Marche Consulaire: A Napoleonic Timeline

[TRH]

Welcome, all. So, after five years and a ton of ideas taken up and discarded in my head, I've finally decided to get off my ass and put something down on paper for the first time. And so, I came up with a Napoleon timeline. That was a long time ago, actually, back before we started getting quite a few of them running around, but I intend to go different places than those, and I hope to stick with this longer than most, so there's that, too.

This one will start in 1805 and end about 1950 or so, and I've at least got some ideas for where to go that whole stretch, although they'll be subject to change as seems reasonable given the butterflies and all. Since it's my first timeline, it'll probably have a rocky start, but I'll appreciate any feedback you guys have to make it seem realistic. Within reason, since I'll probably default to broader strokes in the end. With all that said, let's begin.

Chapter One: A New Europe​

Excerpted from The Founding of Modern Europe by Ronald Hansen, 1978.​

Much of the scholarship surrounding the French Revolution and the wars that followed tends to focus on the years 1805 and 1806. There are several reasons for this: for connoisseurs of tactics, the campaigns against Austria, Russia, and Prussia showcased the Grande Armée and its commander at their zenith in terms of skill and maneuver. That is why Ulm and Austerlitz and Erfurt remain popular case studies at war colleges to this day. For French nationalists, there has never been so great a display of their nation’s military might than in these two years, when their Emperor confronted the other Great Powers of the Continent and triumphed. And for allohistorical enthusiasts, the missteps of the Third Coalition are more glaring than those of any other set of Napoleon’s rivals. Because of this, they see abundant opportunities for better decision-making, resulting in any number of alternative worlds.

All of these differing emphases stem from a greater truth, of course: namely, that at no other point in the Napoleonic Wars did the Emperor face such daunting odds, and come as close to total ruin as he did in the late Fall and early Winter of 1805. The stunning French victory at Ulm left the road to Vienna open, allowing the Austrian capital to be captured with scarcely a shot fired. Despite the magnitude of this achievement, however, Napoleon soon found himself the victim of his own success, for on November 2nd, not two weeks after the surrender at Mack’s army at Ulm, the Kingdom of Prussia officially joined the Third Coalition, declaring war on France. [1] With the Prussian army beginning to mobilize, reaching a peak strength of 200,000 men in early 1806, it became imperative for Napoleon to defeat the Austrian and Russian forces in front of him in order to turn north and face the new threat.

This proved a frustratingly difficult task, however. Although Napoleon’s corps commanders were able to interpose themselves between Mikhail Kutuzov’s force and the sanctuary of Prussian territory, preventing him from joining up with the forces being raised there, the Russian general managed to escape east instead. [2] Deceptive diplomacy and delaying actions from Generals Kutuzov and Bagration stalled the French pursuit long enough for a combined Russo-Austrian force to take up defensive positions at Olmutz. There, they would wait for more reinforcements, as well as for the Prussian army to finish mobilization and advance south, to envelop the French with the weight of overwhelming numbers.

Had this strategy been adhered to, it is difficult to envision a French victory in the campaign. Olmutz was a well-fortified city, and a siege would only buy time for the Prussians to arrive and turn the tables. It was at this time that Napoleon made use of his signature talent, to turn his many enemies against each other, and against themselves. Kutuzov could not be lulled into deviating from the Allied plan – if anything, he would have preferred abandoning Olmutz for an even more secure position.

The same could not be said of the young Tsar Alexander, who had accompanied the Allied army and was eager to confront his French counterpart. Napoleon opted to conceal portions of his own army to accentuate its apparent vulnerability, leave the remainder seemingly vulnerable to an attack, all the while sending out peace feelers to his enemies and feigning nervousness. The true masterstroke in this charade came during an interview the Emperor had with one of the Tsar’s envoys, where he let slip a remark about how he feared to face the might of the Prussian army. The Russian diplomat dutifully relayed this tidbit to his master along with his general impressions, and Tsar Alexander snapped at the bait, suddenly quite conscious of the importance of besting the French army quickly, lest the Prussians arrive and claim credit for the victory.

The result of Alexander’s bout of impetuousness was the Battle of Austerlitz, which remains among the most well-documented battles in history. The resounding French victory spelled the end of Austria’s participation in the Third Coalition, but the greater strategic difficulty remained. To make matters worse, the remnants of the Russian army escaped again, eventually succeeding in reaching Prussian territory and rendezvousing with Prussian forces. For his part, Napoleon decided it would be foolish to face the Coalition forces again so soon, and withdrew into friendly Bavaria to wait out the winter and resupply. Once his men were rested and reinforced, he could resume the offensive.

Prussian passivity during this period is puzzling to some observers. The sluggish mobilization of their army prevented them from interceding during the Austerlitz campaign, but even after their forces were ready, Frederick William’s forces made few moves to openly contest the French. A small force was dispatched to Dresden to coerce the Kingdom of Saxony into joining the Coalition, but otherwise, no other moves were made during the winter months. Mindful as they were not to allow another defeat in detail, the Prussians intended to fight defensively, drawing French forces into their own territory and, with the help of steady reinforcements from Russia, wear them down through attrition. As such, the Allied attempt to avoid repeating the mistake of Austerlitz handed the initiative back to the French, and in early February, Napoleon struck.

The 1806 campaign demonstrated the strength and ferocity of French arms even more than the previous year had, as the Grande Armée outmaneuvered slower Prussian forces and methodically picked apart their defenses. The reasons for the poor Prussian performance have been expounded on at great length in the years since, but most of the problems boil down to a lack of initiative at all levels of the Prussian army. The Prussians had yet to adopt permanent corps or divisions, making effective combined arms tactics difficult to execute. The Prussian high command, despite having a general strategic vision laid out for the campaign, dithered over details, and reacted slowly to developments. On an individual level, the age of the Prussian officers, and, at least in the case of the Duke of Brunswick, borderline defeatism, also took its toll on the Prussian ability to react vigorously to the French offensive. All told, the army remained mired in the antiquated methods of the 18th Century, like a creature frozen in amber, and just as lethargic.

Napoleon’s army pushed into Saxony first, driving back token Coalition resistance, before finally meeting the bulk of the Duke of Brunswick’s army at Erfurt. The decisive victory there set the Prussians reeling, retreating across the Elbe to regroup. This did them little good, because not only were French forces at their heels, but the Emperor had also made use of the winter lull to cultivate allies in the Prussian rear. Led by Jan Henryk Dąbrowski, a renowned Polish general in the service of the French, the people of Poland seized the moment to rise up against their Prussian and Russian occupiers. By February 15th, Poznan and Kalisz were in flames.

As well-led and executed as this insurgency was, however, the timing was mishandled, as Napoleon had urged Dąbrowski to commence his uprising with all haste. Although the Prussians had already suffered serious reverses, the Duke of Brunswick managed to extricate his troops in reasonably good order. [3] This complication, combined with the inflow of Russian troops to aid their Coalition partner, as well as the inopportune capture of General Dąbrowski by a Prussian patrol while travelling between cities, all contributed to the downfall of the Polish rebellion, which was put down after three weeks of heavy fighting.

As February gave way to March, Napoleon continued his efforts to disperse the Prussian army and drive it eastwards. This proved slower going than the first month’s offensives, as fatigue began to take its toll on the French forces, but the Allied strategy of relying on Russian reinforcements had been stymied by the unrest in Poland, which forced a reallocation of manpower to restore order. As such, the superior mobility and flexibility of the French army made its mark. On March 20th, Berlin fell into in French hands, and by mid-April, a vigorous campaign in East Prussia saw the remains of Prussian and Russian resistance routed, finally forcing the two kingdoms to sue for peace.

The failure of the Greater Poland uprising is often overlooked, because of its resemblances to abortive Polish revolts both before and afterwards. However, this one carried a greater significance in the form of the potential that was lost when it was suppressed, and its leaders executed. The promises Napoleon made to Dąbrowski need to be taken with some degree of skepticism, but it seems that he was mulling the idea of restoring Poland, both as a source of troops and as a buffer between his rivals in Prussia and Russia.

The death of Dąbrowski, combined with the failure of the Polish rebels led the Emperor to reconsider his options. If a revived Polish state was unviable, than buying the Tsar's future cooperation might yield better results. So when Napoleon invited Frederick William and Alexander to Tilsit to negotiate peace terms, he came with a framework that would guide the course of European politics for over a century.

[1] This is, of course, the POD. Frederick William seemed to play a will he, won’t he game through a lot of 1805 and 1806 before finally deciding on war, so making the jump sooner isn’t a huge stretch. We can say it’s a panicked reaction to the Austrian defenses crumbling so quickly. Of course, the POD is only an indirect means to what I really wanted to get at here.

[2] Here you can see that I’m kind of struggling with figuring out how an altered campaign should work, so I compensate by leaving some of the finer details vague. It’s important for Napoleon to try and snuff out Kutuzov just like OTL, of course, and he winds up failing like OTL, but here he also needs to worry about the Russians maybe escaping into allied territory, so I just have Napoleon rewrite some marching orders accordingly to try and prevent that. This same lack of expertise also means that my timelines for campaigns might not make a ton of sense, so I invite whatever input you guys have on dates and such.

[3] This is really what I wanted to build towards. From what he said on the subject, Napoleon would likely have abandoned the Poles if the 1806 uprising failed. My problem was that it was well-planned, well-led, well-executed, and the Prussians were already clearly screwed when it began, so I couldn’t just magic it into failure. Hence, the POD, which turns the OTL campaign on its head and forces some hasty re-adjustments on Napoleon’s part.

He hastily calls for the Poles to rise, if only to buy himself extra time, and between that and the altered Coalition strategy, there are enough reserves around to put down the rebels. And because of butterflies, Brunswick doesn’t die in battle like OTL, so he provides more steady leadership during this period. From that defeat, Napoleon’s new plan is the most logical course of action given his short-term interests. If Poland’s a no-go, he’ll try harder to bribe Alexander. And you guys get to see what that involves in Chapter Two.

 

[TRH]

Update time, guys. Here's Chapter 2. This will be a lot more experimental, since I'm doing an entire (half of a) campaign that didn't happen IOTL, so my grounding will be a lot less firm. Again, I'll take whatever constructive criticism I can get. Enjoy.

Chapter Two: The Continental System​

Excerpted from The Founding of Modern Europe by Ronald Hansen, 1978.​

The Treaty of Tilsit was actually a set of two treaties, one each with Russia and Prussia. Together, they laid out Napoleon’s vision for the future of Europe. Ever the classical scholar, the Emperor opted to revive an old Roman practice, dīvide et īmpera, to play his two erstwhile enemies’ interests against each other, and this is reflected in the stark contrast in the treaty terms relating to the two countries.

Prussia was, in a word, emasculated. The once-proud kingdom saw large tracts of territories parceled out to other powers. Cottbus was ceded to Saxony, and the lands west of the Elbe became incorporated into Napoleon’s new satellite state in Westphalia. Most jarring of all, however, were the cessions to Russia. Because Napoleon had abandoned his plans to revive a Polish state, he decided to award all of the lands Prussia had gained in the Partitions of Poland to the Russian Empire. All told, Frederick William lost over half of his subjects. Combined with draconian arms reductions and reparations, these provisions reduced the kingdom to a third-rate power overnight.

Russia, by contrast, could almost consider itself a beneficiary of the Treaty. In exchange for ceding the Ionian islands to France, Tsar Alexander added sizable portions of Poland to his domain, as well as extracting a promise from Napoleon to assist him in a war against the Ottoman Turks. This was the crux of Napoleon’s political strategy – by allowing one rival to profit at the expense of the other, he could hinder future cooperation between them. As at Austerlitz, Napoleon used Alexander as the lever with which he would pry the European powers apart, and elevate France above its neighbors. [1]

The second part of his strategy was the creation of the Continental System, a joint embargo of British trade, which he intended to impose on all of Europe. The Treaty of Tilsit compelled both Prussia and Russia to join. Along with Napoleon’s own possessions, plus those of his allies in Spain, this meant that most of Europe’s markets would now be closed off to the British. Over time, this policy developed into a severe political albatross, as the Emperor was forced to rely on brute force and intimidation to ensure compliance. It also inflicted severe economic damage throughout Europe, as commerce with the rest of the world slowed to a trickle.

In the meantime, however, Napoleon had an obligation of his own to discharge: the destruction of the Ottoman Turks. Russian forces had evicted the Turks from Moldova already, and having secured peace with France, Alexander began to prioritize this theater. Napoleon concentrated the bulk of his Grande Armée in newly ceded Dalmatia, ready to strike a death blow against the embattled Ottoman Empire. Britain, for its part, was not ready to allow the Sultan’s domains to be partitioned between their old enemy and their former ally. Sicily and its Bourbon rulers remained under British protection, and as the threat of a French invasion of Turkey loomed, it became the destination for a British expeditionary force, ready to come to the Sultan’s defense. By August 1806, General John Stuart had nearly 30,000 British and Sicilian troops on high alert for the inevitable French move.

That move never came. The Russian advance through the Balkans continued unabated, but Napoleon’s own forces stayed put. Although the publicly announced terms from Tilsit mandated a joint effort against the Turks later in the year, this was an elaborate ruse to distract from the Treaty’s secret provisions between Napoleon and Tsar Alexander. Russia would be allowed to take whatever concessions it could extract from the Turks, and by having his own army assemble on the border with Turkey, Napoleon could divert troops away from the front, assisting the Russians without firing a shot. In the meantime, Franco-Russian cooperation would be focused on a different target. [2]

The two monarchs agreed that depriving Britain of resources was the best means to coerce London to make peace, and one particular material the country needed was timber, the backbone of the Royal Navy. To this end, they envisioned a joint invasion of Sweden, one of the last British allies on the continent. With the war in Turkey, along with Napoleon’s main army demonstrating on the Turkish border, British attention would be focused on the Mediterranean, and hopefully overlook the buildup in the Baltic until it was too late.

The two-pronged Franco-Russian offensive would hit Sweden from two directions. Alexander’s forces would advance into Finland, while a Franco-Danish force under Louis Davout would invade Scania from the south, proceeding overland to Stockholm from there. The Danes valued their neutrality, but Napoleon was able to win their cooperation with the threefold argument that Britain had already disrespected Danish neutrality in the past, and likely would again in the future, that Scania would be restored to Denmark in exchange for an alliance, and that France and Russia made better allies (and more dangerous foes) than Britain and Sweden did. On August 10th, 1806, Alexander made the first move, calling on the Swedish government to join the Continental System and to close the Baltic to foreign warships. A month later, no reply from King Gustav had been received, so the invasion went forward. [3]

For both the French and Russian forces, the invasion made good early progress. The Swedes were ill-prepared for war, let alone one that pressed them on two fronts. On September 10th, the start of the invasion, the Russians took the town of Lovisa, and on the following day stormed the poorly defended fortress of Svartholm. [4] By mid-October, the Russian advance had reached the western coast of Finland. In the meantime, Davout’s force had beaten Swedish forces north of Karlskrona on September 25th before advancing north to threaten the capital.

The British were slow to react to these developments, both for strategic and political reasons. First, Napoleon’s subterfuge was quite successful, with the British concern about the potential fall of Constantinople superseding other problems. In addition, there were diplomatic difficulties between the British and the mercurial King Gustav. Most importantly, the government was in turmoil, with the death in mid-September of Foreign Secretary Charles James Fox. His successor, Lord Howick, was pessimistic about the odds of success on the continent, and did not believe that Sweden could be saved from Franco-Russian encirclement. Although he was eventually overruled, the debate consumed even more valuable time.

In the end, the news of French involvement galvanized Lord Grenville’s Ministry of All the Talents, and an expedition was dispatched. On October 13th, Sir John Moore’s army, some 20,000 strong, disembarked at Gothenberg, and began marching overland to relieve the beleaguered Swedes. [5] Two days later, a second British force laid siege to Copenhagen, where after a week of resistance, the Danish government was forced to surrender its remaining navy. Lord Cathcart returned home a hero, lauded by the press and the public. [6] Moore, for his part, would not prove so fortunate.

Davout’s army had been able to defeat the Swedish armies sent against him so far, but he had only his own III Corps plus a smaller number of Danish troops, about 35,000 strong altogether. Facing both the British and Swedish simultaneously would be daunting, so like his master, Davout exploited his central position to divide and conquer. After leaving the Danes behind as a covering force, the French army turned southwest, and on October 26th met Moore’s force near the town of Jönköping, on the southern shores of Lake Vättern. [7]

The Battle of Jönköping favored the British initially; with the lake shoring up Moore’s left flank, his troops were able to repel the French assaults with their well-trained musketry. However, Davout had anticipated a stubborn defense, and made the most of his superior cavalry to compensate. A little after 3 P.M., Montbrun’s horsemen emerged from the woods, crashing into Moore’s right rear. At the same time, the French infantry surged forward to turn that same flank, while the artillery concentrated fire on the British center.

These twin blows broke the cohesion of the British army, which surrendered after its troops were driven into the frigid waters of Lake Vättern. Moore himself was killed in action, a victim of the Grande Batterie. This was not the end of the Swedish campaign, which stretched into Summer 1807. However, the British, seeing the worst defeat for their army in over 60 years, declined to lend further aid to their northern ally. By June, the Swedish court, seeing the writing on the wall, replaced the increasingly irrational Gustav with his uncle Karl, who sued for peace.

The Treaty of Vasa was, in accordance with Napoleon’s new diplomatic strategy, a national humiliation for Sweden. To start, Swedish Pomerania was to be incorporated into the Confederation of the Rhine. In the north, all Swedish territory east of the Tornio-Muonio boundary would be ceded to Russia, the gains being incorporated into a quasi-autonomous Grand Duchy of Finland.

In the south, Napoleon pushed for a full repeal of the Treaty of Roskilde from 1658, with Scania and all the other territories Denmark lost a century and a half earlier being returned. The cession of Scania, Blekinge, Halland, and Bohuslän stripped Sweden of any control over the Danish straits. Lastly, the Swedes were obliged to join the Continental System, denying their valuable timber to the Royal Navy.

With the castration of Sweden, the French Emperor meant to send a message to the kings and princes of Europe. Cooperation and compliance with his dictates would be rewarded, quite possibly beyond one’s wildest dreams. Resistance would lead only to national ruin. With that choice laid out clearly, Napoleon needed only to wait, and to allow the nations of Europe to make their choice.

[1] This writer’s style is intentionally a bit more flowery than my own. I’ll eventually use other books for updates, and probably adjust the style accordingly. I’ll note that I intended him to be Canadian, but realized I had goofed on some of those alternate spellings in the first chapter, so that’s ditched.

[2] This is another big concession relative to OTL Tilsit, which forced a ceasefire between the Russians and the Turks. Napoleon has decided to throw the Sultan under the bus too, since Alexander is a more valuable ally. He’s not eager to see the Ottomans fall, but doesn’t think the war will go that far. I’ll get back to this front later.

[3] This diplomatic sequence is pretty different from OTL’s Finnish War, but Napoleon is taking a more personal interest in it, and he wants the element of surprise to get Davout’s men across to Sweden safely, so things need to move quickly.

[4] Svartholm withstood siege for a month IOTL, but the fort was in bad disrepair and the garrison was weak, so I think it could have been assaulted successfully.

[5] Moore got this job IOTL too, but he wasn’t allowed to land. ITTL, the British decide to damn the consequences since the situation is so dire.

[6] The attack on Copenhagen was at least a little controversial IOTL. Here, it’s a lot less so, since the Danes just helped invade Sweden, so there’s the sense they brought this on themselves.

[7] Leaving the exact location a little vague, so terrain issues aren’t nitpicked to death. It’s just on the lake, and with a good number of trees around.

 

[TRH]

Time for a new update, guys. This time, the focus is on British internal politics and strategy. Lots of foreign policy analysis treats states as black boxes, and doesn't delve into their internal workings, or assumes that everyone will agree on a country's best interests, but that's rarely true in real life. And given that IOTL the British government was pretty unstable at this time, with a lot of debate over war conduct, it's only realistic to address this in detail. Also, foreshadowing of Latin American developments for later. Enjoy.

