 losses. The second day was more successful as a weaker spot was found in the first line, the massive charge with support of cavalry and artillery eventually broke the first line and the Anglo-Portuguese forces were forces to retreat to the second line. Wellesley made his stand there on the third day, repealing charge after charge of French forces, using the reverse sloop to protect his men from artillery fire. On the 4th day, Bellegarde changed his tactic, instead he brought over 3,000 women and children to the frontlines, captured from the countryside during the disorganized evacuation of the Portuguese South. He delivered an ultimatum for Wellesley to retreat or 3,000 civilians would be killed from all Portugal every day. For 2 days the heads and blood rolled, and eventually the Portuguese forces were tired of watching their countrymen (and even families) killed, ordering a charge against Wellesley’s orders, falling straight into Bellegarde’s trap, the French defeated the Portuguese and pursued them into a 4th charge against the line, the disorganized Portuguese couldn’t hold back the French, but the British forces under Arthur Wellesley and Bereaugard (British Governor of Portugal) held them off. After a week of battle, and over 50,000 dead in both sides, the British evacuated Lisbon, filling over 70 ships with refugees to the point that one of them capsized. Over 40,000 Portuguese civilians, plus 30,000 British troops were evacuated, leaving Lisbon to be sacked, burned and razed by the French Horde. At last, the Peninsula War was over in the most brutal way possible, with the Portuguese refugees taken to Brazil, Iberia was put under the control of King Louis I Bellegarde, with the French taking control of Catalonia. With the war over, Bellegarde went back to Madrid, toning down on his brutal tactics as he now had a Nation to rule.

Now Albion was alone, with the French and their Continental system controlling from Iberia to the Urals, the entire continent was united under one man: Napoleon I Bonaparte, Emperor of the French

Kaiser of Brazil · Dec 15, 2019

XXX: THE YEAR WITHOUT SUMMER I

Between the Battle of Lisbon and the year of 1816, Europe went into an uneasy period of peace. With all Continental rivals destroyed and not yet capable of clashing with the Royal Navy, Napoleon Bonaparte, Emperor of the French, was the absolute master of Europe. While Albion, led by Prime Minister Spencer Perceval, was unable of finding an opening to strike the French, turning instead to raiding shipping in the Mediterranean and North Seas. The British defenses were headed by two men: Lord Admiral Nelson and Lord Wellesley, commanding the Seas and Armies respectively, all while the French and British fought in the Economical War.

Napoleon’s Continental system had the strategy of starving the “Perfidious Albion”, blockading the European Markets from British products, while Britain also blockaded France from foreign Imports. In this brief interlude, the war essentially became a commercial war between the British Empire and its colonies against Europe. One of Napoleon’s indirect allies was Thomas’ American Empire, while not officially in the Continental system or Embargoing the British, the Federalist-dominated Congress raised massive tariffs on foreign products in an effort to pay off the National Debt. The British traders had barely any profit when trading in the Empire, while it found the United Republics as an open market, trading manufactured goods for cotton and tobacco, but they also were forced to tolerate the red-soaked cotton that was produced by slave labor, it appeared that morals were secondary to trade.

But then, something happening on the other side of the world would end this stalemate. In the British-occupied Dutch East Indies, a supervolcano called Mt. Tambora would enter one of the largest registered eruptions of recent human history in 1815. The eruption of the Tambora was so big that the amount of ashes launched in the atmosphere would block out the sun in the Northern Hemisphere. The result was a drop in global temperatures causing crop failures over the world, especially Europe, and suddenly the British situation became much more desperate. While the Continental system could get their food from the rich farmlands of Eastern Europe and Ukraine, the surrounded Islands didn’t have that option and soon started to starve.

It was in that moment that Napoleon decided to strike.

In 1804, the American inventor Robert Fulton would meet the Consul Napoleon, offering him a type of ship that would make even the most powerful Ships of Line obsolete. Napoleon was skeptical but decided to offer him a chance, in 1805, the first Steam Ship would sail in the waters of the Seine. Napoleon demanded the construction of more, made for war, and while they weren’t ready for the Irish campaign, in 1816, while Britain starved, those ships were ready. And with the favorable winds, Napoleon prepared his army to strike Britain, calling his new Admiral, Magon de Mèdine, to lead the French fleet to strike in the Canal.

The French spent the last 4 years focused on the navy, modernizing and repairing antiquated ships, while also building up new ones that included the “Ironships”, the resources of all Europe were about to come into fruition in the “Battle of the Channel” on the 6th of May of 1816. Nelson led the outnumbered British navy to meet a combination of French, Russian, Swedish, Danish, and Iberian ships that outnumbered his 2-1. In the middle of the battle, Nelson saw a separate group of 10 ships, little bigger and better armed than a Sloop but still called “Iron Frigates”. His line of ships would meet them during the battle, only to see every shot ricocheted by the Iron hull. Still, the Royal Navy would stand firm in a 3:1 Kill rate against the Continental Alliance, only for a lucky shot seal Nelson’s fate and kill the Lord Admiral during a boarding action, his ship crashing on the beach. The British morale, after the loss of the HMS Victory and with the Iron Frigates joining into the battle, Admiral Collingwood would order a retreat, with the loss of Canadian and Nordic Markets, Britain was suffering under a scarcity of timber, being forced to disengage to be able to continue fighting another day. On that day of May, Napoleon was able to finally beat the Royal Navy in a decisive battle and break the wooden wall (at the cost of half of his combined fleet), landing in Hastings on the next day.