Chapter Three: Do Not Interrupt Your Enemy...​

Excerpted from The Founding of Modern Europe by Ronald Hansen, 1978.​

In many ways, British politics faced the end of an era in 1806. The deaths of William Pitt the Younger and Charles James Fox brought about a generational shift in leadership, and it would take some time for normality to reassert itself. This turmoil is reflected in the repeated changes of government during this period.

Lord Grenville’s unity government was likely doomed to failure from the outset, as Fox’s hopes for reaching an accord with Napoleon were dashed by the Carthaginian peace the Emperor enforced on the vanquished Prussians. And with peace foreclosed as an option, the inaptly named Ministry of All the Talents also failed to distinguish itself in military ventures. Whatever accolades the Government received for its swift neutralization of the Danish navy at Copenhagen were promptly invalidated by the reverses in Buenos Aires and Jönköping. The latter defeat became the straw that broke the camel’s back - by January 1807, the government had fallen, leaving the Duke of Portland to take charge of the country. [1]

Portland’s Ministry was home to several quarreling officials, bound together by little more than their loyalty to the late Pitt. The most important of these internal rivalries was the enmity between George Canning and Lord Castlereagh, with each representing a different strategic vision. Ironically, Canning and Castlereagh took stances rather contrary to what one would expect, given the respective positions they held. Canning, as Foreign Minister, was quite averse to dangerous continental entanglements, preferring to exploit British naval supremacy and focus national efforts on the colonial arena, where decisive advantages could be assured. For his part, Castlereagh, as Secretary of State for War and the Colonies, stressed the importance of a coalition to overturn French dominance of Europe. To this end, he argued that Britain should take whatever steps were necessary to reassure potential allies, even to the point of committing the army. [2]

These two strategic frameworks clashed when the Cabinet began to weigh the merits of a second Buenos Aires expedition, intended to avenge the failure of the first and hopefully ignite revolutionary fervor in Spanish America. Castlereagh was vehemently opposed, saying that he feared success more than failure in this quarter. After all, a major coup against the Spanish colonies would permanently damage any hopes of prying the Spanish government away from its alliance with Napoleon. However, Castlereagh’s own ideas tended to hinge on using Sicily as a springboard to invading southern Italy, to draw off French troops in conjunction with an Austrian invasion. With the failure at Jönköping fresh in their minds, and with no Austrian moves immediately forthcoming while that country recuperated from its most recent defeat, the Cabinet discarded this idea.

As such, Canning ultimately won the day, and a second expedition was dispatched in February, targeting Buenos Aires and Montevideo. This was only the spearhead for a more general assault on Spanish possessions, because the Cabinet, for want of other strategic ideas, decided to embrace Canning’s colonial strategy with all due vigor. Expeditions against Spanish colonies were prepared, and with civil disorder brewing in La Plata and elsewhere, overtures were to be made to rebel leaders, to further undermine Spanish authority in the New World.

The second British invasion of La Plata proved just as ineffective as the first. Results elsewhere were, charitably, mixed. Spanish Guinea was occupied with little resistance, but the more populous colonies of Cuba and Venezuela were more difficult propositions. In January 1808, an expedition departed Jamaica bound for Cuba. With 8,000 men under his command, Sir Hew Dalrymple was tasked with capturing Havana. A British force had successfully taken the city during the Seven Years’ War, and Dalrymple intended to reprise that assault, first by storming the high ground overlooking the city. Unfortunately, the British general failed to account for new defenses the Spanish had built to remedy Havana's earlier vulnerability. The fortress of La Cabaña frustrated Dalrymple's attack, repelling his assault force with heavy losses.

Having devised his battle plans on the presumption that he could take the high ground over Havana, Dalrymple apparently had no other ideas for capturing the city. [3] Listless, the general requested reinforcements, and ordered his troops to settle in for a siege. This stalemate lasted a little over a month, before yellow fever set in among the British ranks. By March 10th, Dalyrmple’s notes estimate 3,500 of his 8,000 men were dead or incapacitated by the disease. By the end of March, Dalrymple had been recalled for incompetence, but with the majority of the assault force unfit for action, his replacement decided to call off the siege, returning to Jamaica.

The British invasion of Venezuela was smoother going, in large part due to the greater diligence of Lieutenant-General Sir Arthur Wellesley. A veteran of campaigns in India, he knew the dangers of a diseased army, as well as the importance of thorough reconnaissance before testing a defended position. After his army secured the coastal cities of Caracas, Maracaibo, and Cumaná, Spanish forces retreated into the colony’s interior to continue their resistance. Wellesley was reluctant to pursue, knowing that with May would come the rainy season, and that the further inland he went, the heavier the toll tropical diseases would take on his army. With his most important objectives achieved, Wellesley would stay put for most of the rest of 1808. [4]

When all was said and done, the British campaigns in Latin America were unsatisfactory to Portland’s government. Of five expeditions, three were debacles, and the remaining two were qualified successes only. More importantly, not even Canning could convincingly explain how these campaigns would help defeat the French. An attempted coup by the Anglophilic Crown Prince of Spain had taken place in early 1808, only to sputter out and lose public support when word reached Madrid of the attacks on Havana and Caracas. Carlos IV and Prime Minister Godoy retained power, however precariously, and Spain would remain in the Continental System for the foreseeable future. [5]

Efforts to cultivate rebellion against the Spanish were equally disappointing. In Buenos Aires, general Santiago de Liniers had supplanted Madrid’s appointed governor as the leader of La Plata, the latter having been blamed for absconding from Buenos Aires with the treasury when the British attacked. Liniers, however, had led the forces that expelled the two British expeditions, and was no friendlier to them than his predecessor. Meanwhile in Venezuela, an alliance of convenience had been forged between the prominent agitator Simón Bolívar and Captain General Vicente Emparan. The two men agreed that questions of Venezuelan independence could be postponed until the British invaders had been evicted from the capital and other cities. Independence movements in New Spain and elsewhere shared similar sentiments about British interference in their internal affairs. [6]

Castlereagh, who had narrowly refrained from resigning in protest over the failed expedition to Havana, was back in the ascendant, claiming vindication for his earlier warnings. He persuaded the rest of the Cabinet to impose a moratorium on further hostilities against the Spanish, while focusing the rest of their efforts into assembling a new Coalition on the continent to oppose Napoleon. With the death of Lord Portland later in the year, the Earl of Liverpool became Prime Minister. Castlereagh took leadership of the Tories in the House of Commons, as well as the Foreign Office.

With the Austrian government finally receptive to offers of another alliance, Britain entered 1810 optimistic. The home economy had been hindered by Napoleon’s Continental System, but Europe suffered worse. Although direct alliance with Madrid seemed unlikely for the time being, the Franco-Spanish alliance had frayed due to Napoleon’s actions. And the Hapsburgs had taken advantage of the past several years of peace to reform their armies. Under Archduke Charles, the new Austrian army incorporated corps, the Levée en masse, and other aspects of the French army that had brought Napoleon so many victories, ensuring it would be a much more imposing opponent in the future.

Most of all, there was the sense that the Emperor had become a victim of his own success, overextending his reach and alienating the peoples of Europe with his imperiousness. As the Fourth Coalition prepared to take the field, the continent understood that one way or another, this would be the final act of the Napoleonic Wars.

[1] Grenville’s government didn’t get much done IOTL either, and with the Swedish disaster to contend with, they don’t stand a chance at surviving, to my mind.

[2] Here I’m conjecturing a lot about what Canning and Castlereagh would have wanted in this situation, but I’m basing my speculation on their opposed views of the Walcheren Expedition in 1809. Castlereagh wanted to invade Holland to help out the Austrians, but Canning thought those troops were better off in Spain, where there was a clear avenue of retreat to Torres Vedras if things went wrong. I think this maps out their strategic preferences adequately, as a result.

[3] Moore and everyone else seemed to agree that Dalrymple was an idiot, so this seems like a plausible form of incompetence for him.

[4] I'd planned on killing him with some disease, too, but decided it was too heavy-handed. British involvement on the continent will be limited in the foreseeable future, so there's just no room for him to see action there.

[5] Fernando’s coup attempt doesn’t get exposed in advance, but more British attacks on Spanish colonies lets a lot of air out of his balloon. In the future I intend for divisions in Spanish politics to not correspond neatly to Francophilia or Anglophilia. Politics is rarely so dichotomous.

[6] More on these independence movements in Chapter 6.

 

[TRH]

As it turns out, Chapter Five was a lot quicker to write than Chapter Four was, so here's another update. This is the longest chapter so far, and we'll be seeing the rest of the world after this, starting with the US next chapter. Again, I'm hoping for some constructive criticism and other speculation, since I can incorporate that stuff into future updates. As usual, enjoy.

Chapter Four: The Fourth Coalition​

Excerpted from The Founding of Modern Europe by Ronald Hansen, 1978.​

For Napoleon, the period between 1808 and 1810 is most reminiscent of the brief interlude between the Treaty of Amiens and the inception of the Third Coalition. Although it seems as if the Emperor had adopted a passive stance, waiting for his Continental System to do its work, documented evidence from the period shows that he was anything but idle. Reforms and legislation were enacted during this time, with others being mooted and discarded, and war plans and other strategy also occupied much of Bonaparte’s focus.

The common refrain among Napoleon’s enemies characterizing the Emperor as an addict to conquest has some grounding in his writings from this time and others, with battle plans meticulous and fanciful alike appearing. His main concerns at this time were Austria and Spain. The former was the more pressing concern, being the strongest state on the continent that had yet to be either co-opted or truncated to the point of irrelevance. The Austrians had publicly acceded to the Continental System in 1806, since their army was in no condition to contest the issue. However, while smuggling was commonplace throughout Europe in defiance of Napoleon’s decrees, it was most systematically flouted by the Austrians, where bribes paid out to port inspectors appeared (disguised) on official state ledgers.

Because of Austria’s latent strength and economic double-dealing, Napoleon was tempted at several points to take action. His ideas varied, usually revolving around either removing Francis from the throne and replacing him with a less bellicose ruler, or else tying himself to the House of Hapsburg through a dynastic marriage. For whatever reason, however, neither of these ideas proved alluring enough to warrant a pre-emptive war. When Napoleon did wed Princess Marie-Louise, it was only after he was in a position to truly force the issue.

Spain was a more complicated problem, because the country and its colonial empire were facing significant civil disruption during this time, and that fact by itself seemed to either galvanize Napoleon into wanting to act, or else cause him to recoil from involvement by turns. He distrusted King Carlos, and even more so Carlos’ chosen Prime Minister, Manuel Godoy, who expressed his readiness to abandon the French alliance when the Emperor seemed to face disaster in central Europe in 1805. With that in mind, the abortive coup by Prince Fernando befuddled the Emperor, who does not seem to have understood the depths of Godoy’s domestic unpopularity. It certainly did not register how the populace could see the Prime Minister as Bonaparte’s lackey, when he considered the Spaniard an uncooperative and reluctant partner at best. [1]

As much as Napoleon distrusted the entirety of the Spanish aristocracy by 1808, he seems to have been paralyzed by uncertainty as far as solutions were concerned. Plans to replace Godoy with a more pliant Prime Minister, or to depose the Bourbons altogether in favor of one of his siblings were a common topic of interest in the Emperor’s correspondence and other writings from this time. That none of these plans saw fruition seems to be the result of several factors apart from an uncharacteristic indecisiveness on the part of the Emperor.

One concern was the tenuousness of the Spanish colonial empire, which became highly apparent to Napoleon after the British expeditions in Latin America from 1806 to 1809. So long as the British focused their strength on colonial ventures rather than the Continent, Napoleon was content to allow them their distraction. Revolutionaries like Miguel Hidalgo and Santiago de Liniers posed harder questions, and the Emperor’s thoughts on whether to support these uprisings or to allow their suppression changed from month to month. Another factor may simply have been timing. So long as the Austrian Question remained unresolved, Napoleon was less willing to confront a two-front war where his political ends remained uncertain. Regardless, events in central Europe would soon return to the forefront. [2]

Nearly twenty years of unsuccessful wars against France, along with punitive peace agreements and territorial cessions, had eroded Austrian financial strength. British subsidies were instrumental in allowing the Hapsburg monarchy to continue with retooling its military, but even this largesse had limits, and the Continental System was taking its toll on both nations. Because of these constraints, the Austrian military could only be supported for so much longer. To make use of its reformed army while it was still sustainable, the Austrian Empire agreed to join Britain and the Ottoman Empire to form the Fourth Coalition. Come Spring of 1810, there would be war with France again. Lord Castlereagh had also made overtures to the Russian Empire, but Alexander remained largely satisfied with the territorial gains and political leeway that his alliance with Napoleon had given him, and so rebuffed these advances.

Despite that setback, there were a few advantages the Fourth Coalition enjoyed that its predecessors lacked. First, they were not to be hoodwinked by another strategic deception along the lines of 1805 or 1807, where Napoleon masked the focus of his military efforts. They correctly surmised that the Danube would once again be the target of the Grande Armée. Second, they had finally come to terms with the sheer difficulty of matching the Emperor in the field, even with superior numbers. With these two advantages, the winning strategy was clear: Archduke Charles, the most capable commander available to the Coalition, would hold the Emperor at bay, while a decisive blow was struck where Napoleon himself would least expect it, in Italy. [3]

An Austrian army under Heinrich von Bellegarde would be tasked with breaching the Venetian plain, with Ottoman forces acting in support. In the meantime, John Stuart’s army in Sicily, by now reinforced to 45,000 men, would expel Joseph Bonaparte from Naples. Heavy-handed behavior and looting by French troops had provoked a stubborn and destructive insurgency in Calabria in the past, and it was believed that this could provide the nucleus for a popular uprising that would prove Joseph’s downfall. Once that was done, the remainder of the Neapolitan military could be co-opted, and the allied armies would advance up the peninsula, forcing Napoleon’s less capable subordinates to cope with overwhelming numbers, plus a combination of irregular and conventional warfare.

As is so common in war, neither the Coalition nor Napoleon’s own plans worked as expected. On February 9th, Stuart’s army landed in Calabria as planned, and began the march towards Naples, all the while calling on the populace to rise up against their foreign oppressors. To Stuart’s consternation, these exhortations received only a tepid response from the locals. Joseph Bonaparte was more personable than his brother, and since 1806 had gone to great lengths to win the affections of his subjects. Feudal taxes had been abolished, the educational system modernized, public works projects provided gainful employment, and banditry had been all but eradicated. By 1810, even the most war-torn portions of Calabria preferred the benevolent consensus-building Joseph offered to his Bourbon predecessors. [4]

Despite this unwelcome development, the British force still outnumbered the Neapolitan army nearly two to one, so Marshal Jourdan fought delaying actions only, abandoning Naples. To the north, Marshal Massena led a defensive action against Bellegarde’s army, and was holding out comfortably. Massena was exasperated by Jourdan’s request for reinforcements, but begrudgingly detached two divisions from his own force to assist. With this aid, Jourdan managed to form up a defensive line along the Volturno, checking Stuart. By April, French reinforcements started arriving in Italy in large numbers, allowing Massena to take the offensive against Bellegarde, and Jourdan recaptured Naples on the 6th.

This level of action in Italy had surprised Napoleon, and meant that fresh formations that he had intended to use himself were redirected to the Italian front instead. As a result, when the first pitched battle between his army and the Austrians on March 8th, at Regensberg, the two forces stood at parity in numbers. The city had been captured by the Austrians early in the campaign, and Napoleon intended to recapture it, along with the important Danube crossing it controlled. This proved a difficult task. the Austrian defenders had reinforced the gates with rubble, making bombardment ineffective. It took several attempts, but eventually the French succeeded in scaling the walls and forcing their way into the city. Several hours of street to street combat followed before the embattled garrison finally surrendered.

Regensberg was a costly battle for both sides, with 4,000 French casualties and 6,000 Austrian. Unfortunately, among the wounded was the Emperor himself, his left leg struck by a canister round. He had been swiftly carried to safety by his Imperial Guardsmen, but the word that the Emperor was in no immediate danger reassured the army, giving them the heart to carry the walls on their final assault. Although Napoleon was expected to make a full recovery, he was relegated to commanding from a chaise for the rest of the campaign. Despite his attempts to hide it, observers noticed a tendency to favor his left for the rest of his life. [5]

In the meantime, Charles’ army had retreated into Bohemia, and the French captured Vienna without further complications. The first French attempt at crossing the Danube and drawing the Austrians out to fight resulted in the Battle of Aspern-Essling. If Regensberg had been a prelude of things to come, then Aspern-Essling was the first movement in the symphony of blood that would be 1810. [6] For the better part of two days, the two eponymous villages were captured and recaptured by French and Austrian forces. While Charles’ new army still lacked the flexibility and spontaneity of the French, their sheer tenacity and firepower made up for a lack of finesse. By the end of the second day, the French advance began to run out of steam. In Aspern, Marshal Soult was thrown from his horse by an enemy skirmisher, and his IV Corps inexorably gave way. By the end of the night, the Emperor was forced to concede defeat for the first time in his career, and extricated his army back across the Danube.

As his soldiers recuperated from action, Napoleon took the time to re-evaluate the campaign. In addition to their attempts to decide the campaign in theaters where he was absent, the Coalition also seemed to be taking steps to restrict his room to maneuver, turning the war into one of attrition. This strategy had a fatal shortcoming, however. With the help of his client states, Napoleon now enjoyed numerical superiority over his foes. Even though Alexander had by now concluded peace with the Ottoman Turks, and stood aloof from the Emperor's struggles with the Austrians, he could still win a contest of brute force. [7]

As Napoleon planned his second thrust across the Danube, he also drew in reinforcements to replenish his bloodied army. The subsequent Battle of Wagram was even costlier than Aspern-Essling, as Charles moved to double-envelop the Grande Armée. However, these efforts were unsuccessful, and the Austrians retreated into Bohemia. Rather than pursuing immediately, as he would have during his earlier campaigns, Napoleon decided to wait again, and accumulate even more troops before meeting the Hapsburg army for a final clash on May 1st, at Pressburg.

With fighting on the Italian front decisively in French favor by now, Charles once again felt the need to act aggressively, attempting to pin portions of Napoleon’s army against the Danube and destroy them. For two days, French forces tried advancing east from the river, while the Austrians pushed them back. All the while, canister shot devastated tightly packed formations on both sides. In the end, the Austrian attacks were rebuffed, and on the night of the 2nd, the Archduke conceded defeat, withdrawing further east. Charles had lost 45,000 men to Napoleon’s 32,000, making Pressburg the bloodiest battle of the Napoleonic Wars.

This would be the last major action of the campaign. Emperor Francis had no more confidence in victory, and agreed to meet Napoleon in Vienna to discuss peace terms. To his surprise, Bonaparte was not in a punitive mood, despite the unprecedented levels of bloodshed his army had endured. The Duchy of Salzburg was to be ceded to Bavaria, but the French Emperor was less interested in reparations than he was in alliance. The only obstacle to peace in Europe, Napoleon insisted, was British intransigence, and he himself was largely satisfied with the current state of the continent. To seal this commitment to stability, Napoleon offered to divorce his current wife Josephine and marry into the Hapsburg dynasty. Caught off balance as he was by the French leniency, Francis agreed to allow Napoleon to wed his daughter Marie-Louise. [8]

The royal wedding took place a year after the treaty signing, in May of 1811. On March 4th, 1812, Napoleon’s first son was born. By the time Napoleon II came of age, he could expect an entire continent to inherit as his birthright.

[1] Napoleon’s understanding of internal Spanish politics isn’t really any better than OTL, he’s just a bit more cautious in general.

[2] All of this is attempts by our non-omniscient narrator to explain Napoleon’s passivity from 1808 to 1810. There’s a few reasons that he doesn’t invade Spain like OTL, a lot of them butterfly-induced. The loss of the Danish and Swedish fleets made it impossible to outnumber the Royal Navy for now, so he didn’t seize Portugal’s, and therefore never stationed armies in Spain. Also, his divide and rule strategy means he wants to co-opt Spain into his new European order, but all the civil dissent leaves him unsure of how to do it. In the end, he chooses a wait and see approach.

[3] I want both sides to be at least reasonably competent and try learning from their mistakes. Hence, the Fourth Coalition tries a variation of OTL’s Sixth Coalition’s strategy.

[4] All of that is OTL. Compared with any contemporary monarch, and Joseph was practically a socialist.

[5] Napoleon received a milder wound IOTL at Ratisbon (Regensburg in German). With more even numbers and Regensburg’s gates not getting breached like OTL, the French also suffer double their historical casualties.

[6] I’m finding that writing pretentiously on purpose is actually a lot of fun.

[7] Another theme I want to explore in this timeline is how even if you try learning from past errors, you won’t necessarily learn the right lessons, or else you might make new mistakes in the process. Also, this campaign in general is a reflection of the OTL bloodier parts of the later Napoleonic Wars, where armies got larger and casualties mounted accordingly.

[8] This is the last part of Napoleon’s new divide and rule strategy. In the long run, he intends to sell himself as a guarantor of the status quo, but only after he’s tipped that status quo in France’s favor.

 

[TRH]

I am really enjoying your exploration of a different Napoleonic Era, I can't wait to see where you go from here.

Thanks. If I'm being honest, I'm pretty eager by now to be done with the Napoleonic Wars, and to get to the post-war era, where I feel like I'll have more freedom to diverge aggressively. Only a few more chapters to go before we reach that point. And here's one of them, now that I'm done with Chapter Six, which required a ton of research. Here, we start looking at the war's effects around the world, starting with the United States.

Chapter Five: Good Feelings​

Excerpted from The First American Party System by Charles Francis Adams, 1871. [1]​

As war raged in Europe at the start of the century, the challenge for this nation, still finding its footing in the years after the Constitution, was how fervently to engage with the world outside its borders, and the degree to which true separation was possible. The sectional disputes that assumed centrality at the end of the 1810’s existed a decade earlier, but were far less incendiary in that earlier time, as evidenced by the unceremonious prohibition of the slave trade in 1808. Questions related to the security of American trade and the northwestern frontier carried far more weight.

Thomas Jefferson’s last official act as President in early 1809 was an admission of defeat with regards to his Embargo Act. In attempting to sever the links of commerce between the United States and the outside world, he had inadvertently demonstrated their importance to the livelihood of Americans, merchants and laborers alike. True isolation of the kind that many of the Founding Fathers had wanted for America was proven an impossible dream. And so Jefferson approved a revision of the original legislation; instead of a boycott of the entire world, the United States would only proscribe trade with Great Britain and France, and only so long as those two nations restricted free trade with the continent. As soon as war concluded and the twin blockades were rescinded, commerce could resume normalcy.

In the meantime, however, American merchants, desperate to resuscitate their own enterprises, exploited the liberties afforded them by the new ordinance. Trade with the continent remained a risky venture on account of British and French intransigence, but Spanish America represented too vast an expanse for even the Royal Navy to patrol. In theory, the Spanish crown forbade trade between its colonies and foreign nations, but flouting such regulations was by this point in history a longstanding tradition. And with ongoing war with England, enforcement was exceptionally lax. By 1810, American ships were common sights in harbors from Havana to Buenos Aires, plying their myriad wares. [2]

Among the goods exported from the United States to its southern neighbors in this period, agricultural goods were included, but ultimately drew smaller profits than manufactured ones. Indeed, what Huxley and his fellow travelers now call the industrial revolution seems to have made its mark in America during this brief window. [3] The small village of Slatersville, Rhode Island, rose to prominence on account of the Slater Brothers and their textile mill. A far larger operation arose in Boston in 1813, incorporating English technological advancements and to spin cloth with remarkable efficiency. With English goods in short supply in Spanish America while those two kingdoms remained at war, American industry exerted great influence over a vast market.

The manufacture of weapons also became highly profitable during this period. The revolutionary struggles of Spanish America began in earnest in 1807, with the upheaval in La Plata, and the demand for quality firearms rose accordingly. Again, this development proved a godsend for certain cities and towns in New England, which had suffered greatly under embargo. Pistols from Middletown, Connecticut, and muskets from Springfield, Massachusetts found their way onto schooners in Boston or New Haven, and from there to customers in Veracruz or Buenos Aires. [4] Both the gunsmiths who manufactured these weapons and the ship owners who transported them remained studiously incurious about their intended use. So long as gold or silver were at hand to pay for them, the American merchants were satisfied.

This influx of trade with Spanish America did much to alleviate the economic damage that America had suffered under Jefferson’s Administration. The wheels of industry began to turn once more in New England, and that good fortune spread to shipping interests in those same states, as well as to cotton and tobacco growers in the southern states. As Americans returned to good spirits, they rewarded James Madison with a second term as President in 1812, throwing the national viability of the Federalist Party further into question. That the Democratic-Republicans would become victims of their own success, and be obliged to address questions of sectionalism once they had come to encapsulate sectional disputes within their own Party, would become obvious only later. For the time being, this was the Era of Good Feelings.

The other source of American concern during this period was on its frontiers, where Indian wars tasked the limited resources of the Army. A charismatic Shawnee chieftain named Tecumseh traveled the frontier, calling for a Confederation of Indian tribes to resist encroachment on their lands by American settlers. In 1808, he and his brother, known to the tribes as The Prophet, founded the village of Tippecanoe on the banks of the Wabash. For the next several years, tensions rose between the two chiefs and territorial governor William Henry Harrison. Tecumseh sought to curtail Harrison’s efforts to draw American settlers into what he considered his peoples’ homeland.

During meetings between the two men, the Shawnee warned that his people would have British support in the event of war with the Americans. From what archival evidence exists, it is difficult to judge the veracity of this claim. Indeed, authorities in Canada had approached Tecumseh about a possible alliance, but the latter was reluctant to commit himself in such a fashion. It is possible that the Shawnee's threats were a mere negotiation tool to give Harrison pause. Unaware as he was of this, however, the Governor received the warning with all due gravity.

Matters came to a head in 1811, when a warning reached Harrison from the Miami tribe. [5] They were the rightful owners of the land where Tippecanoe stood, although their leadership disavowed association with Tecumseh's Confederacy. They had cause to believe that the Shawnee leader was readying for war, and that tribes farther south might answer his call to arms. Upon receiving leave from Washington to act, Harrison mustered a force of just over a thousand regulars and militia, and set forth for Tippecanoe.

On November 10th, the American force arrived, and Harrison met with Tecumseh and The Prophet under a flag of truce. Tecumseh expressed some willingness to evacuate the settlement and disperse his followers, but also appealed for time, committing to little in the immediate future. Harrison was conscious of the other’s tactic, as well as the infeasibility of keeping his militiamen encamped for too long, particularly with winter approaching. After several more days of fruitless discussion, on the 14th Harrison finally decided to resort to force.

The Battle of Tippecanoe was a bloody affair, far more so than the last confrontation with an Indian league at Fallen Timbers. Both leaders knew the importance of rallying the spirits of their men, with Tecumseh appearing several times in the thick of the melee, while Harrison led two charges at the head of his cavalry. This boldness proved their undoing, however, and both leaders, along with The Prophet, fell on the field. The leader of the regulars, one Major Floyd, did what he could to maintain the force’s discipline, but a bloodlust had taken hold of them. The retreating Indians were given no quarter, and the town itself succumbed to flames. With it, the last hope for unified Indian resistance to the United States also perished.

Secretary John Gibson became acting Governor of the Indiana Territory after the battle. Although over a hundred militiamen fell alongside Harrison, with many more wounded, there was little else to reproach about the results. Without leadership, the Shawnee and their allies drifted apart, ensuring a modicum of peace in the northwest for the next few years. With Andrew Jackson’s subsequent intervention on the side of the Lower Creek in the Creek Civil War, the last remnant of Tecumseh’s dream was snuffed out.

The burning of Tippecanoe ensured the destruction of whatever evidence may have linked Tecumseh’s Confederation with Canadian authorities, and although Henry Clay and other hawks needed no such evidence to suspect collusion, there was also a reduction in concern over possible connections between the British and Indians. The decision by London to repeal its 1807 Orders in Council in late 1812 removed yet another impetus for war with England. In his official reply to the British note, Madison thanked the Earl of Liverpool for his act of fairness, but reiterated his commitment to an embargo until such time as hostilities on the continent were terminated. [6] Little did the President suspect, of course, that the end of the war in Europe was close at hand.

[1] And finally we move onto a new writer and book. Charles Francis Adams was the son of John Quincy, and as a historian wrote a biography of his grandfather’s Presidency. I try my best to capture 19th Century voicing, but considering I was using a stuffy writer to begin with, I kind of have an uphill battle.

[2] Jefferson altered the Embargo Act as I described IOTL too. The big opportunity here is that, thanks to Napoleon staying out of Spain, they remain at war with the UK. I think the Continental System was a huge blunder, but it would have been a lot less so had the British not gained the opportunity to trade with Latin America so soon after it was imposed. Here, the US seizes the opportunity to undercut some of their trade, and makes out like a bandit in the process.

[3] Huxley is still a biologist ITTL, but I’ll get to what he and Charles Darwin are up to down the line. As a hint, they'll try their hands at some sociology, with some major unintended consequences.

[4] Springfield was (and remained so until 1968) the National Armory and made the Army’s muskets at this time. Middletown was a port in its own right and made pistols. It was also the biggest city on Connecticut at this time, oddly enough. In general, all the industrial development I mention here is OTL, but will be doing better with more access to markets in this window. Actually, industrialization will be another big theme I'll explore a lot ITTL, with different approaches in different countries. This marks some of the beginnings in the United States, at least that gets noticed on a national level.

[5] This course of events is a little different from OTL, where Tecumseh was in the south gathering support when Harrison was recalled by his acting Governor and went for Tippecanoe. One result is that Tecumseh doesn’t make quite as much progress in his cause before he goes into combat and dies.

[6] In addition to the end of Tecumseh making the western states less fearful, the victory on the Orders in Council strengthens the hand of moderates who think that diplomatic and economic pressure can work against Britain. Famously, the message that Britain would abandon the Orders only arrived in the States after war was declared IOTL, of course. Here, Madison is perfectly happy to continue presiding over a peaceful recovery instead of a war where most of the American grievances have now been resolved.

 

[TRH]

Time for a new update, guys. Sorry it's taken longer than usual, but I've been distracted by that nuisance called real life. Anyways, time to avert the Nothing Happens in South America cliche. And hopefully, this won't come across as amateurish ignorance, since this really isn't my area of expertise. Enjoy, guys!

Chapter Six: Misanthropy and Repentance [1]​

Excerpted from The First Wave: Independence Movements of the Napoleonic Era by Juanita Perez, 1984​

As always seems to be the case, the seeds of rebellion in Latin America had taken root years or centuries beforehand. Despite their best efforts, the Spanish had never quite succeeded in extinguishing the native cultures of the lands they conquered, and even by the 19th Century, pockets of resistance carried on in remote parts of Central and South America. More importantly, the internal contradictions in the colonial regime pitted the interests of the colonists against those of Spain itself. And with the revolutions in the United States and France serving as inspiration, all that was needed was a spark.

Although Britain remembers it primarily as an embarrassing failure, from which the government in London took all of the wrong lessons, the 1806 expedition to Buenos Aires marked a sea change, the moment that Spanish America was put to rest, and the spirit of Latin America was born. Because of Spain’s isolation from its own colonies following the defeat at Trafalgar, La Plata and other territories were left to fend for themselves. In order to cope, they created new social, political, and military arrangements that exposed how inessential Madrid was to the lives of La Platans, Mexicans, or Venezuelans. [2]

In all of these early rebellions, the social divide between the Peninsulares and native-born Criollos played a central role, with the latter becoming increasingly resentful over their lack of influence. In Buenos Aires and Montevideo, the Criollos defied longstanding decrees, forming their own militias to resist the British invasions. The victories won by these outfits earned power and prestige for their commanders, elevating men like Santiago de Liniers and Cornelio Saavedra to prominence at the expense of Madrid’s appointed officials. Having proven they could stand on their own two feet, the citizens of La Plata would only tolerate Spanish rule in exchange for more benefits and social dignity than they had been traditionally afforded.

The forces of conservatism wouldn't cede their privileged status so easily, of course, and in 1809, a conspiracy between Peninsular officers and merchants attempted to overthrow Liniers. This coup was defeated by the same loyal troops who had expelled the British two years earlier, and galvanized the public, strengthening their support for Liniers even more. Tensions finally reached a boiling point in 1810, when Madrid, having reached a temporary accord between King Carlos and Crown Prince Fernando, decided to bring its colonies back into line. In La Plata, this meant an order for Madrid’s appointed Viceroy, Rafael de Sobremonte, to be reinstated. [3]

Sobremonte had been disgraced in the eyes of his constituents during the British invasion years before; while Liniers and others led armed resistance against the invaders, Sobremonte had fled the city with its treasury, leading many to brand him a coward. This was unfair to the man, who had taken steps to fortify Montevideo, thinking that city was the most likely target of attack, and whose retrieval of the treasury was in accordance with Spanish law. Nevertheless, the image stuck, and the people of Buenos Aires recoiled at replacing the heroic Liniers with the craven Sobremonte. Encouraged by Saavedra and other advisers, Liniers called for an Open Cabildo to discuss the new orders from Madrid. [4] This Cabildo took place on March 9th, 1810. The main point of contention for the meeting would be whether Liniers should stand aside and allow Sobremonte to reassume his office.

Although he had called the meeting, Liniers himself leaned towards a nonviolent resolution of the standoff with Madrid. In any case, he also wanted a consensus behind whatever actions would be taken, and so gave little lead during the Cabildo’s proceedings. The discussion was instead dominated by Juan José Castelli, a Criollo lawyer who wanted an end to absolute monarchy. Earning his later title of Speaker of the Revolution, Castelli gave a half-hour speech, detailing at length the failures of Sobremonte and Godoy in prosecuting the war with Britain.

“Here there are no conquerors or conquered; here there are only Spaniards,” Castelli said. “The reason and the rule must be equal for all. The king rules from Madrid not because Madrid is conquered, but because Madrid is protected, protected by Spaniards. Buenos Aires is protected not by Spaniards from Spain, but by Spaniards from Buenos Aires, from Montevideo, and other parts of America.” [5]

According to Castelli, necessity had already forced La Plata to create its own government, and its own military. Madrid could recognize these, and negotiate with them over the territory’s status, but if it refused to do so, then a new nation already existed, only needing to be declared. Eventually, a plan of action was hammered out between Castelli, Saavedra, and Liniers: A Junta would be formed, with Liniers acting as its President. Saavedra would lead the military, and until such time as the Spanish crown acknowledged the legitimacy of the Viceroyalty’s self-government, they would resist attempts to reinstate unilateral control from Madrid. Diplomats were dispatched to Montevideo and other key cities to invite delegations to join the new Junta. The March Revolution had begun. [6]

Buenos Aires turned out to be just the spark that the continent had been waiting for, and by the end of 1810, several major uprisings against Spanish rule had begun. In New Granada, a Junta modeled after the one on Buenos Aires was founded by the Criollo lawyer Camillo Torres Tenorio. In Mexico, Miguel Hidalgo led a working-class revolution, known from their standard as the Martyrs of Guadalupe. At the end of October, the Martyrs met the Governor’s forces at the Battle of Monte de las Cruces, routing them. Two weeks later, they had taken Mexico City, deposing the Governor and installing Hidalgo’s trusted military leader, Ignacio Allende, as the Viceroy of New Spain. [7]

In this, we can see a fundamental difference between Hidalgo’s rebels and those in Argentina. Castelli was a radical, inspired by the Enlightenment, and his end goal was an independent republic in South America. Whatever compromises he made were still geared towards that ultimate end. Hidalgo, by contrast, had more immediate grievances related to callous governance from Mexico City and the plight of the poor. He didn’t intend to throw the Spanish monarchy, or its authority in America into question. Having taken power, at least temporarily, he and Allende set about enacting land reform and other measures to help farmers and other struggling members of the underclass, but made few changes to the machinery of government the way that the Argentine rebels intended to. This passivity likely contributed to their ultimate undoing.

On July 24th, 1812, Carlos IV of Spain passed away peacefully in his sleep at the age of 63. After years of conflict between him and his father, Prince Fernando could finally assume the throne. Although he was no friend of Napoleon, the new king had also become disenchanted with the British over the past five years, blaming them for the disorder in the New World. Now that he had the throne, Fernando set out to pursue a third path for Spain, one that would have it beholden to neither the British nor the French. And his first order of business was to neutralize the rebellion unfolding overseas.

The first steps to suppressing these uprisings had already begun, with an expedition dispatched earlier in the year to Mexico. Backed by 30,000 regular troops, General Francisco Castaños made smooth progress from Veracruz towards Mexico City, retracing the steps of Cortez and scattering all before him. Hidalgo and Allende tried frantically to negotiate, protesting their ultimate loyalty to the monarchy. But Castaños’ orders were to give rebels no quarter, and his sizable regular force was more than enough to crush the ill-trained and organized forces that the Martyrs of Guadalupe could send against him. By the time Fernando was crowned on July 27th, the royal army had recaptured Mexico City and put an end to the rebellion. Overjoyed by the success, the new king rewarded his victorious general with the position of Viceroy. [8]

Despite this early victory, and a similar success in New Granada in 1813, Buenos Aires was a more difficult proposition. Thanks to their experience against the British, the Junta in Buenos Aires were well accustomed to facing amphibious assault, and both that city and Montevideo were fortified against direct attack, with earthworks dug and cannons ready to return fire against any bombardment. An attempt in May 1813 to land troops outside Buenos Aires and seize the city on foot was repelled with heavy casualties. With their coast secure for the time being, the Junta, led by Castelli, Saavdra and an increasingly reluctant Liniers, began to look outward.

The rebellious Argentinians may have been willing to negotiate with Madrid initially, but they were chilled by the heavy-handed treatment of Hidalgo, whose aims were far less radical than theirs. If there was no hope of reconciliation with Fernando, then a successful revolution was the only way for the ringleaders in Buenos Aires to save themselves. And for the revolution to succeed, it needed to expand. Montevideo and other coastal towns, conscious of the need for security against the British or other invaders, had joined the new government, but communities farther inland and across the Andes were more reticent. If these places would not accept revolution when the opportunity presented itself, then it would have to be imposed by force. Should things go well, all of Spanish-speaking South America would be united under a guiding republic, and a new age of freedom would begin.

[1] This was the title of a German play performed in Buenos Aires after they requested a more “topical” one not be done. Seemed like it fit the theme well.

[2] One thing I learned doing my research for this is that the invasion of Spain was just this momentous, era-defining event in the Spanish-speaking world. I intended to avoid it for Napoleon to win, but that left me the question of how to handle Spanish and Latin American history afterwards. The tensions that led to revolution were still there, of course, and so I look to other OTL signposts like British invasions of Buenos Aires to center things.

[3] Most of the stuff I described here is OTL (with omissions due to no Peninsular War, of course), but them trying to reinstate Sobremonte is an invention of mine. IOTL, the Juntas that replaced the Bourbons in fighting Napoleon in Spain sent their own guy, but that wouldn’t happen ITTL, so I figured Carlos would favor continuity. And of course from his perspective, Sobremonte didn’t do anything wrong.

[4] Poor Liniers. IOTL, he was too moderate/conservative for his own good, and got executed fighting against the rebels. ITTL, he’s maybe a bit more ambitious, a bit more irritated at how tone-deaf Madrid has to be to try bringing Sobremonte back, and therefore listens to Saavedra and others more.

[5] I paraphrased some of his OTL remarks and rearranged them to make a different argument. Here, his point is that governments derive authority by right of protection, not conquest, and Godoy is derelict.