And for the first time since 1066, a French conqueror landed on the British isles.

Kaiser of Brazil · Dec 17, 2019

XXXI: THE YEAR WITHOUT SUMMER II

Lord Wellesley leading his troops in the Battle of Burgess Hill

Over 400,000 men of over a dozen nations, centered around a core of 280,000 Frenchmen, led by none other than Napoleon I Bonaparte and the cream of his Marshal corps, disembarked in Hastings on the 7th of May of 1816. The Campaign of England would be remembered as the bloodiest and most destructive one of the Napoleonic Wars, even if it didn’t involve as many soldiers as the Russian campaign. Countering them was the entire nation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, led de Jure by the insane King George III and his Prime Minister Spencer Perceval, but from the moment the French stepped on British soil, it was de facto led by Lord Arthur Wellesley and his Army. The French had several advantages from the beginning: Better leadership, larger numbers, and better supplied troops (Britain was suffering a massive hunger due to the crop failure caused by Mt. Tambora), but the British were at home.

Wellesley has spent the last 4 years surveying the terrain of England, creating a chart of the best possible locations to defend from a French attack with every possible invasion scenario being simulated by his General Staff in War Games. Hastings was put as one of the best locations for a French invasion, especially due to the symbolism of being where William “the conqueror” defeated the Anglo-Saxons and conquered England. As expected, Napoleon’s first target was London, the seat of government and the largest city of Britain, the order of evacuation was given on the 8th of May while the French were still disembarking their troops, with the Royal Family and seat of government moved to Yorkshire. But Wellesley had to deal with the civilians attempting to escape, especially when the news that Marshal Bellegarde was leader of the Vanguard Corps arrived in the city. Refugees clogged the roads to the North and delayed the evacuation for precious days, making the logistics an nightmare especially in regards of the food for the massive refugee columns heading North, Wellesley had to buy them time.

Of course the French army didn’t march in unison in the same direction, Napoleon divided his Grand Army into 3: West, Northwest, and North. The first group led by Marshal Soult would lead 120,000 men to conquer the Southern coast of England all the way to Cornwall, including the capture of Naval bases in Wessex. The second one was led by Davout and would advance towards Oxford and Bristol, with an equal number of troops to the Western army. The third one led by Napoleon himself, together with Marshals Murat and Bellegarde, would head towards London itself, using the evacuation delay to capture the government. Time was of the essence, when storms arrived in Southern England, turning the roads around London into mud, Bonaparte expected it to delay the British escape enough for his army to capture the government and win a decisive battle against Wellesley.

Not all British troops were in London, a large number was in Ireland where Napoleon last invaded, others were spread over the coast, expecting the French to land in Wessex, East Anglia, or even London itself. Wellesley stationed about 90,000 men in the road towards London in Burgess Hill, one of the defensible locations in the case of the “Hastings Scenario”, he knew he most probably wouldn’t win and he didn’t expect to, instead he wanted to buy enough time for the evacuation of over 200,000 Londoners be completed. On the 11th of March, the French Vanguard corps led by Bellegarde would meet the British in Burgess Hill. The French outnumbered the British 4:3, but that was irrelevant when fighting Wellesley in a good defensible location as Torres Velas showed Bellegarde. In his usual fashion, “El Terror Franco” would spend the day launching wave after wave of attacks, sometimes almost breaking Wellesley’s line, but the British stood firm and exhausted the French. As the other 280,000 men of the army arrived behind the Vanguard on the 12th of March, Wellesley also received 100,000 men in reinforcements. The second day of battle would claim over 60,000 lives, the bloodiest day of the Napoleonic Wars, until both sides were too exhausted to fight and retreated back in their camps. As the French bombarded and charged the hill on the 3rd day, they found it deserted, Wellesley had retreated to his second line: The city of Crawley.

Napoleon changed his plans, keeping his army uniform until London is captured. He was more cautious to not get caught in a urban warfare as the city of London could be viewed from the distance. He tried to bait Wellesley outside of the city’s defenses, but in a typical stoic way, the British “Lord of War” refused to flinch. As result the French would spend the next 3 days attempting to take the city, only for Wellesley to escape on the 4th. On the 22nd of May of 1816, French troops marched on London, only to find the city abandoned by the army, both sides suffered heavy losses in the London campaign, the French lost (including injuried) 70,000 men, and the British lost 30,000. Even if the French managed to take the city, Napoleon called it a defeat, as he was now stuck in a campaign on the other side of the Channel.

Bonaparte declared London the capital city of the “Kingdom of England” after Percival rejected his peace offer, leaving back to Paris and leaving Marshal Oudinot in charge of the affairs as Regent of the Kingdom. Napoleon installed his son with Grand Duchess Anna, Napoleon-Alexandre Bonaparte, or Napoleon II, as King of England, even if he had never stepped on English soil. Davout, Murat and Bellegarde also returned to their nations, leaving Soult and Oudinot in charge of the English operations by April.

The British started a scorched land campaign in Southern England, razing farmlands and dismantling factories. In the moment of crisis, Parliamentary approval and politics were thrown out of equation as Wellesley became de facto Lord Protector of England like Oliver Cromwell before. The fall of London sent shockwaves in the Islands, with Ireland erupting in revolt, Irish revolutionaries easily captured the island by July, mostly because Wellesley stripped its defenses and left a skeleton army only, he considered it an acceptable cost to save England. The Irish invited French troops to safeguard the nation as a French protectorate against a possible British counterattack.