[6] By this point, things will have gotten way out of hand for Liniers, but he’s reduced to being a figurehead for more radical figures, and he’s afraid to lose his head if he steps out of line.

[7] The Cry of Dolores seemed a little contingent on happenstance, so I have them take their name from their battle standard, which had the Virgin of Guadalupe. Also, Hidalgo IOTL didn’t exploit his victory at las Cruces, despite Allende begging him to go for Mexico City. Here, he listens, and decides he’d rather let Allende take the spotlight instead of him.

[8] I feel like Carlos would try to converge on some of Fernando’s positions later in his rule to try and forestall another coup. Certainly, the arch-conservative Fernando is in no mood to negotiate with terrorists.

 

[TRH]

Next step a united latin America? Wow

Well, you shouldn't jump to conclusions just yet. I don't think it spoils much to say that Castelli's ambitions exceed his country's capabilities. And most of Latin America is back under Spanish control. For now. That said, expect things over there to get worse before they get better. And on that note, here's Chapter Seven.

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Chapter Seven: Changing of the Guard​

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Excerpted from The Founding of Modern Europe by Ronald Hansen, 1978.​

The lynchpin of Napoleon’s post-Tilsit designs for Europe was the alliance he cultivated with Tsar Alexander of Russia. This partnership was in large part one of convenience, with Napoleon encouraging his Russian counterpart to extend his influence into areas where it would be inconvenient or impolitic for France to do so. Alexander himself seems to have been well aware of this, and as the Russian economy began to suffer the effects of the Continental System, the Tsar scaled back his campaigns of conquest accordingly.

After securing peace with the French at Tilsit, Russian planning for the ongoing campaigns against the Ottoman and Persian Empires took precedence. More troops and better officers were dispatched to take charge in the Balkans and the Caucasus. By Summer of 1809, General Bagration’s forces had expelled the Turks from Dobruja, as well as capturing the cities of Rustchuk and Silistra on the south bank of the Danube. [1]

At this point, British diplomats began approaching Selim III about an alliance against France, advising him to make peace with the Tsar, so as to only face one enemy at a time. Accepting this rationale, the Sultan reluctantly agreed to a peace deal. The subsequent Treaty of Bucharest confirmed the loss of eastern Moldova, along with a recognition of Serbian autonomy. With the Russian threat neutralized, Selim opted to collect immediately on Castlereagh’s promises. Ever since he took the throne in 1789, the Sultan had been interested in reforming his country and military, but in doing so, had to tread lightly.

Much like the Praetorian Guard of old, the Janissary Corps had fallen far from their former glory as the Ottoman Empire’s elite shock troops. By the turn of the 19th Century, they were less interested in defending the Empire and more in protecting their own privileged position. These formerly enslaved soldiers became landholders and tradesmen, while also making enlistment into their numbers hereditary, entrenching themselves as masters of the Ottoman Empire rather than its servants.

This museum display commemorates the 1804 massacre of Serbian nobles by a Janissary junta, in defiance of the Sultan.

Selim’s ambitions to reform the military would upset this status quo, and he feared a coup. Therefore, his price for entry into the Fourth Coalition was twofold; first, the British would assist him with funds and advisers to modernize the Turkish army. Second, they would assist him in destroying the Janissaries. The first obligation was fulfilled by Sir John Malcolm, an old India hand who traveled with several other officers to Constantinople. Malcolm’s mission would spend several years there drilling and reorganizing soldiers. [2]

Fulfillment of the second obligation would follow shortly. Twelve years earlier, the Sultan had introduced the Nizam-i Djedid Army, a new force equipped with modern rifles and artillery, as well as being drilled along European lines. By 1809, this force numbered 40,000 strong, its strength preserved by Selim’s reluctance to risk them against the Russians. With the arrival of Malcolm’s mission, he now felt confident enough to take action against his internal enemies. On August 14th, the Sultan announced the disbanding of the Janissary Corps, ordering all units back to their barracks to surrender their weapons. [3]

As expected, the Janissaries defied this order, and fighting broke out across the capital. Selim had prepared for this insurrection, however, and the city was heavily garrisoned by loyal Nizam-i Djedid soldiers, as well as by Kapikulu sipahis, the traditional nemeses of the Janissaries. To fulfill their promise to the Sultan, the British contributed the elite troops of the 95th Foot. By the 16th, the Sultan’s forces had secured the city. Although the surrendering Janissaries feared execution for their mutiny, Selim showed some clemency, ordering officers who participated in the coup to death, while the rank and file would be incorporated into the Nizam-i Djedid army. [4]

Selim’s rule was still not entirely secure. Provincial governors varied widely in their degree of loyalty to the Porte, and Selim's reforms had angered conservative elements throughout Ottoman society besides the Janissaries. He nevertheless felt secure enough to participate in the War of the Fourth Coalition the following year, answering his treaty obligations to the British. Despite his earlier friendship, the Sultan had grown disillusioned with Napoleon following Tilsit, and wanted the French advance curtailed before it could encroach further upon his possessions. The Ottoman contribution to the Coalition was light, but the Nizam-i Djedid soldiers gave a good account of themselves against the French under Bellegarde and Stuart.

Sultan Selim inspects the Nizam-i Djedid on parade.

With the peace of Schönbrunn ending hostilities between France and Austria, Selim hastily sought a separate peace with Napoleon as well. Because of the limited involvement of the Turks against him, the French Emperor was content to exact a token indemnity and no territorial cessions. Despite this leniency, some suspect that this episode spurred Napoleon to entertain later action against the Ottomans, thoughts which saw fruition the following decade. In the meantime, the Sultan had finally lucked into some breathing room, buying time for further internal reforms. He had no intention of facing such losing wars again. [5]

Tsar Alexander was willing to accept moderate gains from the Turks in 1809, in no small part because his spies had informed him of the Turkish contact with British and Austrian envoys. Despite his arrangements with Napoleon, Alexander was unwilling to make France’s enemies his own. This restraint was not applied to Persia, however, and it was not until Russian forces reached the River Aras in Autumn 1812 that they entertained offers of peace. The subsequent Treaty of Nakhichavan set the Aras as the new border between Russia and Persia, all but expelling the latter from the Caucasus.

This reversal evinced great anguish from Fath-Ali Shah, not least because his foreign diplomacy had been unable to alleviate his predicament. Like the Sultan, he had treated with the British for aid and protection from his rivals. Because of the advice of his envoy, Sir Harford Jones, he had been under the impression that the British crown would assist him in the defense of his realm. Unfortunately for the Shah, Jones spoke not for London itself, but for the British East India Company, and the Company stood at odds with Downing Street on the Russian Question. [6]

Lord Melville, then President of the Board of Control, feared that the Franco-Russian alliance born at Tilsit presented a threat to British India. To forestall invasion, he sought friendly relations with the Company’s neighbors, including the Shah. If relations deteriorated, he would stand with the Persians against the Tsar. Needless to say, the Earl of Liverpool saw things differently. After 1810, his Government was largely casting about for new allies and a new strategy to continue the war against Napoleon. Castlereagh was especially vocal about keeping Britain’s options open, and attempting to sway members of the Continental System away from the French orbit. With this imperative in mind, there was no question in Liverpool’s Cabinet that potential mending of relations with Russia would be far more valuable than the friendship of Persia. And the fact that their treaties with the Shah were predated by his war with Russia gave them ample pretext not to help.

After a distraught Sir Harford did his best to explain the political complexities involved, the Shah had little choice but to accept his current situation. His country and military were in no condition to redress the losses he’d sustained. That said, he also grasped the importance of keeping himself as well-apprised as possible of European affairs. If the British continued to be ineffective allies, then perhaps a relationship with France could provide better results.

[1] IOTL, Turkish reinforcements forced Bagration to retreat from Silistra. Here, he has more troops himself, and feels confident enough to stick with the siege until it succeeds.

[2] Malcolm was an envoy to Persia IOTL, so not a big change, and well up his alley.

[3] In 1806 IOTL, the army had 25,000 troops. It’s unusual for Selim to crack down on his enemies like this given his OTL behavior, but with Napoleon betraying him, he’s looking at things differently, and wants to make the most of an alliance with Britain while he can.

[4] And that move of charity seemed more in character with OTL Selim.

[5] Just because he wants no more losing wars doesn’t mean he’ll get none, of course. But he’s safe for the time being.

[6] Jones was pretty idealistic in denouncing the annexation of Sind IOTL, so I figure it’s in character for him to advocate making friends with Asian rulers and keeping promises.

 

[TRH]

Time for a new update, this one the last of the Napoleonic Wars. I've mentally divided this story into phases, and the epilogue-ish Chapter Nine will conclude the first of these phases. As for what comes after, well, I'm honestly in the mood to write about Gothic horror, so probably a cultural update first, and then we'll see what comes next. In the meantime, enjoy!

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Chapter Eight: The World Turned Upside Down​

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Excerpted from The Founding of Modern Europe by Ronald Hansen, 1978.​

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Napoleonic Wars ended with a whimper rather than a bang. There never was a Fifth Coalition, despite the best efforts of the Earl of Liverpool and Lord Castlereagh. From 1811 to 1814, the Foreign Secretary approached a multitude of candidates, making whatever promises necessary to cobble together another alliance against the French.

Unfortunately for Castlereagh, Napoleon’s own political and diplomatic maneuvers frustrated his own. Prussia was ill-equipped to resume hostilities. Although their practical military strength exceeded that prescribed by the Treaty of Tilsit, and Berlin had introduced some important reforms, including the first modern General Staff, their ability to mobilize their own armies was extremely limited. As General Scharnhorst explained in a letter, French and allied German troops could be in Berlin before the Prussian army could be fully mobilized. Furthermore, Frederick William and the Prussian court remained resentful of Tsar Alexander’s profit at their expense at Tilsit. This made any proposals for a Russo-Prussian alliance extremely difficult.

Alexander himself was equally uncooperative. Although the level of smuggling between his country and Britain had increased over the past several years, the Tsar had taken an interest in internal reform, and was losing interest in more foreign adventures for the time being. He told British diplomats that he didn’t see the same urgency that they did for overturning the state of affairs on the continent, and suggested they consider alternative solutions to the French Question.

With the death of King Carlos in Spain, Castlereagh became hopeful that he could broker a deal with the more Anglophilic Fernando. Fernando's dismissal of Prime Minister Godoy immediately upon assuming the throne was another sign that the new king intended to steer his country in a different direction from his father. Although the king initially presented a cold shoulder to British advances, by 1814 he was becoming more receptive to the idea. But the king made it quite clear that he would only entertain an alliance if it came in conjunction with Austria, Russia, or both, and that he also wanted reparations for previous British attacks on Spanish colonies.

Liverpool’s Government was willing to grant the reparations, and a deal seemed close at hand in Spring of 1814. However, Castlereagh soon found himself outflanked by a move from his French counterpart, Charles Talleyrand. In a secret dispatch to Pedro Cevallos, the new Spanish Prime Minister, Talleyrand confided that the Emperor had promised to end the Continental System once hostilities with Britain were over. This was only a half-truth; Napoleon had confessed as much to Talleyrand, but he had done so several years earlier. The French statesman had kept the revelation a secret until a critical moment, when it could have the most impact. [1]

This promise from Paris had the desired effect on Cevallos. After the failures of previous Coalitions, the Spaniard had already been skeptical of the idea of joining a new one. To him, an opportunity to rescind the economically disastrous Continental System with France’s blessing was a far greater offer than anything the British could propose. And so Cevallos took it upon himself to thwart the proposed Anglo-Spanish alliance for the greater good of his country. In his next dispatch to Castlereagh, Cevallos said that circumstances had changed, and that Spain would require more considerations from London as a token of good faith. In effect, he demanded that the agreed upon reparations be doubled, and Gibraltar returned, in exchange for an alliance.

Prime Minister Cevallos saw continued alignment with the French as a safer option than joining a Coalition against them.

Liverpool’s Cabinet was startled by this sudden about-face from the Spanish. At the same time, they were well-aware of the most likely cause for Cevallos’ new demands, correctly surmising that the French had made their own offer. Unfortunately, they had only conjecture to rely on in determining what exactly Napoleon had promised the Spanish in exchange for their continued friendship. Spencer Perceval, Chancellor of the Exchequer, gloomily suggested that the Emperor had promised to restore Gibraltar. It fit with his pattern of co-opting his neighbors through territorial aggrandizement, Perceval argued. And for the Spanish, this new offer ensured that regardless of whether Britain or France won the larger war, they could still claim their prize.

Perceval’s deduction failed to convince the entire Cabinet, but that particular question was academic in the end. Regardless of what the Spanish had been promised, ceding Gibraltar to them was a non-starter. That left only Austria as a worthwhile target for diplomacy. Unfortunately, the new Austrian foreign minister, Klemens von Metternich, was also proving difficult. Unbeknownst to Liverpool’s Government, Empress Ludovica was currently on her deathbed from tuberculosis. By the end of 1814, the 26-year-old Empress would succumb to the disease. Without her to lead the hawks, the more cautious Metternich and Archduke Charles had gained supremacy in Francis’ court. [2] Convinced as he was that another war with France would be futile, Metternich resolved to greet the British with deliberately unreasonable demands.

Like Fernando, Metternich placed a heavy emphasis on there being a second front, if Austria was to fight France at all. If Spain could not be convinced to join a new Coalition, the Austrian told the British ambassador, then Britain would have to invade Italy or the Netherlands again. In addition, Prince Metternich requested truly exorbitant sums of money in order to finance another war effort. Frustrated with Metternich’s intransigence, the ambassador finally exploded, declaring that “Should Austria insist on such extravagant expectations, then its friendship will be of little use to England.”

Metternich fired back, saying that “So long as England sits aloof behind its wooden walls, its friendship is of little use to anyone.”

With their efforts at acquiring continental allies having come to naught, the Earl of Liverpool and his Cabinet began serious discussions about whether the war against France could be continued any further. Despite widespread smuggling, the Continental System had cut trade with the Continent and with Spanish America roughly in half. This was a significant drain on import and export businesses, but also had another less obvious economic impact. With European trade officially forbidden, investment capital had nowhere to go during this period, and this fueled speculative bubbles in Britain’s domestic economy.

This 1817 painting depicts riverine commerce at East Bergholt, Essex.

Canal Mania had first arisen as a phenomenon in the 1790’s, as the Duke of Bridgewater’s famous canal cut the price of coal in Manchester in half. The advent of the London Stock Exchange in 1801 further exacerbated public euphoria about the potential profitability of canals. By 1808, the bubble began in earnest, with the price of shares in the Grand Junction Canal rising from £96 to £314 in just over a month. By 1811, the price had declined to £200, but the following year, it began to rebound. Share prices peaked in July 1813, at just over £400 each. And come October, the dam finally burst. [3]

Over the course of just two weeks, the Grand Junction Canal lost nearly 90 percent of its value, plummeting to a paltry 50 pounds a share. As is typical when a speculative bubble collapses, investors panicked, hastily selling off securities not only in Grand Junction, but also in other canals, and even in unrelated businesses, intent on rescuing their money before it was too late. Many marginal or less profitable canals, such as Herefordshire and Gloucestershire, went under during this panic, and would remain inactive for years after. Work on the ambitious Grand Western would never be completed.

More broadly, the British economy was devastated by the rupturing of the Canal Bubble. Although unemployment figures from this time are incomplete or unreliable, workhouse administrators note a multitude of new supplicants during this period. In addition, they observed a surge of wife selling in the Winter of 1813-1814. By the time Liverpool’s Cabinet convened to discuss the state of the war in May 1814, the situation at home had grown extremely tenuous. [4]

Despite the frail economy, the Government was even more concerned about the military situation. Army recruitment rose following the Panic of 1813, but many of the new recruits were malnourished or diseased, and the Duke of York flatly informed the Cabinet that it would be several years before Britain could field a force capable of contesting the French in the field, if ever. With government finances in shambles after years of subsidizing continental allies, that much time couldn’t necessarily be counted on. Worse, there was the fear that should hostilities continue, Napoleon would eventually manage to out-build the Royal Navy.

The Government hadn’t concerned itself with a French invasion for almost ten years by this point. The decisive victory against the French and Spanish navies at Trafalgar had gutted their capabilities, which even before then had paled in comparison to what Britain had to offer. Years of blockading Europe and contending with the Continental System had eroded the Royal Navy’s strength, however. At the same time, Napoleon had been conducting a systematic effort to rebuild his country’s naval strength. By 1814, the Royal Navy still had the edge, with 142 ships of the line, compared to 106 French and Dutch ships. [5]

Years of attrition also made it increasingly difficult to crew British warships, and the deterioration in seamanship was made all the more apparent by an upset French victory in the southwestern Indian Ocean in 1810, where French frigates destroyed a British squadron at Grand Port with little cost to themselves. The specter of a cross-channel French invasion could no longer be ignored. [6]

The French exploited their knowledge of the local anchorage to outmaneuver the Royal Navy at Grand Port on Isle de France.

With all of this in mind, the Cabinet debated at length. Although opinions differed on the long-term geopolitical outlook, they could not avoid the same basic conclusion: the war could not be continued with any hope of success. On May 21st, 1814, the Earl of Liverpool’s Government approached the French via Spain, regarding terms of peace. Napoleon accepted the offer, and met with Liverpool in Madrid to discuss a conclusive treaty to end the war. [7]

The British could at least content themselves with some colonial gains during the long war, which were set in stone by the Treaty of Madrid. Napoleon agreed to abandon all claims to India, which, combined with wartime gains against the Mughals, meant that the British had become the predominant power on the Indian subcontinent by far. London also claimed the Cape Colony, and Spanish Guinea. In general, however, the British were still averse to alienating the Spanish too heavily, and so abandoned their foothold in Venezuela. In addition, Santo Domingo, which had been captured from the French in 1809, was returned to Spanish control. The French were returned Martinique, Guadalupe, and the Séchelles, the latter because of the local superiority the French unfortunately enjoyed in the area.

Southern Italy was a fraught question, because both Joseph in Naples and the Bourbons in Sicily claimed kingship over the other’s domains. In the end, the negotiating parties decided to do nothing on this front. Sicily would remain a Bourbon realm under British protection, Joseph’s Naples under French protection, and the competing claims would simply stand. What was most important of all, of course, was Britain’s tacit recognition of the state of affairs on the continent, and of French annexations over the past two decades. Lastly, the French Continental System was rescinded, allowing freedom of trade between the United Kingdom and Europe again. After twenty-two years, Europe could finally enjoy peace again.

[1] I’m honestly surprised it took this long for me to bring good old Talleyrand into this story. His loyalty certainly wavered a lot ITTL, especially post-Tilsit, but by 1814, he’s decided that Napoleon will probably win, and that ending the war as soon as possible is the best thing he can do for France.

[2] Ludovica dies two years sooner than OTL of the same disease. Charles leading a battle at Pressburg is really important here, because IOTL he cut his own peace after Wagram, which led his brother to sack him. Here, he stays at the head of the Austrian military, with a commensurate amount of influence in the Hapsburg court.

[3] All of these price movements are OTL or close to it, except IOTL there wasn’t a rise again right after 1811. Here, with British capital bottled up, the Canal gets bid higher and higher until it bursts.

[4] Yeah, you read that right. Wife selling was an OTL practice in British poorhouses.

[5] IOTL, the figures in 1814 were 150 British and 102 French ships. Napoleon didn’t annex Holland ITTL, but those were the numbers I had, so I lumped them together anyways because of their alliance.

[6] The French victory at Grand Port is OTL, too. The only difference here is that the British decide they can’t afford a second Mauritius expedition.

[7] And that’s all she wrote for the Napoleonic Wars. With everything that went wrong for them, I think I was actually pretty generous in terms of how long the British could finance a war effort. Napoleon not invading Spain made TTL’s Continental System bite a lot harder, though, and with the economic and social turmoil, Liverpool’s Cabinet just don’t see a light at the end of the tunnel anymore.

 

[TRH]

And as promised, here's a map of the world in 1815, shortly after the Treaty of Madrid. Credit to @Kikkomaan for making the map itself. Cheers!