By August, most of Southern England, from Bristol to London, was captured by the French. But then, the Royal Navy struck back, not in a pitched battle like in May, but as a series of raiding actions, severing the supply line of the French forces and the continent, trapping them in England.

Kaiser of Brazil · Dec 18, 2019

XXXII: THE LORD PROTECTOR

King George IV

Between 1816 and 1819, never before was Britain so close to extinction, it didn’t just suffer under the invasion of France, but a crisis in the leadership almost brought down the Kingdom to it’s knees. The first impact was the death of King George III on the 15th of August of 1816, already suffering of mental illness, the trauma of the evacuation and the fall of London proved too much to the elderly monarch, responsible in the eyes of many Americans for the revolution that created the American Empire, he is generally put as one of the worst British monarchs. His son George IV would take power, only to show himself to be as incompetent as his father, even in war time, he threw responsibility out of the window and spent most of his time in lavish parties in Scotland, where he lived a life completely different from his ministers and subjects further south.

This enraged Wellesley, while he was giving his best to try to save his country from impossible odds, an obese womanizer was throwing parties in Edinburgh. And to make matters worse, Prime Minister Robert Perceval was assassinated, many suspecting of French agents, on the 16th of July of 1817, creating a power vacuum filled by a series of weak governments with an average lifespan of 5 weeks. Wellesley was overseeing his army fighting another battle with the French at the gates of Manchester when Lord Liverpool, an influential Tory PM, went to meet him.

22nd of November 1817, Manchester, United Kingdom.

“You understand that what you are suggesting is treason.” Replied the General, meeting with the Tory Lord at night, after the second day of Battle.

“It is treason not to do it Lord Wellesley, Yorkshire was taken over by a bunch of defeatists, planning to hatch a peace treaty giving away all of England and Wales, and God knows that would be the end of this nation. You know better than I that they must go, together with the Buffon who is currently having a party in a castle somewhere in the Highlands if the invitation he sent me is true. You are the only person Britain looks up to now, the only one that can save us from this disastrous situation, otherwise all those years fighting the Ogre of Corsica will be in vain.” Lord Liverpool attempted to hide his desperation behind a stoic face, but years of experience taught Wellesley to see through it.

“If you are so desperate, why don’t you do it yourself ? You expect me to leave my men to make a coup and become some kind of English Bonaparte ? Can’t you just get yourself elected and end this peace plot ?”

“I could be elected with ease at any moment, but I wouldn’t be able to govern, hell, the last cabinet members had to be literally put under house arrest so they don’t escape their appointments ! Politics cannot work anymore, and you have the army. This is Britain’s most definitive hour, will you let it perish or save it ? Remember that you swore an oath.”

“An oath to the King...”

“There is no King, our last King died a senile old man last year, your oath now is to Britain.”

In the following day, the French army was beaten in Manchester, another offensive North failed, by now the French troops marched over Southern England, Wales, East Anglia, and Ireland. Marshal Oudinot and his troops halted the attacks for the winter in another of the truces that happened during the war, when both sides were too exhausted to attack. Using that unofficial ceasefire, Wellesley marched North with 20,000 of his most loyal men, using one of the rare moments the King showed up in Yorkshire, where the peace proposal was about to be signed by the King to be sent to Paris. On the 7th of December of 1817, Lord Wellesley and his guards marched in the House of Commons as the King was inside, he accused of treason the members of the House who approved of the peace offer, and declared the King as “Traitor of the Nation”. George IV was dragged outside together with over 2/3rds of the House, being arrested. Lord Liverpool, leader of the Hardline Tories who voted “no” against the peace feelers, called for a vote to dissolve the institution of the Monarchy, instituting the Commonwealth of Britannia and declaring Lord Arthur Wellesley as it’s Lord-Protector for life. As expected, the vote was unanimous.

Centuries of Royal tradition are destroyed, now a single central leadership unites Army and State to liberate England and end the Napoleonic oppression once and for all. And the motto of this new State shows the situation: “To Victory or Death !” Britain will survive, or die trying.

Kaiser of Brazil · Dec 20, 2019

XXXIII: “TO VICTORY OR DEATH”

“Forward sons of Britannia ! Your country needs you ! This is your finest hour ! To Victory or Death !”
-Lord-Protector Arthur Wellesley, February 16th 1818.

The English campaign of the Napoleonic wars is known to be one of the most, if not the most, brutal campaigns of the Napoleonic Wars until that moment, being it’s final act during the reign of Napoleon I. The French army on the island led by Marshals Oudinot and Soult, numbered around 270,000 men, controlling Southern England from Wales to Lincoln In it’s peak. Probably England would still be French had Napoleon not demanded a total conquest, threatening to demote his two commanders if they didn’t do the impossible. Guerrilla attacks ravaged the French army, with cities rebelling the moment the French army marched away, in practice the French army didn’t have effective control in places without a substantial garrison. To make matters worse, the retreating English forces between 1816 and 1817 destroyed the farmlands and factories of southern England as they were pushed back, with the French forces depending of supplies over the channel that were endlessly raided by the Royal Navy. The truth is that the French Army couldn’t push past Liverpool due to several difficulties, with their resources overextended, and between 1818 and 1819, after Wellesley’s coup got rid of the incompetent leadership, it was time for Britain to fight back.