 

[TRH]

Hey guys, it's been a little while since the last chapter. Of course, I've been traveling, had some family emergencies to sort out, and am writing up year-end music reviews on my blog, so that's slowed me down. As such, I'm only about halfway done with Chapter 10 right now. Still, I want to keep some momentum before Turtledove season, so here's Chapter Nine now. It's mostly a recap, and summing up where important actors are standing politically. Also, lots and lots of foreshadowing. Enjoy.

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Chapter Nine: The End of the Beginning​

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Excerpted from The Founding of Modern Europe by Ronald Hansen, 1978.​

At first, the Treaty of Madrid seemed likely to be a short-lived truce, much like the Treaty of Amiens twelve years before. The 1814 peace proved more resilient, in large part because the combatant nations, including France and Russia to no small degree, had grown weary of continuous warfare, and a shift towards settling internal affairs was common across the continent.

For Napoleon, the experiment with the Continental System made clear the importance of trade to European security. With the advent of peace, British manufactured goods began to enter the European market again, but the Emperor limited their spread through protective tariffs. French industrial development began in earnest during this period, particularly in the Southern Netherlands and the Loire basin, where coal and iron were in ample supply. [1]

Like in Britain, textile manufacturing was an important early industry. One other industrial process that rose to prominence was canning. Canned food was developed during the war as a way to supply troops with unspoiled provisions in the field. The inventor Nicolas Appert constructed a factory for mass production of his innovative glass jars outside of Paris in 1810. Over the following decade, more such factories opened, using both glass, as Appert did, or, after the Continental System was lifted in 1814, imported tin. These early canned goods were expensive due to the precision demanded in the production process. To offset this cost, more exotic foods were often sold, particularly tropical fruit.

As for Britain itself, the country entered an odd place socially and politically in the wake of Madrid. The resumption of full trade with Europe and Americas restored business confidence, and the slump of 1813 quickly receded. The return of economic prosperity could not alleviate a broader sense of malaise, however, as the nation got to grips with its second defeat at French hands in just over thirty years. The Earl of Liverpool dutifully fell on his sword, resigning his office as penance for presiding over a losing war. Lord Castlereagh, his primary confidante in diplomatic strategy during his Government, followed suit, and new elections were called.

The campaign was unusual, with both parties in exceptionally weak positions. The Tories were in disarray, with George Canning emerging as their leader in the House of Commons, in large part due to a lack of interest from other potential candidates. [2] And just like the aftermath of the American Revolution, the Party was associated with the failed war against Napoleon, and the subsequent Treaty of Madrid. Despite these glaring liabilities, the Whigs were in even worse shape, led by the diffident and maladroit George Ponsonby. In the end, the Tories prevailed, but their majority was trimmed down to 70 seats in the process. Canning would have a weak mandate to govern, and with George III’s physical and mental health both hanging by a thread, the new Prime Minister would have a long struggle ahead of him to restore British self-confidence and strength.

In Russia, Tsar Alexander was well-pleased by the news from Madrid. For one, it legitimated his significant gains in Europe and the Caucasus. Just as significantly, it promised breathing room in which he could pursue more ambitious domestic reforms. The Tsar was not prepared to go to the lengths that his adviser Mikhail Speransky prescribed, but he was quite willing to pick and choose from the suggestions he was given to chart a moderate path forward for his country. In 1810, he had introduced the State Council, an advisory body to help him devise and execute policy. This group had little sway over Alexander himself, and lacked the authority to legislate on its own, but it would grow more influential in the future, when weaker and less driven Tsars became more dependent on its recommendations. [3]

Alexander also fostered science and the arts, following in the tradition of Peter the Great and other reformist Tsars. By establishing a solid educational base, Alexander laid the groundwork for a modern administrative state. This potential would not be realized until well after the Tsar’s death, but in following Sperensky’s advice, he unknowingly paved the way for the end of the monarchy in the following century. Of course, such changes remained a distant dream of the future in 1815. For the time being, Russia had secured its place in Europe. Rather than challenging the Napoleonic Order, it would spend the next century advancing its Caucasian and Asian frontiers, filling the void where its European peers could not.

If France and Russia were the victors in the Napoleonic Wars, then the losers were certainly Austria and Prussia. The latter had fallen far from its heights under Frederick the Great, and been reduced to a French satellite in all but name. Austria avoided the same fate in large part by reconciling itself to a subordinate position to France, retaining more of its strength at the cost of its dignity. Despite these catastrophic setbacks, in both states there remained a kernel of significant power. The Austrians had gradually strengthened and modernized their military, to the point where it could stand its ground against even the Grande Armée.

Prussia, for its part, had been more surreptitious in its reforms as a matter of necessity. Their new General Staff institutionalized the sort of flexibility and clear thinking that Napoleon and his Marshals relied on raw talent to fully realize. In doing so, they applied the lessons of the late Napoleonic Wars better than any other power, leaving them deceptively well-prepared for future wars of attrition, where the most efficient and direct applications of raw force would prove the key to victory. For observers curious as to the Quadruple Alliance’s ability to punch so far above its apparent weight several decades later, the staff work of generals like Scharnhorst and von Clausewitz provide the answers.

Spain occupied an unusual position in Napoleonic Europe. Like Alexander, King Fernando was no bosom friend of Napoleon, and whatever associations he had with the French were alliances of convenience only. Unlike the Russians, his primary concern was not with expanding his empire, but preserving it. The Martyrs of Guadalupe fell to his armies with relative ease, but unrest still festered in New Spain, particularly in remote regions like the Yucatan Peninsula, where centralized authority was shaky at the best of times. Far more troubling, however, was the unrest in La Plata, where the radical republican junta led by Juan José Castelli had taken power.

Not content with securing their own hinterland, Castelli’s republicans began to push into Paraguay and Chile in 1814. The populace in those areas was more loyal to the monarchy, but without support from Spanish regulars, it would only be a matter of time before the La Platans overran both. Fernando made protecting those areas his first priority, with offensive operations put on hold until after the rebel advances had been checked. In addition to these problems, the king also had to contend with opportunists, who might take advantage of the instability of Spanish America to seize portions of it for themselves. Portugal and the United States were of particular concern, threatening Montevideo and Pensacola, respectively. [4] An alliance with Britain would help rein in both, but Fernando was conscious of the danger of looking weak, and relying on a mercurial ally to protect his own possessions was anathema. Spanish domains would be safeguarded by Spanish strength, regardless of the consequences.

Lastly, there was the United States. President Madison would depart office in 1816, and Secretary of State James Monroe was the heir apparent to succeed him. Monroe’s position was not entirely secure however, as many Americans were weary of Virginian Presidents, who had governed the country for all but four years since the Constitution was ratified. And should he prevail, Monroe would have to contend with the rise of sectionalism in American politics.

With settlers moving into the lands of the Louisiana Purchase, new states would emerge, and it was an open question as to which new states should allow slavery and which should not. Southern politicians like John Calhoun of South Carolina and Thomas Cobb of Georgia warned of a “Federalist plot,” wherein the increasingly marginalized northeastern Party would join forces with abolitionist Democratic-Republicans. This would effectively create a Party of the northern states, relegating the remainder to be a Party of the south. This cleavage, they warned, would inevitably lead to a civil war. With this specter of sectionalism and sectional parties looming, the fifth President of the United States would have a daunting challenge ahead of him.

[1] Having the Austrian Netherlands is understandably going to be a big boon for French industry going forward, given their wealth of resources.

[2] Also, Canning was shuffled out of the Cabinet after the Duke of Portland died, so he escapes association with Madrid here, which is more than a lot of Tory leaders can say.

[3] The State Council is OTL, but with the foreshadowing there, you can expect it to take a different path in the future. Pure absolutism isn’t as attractive ITTL, ideologically speaking.

[4] The Portuguese meddled like this IOTL, too, actually. That’s why Uruguay is its own country today. Things might not shake out the same way here, however. You’ll just have to wait and see how that goes.

 

[TRH]

Hello again, guys. Been a while since my last update. Unfortunately, I'm still not quite done with my blog's music reviews, I've been sick, and there's been a death in the family, so I've had a lot on the brain lately. Insofar as we're starting a new phase of the timeline here, it's kind of weird that I'm starting with this chapter on Gothic literature, but I kind of needed the easy breather. And hey, cultural updates make timelines more distinct. Chapter Eleven will definitely take us back to South America and see how the revolution down there is going. In the meantime, enjoy.

Chapter Ten: Dark Romanticism​

Excerpted from Blood Beneath the Rose: A History of the Gothic Novel by Katrina Bentsen, 1990.​

Although there’s certainly some truth to the adage that art is ultimately a product of its time, and the social and cultural conditions that surrounded it, applying this to individual works can be dangerous. It's easy to read more into a work than it deserves, and the resulting leaps of logic descend into pretentiousness at a rapid clip. Still, the zeitgeist of the Napoleonic West was certainly fertile ground for the development of Gothic literature. The comprehensive defeat of the old European monarchies, along with the rise of industrialization and urbanization, all contributed to a climate where the literary tropes of Horace Walpole and his successors felt more relevant than ever before.

To demonstrate this influence, we should consider three classics of the genre from the 1810's and 1820's. The most famous of these, both at the time and today, is Mary Shelley’s The Modern Prometheus. The book’s themes surrounding humanity, Doppelism, scientific obsession, and artificial life are well-trodden ground, but the framing device is often overlooked. [1] Having pursued his errant monster to the frozen north for revenge, the Doctor relates his story on his deathbed to members of an Arctic expedition. Geography is a recurring motif in the novel. Shelley famously began writing on vacation in Geneva, when the infamous Year Without a Summer left her and her companions snowed in, they resolved to pass the time with storytelling. The sense of forbidding Hyperborean fastnesses informs many of the landscapes described in Modern Prometheus. [2]

Mary Shelley, as an avid reader and a friend of Lord Byron (himself no stranger to the Romantic movement), understood the ability of exotic settings to evoke certain moods, and to set a scene. This has always been a cornerstone of Gothicism. This could be seen in the abandoned castles and monasteries of Walpole, which, although familiar sights to European audiences, could still command attention through their decay and the history they evoked. Or else one could paint vistas of wilderness farther afield, capturing the imagination through the setting's natural majesty and distance.

This second kind of physical description informs Washington Irving’s The Children of Leeds, the first great American horror novel from this period. The remoteness of New Jersey’s Pine Barrens are famous for the claustrophobia and paranoia they can instill even today. This stretch of forest represents an enigma in American geography and development. The bustling metropolises of New York and Philadelphia are close by, and the sizable and well-traveled Northeast Corridor rail line runs straight through much of the area. Despite their proximity to civilization, the woods of southern New Jersey have retained much of their sense of wildness. Little surprise, then, that legends surrounding a quasi-mythical creature might emerge in this setting. Starting in the 1700’s, folk tales of a demon took shape in New Jersey. [3]

Enter Washington Irving. The New York writer traveled New Jersey several times during the early 1810’s, hearing several versions of the story surrounding the Devil of Leeds. Irving was not above capitalizing on hoaxes and tall tales; he'd gone so far as to put out a missing person notice for the protagonist of his first novel to drum up sales in 1809. And by 1818, he'd distilled the local legends into his magnum opus.

The Children of Leeds was a challenging work of fiction, in both subject matter and style. Like Shelley, Irving told the story in epistolary fashion, helping to resuscitate a form of storytelling that had come under heavy ridicule during the preceding century. Unlike Shelley, Irving played fast and loose with the reader’s sense of time. The framing device is crucial, because Megan Potts, the last witness to the birth of Deborah Leeds’ accursed thirteenth child, notes how her flight across the Pine Barrens has taken a toll on her nerves, and her journal writing suffers as a result. That it also may have affected the accuracy of her recollections of the fateful night goes without saying.

As any film aficionado can attest, the story of the Devil of Leeds, just like that of the Doctor and his Monster, has survived to become a part of popular culture to this day. Leeds Point, New Jersey still markets itself as “the most haunted town in America.” [4] The commercial and cultural success of these two stories can be attributed to their timelessness: the weighty yet intuitive themes of Shelley’s work, along with the gripping atmosphere and character drama invoked by Irving, have assured immortality as Gothic classics.

By contrast, the premier French roman noir from the early Napoleonic era can be said to have survived in large part due to fitting the national mood in a critical moment - not the moment of its publication, however, but a period over 50 years afterwards, when a younger generation came with a new appreciation of its brilliance. This was Jean-Luc Botrel’s La Comtesse Hongroise, a work now remembered as a harbinger of things to come. [5]

Like Shelley and Irving, Botrel combined local folklore with a blend of historical and cultural knowledge to craft an original narrative. Most obviously, the French war veteran deserves credit for bringing the vampyre to the modern world. But for sheer brazenness, he outdoes his contemporaries, explicitly revealing his vampyric antagonist to be the Hungarian Countess Bathory, who had spent centuries appropriating the identities of her own descendants. Theft of identity aside, the historical figure was guilty of all the gruesome crimes she stands accused of in the novel, a chilling reminder that truth is often stranger, and more horrific than fiction. More than that, though, Botrel did what seemed unthinkable under the regime of Napoleonic censorship, and skewered not only the incestuous nature of the Hapsburg monarchy, as contemporary readers assumed, but the notion of hereditary leadership in general.

Jocelyn Gicquel made this case in more length in the forward to her Romans Noir anthology ten years ago, but the motif of blood and heritage, which the protagonists decry as “barbarism and atavism,” as easily applies to any hereditary lineage, and can be seen as a denunciation of how conflicts like the French Revolution, despite spilling rivers of blood, only replace one dynasty with another. And when the 1870's brought with it the tribulations of the Second Terror, the true cost of this irony became impossible to ignore. The promise of liberté, fraternité, égalité remains one that the French do their best to live up to, but the tendency for wealth and power to be borne in the blood is equally resilient.

In any event, the ability of modern audiences to come to stories with novel interpretations based on our own experiences is part of the joy of literature, and has helped Gothicism stand the test of time as a source of entertainment. Just as the writers of the Napoleonic era looked to the past for inspiration for their own stories, so can modern writers take cues from them. By understanding their inspirations, we can better appreciate the world they lived in, as well as our own.

[1] Doppelism refers roughly to the uncanny valley, the sense that something is close to be human, but still somehow off. It was derived from the idea of Doppelgangers bringing unease and bad luck.

[2] IOTL, they were rained in, but given the conditions of OTL 1816, snow in the summer in Switzerland wouldn’t be a huge stretch.

[3] Excepting Irving writing about it, all of this stuff about the Pine Barrens and the Jersey Devil is OTL. It’s always weird when you get a patch of basically virgin wilderness smack in the middle of one of the most urbanized regions of the world, and like the author says, not surprising that you’d get ghost stories and the like cropping up.

Also worth noting: one of the OTL sightings of the Jersey Devil was attributed to Joseph Bonaparte. I'm not one to put stock in omens, but you'll understand why I took that as a sign that I had to do something with this.

[4] I may come up with a TTL replacement for “movie”, but I haven’t decided on anything yet, and “film” is a neutral placeholder for now. Also, you’ll note that TTL’s Frankenstein doesn’t use that name; Shelley uses epithets for the Doctor and the Monster instead.

[5] This is a fictional author and work. Basically, some OTL nobody who served in Napoleon’s army heard local stories about vampires, later read up on Elizabeth Bathory, and decided to write a proto-Carmilla.

 

[TRH]

Hey guys, just wanted to let you all know that this timeline is very much not dead. I will finish this, even if it takes years. In the meantime, enjoy the new update, and comments are appreciated. Latin America will be the focus here, and next time...another revolution. So, not too different from this chapter.

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Chapter Eleven: One Good Turn​

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Excerpted from The First Wave: Independence Movements of the Napoleonic Era by Juanita Perez, 1984.​

The events of the Argentine War of Independence are often compared to those of the French Revolution – as the analogy goes, both upheavals escalated into larger conflict as the forces of monarchy attempted to extinguish them. Eventually, each of these wars embroiled a continent. The only difference, or so they say, is that the Argentinians lacked a Napoleon, someone with both the domestic clout to stabilize internal politics, and the military skill to spread their influence to all of their neighbors. [1]

In truth, this comparison oversimplifies both conflicts, and sells short French strengths, which allowed their republic to survive seven years of fighting even before Napoleon took charge. Ever since the Middle Ages, France had enjoyed a larger population than any of its European neighbors, and the military reforms of the Revolution finally allowed the country to leverage these strengths to the fullest. Combining the weight of numbers with excellent artillery and officers gave the republic’s armies significant advantages over the various Coalitions and their more antiquated militaries.

Rio de la Plata lacked the same preponderance of manpower, even compared to the other colonies in South America. This shortcoming was compounded by the borderline utopian political ambitions of Castelli and other radicals in the Buenos Aires Junta. These men held out hope that even though the appointed leadership in other colonies had declined their invitation to form a republic. The common man in Paraguay or Peru would be more sympathetic, they told themselves, and would join revolutionary armies should they appear.

This optimism would be tested by events on the ground, as revolutionary forces overextended themselves. An 1813 expedition into Paraguay was defeated by local troops, necessitating a larger force to bring the area to heel the following year. [2] The Republican campaign in Upper Peru faced even stiffer opposition. By the time of the Treaty of Madrid, the heaviest fighting in Spanish America was taking place along the rivers south of Lake Titicaca.

Despite their struggles, the revolutionaries did have several advantages that helped them avoid the same fate as the Martyrs of Guadalupe. The Criollo militias of Buenos Aires and Montevideo had gained valuable experience fighting the British in 1806 and 1807, and these cadres provided a foundation for expansion of the La Platan army during the revolution. Second, their victory in Upper Peru proved a boon for the revolutionaries economically. La Plata had traditionally been a relative backwater of the Spanish Empire, dominated by subsistence agriculture. The silver mines of Potosi were not the powerhouse they had been in the 16th century, but they retained significant reserves of the precious metal, as well as tin and other minerals. Silver exports were critical in securing a steady inflow of weapons, cotton, and other important resources. [3]

Most important of all was the fact that Buenos Aires was merely the loudest and most radical source of discontent in Spanish America. Fears of British invasion faded with the Treaty of Madrid, and the uneasy peace that prevailed in other Spanish colonies came to an end. In Caracas, Simon Bolivar voided his temporary modus vivendi with royalist authorities, proclaiming a Republic of Gran Columbia. To make matters more fraught, Bolivar had cultivated ties with republicans in New Granada, and his declaration led to renewed unrest there as well. [4] Only in New Spain was revolutionary sentiment diffuse enough for the territory to remain relatively peaceful, and even so, it was a peace enforced by a heavy Spanish troop presence.

The end of the Napoleonic Wars had other effects on the fighting in Spanish America. Despite the Spanish navy’s attempts to curtail rebel trade, commerce with Europe began to resume after 1815, resulting in even more weapons finding their way to Bolivar and Castelli’s armies. The most important development of all came when a Spanish Army officer resigned his commission and returned to his native Chile.

Chile had many of the same social characteristics and inequalities that had provoked the Junta in Buenos Aires, but they lacked the same experience with foreign invasion, and the subsequent radicalization that sent Argentine criollos inexorably towards independence. Still, much of the same middle-class discontent was there, and with the right leadership, it would ignite. The spark was provided by retired soldier José Miguel Carrera, a well-educated war veteran who had, to his shame, served in the expeditionary force that had recaptured New Spain several years earlier. Armed with fiery charisma and a tale of redemption, Carrera became a leading force in Chilean politics as the colony finally resolved to follow the example set by La Plata and New Granada, declaring their own independence from Spain.

Of course, the situation in Chile was far more difficult than it had been for previous independence movements. The Spanish army retained significant strength in Chile, using it as a conduit through which they could meet the rebellious La Platan forces. As such, Carrera and his allies resolved to fight an irregular campaign, raiding the supply lines of forces attempting to recapture Upper Peru. The Buenos Aires Junta welcomed this development – although they preferred a more universalist vision of a united South America to Carerra’s more distinct Chilean nationalism, they recognized the usefulness of a threat to their enemy’s rear area, and ignored his ideological heresies for the time being.

And so indecisive fighting between republicans and royalists along the Andes continued for several years. The royalist forces were stronger on paper, but had difficulty resupplying themselves, while the rebels made good use of the river system on their side of the mountains. Come Autumn, both sides withdrew from contested mountain passes to avoid getting snowed in, and the cycle began anew the following Spring. This stalemate dragged into 1819, when an unexpected stroke of fortune changed everything. [5]

[1] Honestly, I’m a little out of my depth on this Latin American history, and am worried it’s going to turn into an Argentinewank eventually. Still, I hope I’ve justified this at least a little with everything else going on here.

[2] They didn’t send a second Paraguay expedition IOTL, but here the influx of foreign arms makes the Argentineans try for a levée en masse strategy, and so they’ve got more manpower to play with.

[3] Bolivia actually remained a major silver producer well into the 20th century, even if tin had become more important by then.

[4] Bolivar made two failed attempts at a Venezuelan republic IOTL, but those were butterflied by his wartime cooperation with the royalists here.

[5] I may be a little out of my depth on Latin America stuff, but I think it’ll be worth it once things get even more crazy and complicated in the next update.

 

[TRH]

I should explain my writing process a little here. I have the story divided into arcs of sorts, with the first one ending with the Treaty of Madrid in 1815. Other than those, however, my chapters are essentially delineated by whatever subject matter I want to address in them. This can result in really lopsided chapter lengths, and before I knew it, this latest update swelled into the longest one yet - almost 3000 words including footnotes. Still, it is what it is. Today, the Spanish Revolution. After this, we'll be returning to the United States for an update. Enjoy, and feel free to comment. Especially in areas like this outside my usual wheelhouse, reader input can be a useful guide.

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Chapter Twelve: Of Patriots and Tyrants​

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Excerpted from The Age of Revolutions by A.F. Stoddard, 2006​

The wars for independence in Spanish America were a bitter and acrimonious struggle, to say the least. Although the hardline approach taken by King Ferdinand VII with his colonies deserves much of the blame for this, the conflict was also exacerbated by political, social and economic differences.

The examples of George Washington and Napoleon Bonaparte certainly loomed large, and it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that opportunists and adventurers like José Miguel Carrera wanted to emulate these two figures, and conquer their way to power. At the same time, Creole elites within the colonies were dissatisfied with the previous century’s economic reforms, which brought the Spanish Empire more in line with the mercantilist ideals of the British and French Empires. Colonial offices, which until then were commonly purchased by local Creoles, became appointed by the Crown instead, and Madrid-appointed intendencies increased overall tax revenue, albeit at the cost of central authority in each colony. These new arrangements were calculated to benefit Europe at the expense of America, so despite the common tendency to portray the republican revolutionaries as liberals, they were, in large part, fighting to preserve their traditional privileges. [1]

And it’s also important to remember that in times of war, radicals on opposing sides have a symbiotic relationship – if one side adopts a hardline stance, the other can claim vindication for their own position. As a result, the radical republicanism of Juan José Castelli and Simon Bolivar clashed with the firm absolutism of King Ferdinand, each hardening the resolve of the other. Unfortunately, this meant that even victory would not be enough for the royalists – their reprisals would only inspire lingering resentment that would blossom into more revolts in the future. [2] This deadlock could only be broken by the removal of one or the other belligerent, and in 1819, with the Spanish Revolution, that’s exactly what happened.

The Napoleonic Wars had put a heavy strain on the Spanish military, as it did for other combatant nations. Unlike other countries, however, the unrest in the New World required Spain to stay on a war footing for years after the Treaty of Madrid. The list of expeditions seemed endless: to Mexico, New Granada, and Argentina in 1813, to Buenos Aires again the following year, back to New Granada in 1815, and to Chile and Peru for several years after that. For the common soldier, service in the 1810’s entailed one trek after another through mountains and jungles, with no end in sight. Morale slumped, and as it turned out, the commanding officers were equally disillusioned.

The critical figure to the 1819 Revolution was José Palafox y Melci, a general from the Aragonese aristocracy. After commanding royalist forces in New Granada in 1813, Palafox eventually concluded that only a more diplomatic approach to the colonies could regain their trust. In this, he found a kindred spirit in Francisco Javier Calo, the beleaguered President of the Council of the Indies. As a Creole from Santo Domingo, Calo was especially sensitive to the political needs of the colonies, and as the 1810’s dragged on, he became increasingly convinced that Fernando’s intransigence was the main obstacle to peace.

Matters came to a head on July 9th, 1819, when a regiment in Seville, under orders to embark for South America, turned on its officers and imprisoned them. [3] More mutinies followed throughout southern Spain, as soldiers called for higher pay, an end to the American expeditions, and, among more radical units, the abdication of Ferdinand himself. But even at this critical juncture, Ferdinand seems to have only have half-recognized the precariousness of his position. He agreed to raise the army’s wages, but at the same time insisted that the Seville mutineers be punished. More importantly, he made no concessions on the question of the war in the Americas. With this crisis fully exposing the discontent and rot within the Spanish armed forces, Calo, Palafox, and other Spanish generals and notables agreed that the time had come to act.

Ten days after the initial mutiny, Calo offered the king a final lifeline, suggesting that the Cortes be convened to write a Constitution for Spain. This olive branch, however well-intentioned, proved a tactical blunder. For all his heavy-handedness, Ferdinand was, if anything, openly paranoid about the prospects of a republican revolution, and he interpreted Calo’s offer as the prelude to just such a coup. With the help of his conservative supporters, Ferdinand and his family fled Madrid less than a day ahead of Palafox’s soldiers.

This oversight was a hindrance to the coup plotters, who had hoped to coerce Ferdinand into abdicating his throne. Instead, he was able to escape to France, and from there denounced the revolutionary chaos in his country. Nevertheless, the king had ceded Madrid to his enemies. Instead of forming a republic, as the rebels in South America had, Palafox and his fellow generals instead declared a regency, accusing the king of abdicating his responsibility to govern. Calo, as the new Prime Minister, convened the Cortes to discuss plans for a Spanish Constitution to guide future monarchs.

In the meantime, the uprisings in the Spanish colonies still needed to be dealt with. Fortunately, apart from Rio de La Plata and Upper Peru, Spanish armies had the upper hand in most of the New World, despite low morale and fatigue. This gave the new government room to send out peace feelers to the rebel forces, promising both amnesty for recent events as well as a reorganization of the Spanish colonial system to be more responsive to the needs of the colonists.

The Ordinance of 1819, as it was known, was a comprehensive overhaul of the governing of the Spanish Empire. The single monarchy would be replaced by an intricate set of constituent kingdoms established in the American colonies. These kingdoms would all swear fealty to the throne in Madrid as before, but otherwise be given far more internal autonomy, to satisfy the local Creole elites.

As radical as this plan seemed, however, it had precedent in past proposals for reform of Spanish America. In particular, the plan owed a great deal to the Condé de Aranda, who had originally proposed such a reorganization in the wake of the American Revolution, hoping to stave off just such a spate of revolutionary activity. The Ordinance required several modifications from Aranda’s original proposal, however. The trade barriers against the British that the Condé had proposed were far too contentious in the wake of the Continental System. And with the royal family having escaped to France, Bourbon princes would be replaced with appointed viceroys in each of the American kingdoms, with the Spanish king retaining nominal suzerainty. [4]

One final difference was the scope of the plan. Aranda’s original vision only included three new kingdoms, one each in New Spain, New Granada, and Peru. Prime Minister Calo’s amended version had three additions, with kingdom status granted to Chile, Venezuela and Rio de la Plata as well. The latter was a necessary addition given the vehemence of their rebellion, but the first was a political ploy, calculated to drive a wedge between the universalist ambitions of the Buenos Aires clique and the more particularistic nationalism espoused by José Miguel Carrera. If all went according to plan, the Chileans would accept Madrid’s proposal, and leave the recalcitrant La Platans isolated.

To be sure, the Ordinance carried significant drawbacks, the obvious one being the ability of the American kingdoms to inexorably drift away from Madrid’s orbit. This was a price Palafox and the Spanish army was willing to pay, however. After years of fighting, it was imperative to draw down hostilities to preserve Spanish strength, and the proposed arrangements still offered more Spanish influence in the New World than they could expect in the event of a clean break.

The Ordinance received a mixed reception in the New World, with particularly complex results in South America. Things went smoothest in New Spain, where the revolutionary position was the weakest. The most prominent resistance leader was José Maria Morelos, a former member of the Martyrs of Guadalupe.

Morelos was wary of the Spanish peace offer, but replied that he would consider standing down on certain conditions. These included land reform, limits on church privileges, abolition of slavery, and that Francisco Castaños be replaced as Viceroy, as the executioner of Hidalgo had gained notoriety in New Spain as the face of oppression. The Spanish reply offered to appoint Morelos to the Viceroyalty himself, and give him leave to pursue reform agendas as he saw fit. The brazenness of this about-face was enough to sway Morelos, and on September 9th, 1819, he accepted the new appointment as Viceroy of the Kingdom of New Spain. [5]

In New Granada, the Ordinance caused a political split within the independence movement. One of the leading figures among the rebels was the Venezuelan Simon Bolivar, who dreamed of a Grand Columbian state that comprised both New Granada and Venezuela. More importantly, he wished for the new state to be an independent republic. For him, the 1819 Ordinance was an empty promise, designed to quiet calls for freedom by dividing rebels against themselves. As a result, he vehemently opposed accepting the offer from Madrid.

Unfortunately for Bolivar, he found himself in the minority. And as Bolivar’s comrades turned against him, the worst betrayal came from an unexpected source – a 27-year-old soldier named Francisco de Paula Santander. Santander castigated Bolivar for what he called “craven hypocrisy,” noting that the Venezuelan had willingly arranged a ceasefire with Spanish authorities ten years earlier. For him to treat with the Bourbons when it was convenient, only to turn away when the people of Spain were attempting to replace absolute monarchy with a constitutional order was a betrayal of principle. Santander accused Bolivar of opportunism and worse, Bonapartism.

Santander’s invective hit its mark. At his suggestion, Bolivar was incarcerated by his fellow revolutionaries, before eventually being turned over to royal authorities. The erstwhile revolutionary was never heard from again. New Granada and Venezuela would both accept new viceroys by the end of 1819. [6]

In Peru, the political situation was even more fraught. This colony was more conservative and devoted to the monarchy than its neighbors, and to them, the Palafox regency was simply Republicanism hiding behind a thin veneer. They replied that they would accept such an Ordinance only from a Bourbon king, and that their loyalty remained with Ferdinand and his descendants. In doing so, they joined Rio de la Plata as the only colonies to reject the Ordinance outright.

The situation in Chile was rather the inverse of that in New Granada, although this was not obvious to Madrid at the time. Carrera was the most visible face of rebellion here, and his calls for an independent Chile put him at odds with his co-belligerents in Buenos Aires. However, the lengthy stalemate along the Andes finally tipped in favor of the Spanish in August and September 1819, with La Platan forces retreating into Upper Peru, their strength finally spent. With this in mind, Carrera saw little to lose and much to gain in accepting the peace offered by the 1819 Ordinance. His two main stipulations were the departure of Spanish forces in Chile, and that he be appointed Viceroy. With these granted, the deal was struck, and Spanish forces began withdrawing from their last major operation in the Americas.

Carrera’s success was, however, soon revealed to be illusory. Although he believed he had swayed his fellow Chilean Creoles towards his own nationalist stance in his four years among them, this was not the case. A rival faction promoting universalist sentiments also existed, led by Bernardo O’Higgins and other members of the Lodge of Rational Knights, and backed by Buenos Aires. When Carrera and his brothers moved to take charge of the revolutionary movement in 1815, this faction had reluctantly acceded to Carrera’s agenda, but now that peace had been secured with Madrid, the Carrera family had outlived its usefulness. [7]

On the Ides of March 1820, the Lodge and its allies executed a successful coup against Carrera, killing the general along with his most prominent supporters. The new government rejected the Ordinance of 1819, and declared its intention to unite with Rio de la Plata. Two months later, the La Platan army marched into Santiago unopposed.

This reversal was an embarrassment to the government in Madrid, but there were more pressing concerns at home. Although Napoleon Bonaparte had granted sanctuary to Ferdinand and his family, the deposed monarch’s requests for a French army to restore him to power fell on deaf ears for the time being. This didn’t entirely alleviate the sense of insecurity in Spain, where regent Palafox remained ill at ease so long as the Bourbons plotted against him. And while the general had successfully defused most of the violence in Spanish America, external actors further complicated the situation. The Portuguese, previously deterred by threats of war from Ferdinand should they intercede in South America, now mobilized to invade Rio de la Plata. Palafox and Calo, having washed their hands of that part of the continent, raised no objection.

More galling was the situation in Florida. In the fall of 1819, the city of Pensacola was occupied by American forces under General Zebulon Pike. A former explorer, Pike had previously been captured by Spanish authorities on one of his expeditions into New Spain over a decade earlier. Pike’s captivity had taught him much about the fragility of Spanish rule in the New World, something he now sought to exploit. [8]

Because of this insight, Pike felt secure in his unauthorized actions against Madrid, confident that war weariness in Europe would hand him a victory through fait accompli. This confidence was borne out by the subsequent Adams-Cevallos Treaty, acknowledging American control over Florida. The American public had little time to savor this triumph, however, as a more pressing crisis loomed, one that would swiftly eclipse all other concerns.

[1] This is another theme I want to explore with this timeline. The French Revolution is seen as having succeeded, at least in a way, and although the geopolitical implications are limited beyond Europe, the political and cultural ones are enormous. That doesn’t mean that the world is so evenly divided between liberalism and conservatism, however, and that’s very apparent in Latin America ITTL. These revolutionaries are (generally) not psychopaths, but they’re no saints, either.

[2] And this is my best extrapolation of how things would proceed in the absence of Napoleon invading Spain. Without the Peninsular War wrecking the country, Fernando has significantly more strength he can bring to bear against rebels in the New World. That said, his military strength isn’t enough to resolve lingering political questions, and I see that as his real obstacle to long-term success. And because Fernando won’t bend, his kingdom will instead.

[3] This is actually pretty similar to the start of the OTL Trienio Liberal. Fun fact: Seville (unofficially) recorded the hottest ever temperature in Europe in 1881, of 50 degrees Celsius. Combine extreme heat with the tense political climate and low pay, and presto, soldier mutiny.

[4] This is my stab at taking Aranda’s OTL proposals from the 1780’s (which I admittedly only have limited second-hand information about) and tinkering them to fit the needs of the new liberal government. It’s important to keep in mind that Palafox sees himself as having a popular mandate to end the wars in America, so he’s willing to entertain really generous terms, even to the point of a glorified peace at any price deal.

[5] Fortunately for Palafox and Calos, their desperation for the best deal they can get means they can catch the rebels off-guard with their generosity. The contrast between their ideas and Fernando’s enhances their self-presentation as a genuine break from past policy.

[6] An ironic reversal of what Bolivar did to Francisco de Miranda IOTL.

[7] Here Carrera gets screwed over by butterflies. Because he spent a longer period in the army ITTL, he’s seen in Chile as something of a Johnny come lately to the rebel cause. He talks and fights his way to the top in part because of his military skill, in part because the Chileans were desperate enough to entertain a unified front, but less so because his ideas were seen as persuasive. And unfortunately, his ego blinded him to this reality until too late.

[8] In his journals, Pike mentions an encounter he had with a spy sent by the local governor, who posed (very poorly, in Pike’s estimation) as a discontented local, complaining that he and his were prisoners just as much as Pike and his men. The idea apparently being to suss out Pike’s intentions, and whether his expedition was sent to stir up unrest with bait. Whether or not this encounter was real, it at least indicates that Pike was aware of unrest in New Spain, as well as knowing that Spanish authorities were worried about it. And no, the Spanish haven’t heard the last of him yet.

 

[TRH]

And it's time for another update, this time on American politics. I'll admit, I'm starting to wonder if my narrative pace is too slow, and if I should just try to move things along a little faster than I am right now. At the same time, I kind of see myself as a by-the-book writer. I'm leery of glossing over too much material, since I feel that's a mistake my least favorite timelines tend to commit too much. So, I guess I'll leave that in the air as an open question for you guys. Next chapter, I'll be returning to France and England for a while, if only because I feel like I've written more on Latin America than France so far, and that doesn't seem quite right.

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Chapter Thirteen: The Missouri-Arkansaw Crisis​

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Excerpted from The First American Party System by Charles Francis Adams, 1871.​

The first party system of the United States is remembered as a casualty of sectionalism, with the Democratic-Republicans inexorably rent asunder by diverging Northern and Southern interests. While concerns over slavery and trade policy certainly played their part in this fracture, the last decade of the system illustrates that personal ambition and pique were equally consequential in bringing about the eventual split.

The 1816 election represented the first chink in the dam. What had been presumed to be an easy election for Secretary of State James Monroe was interrupted by dissension from within his own party. As was mentioned before, the country had had its fill of Virginian presidents, who had held the office for all but four years of the republic so far. More importantly, Monroe’s detractors noted that he himself had challenged President Madison’s bid for office eight years earlier. As such, his denunciations of the upstart William Crawford as putting personal ambition before party or country rang hollow.

When the party leaders conferred, Crawford’s coalition of supporters from Georgia, New York, New Jersey, North Carolina and Kentucky proved too much for Monroe to overcome, and the Democratic-Republicans officially nominated the Georgian for President. [1] After that, the general election campaign against the Federalists was effectively a formality. Monroe never forgave Crawford for denying him the Presidency in 1816, and so my father found himself replacing the Virginian as Secretary of State in the new Administration.

William H. Crawford, fifth President of the United States.

As much as it was possible, the Crawford Administration attempted to bridge sectional divides through its policies. The fact that it failed, and in so doing, led to the fraying of Crawford’s party in 1824, does suggest that the ultimate dissolution of the Democratic-Republicans was exactly as inevitable as pessimists like Thomas Cobb feared. Crawford’s cooperation with fellow statesman such as Henry Clay and my father focused on building American strength through internal improvements at home, and expansion of its frontiers. Road and canal building, along with a new charter for a Bank of the United States satisfied the former imperative. [2] The latter was realized through treaties with Britain and Spain, along with greater settlement of the west.

Crawford’s system was tested by two crises in the latter half of his first term. In both cases, these obstacles grew daunting because they had been birthed by the Administration’s focus on improvement and expansion. First, there was the Panic of 1819, the first true financial calamity to plague the United States. One unforeseen consequence of American policy from this period was a speculative bubble surrounding land and agricultural interests. To promote migration westward, the government sold land to settlers at low prices, and the Second Bank exacerbated public euphoria through excessive lending.

This state of affairs couldn’t last, propped up as it was by high prices for agricultural products and artificially cheap credit. Indeed, the seeds of its failure were sown concurrently with the boom itself, as European farmers began to recover from decades of war, and cotton growing in India rose to challenge the American monopoly. By 1818, the American agricultural sector was contracting, and in the following year, it took overextended banks down with it.

A contemporary cartoon depicting the Panic.

Despite the scope of the chaos that ensued, the state and federal responses to the Panic of 1819 also show the flexibility and resilience that Good Feelings America could muster. Crawford was a realist in matters of finance, and understood the importance of restoring public confidence in the economy. To that end, he convened a special session of Congress to pass debt relief for those who had bought public land. [3] As well, he urged state banks to suspend specie payments to depositors, in the hopes that an expanded money supply could combat the crisis.

These measures helped President Crawford weather the Panic, which did little to jeopardize his election to a second term. Nevertheless, the episode provided a cautionary lesson about the volatility of modern finance, as well as the manic tendencies that western settlement could inspire in the American public. What proved even more trying was the Missouri-Arkansaw crisis, which exposed the political dangers involved in opening new land, and introducing new states into an uneasy Congressional equilibrium.