The British plan was similar to the peninsula war strategy, divide et impera, keep the French forces distracted with rebellions and sabotages and pick their army corps one by one. Wellesley by then had a much reduced army of 180,000 men, outnumbered by the French but that combined force could individually defeat any French army. He divided his force into two, with himself leading the “Western Army” stationed at Liverpool and William Beresford leading the “Eastern Army” stationed at Hull. On the 12th of February of 1818, Wellesley led the first attack against the French forces gathering in Northwich for an attack, the result were a series of battles between the 12th and 18th of February that pushed the French forces back to Birmingham, where the Lord-Protector stopped the offensive at the outskirts of the city, swinging North towards Wales and defeating a 56,000 French army who attempted to cut him at Whitchurch.

The winning streak was halted after the French counter attacked at Shrewsbury, forcing Wellesley to give in battle with a bloodied noose, but not before cutting a whole arm from the French in the pitched battle. Meanwhile, Beresford marched his army south to Chesterfield, where Soult was defeated, barely escaping from capture, resulting in the fall of Lincoln, both the British and French forces both would spend 2 months before any new moves. The two sides were forced to recover, with Wellesley pushing the offensive again in May, taking back Birmingham and opening up the Midlands for reconquest, only to be halted by the presence of a 60,000 men army to his west. He would spend the next months in a campaign to retake Wales, with the French only holding Cardiff by August. Beresford, meanwhile, didn’t do any new advances being forced into defensive by Oudinot’s 110,000 men army, the Battle of Collingham would leave both sides bloodied, with the British still holding firm.

One of the main events other than Wellesley’s slow push into the South, was the raid of Cherbourg. A single British 5th-rate frigate, the “HPS Protector”, led by Captain Charles Green, would infiltrate Cherbourg at night. A boarding party led by the Captain himself would disembark one the city, dressed up as French sailors, and would successfully capture and escape with the “Austerlitz” one of the French Iron Frigates, delivering it in Liverpool, where engineering analysts would spend day and night attempting to replicate such a ship, by 1819, there were 3 in Total.

For another year, British forces would slowly push south, fighting bloody battles. Seeing the writing on the wall, Soult ordered the French troops to not leave anything that could be used by the enemy, burning entire villages and farms as they retreated. Historical monuments, factories, nothing that could be used should be left, and the land was literally salted in some places, the devastation of Southern England can be still seen today in some places. Prisoners of war were executed, and entire cities were put to the torch like Bristol, it only didn’t happen to London thanks to the signing of the Peace Treaty.

The French were slowly but surely pushed back, being reduced to the regions of London and Kent. Napoleon didn’t want to give up England, knowing that never again such opportunity would arise for him again, and if Britain continued to exist, coalitions could still be formed against him. He decided to send reinforcements, 70,000 men crossing the channel on the 18th of March of 1819, and that was the moment where the rest of the Royal Navy, including the 3 new Iron Frigates, led by Admiral Collingwood, would strike the French navy at the Battle of Dover. The British changed their approach on the Iron rates, instead of fighting them traditionally, they were the main targets for boarding actions. The battle ended in disaster, with half of the transport ships sunk, and over 2/3rds of the escort fleet either sunk or captured, including 4 Iron Frigates”. It was in that moment that Napoleon knew Britain was lost, he sent an ambassador to Yorkshire under a truce flag, and a ceasefire was called as London was put under siege.

The British were still treated as the defeated party, being forced to give away the entirety of Ireland as an independent Republic under French protection, also recognizing the French treaties and supremacy over Europe, ending the blockade and promising to not fund any coalitions against France. But the British also sent their demands, ordering 130,000 French forces to evacuate from London, with Napoleon recognizing Wellesley as Lord-Protector of the British Commonwealth, and retreating his family’s claim to the title of “King of England”. The French refused to pay reparations for the damage caused in the invasion, but agreed to end the Continental embargo and open the European markets, albeit under protectionist tariffs that penalized Britain.

As the French forces evacuated London under the jeers of the Londoners, and the Treaty of York was signed on the 5th of April of 1819, the British celebrated the liberation day by welcoming their new Lord-Protector, Arthur Wellesley, parading in the city and taking the Buckingham Palace as residence. And with that, over 20 years of war were over, but it wasn’t a peace, everyone knew that it was only a matter of time for one day the British and French fight one another again. But for now, Europe had the chance to bury the bodies of over 5 Million that died after 26 years of almost endless conflict.

And as the dust settled down, an new Europe had arisen, where the Golden Eagle extended it’s wings, from Lisbon to Kiev, from Baghdad to Stockholm, one man was the absolute master of it all: Napoleon Bonaparte.

Map of Post-War Europe in 1819 (Courtesy of @ThecrownPrince)

Kaiser of Brazil · Dec 25, 2019

Christmas Special
Peace between Enemies

Privates Clinton and Brian were dug down in a trench in the snowy forest, together with their comrades of the 17th Infantry regiment of the Lord-Protector’s army. It was the Christmas of 1818, and hopefully the last one they would be fighting the French, that only if they survived the battle to come in Snowshill, and Brian now knew why it was called that. On the Christmas of 1816 he was conscripted by the retreating British forces, being taken from his home by a draft, he fought the last Christmas in the Battle of Chester, barely surviving a bullet that left him with a limp in his right leg. Clinton, on the other hand, joined out of voluntary duty after the fall of London, he was a Briton at heart, holding his duty to the Lord-Protector and Holy Britannia as first, hating the French as all Britons ought to. But on the night of the 25th, a remarkable incident would mark their lives, as the French forces charged the British defenses.