In February 1820, Congress began debate on statehood for Missouri. While the discussions began without incident, they would swiftly take on far greater import, as sectional divides over slavery assumed centrality. This discord did not begin with Missouri, however; in fact, it was a related dispute over the status of Arkansaw territory where the matter of slavery was first broached. In that debate, New York Representative John Taylor forced the issue into the open, with an amendment prohibiting the introduction of new slaves into the territory, paired with gradual emancipation for children born in Arkansaw thereafter.

Taylor’s amended proposal passed the House of Representatives narrowly, on a vote of 89-87. [4] Buoyed by this success, the House attached a similar amendment to the proposal for Missourian statehood, which passed by 90 votes to 79. Both of these measures failed in the Senate, then controlled both by Southern delegates and by Northerners less sympathetic to abolition. With the Senate unwilling to approve Taylor’s amendments, and the House unwilling to approve Arkansaw Territory or the state of Missouri without them, a standoff ensued.

More than any other issue, it was the Missouri-Arkansaw crisis that most profoundly challenged Crawford’s faith in his own system. His ambition had been nothing less than to extend the Era of Good Feelings into perpetuity, with the Democratic-Republicans advancing the national interest through negotiations within the party, rather than contesting power with an opposed faction.

From John Taylor, the President did not merely see a challenge to slavery, but to his larger unipartisan vision. From this perspective, the coalition of Federalists and northern Democrats who had passed Taylor’s amendments became not just an alliance of convenience, but an opposition party in all respects except name. This would lead, or so Crawford feared, not simply to the dissolution of his party, but of the Union itself. [5]

Crawford spent much of 1820 trying to sunder what he perceived as the Northern coalition, to secure Missouri’s entry and neutralize the Federalist threat. In this, he had assistance from House Speaker Henry Clay, who shared the President’s dim view of the crisis, if not his fear of the Federalists. However, even Clay found himself frustrated by the intransigence of Taylor and his Congressional allies. He assured the President that he could pass an unamended proposal for Arkansaw Territory, but to do so would only harden Northern resolve on the question of Missouri.

To resolve as many outstanding issues as possible, Clay proposed a compromise, whereby Arkansaw would face no restrictions on slavery, while Missouri would be admitted with Taylor’s amendments. To maintain sectional balance in the Senate, Missouri’s admission would be paired with that of Alabama, while Maine’s request for statehood would be postponed until Congress was ready to admit another slave state. In addition, the Missouri-Arkansaw border would delineate the division between future free and slave states further west. With reluctance, Crawford signed the appropriate measures in March of 1821, at the beginning of his second term.

The Compromise of 1820 doubtless saved the Union in the short term. Indeed, one imagines that if the matter had progressed towards bloodshed, the first of it would have been spilled on the House floor itself. Still, this did not protect Clay and Crawford from opprobrium at their concessions. Ironically, the fiercest critic of the Compromise was a Northerner, John Holmes of Massachusetts. As a representative from Maine, Holmes was livid at the territory’s statehood being sacrificed as appeasement of the “New York abolitionists," namely Taylor, Senator Rufus King, and Representative James Tallmadge, who had all supported the Compromise.

In any event, the fear of sectionalism and sectional parties could no longer be dismissed. As the Era of Good Feelings gave way to unease, and an increasingly assertive North confronted a defensive and paranoid South, any party hoping to bridge the geographic and ideological divide would face an impossible task. The only remaining question was how to dissolve the union of party while preserving unity between the states. That would be the challenge of 1824.

[1] Funnily enough, this was a close contest IOTL, despite Crawford never announcing a candidacy, and making clear he didn’t want to run. All that really changes here is him deciding to go for it, and swaying the nine votes needed to tip the scales.

[2] More so than Monroe, Crawford seemed relatively open to things like internal improvements, and less concerned with their constitutionality. This is otherwise OTL Monroe policy.

[3] This is different from Monroe’s response, but only somewhat. Monroe refused to call a special session to deal with the Panic, and he didn’t enact debt relief until his second term. Crawford is doing much of the same thing, but more proactively.

[4] This nearly happened IOTL too, actually. The historical vote was 87-89 against. What’s going on here is that the North, having been spared a lot of economic damage from the absence of a War of 1812, plus more trade with Latin America, is a little bit stronger and more self-confident than OTL. As a result, there aren’t as many doughfaces in Congress, and they’re willing to hold out for abolition in Missouri. This dynamic will have even more significant implications further down the road, as I’m sure you can imagine.

[5] Thomas Jefferson expressed his fear of this at the time, and opposed the Compromise because he feared it would reinforce sectional differences. ITTL Crawford shares that fear, not least because of the implications for his party. Like the Framers, he’s no fan of rampant partisanship, and so he sees Democratic-Republican dominance as a way to avoid party becoming the most important political divide.

 

[TRH]

Well, unfortunately my job is getting more demanding lately, which has cut into my time, and perhaps more importantly, energy, to do research and writing. I'd intended for this new chapter to cover peacetime France, plus relations with Britain, and how French migration patterns are changing ITTL. In the end, I had to give short shrift to the British relations, and the French diaspora will be the subject of the next, probably much shorter chapter. A Britain-focused chapter will come sometime in the future, as well. In the meantime, this new update addresses some of France's longer term 19th Century issues, in particular its demographic problems. I'd thought about letting Napoleon implement a bolder policy attempting to imitate England's Agricultural Revolution, and see if that might jump-start French birthrates and industry relative to OTL, but decided it would be too incendiary domestically. Instead, he'll do more of a compromise between that kind of platform and OTL France. Historical trends are stubborn things, after all. Enjoy.

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Chapter Fourteen: The Eagle’s Repose​

​

Excerpted from The Age of Revolutions by A.F. Stoddard, 2006.​

The exact timeframe of the French Revolution remains contested among historians even today, but the ratification of the Treaty of Madrid is widely seen as marking the end of the Revolutionary period. By affirming the Bonaparte dynasty as the masters of Europe, it served as the final acknowledgement that the Bourbons would never again sit the throne in Paris. All that remained for Napoleon was managing his empire, and adjusting to its peacetime demands.

For a long time, the first Emperor’s economic policies were seen as a continuation of 18th Century mercantilism. The Continental System was done away with, only to be replaced by a less stringent, but still protectionist trade program. Napoleon’s German and Italian satellite states served as a captive market for emerging French industries, while tariffs kept more efficient British goods at bay. These states, along with the sizable French domestic market, provided a sturdy foundation on which to develop French textile-making, canning, and iron-working enterprises. And as these industries grew, the demand for labor drew French farmers into urban areas seeking higher wages.

In the last two decades, this interpretation has been challenged by revisionists, who raise several objections to the narrative. First, they suggest that because of his use of the Continental System to win his war with Britain, the Emperor has been unduly associated with trade barriers and protectionism, even in peacetime. Second, it’s noted that Napoleon’s trade and industrial policies are often contrasted with those of his son. Because Napoleon II was more ideologically committed to Ricardianism, observers tend to exaggerate the policy differences between the two Emperors. By the same token, the French system is juxtaposed against that of Britain – but, the revisionists argue, the popular perception of Britain tends to be derived from later in the century, after their own reckoning with the Corn Laws and other protectionist measures. Comparing Napoleon’s France to Britain under Canning, one finds that both countries employed selective tariffs in some areas, while eschewing them in others. [1]

This debate is no minor intellectual dispute, because the revisionist argument goes a long way towards explaining some of the economic and social changes that took place during this period. In particular, the French government resisted entreaties to levy farm tariffs. Traditionally, French agriculture had been the envy of Europe, and hardly needed protection to dominate the international market. This started to change, however, as Russian wheat and other imported goods became more widely available during the post-war years. [2]

The burgeoning French entrepreneurial class welcomed the disruption, as the influx of foreign goods lowered the costs of several key production inputs, along with the cost of living in general. They made the Ricardian case to the Emperor through Jacques Claude, the Comte de Beugnot. Having served as the prefect in the Nord department before rising to head the Interior Ministry, Beugnot had forged working relationships with local manufacturing magnates, who impressed on him the importance of their work to the national interest. As a result, Beugnot counselled the Emperor to disregard calls for protection for the French small-scale farmer. It was better, the Comte argued, to encourage consolidation in this sector, and foster greater efficiency, with more productive farms supplanting their weaker competitors.

Interior Minister Beugnot's Ricardianism was a heavy influence on Napoleon I and his son.

It is tempting to make comparisons between Beugnot’s proposal and the economic upheaval in Britain caused by its Enclosure policies during much of the 18th Century. However, the two cases differ in both initial conditions and implementation, which explains their divergent results. The Emperor was swayed by Beugnot’s arguments not to protect French farming, but balked at more direct intervention to bring about consolidation in this sector. This reticence on Napoleon’s part can, in turn, be explained by the second distinction, that being the power wielded by minor French landholders. With feudal and clerical authority shattered by the Revolution, most French farmland now rested in the hands of small farmers, who guarded their land and their livelihoods jealously. The Emperor was likely all too aware of the danger of internal revolt should he challenge the status quo in the French countryside.

The relative power and prosperity enjoyed by small French farmers also explains their resilience towards hostile market conditions. For those landholders who did see their fortunes take a turn for the worse, it also explains their diverse set of reactions. An observer of the British Agricultural Revolution would expect displaced rural workers to migrate towards Paris, or else to other growing centers of industry such as Mons or Saint-Étienne. And many farmers did exactly that, swelling the country's urban population. However, the logistical realities of the time also meant that for a displaced French peasant, travelling to the city was only marginally cheaper than trying one’s luck overseas. Because of this, French trade policy also helped fuel the 19th Century French diaspora. [3]

Of course, trade and economic policy was only one of the Empire’s preoccupations during this period. Certainly, for Napoleon, these considerations were always secondary to the larger political situation. However convincing Beugnot’s case for selective Ricardianism may have been, it is hard to discount the possibility that the Emperor’s trade policy was actually driven by a desire not to antagonize Tsar Alexander. More than anything, the memory of the Continental System left Europe with two maxims as its legacy: first, that trade could be a weapon, and should often be understood as such. And second, that control of one’s own trade policy is a key component of national sovereignty. It would therefore be considered an affront for Napoleon to raise trade barriers against his primary ally. [4]

And although the Emperor was more willing to offend Britain's sensibilities than Russia's, there were important steps towards rapprochement with London during this time. In general, the Emperor favored symbolic, low-cost concessions as the basis for reconciliation, while dangling the prospect of more significant peace offerings. One area of agreement between the two countries was the question of slavery. In exchange for the return of Martinique and Guadalupe, the British persuaded Napoleon to once again abolish slavery in French colonies. Having acceded to this request, Bonaparte decided to follow the example set by the British in West Africa. Following the Treaty of Madrid, the French navy began taking action against the slave trade in Zanzibar, using Grand Port as a base to raid slave shipments departing from East Africa.

However welcome this gesture may have been, the most important entreaties from Britain concerned the Spanish Revolution, and here, Napoleon was more reluctant to act. He allowed the deposed King Ferdinand to take shelter in France, but had otherwise decided to let the King and Regent Palafox compete for his favor, rather than committing to one side too hastily. Several scholars have suggested that the Emperor, having seen the potential to expand French influence in the New World, also wanted to buy time for the Ordinance of 1819 to take effect.

For his part, the Regent publicly announced his willingness to step aside, should Ferdinand or one of his relatives promise to respect the authority of the Cortes and its new Constitution. This declaration should be taken with some skepticism, since Ferdinand’s well-known antipathy towards Constitutional government meant that in practice, Palafox could remain Regent for as long as he pleased. The only way to guarantee his ouster would be to commit the French army, something Napoleon understood all too well.

As his audiences with Ferdinand dragged on through 1819 and into 1820, Napoleon tired of the obstinate Spaniard, and became increasingly interested in Palafox’s suggestion to put a more cooperative individual on the throne. Eventually, he said openly that he would be willing to invade Spain and restore the monarchy – but only if Ferdinand abdicated his position to someone else.

Ferdinand’s opposition aside, this tack had its own problems. The King’s only child, the Princess Maria, could not inherit, so the throne would instead pass to his eldest brother, Prince Charles. Charles, much like Ferdinand, was staunchly conservative, and loudly spoke of the need to quash the “sacrilegious Jacobinism” that had overtaken Madrid. [5]

This was no solution to Napoleon, who had by now concluded that a restoration of the same reactionaries who had alienated their people to begin with was a non-starter. What he needed was a candidate with the flexibility to accept Palafox’s call to honor the new Spanish Constitution, while also being pliant enough for the Emperor to influence. Ferdinand’s youngest brother Francisco was weaker-willed and more of a cipher than his two brothers; an ideal proxy for French interests, given the right advisers. The prince’s ambitious wife Luisa Carlotta was excited by the prospect of becoming Queen, and won her husband over to the idea. His older brothers were more recalcitrant, perhaps sensing that in their sibling, Napoleon saw an easy pawn. Persuading both Ferdinand and Charles to abdicate in favor of Francisco would be a challenge.

To remedy this, the Emperor sought assistance from his erstwhile foes in London and Vienna. He played the part of a frustrated peacemaker, whose measured attempts at brokering a compromise with Madrid were being stymied by Ferdinand’s intransigence. [6] Napoleon made the case for Francisco as the new King of Spain, arguing that he could restore the Spanish monarchy without a shot fired, but only if the exiled monarch and his brother Charles could be prevailed upon to step aside, for the good of their country. This led to a complex series of diplomatic maneuvers, with British and Austrian diplomats interviewing all three of the Bourbon siblings at length to weigh their cases against the Emperor’s. The impasse would delay a unified response to the Spanish Revolution for nearly two years. In the meantime, events on the other side of the continent would take center stage.

[1] This is an assertion that I saw crop up in the 90’s, stating that Britain under the Corn Laws was actually more protectionist than contemporary France. I don’t know enough about trade policy to gauge its veracity, but at least in this timeline, it carries more weight, since France did start introducing farm tariffs after the Bourbon Restoration IOTL.

[2] As far as time frame goes, this is roughly concurrent with the Panic of 1819 from last chapter. Basically, the recovery from the war and from 1816’s Year Without a Summer results in depressed food prices on both sides of the Atlantic.

[3] Chapter Fifteen will explore this migration in more detail.

[4] This may seem like an obvious or banal observation, but think about the international economic institutions we’ve got in the real world, and how anti-trade barriers they tend to be. A stronger emphasis on national sovereignty as represented by popular control of trade policy could make for some interesting Global North-South debates come the 20th Century.

[5] Infante Maria Luisa died as an infant IOTL, and complications from her birth resulted in her mother’s death during her second childbirth. Here, Maria is born without a hitch, and the Queen remains reasonably healthy as a result.

[6] I alluded to this strategic shift way back in Chapter Four. Napoleon’s now in a position where he can broker compromises that conveniently benefit him, and then turn around and blame more skeptical parties for getting in the way of a reasoned settlement.

 

[TRH]

What was originally going to be a short, quickie update became a normal length one after I decided to attach some information about French policing that I'd planned to expound on later. So enjoy Part 2 of my exploration of post-war France, now with extra heavy-handed foreshadowing.

Also, I've been trying to include more pictures in the last few chapters to hopefully make the updates more engaging than a straight wall of text, so let me know how that's been going. Eventually, I'll start including pics that aren't just portraits of important people, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

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Chapter Fifteen: The Eagle’s Repose, Continued.​

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Excerpted from Patterns in French Migration from 1820 to 1950 by Alessio Vernengo, 1988.​

The first thing that stands out about the French diaspora is its size. Compared to the large outflows from England, Ireland, Italy, Germany, and other parts of Europe, France experienced much lower population losses to emigration during the 19th Century. Between slower population growth and the relative security enjoyed by small farmers in France relative to other countries, there was less pressure, and less of an impetus for families to move abroad.

Despite this, there were two periods during this time in which French emigration spiked. The larger and more famous of these episodes came in the 1870’s, as many thousands of French fled the country to escape the excesses of the Second Terror. The other incident came several years after the end of the Revolutionary Wars, with the agricultural slump that stretched roughly from 1818 to 1823. This displacement resulted in approximately 90,000 citizens leaving France over the course of the 1820’s. [1] Approximately two-thirds of these emigrants set off for the New World, primarily the United States.

Despite its smaller size, the contingent that went to Mexico also had profound implications in later decades. The newly minted Kingdom of New Spain offered several advantages that America lacked. The first and most obvious factor was a lack of anti-Catholicism; despite a popular sense of anti-clericalism from the recent rebellion, few Mexicans would discriminate against French immigrants on religious grounds. Another reason was a relative lack of government oversight. Viceroy Morelos was preoccupied with a series of ambitious social reforms, including an effort to gradually abolish slavery. Because of this, sparsely populated regions in Veracruz and Tejas became popular destinations for French settlers.

Historically, Tejas had resisted Mexican settlement, as conflicts with Apache and later Comanche Indians were a perennial obstacle. As a result, the region boasted little more than 3,000 settlers in 1820, a population outnumbered by the indigenous tribes. Morelos tried to rectify this through generous land grants, on the condition that new residents learned Spanish and practiced Catholicism.

These stipulations didn’t prevent Anglo settlement, but French émigrés were more welcomed, and in 1823, a community of 600 was founded at the mouth of the Nueces on the Gulf Coast. [2] In addition to some small farming, the town of Bettencour also sustained itself through trade with Mexican soldiers stationed in the area to stave off the Comanches. This symbiosis eased what might otherwise have been a contentious relationship between the new immigrants and the Mexican army, and formed the foundation for the French Mexican community to grow over the subsequent decades.

1873 Sketch of Bettencour, Tejas. ​

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Excerpted from Angels and Demons: The Shadow War for the Soul of France by Mathias Gaspard, 2004.​

Any observer tracing the historical development of industrialism and other radical ideologies first needs to appreciate their births in the proper historical context. And to do this, one needs to understand the nature of the French security state as it evolved over time. After all, it was under the shadow of Napoleonic surveillance and censorship that the Blanquists and other social movements took shape. The need to evade government scrutiny while still building popular support is reflected in the tactics favored by these groups – in many respects, it even pervades the ideologies themselves. [3] Therefore, a thorough review of the security state itself is in order.

As a part of his broader effort to centralize the French state, Napoleon I laid down the foundations for modern French law enforcement. The fruit of this labor, La Sûreté Nationale, was refined further by Napoleon II, taking on a sophisticated counterintelligence role, before finally being unleashed on the French people in all its fury by Napoleon III. Despite the reputation it would later acquire, the French police, much like the Emperor himself, had humbler origins.

Napoleon’s overhaul of French administration and law enforcement was a gradual process, starting during his time as First Consul and continuing until his death. The Emperor had several interests to balance: on the one hand, he wanted to concentrate administrative power in Paris, to restore a sense of stability in the wake of the Revolution. He also wanted a security apparatus that could supplement his military intelligence gathering. On the other hand, Napoleon’s years of campaigning meant that he also needed the police to function without his direct supervision. Threading this needle would require a spymaster blessed with both skill and the nerve to operate independently.

Both of these needs were met by Joseph Fouché, Napoleon’s Minister of Police. Appropriately, Fouché was mistrusted by the Emperor personally, but retained his position through a skill and efficiency that commanded universal respect. As Napoleon put it, “He is the police incarnate. He would teach it to God the Father, and the Devil would have nothing to teach him.” [4]

Fouché’s police force maintained peace in Paris, kept the Emperor appraised of domestic threats to his rule, primarily from royalists, and provided critical intelligence during Napoleon’s campaigns. After the Treaty of Madrid, the Minister’s focus shifted towards monitoring the French countryside, making sure that the disruption of French agriculture in the post-war years didn’t boil over into violence.