The two of them were moved only by the alcohol of last night’s whiskey and the heat of battle, that was all that prevented them from freezing in that hill. Snowshill was a minor battle compared to the ones in Gloucester and Oxford, but it was major for the success of the other two. The French had sent 10,000 men to strike at the forested area between the two cities, opening a hole in the British lines and allowing the Britons to be flanked at Gloucester or Oxford, and that was a risk Wellesley could not take. But only 7,000 men could be spared to hold that vital center, amongst them were the two privates of this story, who were desperately shooting into shadows moving and yelling against them. The French used a snowstorm to cover their advance and charged against the British lines, after almost an hour of fighting with bayonets under freezing temperatures, the British forces sounded the retreat. Brian didn’t need another call and started running as fast as he could away from the French, but his limp prevented him from doing so, in desperation he saw a small cabin away, running towards it. Clinton didn’t want to run back, fearing that if the French won there, they would win the war, but eventually his desire for survival won over his patriotism and he would run for his life.

The small log cabin was away from the action of the battlefield, observing the right flank of the British army. Brian knocked over the door and received no answer, of course no one would be foolish enough to remain inside once the cannons started roaring, he used his rifle to break the knob and entered, only to find someone dressed in French uniform, aiming a rifle at him. The two reached a stalemate, aiming at one another, the French looked young, in his 20s compared to the 32 years of Brian, and scared. A look to the side showed a fireplace, with a pair of boots drying up, then the Frenchman spoke in a heavy accent. “Peace ?” Brian was surprised, but he didn’t want anymore bloodshed. “Peace.” The two slowly lowered their rifles and put them over the table in the middle of the cabin.

Brian didn’t hate the French, the boy probably was a conscript just like him, Bonaparte didn’t get an army with more than a million men just by accepting volunteers. The two shakes hands and say together by the fireplace, united by their survival instinct, that didn’t mean they trusted one another, but hypothermia and frostbite were worse enemies than their nationality. Brian reaches for his bag, grabbing a canteen of water, offering some to the French.

“What’s your name ?” Brian asked.
“E-Emile.” Replied they French in the little English he knew after 2 years fighting them.
“How old are you ?”
“Deux... Three.”

Then came a silence for a moment, until the door opened again, with a British soldier aiming his rifle at the two men near the fire. Brian and Emile turned around, Brian recognized him, it was private Clinton.

“Wait ! Don’t shoot, Clinton !”
“What is going on here ?!”
“It’s me, Brian of the 17th !”

Clinton wasn’t any more relaxed by that as he saw Emile slowly reaching for his rifle. The Frenchman halted on his tracks as the Briton’s bayonet aimed against his throat.

“And who is this one ?”
“He is not a hostile, Clinton, trust me please, if he wanted to fight, he could’ve killed me.”
“Well, if the French come, we can use him as shield. I can’t believe you would be in the same house with the enemy, Brian.”
“It was either that or freeze outside with Frenchmen who would kill me.”
“Good point.”

Clinton lowered his rifle, the next moments were tense, as the 3 tried heating their hands, Brian standing between Clinton and Emile who seemed to be at eachother’s throats. Eventually the night started becoming more silent, with the French halting their pursuit and setting up their camp on the north of the British camp, away from the cabin. Clinton opened up his bag and grabbed some bread and cookies, offering to Brian who gladly accepted, the two grabbed a pair of chairs and started eating. Emile was starving, but of course he was too afraid to ask Clinton for food that he knew would be refused, and Brian noticed that, he got to his feet and gave half of his bread to Emile, leaving Clinton clearly upset. The eyes of Emile sparkled like the ones of a child, he started eating the bread like he was eating a steak.

“Why don’t you join us in the table ?” Brian gestured to the table.
“What ?! The Frog eating with us ? Are you mad Brian ?”
“It’s Christmas, Clinton, show some kindness.”
“They are slaughtering us Brian ! What’s wrong with you ?! These devilish creatures deserve no mercy !”
“I know that, but this one is just a kid, you are 10 years older than him, he knows that if he does anything he is dead, please Clinton.”
“Okay, fine ! But he will be seating away from me.”

Emile sat at the opposite end of the table, Brian would later find a chicken in another room, killing it and roasting on the fireplace, Emile would find a wine in the closet, and soon the 3 of them would be having their diner at midnight of the 25th of December. United by the cold in a cabin, the 3 men that were supposed to be killing one another made a truce, falling asleep (Clinton only doing it after making sure that Emile was sleeping) later. They woke up to the sound of artillery as the British started a counter attack with reinforcements that drove the French away early in the morning. Clinton grabbed his rifle and turned to Emile.

“Okay, the truce is over, Rule Britannia !”
“Clinton ?! What are you doing ?!”
“Freeing my country from this scum.”

Clinton shot a scared and confused Emile in the chest, hurrying outside to join his comrades in a charge. Brian rushed to Emile’s side, pressing against his wound, but he was losing blood too fast.

“T-Thank you...”
“For what ?! You are dying because of me ! If I had never gone inside the cabin-“
“Then he... would kill me yesterday... thank you... for giving my Christmas.” Then his head fell backwards, Emile breathed hardly, his lungs full of blood, he spit some blood and then died. Happy for having one last Christmas, a small glimpse of humanity in the middle of the war. Brian would live on after the war, while Clinton would be killed that same day in a bayonet fight with one of the French.

Kaiser of Brazil · Dec 29, 2019

XXXIV: KING IN EXILE

Carlos V was no doubt one of the greatest losers of the Napoleonic Wars, 3 times being exiled from his country into a Colonial Empire that he never visited. In 1808, the Spanish Royal family was held prisoner by Napoleon in a trap set by the Emperor in Fontainebleau, only Carlos was skeptic of such visit, seeing how the French forces acted in Spain, he saw the writing on the wall and fled. By using policies of high taxes and conscription, he organized 2 expeditions to Spain, the two were beaten by the French, first by Napoleon and then Bellegarde. The King of Spain didn’t control an inch of Spain by 1813 and that pushed him into the brink of insanity, ever since arriving in Mexico City and declaring it Capital of the Empire, Carlos was obsessed with a return to his homeland, he didn’t spend a dinner without making a grand speech on how he would parade the heads of the Bonapartes on pikes across the Empire and enforce his claim as a Bourbon to the French throne (ignoring how the French branch was still alive and headed by an exiled Louis XVIII in Britain), many in the court saw him going through a traumatic depression every time he was forced to leave Spain when the French counterattacked.

The Vice-Kingdom of New Spain, extending from California and Texas all the way to Panama, was the main benefactor of the exile, like the Brazilian colony benefited from becoming the Capital of the Portuguese Empire. Taxes and the grand wealth of the Spanish treasury (Owning over a third of the world’s supply of Gold) would arrive in Veracruz together with the King. In 1816, when London fell and the 3rd expedition was sunk beneath the waves near Trafalgar, Carlos finally lost the hopes of returning, even if he wouldn’t admit it publicly. With New Spain becoming the seat of the Empire, it would see a period of unprecedented growth on the next 3 years, with the number of roads increasing almost 3 times, the first factory being open in Guadalajara, the expansion and opening of the ports for foreign trade (with the end of the Colonial Pact allowing colonies to export to foreign ports), the opening of printing press (even if censored) and many other reforms would make New Spain the most prosperous region of the Empire. But the fact that it was only restricted to New Spain would bring the downfall of the Empire.

For most of the other colonies, south of Panama, they merely changed their overlords from Madrid to Mexico, not only that but they also had to give increasingly amounts of money and soldiers to Carlos’ expeditions who never delivered the money and men back. Even after 1816, the taxes would continue in order to keep the funds for the reforms and the luxurious life of the “Castellano” court. It was in this situation that 4 men would take the leadership of a fight to free South America from the Spanish: José de San Martín, Bernardo O’Higgins, Francisco de Miranda, and Simón Bolívar.

The 4 men were Creoles, the local elite class of America until the arrival of the court. The first revolt would happen in Buenos Aires, one of the largest cities of the Empire and Capital of the Vice-Kingdom of La Plata. Between 1806 and 1807, the city managed to defend itself from two British expeditions without the support of the crown, giving the locals a taste of autonomy. In 1815, as the 3rd expedition was being prepared, Spanish officials would forcefully conscript thousands of locals, taking men from their homes based on a lottery and shipping them to Veracruz, creating a great amount of resentment. When the expedition was sunk during the Battle of Trafalgar (after being first hit by a storm) without even stepping on Cadiz, the population was filled with hate for Carlos V, who was blamed for sending their men to death. When rumors of a 4th expedition being organized (which proved to be false), panic spread from La Paz to Montevideo, and Buenos Aires decided to act. On the 15th of February of 1817, Governor Baltasar Hidalgo de Cisneros would be forced to flee the city, giving control to the First Triumvirate, a junta of 3 consuls that appointed General Manuel Belgrano as Director of La Plata.

The revolution would spread like wildfire, on the next 3 years, Belgrano would be overthrown for his incompetent policies and his failure to defend La Plata from the Portuguese invasion that took Cisplatina, with José de San Martín appointed as Director. San Martín would lead the Independence War, crossing the Andes and sparking an uprising in Chile, placing Bernardo O’Higgins as Director of Chile. The two men would eventually lead the Southern Front of the Independence War.

Further North, Venezuela would be the next to catch on fire. Part of the Vice-Kingdom of New Granada, the colony was placed in similar circumstances of the Argentines, with enforced conscription, high taxes, and lack of autonomy being the reasons for the revolt. The rebellion would start in Caracas on the 4th of June of 1818, inspired by the southerner example. The revolt would be led by the Criollo Francisco de Miranda, a revolutionary officer who fought in the American and French revolutions and entered in contact with American ideas of self-determination. Inspired by the example of George Washington, Miranda would lead the revolution after overthrowing the Caracas Garrison. But he would also be the first Libertador to die on the 7th of November at the Battle of Cucutá, while attempting to cross into Colombia. His successor would be his protege Simón Bolivar, who would declare himself “Consul of Venezuela” on the 15th of December of 1818.

But the wars of Independence would be far from over as 1820 arrived. Peru and Mexico were still strong Loyalist strongholds, with Carlos preparing his armies to crush the rebellions. Meanwhile, Paris, Philadelphia, Rio de Janeiro, and London watched with interest the developments in South America.

Kaiser of Brazil · Dec 30, 2019

XXXV: THE PEOPLE’S MONARCH

Emperor Thomas I

The period between the end of the Civil War and the rise of Andrew Jackson as a political figure is seen by many historians as a period of calm in American History, with the Empire mostly staying uninvolved on foreign affairs, and also a period of growth with the arrival of the Industrial Revolution. The truth is that it was a period of profound social changes, with the creation of the American Imperial Church that would guide the spirituality of most the Americans, the arrival of industrialization that would change the work relations and cities of America, and the changes that Thomas I would give to the figure of the Monarch and it’s place in American society.

Between 1809 and 1825, the industrial output in America would receive a boom provided by the effects of the war and protectionist tariffs. The restrictions to foreign markets due to the blockade and the sharp rise in the demand for clothing and weapons would see the rise of American industry. The market would react to that demand by the rise of textile industry in New England and New York, only to suffer a terrible shock in the form of the southern secession, cutting the Empire from the rising cotton industry, except for Louisiana. Only after the war could the industry access southern markets again, albeit under heavy tariffs, while adopting the factory system, centralizing work in a single location, and the greatest example of the first American Industrial boom was the creation of the Eire Canal, connecting the Great Lakes and the Hudson River, allowing easier access from Minnesota and Northern Canada to New York.

Meanwhile, American society was also experiencing a religious revival, spearheaded by evangelical priests across the nation during the 1810s and 1820s. Baptist and Methodist priests would roam across the nation in a Grand reaction against the skepticism and hopelessness of the enlightenment and the war. This surge of moralism and religious fervor would be used by Emperor Thomas I who, on the Easter of 1818, would create a official church for America. The American constitution at first didn’t have any mention of an official church, until George Washington met with Hamilton on the night before the draft was finished, threatening him of refusing the crown if it wasn’t specified that the American Empire was a “Christian Nation”. It was using that wording that Thomas would rally a crowd in the City of Columbia (which was still under reconstruction), showing up during a Baptist cult to make his call. The Emperor spent 9 years ever since the Battle of Richmond studying the Bible and Protestant writings, dwelling deeply into God’s teachings to prepare the “Perfect Doctrine”, an evangelical branch of Christianity known as “American Protestantism” would be born that night, with Thomas’ charisma and fervor converting the first thousands followers, including even the Priest. On the next day, he would meet Prime Minister Henry Clay, winning another follower who would work tirelessly to sell the idea to other congressmen and senators. On the 18th of May of 1818, the “Imperial American Church” (IAC) would be declared the State Church by an Imperial decree, with it barely passing a Parliamentary veto, with the Emperor as the Head of the Church.

Thomas wasn’t done yet, as shown in the creation of the IAC, the Emperor was young and charismatic, and would set a precedent for other American monarchs. The idea of the “People’s Monarch” would rise in the country due to the actions of Thomas in his reign, being not only the embodiment of the country but of the people, drawing it’s legitimacy from the people’s will and in return would give back the favor by acts of Charity and goodwill. During the winters in Philadelphia (and later Columbia) the doors of the Palace would be open to the homeless of the city, the Empress, Charlotte Bonaparte, would lead at least 5 different charities during Thomas’ reign and after it the number would double.

Charlotte Bonaparte was the daughter of the Hungarian King Lucien I, Napoleon’s brother, marrying Thomas in 1817, being known to be a kind and generous woman, with Thomas’ first son John being born on the 1st of December of 1818, and his second son Thomas on the 8th of June of 1821.

As the 1820s came, the Federalist Party would start to see the decline of it’s decade of domination over politics. Under 3 Prime Ministers (John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay, James Monroe), the two houses would be controlled by the Federalists, with the Whig Party defecting to the South and no other politicians being capable of forming a successful opposition, most of the Federalist opposition simply remained independent, until the arrival of Andrew Jackson. Jackson would be initially reluctant to enter the Federalist Party, instead he would join several like-minded politicians in 1823 to form the “People’s Party”, running on a populist platform against the Federalists in the 1824 elections. Jackson would be the first politician to run in campaigns across the largest cities, from Ottawa to Columbia to the growing cities of the Ohio Valley. The American people was tired of the Federalist domination, and the “Great Commoner” (The first man of humble birth to run a party) would be the great relief, a true landslide was seen, with a 85% Federalist congress being reduced to 43%, with the People’s Party taking 35% of the seats (with 22% minor parties), adding up a few coalitions and the support of Thomas, Andrew Jackson’s Party would take 52% of the Congress and 34% of the Senate, being invited to form a govern by the Emperor, starting the Jacksonian Era.

Kaiser of Brazil · Jan 1, 2020

MASTER AND SLAVE

“For all Americans have the sacred right of property, and as such, the right to own, trade and transport a slave shall not be infringed.”
-Article 7th of the Republican Constitution

When Alexis de Tocqueville, the famous French writer, came to America in 1831, he would find a sharp contrast between North and South. He would write: “The American Republic, calling themselves bastion of liberty and champion of justice in the world, resembles more a Feudal State of old. Plantation owners are the Feudal lords, marrying their children off to inherit lands and fielding personal levies to hunt slaves and terrorize local towns. And the slaves are the new serfs, working in cotton farms that give us, Europeans, our clothes, but the Serfs would be terrified if they saw the conditions the slaves are under. For me, it is clear that this republic that started as an utopian idea of a brilliant man, has degenerated into the worst side of humankind.”

Jefferson would be the first President of the Republic, between 1808 and 1811. He would start the nation destined to be “All that the hated Empire failed to be”, a country of freedom, equality, and justice. His dreams would be shattered still in 1809, when the realities of the American South would hit him, as the new rising planter class expanded cotton farms thanks to the invention of the cotton gin, they desired to protect their future interests. Jefferson’s ideas of a weak central government with a rural America would meet a perfect match in the south, but that same combination now turned against him by giving him a weak presidency that was tied to a Constitution made in a closed doors meeting by the Presidents of each “Republic” (as the Commonwealths were now called). On the following morning, Jefferson would receive the final draft of the constitution and was forced to sign it on the 10th of November of 1809, and while it guaranteed the freedom of religion, speech, arms, and press, it would also include the infamous article 7, guaranteeing the freedom to buy and own slaves. On the next 2 years, he would see the decline of the dream he once had, with the Congress divided between 2 parties that were essentially equal and represented the same planter elite: The Confederate Party and the Democratic Party. The weak presidency was unable to have a minimal control over the acts of congress, with the Presidency being essentially a rubber stamp for congress laws. On the 24th of May of 1811, with his spirit broken by the downfall of his utopian republic, Thomas Jefferson would resign and live the rest of his days in his farm, disenchanted by two nations.

For the next years, the United American Republics would become more corrupt, with bribes becoming a norm in politics and dirty schemes would be made to fraud elections in a massive scale. The interest of the farmers would come first, with the Republic greatly expanding in its production, by 1840, it supplied a third of the world’s cotton supply. Only landed men were able to vote, ensuring a consistent profile of the presidency and congress, with Democrats and Confederates essentially taking turns in power each 4 years, all while expanding the institution of Slavery. In 1819, the “American Colonial Society” would be founded and received official government funds to colonize the African coast, settling in a region called “Liberia”, where hundreds of thousands of blacks would go through the ports of “Harrisonville” (in honor of the President and War Hero of the Independence War) from all Western Africa to the plantations in Georgia, Virginia and others. Liberia would become the world’s largest importation center of slaves, with its own plantations being created.

One of the issues the Republic had to deal with were the Natives, the Cherokee, Creek, and Seminole tribes would harass the Republic for over a decade until President Harrison (1819-1825) would find a solution in the South, in the swamps of Florida. Harrison would then sign the “Indian Removal Act”, transferring the tribes to the region South of the Everglades and creating the “Indian Territory” composed of roughly half of southern Florida. It is estimated that the forced transfer and diseases killed about 12,000 natives.

Further south, the Spanish Empire was fighting a brutal war in Colombia and Peru to keep control of its colonies, leaving many of its holdings with undermanned garrisons, including the Island of Cuba. Using the argument of “Freeing the Cubans from Spanish tyranny”, 26,000 Republican troops under General Zachary Taylor, invaded Cuba on the 18th of June of 1821. The Cuban War was short, as the Spanish Navy was still crippled from Trafalgar, it was mostly a fight of the URA against the local garrisons. The Spanish tried to send an army to invade the URA, but the American Empire (aligned with Napoleonic France) would refuse access to Louisiana. The two sides would reach an agreement 3 months later, with Cuba being given to the URA as a territory, in return the URA would promise to cut support to Bolivar’s rebellion. Cuba would grow to be essentially the world’s largest real estate, with plantations of sugar and tobacco being given to the family of General Taylor (The general confiscated the plantations of the island during the war, with the Congress merely recognizing that and awarding them). The Taylors would essentially rule the island through puppet Presidents and congress, owning over a hundred thousand slaves and becoming one of the most influential republican families, with 3 presidents being Taylors.

The URA would grow to become more corrupt with time, but one aspect of it that could not be scrapped was the military. There was always a paranoia of a Northern reconquest, especially during Jackson’s era, as such it was said that “The only thing working in this country is the army”, with the Republics keeping well-drilled and disciplined troops ready at any moment to merge into a large force to counter a Northern aggression. Still, as with everything in the URA, the army command was filled with corruption and nepotism, with some men growing from private to Colonel or Major in a matter of months thanks for the support of a influential family. Not to say that weren’t competent leaders in the Republican forces, Zachary Taylor is an example, but overall the Republican army was the best description of “Lions led by Sheep”.

Economically, the Republic depended on the exports of Cotton, especially to Britannia, it’s closest partner who gave a blind eye to the slavery to prop up its textile industry and have a loyal ally in North America after the loss of Canada.

1 in every 3 people of the Republic were slaves, and that generated an ever-present fear of a slave rebellion similar to the Haitian one, where the slaves would kill their landlords and take over the farms. This paranoia contaminated the minds of the elites, motivating brutal punishments in an attempt to instill fear in the slaves, but it only served to anger them. And as the century would reach its half, the republic would pay the price when a slave called Nathan Turner, with the help of Northern abolitionists, was the sparkle that would burn the cotton fields of the URA.

Kaiser of Brazil · Jan 7, 2020

Well, I’m trying to write an update in this format but I still need to get used to it, for now I shall make a contest: Write a national anthem for the American Empire. You can use IRL tunes and adapt the song or make a whole new one. The winner gets the anthem adopted by Prime Minister Jackson.

Empire of Freedom: The History of the American Empire

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