Following Fouché’s death in 1819, the Emperor appointed an even more controversial figure as his replacement. Eugène Francois Vidocq, a thief and forger, had joined the state’s payroll as an informer ten years earlier, and spent the intervening years ascending the ranks of the police. La Sûreté was, in fact, Vidocq’s brainchild. Initially an informal outfit of plainclothes detectives, the organization was quickly rolled into the Minister of Police’s purview. By infiltrating the criminal underworld, Vidocq’s detectives could identify and track threats to public order, allowing for more proactive security policy. The Emperor’s promotion of Vidocq in spite of his criminal past was a strong signal of Napoleon’s desire for investigation and detective work to take center stage. Some degree of crime would be tolerated, so long as it could also be controlled.

Eugène Francois Vidocq, Father of La Sûreté

One of Vidocq’s first acts as Minister began the transition of the Sûreté from an investigative branch of the Paris police towards its later role as the command and control of domestic intelligence gathering. [5] This shift was encouraged by Napoleon, but was pursued even more vigorously by his son, who saw the benefits to infiltrating and monitoring any potential subversive movements in the Empire. This awareness would enable the state to deal with threats as delicately or forcefully as the situation demanded, even influencing the country’s political culture through selective enforcement. This posture was also well in keeping with the political changes of the Constitution of the Year XL, and its empowerment of professionals over lawmakers.

What the Emperor did not realize, however, was that this environment would have other, less readily foreseeable implications for his country’s political culture. Blanqui and others were well-aware of the danger of state infiltration of their movements, and tailored their structure and tactics to exploit gaps in the state’s abilities. Not only could this awareness let radical groups evade detection, but it also guided them towards avenues in which they could build their own power base, with Imperial officials none the wiser. This, too, would have profound effects on the crisis of the 1870’s.

[1] This is a huge boost from OTL’s 1820’s, but that’s cancelled out by a tapering off in the next few decades where there was a more of a steady increase over time IOTL. Of course, sending out more migrants earlier on will have a compounding effect in the future of this timeline.

[2] OTL Corpus Christi. There were a couple unsuccessful colonization attempts in the 18th Century IOTL before the successes of the 1830’s and 40’s.

[3] Considering OTL Blanquism is basically all tactics and no ideals, this says a lot.

[4] OTL quote from Nappy. He didn’t like or trust Fouché, but he certainly seemed to respect the guy’s acumen. Also worth noting that the Walcheren Expedition didn't happen ITTL, and neither did the Perceval Ministry, removing the two most immediate reasons Fouché got fired IOTL.

[5] This happened much later IOTL. Here the shift means that la Sûreté retains its detective branch even as it starts managing the rest of the constabulary.

 

[TRH]

Now that I'm back in the swing of writing for this, I'm going to try and see if I can maintain an update a week, or every two weeks at most. So now we've got a British politics update, and the next one will bring us back to South America to wrap up unfinished business down there. Enjoy.

Chapter Sixteen: State of Emergency​

Excerpted from The Age of Revolutions by A.F. Stoddard, 2006.​

In the wake of its defeat against Napoleon, the British Empire entered a strange torpor politically, and nothing exemplified this better than the occupant of Number Ten. Simply put, George Canning was not supposed to be Prime Minister. He was too much a Tory for the Whigs, too Whiggish for many Tories, and was personally mistrusted by the King. Worse, Canning also suffered from being hemmed in by the legacies of previous governments, further stymieing his ambitions for social reform. Nevertheless, due to the listlessness pervading both parties, he found himself at the forefront, as the only reasonably acceptable choice to maintain a majority government.

One of Canning’s passions was free trade – as an early disciple of Ricardo, he believed that a world shorn of trade barriers would accentuate the superiority of British industry. Unfortunately, the last measure taken by the outgoing Liverpool Ministry was an agricultural tariff, the first of the Corn Laws. [1] The tariff kept bread prices high in England even as they began sinking on the Continent after 1818, benefiting landholders at the expense of urban laborers. Despite his opposition to the tariff, Canning knew better than to challenge the Corn Law. Farmers on the Continent and even across the Atlantic were put out of business as food prices declined. For the landholders and their advocates in the House of Lords, Britain’s insulation from this trend was a sign that the Law was working exactly as intended, and was therefore grounds not to challenge it.

Canning’s other unwelcome bequest from previous governments was a historic level of war debt. The Napoleonic Wars had raged for nearly a quarter of a century, and outfitting its own armies as well as those of its continental allies had left the British government with 850 million Pounds in debt - an unprecedented burden. [2] Canning described the dilemma before his government succinctly, noting that “Should we keep taxes as they are, the country’s pensioners and creditors will rise against us. Should we raise taxes to retire the debt more quickly, the rest of the country will riot. We face popular opprobrium regardless of our choice.”

In the end, raising taxes was deemed the lesser evil. The House of Commons refused to retain an income tax in peacetime, forcing the government to increase the excise on liquor, tobacco, and several other goods. This did little to ease the nation’s spirits, but it did allow Canning to make steady progress towards lowering the public debt burden. From 1816 onward, the ratio of debt to output was on the decline. [3]

In the meantime, Canning decided to tackle another of his domestic ambitions – Catholic emancipation. Ever since the Act of Union in 1800, the question of anti-Catholic discrimination had been a thorny issue. At the time, Pitt had promised an end to the Test Acts and other legislation that pressured British Catholics to effectively renounce their religion to hold public office. Opposition from George III had been the main stumbling block at the time, and Pitt’s government fell once it became clear he couldn’t keep his word.

The King’s death in 1819 provided an opening to tackle the Catholic Question again. George IV was no friendlier to the Catholic cause than his father, but Canning’s Cabinet of pro-Emancipation Tories and Whigs was prepared to go to the mat on the issue. On January 29th, 1820, Canning and Home Secretary Lord Wellesley met with the King. An Emancipation Bill had been drafted by William Plunkett, and the two men flatly informed George IV that should he withhold his consent from the legislation, then the entire Cabinet would resign. Reluctantly, the King acceded to Canning’s ultimatum. National unrest seemed to be approaching a boiling point, and George feared the instability that could result from a fallen government at this juncture. His obligation to uphold the monarchy outweighed his loyalty to the Church of England.

The King was right to worry – the Revolutions in France and Spain were vivid demonstrations of what could happen when a monarch refused to bend to the will of the people. Modern historians tend to cite greater prosperity and stronger and more responsive institutions as reasons why Britain avoided a similar upheaval as its continental neighbors. These points have merit, but the fact remains that British radicals existed, were a potent force, and despite reform efforts by Canning and others, it was often violent repression that kept these radicals from power.

In Britain, there were two primary movements that pushed for revolutionary change in the country’s political and economic governance. Of these two, the more famous were the Luddites, whose cause became so well-known that their name remains in use today to denote opposition to new technology. Spurred by harsh working conditions during the Napoleonic Wars, this movement took aim at new advances in automated textile making, which deprived skilled craftsmen of their livelihoods, only for these tradesmen to be replaced by less skilled, less well-compensated workers.

A sketch of machine breaking.

The Luddite response was a program of economic sabotage, with affiliated workers destroying mechanical equipment throughout the country, but particularly in industrial centers in Nottinghamshire, Yorkshire, and Lancashire. This movement is traced back to 1811, but picked up further steam following the Panic of 1813, as well as in the wake of the Treaty of Madrid in 1815. What began as an apolitical protest movement gained further adherents who brought with them the sense that British government had failed its people, and that the only recourse for the downtrodden was to damage the livelihoods of the elite, and make them feel the same hardship that afflicted those beneath them. [4]

Ultimately, the British Army was forced to take action against the Luddites. Indeed, as Lord Byron sardonically observed, there were more British troops taking action against public unrest in Northern England in 1814 than had fought the French during the Fourth Coalition. “Because when confronted with our age’s Caesar on the Continent, and a few broken looms at home, certainly the latter is the more pressing danger,” he deadpanned. [5]

Regardless of urgency, the government responded with mass show trials, one in 1813 and another in 1816. In both cases, around half of the defendants were acquitted, but the other half faced execution or transportation. This harsh response eventually halted the growth of the movement, but its heavy-handedness may well have radicalized the more stalwart agitators, which led to the growth of this period’s other significant movement.

Despite achieving less initial notoriety, the second radical group, the Spenceans, may well have been the more influential, if only for their one chance success in 1820. The Spenceans were disciples of Thomas Spence, an 18th Century radical who advocated an end to aristocratic landholding in favor of collective ownership. Unlike the Luddites, this movement was non-violent at first, seeking redress for the country’s poor. Although the British economy rebounded from the Panic of 1813, the firm floor on cost of living imposed by the Corn Laws, paired with Canning’s tax increases, collectively excluded the country's poor from the recovery. Output plateaued in 1818 and stagnated, never quite returning to its pre-Canal Mania heights.

As with the Luddites, the government responded with a show of force, trying Spencean leader Arthur Thistlewood and several others with high treason for their part in inciting unrest. The men were acquitted, but the display of governmental contempt hardened their resolve in the righteousness of their cause. As will become clear, our primary source on the Spencean leader’s thoughts is emphatically not an unbiased observer, but according to him, the 1817 Islington Affair was the moment when Arthur Thistlewood lost any remaining faith in British government. For him, the only way forward was to bring the entire edifice crashing down.

The following year, Thistlewood and his followers began plotting a violent overthrow of the British government. With the death of George III and the subsequent furor over Catholic emancipation, it seemed as if their time had come. The Spencean Philanthropists, as they were known, would attack Canning’s Cabinet at a ceremonial dinner, decapitating the government in one fell swoop. To facilitate the plan, the group rented a house on Cato Street and awaited their chance.

That chance was ultimately an illusion. Ever since their previous brush with the law, the Spenceans had been monitored and infiltrated by British authorities. Thistlewood’s second, George Edwards, was secretly a police informant, and he had concocted the story of the Cabinet dinner to ensnare the others. On February 1st, 1820, the night before the conspirators intended to move, the London police struck first. The operation hit an early snag when the Coldstream Guards, whose support had been requested, failed to materialize, forcing the police to belatedly make the arrest alone. Despite this setback, most of the ten men enlisted in the conspiracy were captured. The sole exception was Thistlewood, who escaped through a window. To evade pursuit, the Spencean sought refuge in the home of a sympathetic cobbler while he devised a new plan. [6]

The February 1st Raid on the Cato Conspiracy was not the success the government had hoped for.

It is unclear whether Thistlewood realized at this point that his group had been betrayed, but he knew that he couldn’t count on additional help, and that his own arrest was imminent. With these grim realities apparent, he set his mind on one last roll of the dice. And so it was that on February 3rd, a mere two days after his fellows were captured, Arthur Thistlewood walked into Number 10, disguised as a member of the cleaning staff. As outlandish a plan as this may have seemed, it worked. The men on duty, not recognizing the wanted criminal in his stolen clothing, allowed him inside without incident. Once there, he found his way towards the Prime Minister’s office, where Canning was discussing strategy with Lord Wellesley. [7]

Thistlewood attacked the two, shooting the Prime Minister and stabbing the Home Secretary. Both men would perish within the day. News of the assassination shook the country, and not simply because of the violent act itself. The fact that a man with an extensive criminal record, whose activities had been closely monitored by authorities, and who had been the target of a city-wide investigation, could not only slip through the law’s fingers but, in so doing, bluff his way to the doorstep of the Prime Minster, was a harrowing turn of events.

It was also one that found Canning’s conservative rivals quick to take advantage. Chief among them was Henry Addington, the Viscount Sidmouth. As Home Secretary, he had overseen the initial government response to the Luddites, with an emphasis on maintaining public order at all costs. Sidmouth subsequently left government in protest of Catholic emancipation, which he strongly opposed. With Canning’s assassination, the former Secretary now saw an opportunity to retake the Tory Party from the late Minister’s reformists.

He couldn’t do this alone, however. Sidmouth had served as Prime Minster before, signing the Treaty of Amiens, but that tenure had been cut short by a Parliamentary revolt against his weak leadership. He knew the moment was ripe for a strong appeal to public order, but he also knew that his oratorical skills were ill-suited for the task. To remedy this, Sidmouth forged a partnership with Lord Eldon, the longtime Lord Chancellor, who could provide the strong rhetoric and charisma demanded by the situation. Together with Sidmouth’s old ally Spencer Perceval, the three resolved to steer their party and their country back on course.

On the 9th, less than a week after Canning’s demise, the surviving Cabinet secretaries met with King George. The current Cabinet, divided as it was between Whigs, Canningite Tories, and more traditionalist conservatives left over from Liverpool, was unable to decide on a successor. [8] There was no choice but to call a new election, less than a year after the one that followed the death of George III. And as the country prepared to visit the polls again, Sidmouth and his allies had a secret weapon in their corner: George Edwards.

As the government’s mole inside the Cato Street Conspiracy, Edwards remains our primary source of information on Arthur Thistlewood and the slow descent of the Spencean into an anarchist assassin. Throughout the months of February and March, Edwards offered his (stringently coached) account of the Conspiracy and its infamous leader to The Times. This process is considered by journalists as the precursor to modern interviewing, as well as a cautionary tale into the pitfalls of overreliance on official sources.

For weeks, readers were treated to an exhaustive account of Thistlewood’s activities and the precautions taken by government to mitigate potential damage. This tale culminated in the fateful raid on the 1st, where Edwards spared no criticism for the police force’s failure to apprehend the ringleader, and the subsequent lack of vigilance that had cost the Prime Minister his life.

The Tory Party traditionally enjoyed a majority during the elections of this time, thanks to the inclusion of seats from rotten boroughs. The 1820 election was more than simply an assertion of majority party dominance, however. In fact, while the Whigs lost dozens of seats, the true losers were the Canningite Tories, who were charged by the press and by more hardline conservatives with vacillation and incompetence, with letting public order in England fall by the wayside in their zeal to appease the Irish. In accordance with Sidmouth’s plans, Lord Eldon emerged as the new leader of the party. With the High Tory faction triumphant, Eldon formed a new Cabinet from veterans of the Liverpool and Portland Ministries.

The new government operated on the basis of five fundamental points of agreement:

1. No Catholic Emancipation.
2. The Corn Law was not to be contested.
3. The breakdown in order exemplified by the Luddites and Spenceans was to be met with all means at the government’s disposal.
4. Electoral reform was to be tabled. The cause had some adherents among doctrinaire Anglicans, but was still too contentious for the government to support.
5. The unrest in Spain must be dealt with, even if doing so required an alliance with Napoleon. Otherwise, intercession on the Continent was to be minimized. [9]

With these imperatives in mind, and with Sidmouth reinstated as Home Secretary, the new High Tory government set out to meet the challenges of the 1820’s, preserving social order by any means necessary.

[1] This is my attempt to resolve what might have otherwise been a continuity snafu from two chapters ago. I mentioned Canning and Corn Laws, but given his opposition to them, I decided it could be something he was saddled with by Liverpool, who also wasn’t a fan, but got pushed into it IOTL anyways.

[2] Less than OTL in other words – no Peninsular War, more colonial action, more subsidies for allies in 1809-1810, but few/none afterwards. Still well over 100 percent of GDP, though, so a major long-term problem, and difficult to service with no peacetime income tax.

[3] This is a swifter response than Liverpool did, though, so the country will find itself on the mend sooner rather than later.

[4] This is a divergence from OTL’s Luddites. Basically, the discontent from those two shock events that didn’t happen IOTL cause the movement to take a more politicized bent and last a few years longer before petering out.

[5] This, however, is basically OTL. There were a lot of British troops up north during the war, and Byron was sympathetic to their cause.

[6] Most of this is OTL, until the raid. There, several people escaped along with Thistlewood in real life, but were all caught here. Ironically, this makes things easier for him, as he simply needs to go to ground by himself instead of with a group.

[7] And this is basically an acknowledgement of the whole social engineering literature on infiltration. It offends our sense of logic, but insultingly simple deceptions like this really do work more often than they should.

[8] A task made harder by Sidmouth, Spencer and Eldon advising the conservatives to gum up the works as much as they can, to force a new election.

[9] Canning was actually not so sentimental about the differences between republic and monarchy. Sidmouth and friends care about the distinction a lot more, however.

 

[TRH]

Phew, just barely managed to avoid breaking my one update a week promise - the week after I made it! But here I am, wrapping up the war in South America. Next, we're going back to Spain to see how its Revolution is coming. Enjoy!

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Chapter Seventeen: The Enemy of My Enemy​

Excerpted from The First Wave: Independence Movements of the Napoleonic Era by Juanita Perez, 1984​

The Ordinance of 1819 marked the beginning of the end of fighting in Spanish America. In most Spanish colonies, Royalist forces held the upper hand, however hard-fought or tenuous, and war-weary locals were willing to give the new Regencia Liberal a chance to address their problems peaceably. The exceptions to this were the two colonies who rejected the Regency on principle.

Despite this commonality, the two most persistent trouble spots shared little else politically. The Viceroyalty of Peru refused to accept the Palafox Regency as a legitimate continuation of the Bourbon monarchy, effectively joining the ranks of rebellious Spanish colonies, even as most others laid down their arms. The other outlier was the first and bitterest of the uprisings, in Rio de la Plata. Here, the Buenos Aires Junta was confident of ultimate victory, an optimism further reinforced by their successful manipulation of the competing factions in Chile.

From 1816 to 1819, the Spanish army had clashed with the La Platans on the border between Upper Peru and Chile. The Royalists were better-trained and had superior numbers, but their long and easily raided supply lines proved a liability. In both 1817 and 1818, the Royalists had gained the advantage in Upper Peru during the summer, only to retreat back into Chile in the Fall, to avoid getting cut off once snow blocked the mountain passes they depended on for resupply. By appealing to José Miguel Carrera’s ego, Buenos Aires’ allies in the Lodge of Rational Knights were able to secure a ceasefire on this front, with their subsequent coup putting the revolutionaries in charge of all Spanish territories south of Peru.

And Peru, in spite of its royalist sentiments, appeared doomed to share the same fate. With Santiago secured, the Castelli Junta turned its attention towards Lima. In light of the colony’s monarchist resistance against the regency in Madrid, Peru now seemed like an easy target. In July 1820, La Platan forces under José de San Martín landed on the coast of Peru with roughly 20,000 troops. Deprived of protection from the Spanish army, the Peruvians could muster forces only a third of this size. [1] For Viceroy José de la Serna, it was clear that Lima could not be defended against such overwhelming numbers. This did not make Serna willing to give up, however.

The Chilean Navy, Supporting San Martin's 1820 Invasion of Peru.

Instead, the Viceroy resorted to irregular warfare, dispersing his forces across the colony to harry San Martin’s columns and impede their progress. La Guerilla, as it was called, severely tested an already war-weary force. This alone wouldn't be enough, however. With a clarity often absent in other royalist administrators, Serna realized that only a broad-based resistance movement could compel the La Platans to abandon their newest conquest. And in Peru, this meant inclusion of the natives. The Spanish subjugation of the Incas had never been a truly settled matter, with revolts flaring up periodically from the 16th Century onward. Fourteen such uprisings had occurred during the 18th Century alone. With the disorder unleashed by La Guerilla, the Indios rose once more, conducting hit and run attacks on royalists and La Platans alike.

Even before 1820, a certain modus vivendi between Spanish authorities and native leaders had been necessary for Peru to function smoothly. To sway the Indios towards the royalist cause and against the La Platans would take far more than mere accommodation, however. As a result, Serna’s championing of the royalist cause in the absence of any real oversight from the Spanish monarchy was an unqualified boon under these circumstances. On Christmas eve, the Viceroy met with a group of Quechua and Aymara chiefs, along with the Mestizo militia leader Mateo Pumacahua. Together in the mountains north of Cusco, this group hammered out a consensus that would dramatically alter the political character of Peru.

The Charter of Cusco was, ironically enough, a mirror image of sorts to Palafox’s Ordinance of 1819, overhauling the Bourbon architecture of the previous century to better suit current conditions. [2] Where Palafox and Calo attempted to sway the rebellious Spanish American colonists with promises of greater representation, so too did Serna entice Quechua and Aymara notables. Specifically, the Charter promised to grant both tribal groups representation in Peru’s Real Audiencia, the colony’s judicial-legislative apparatus. Through that body, the natives would have a direct avenue for redressing grievances, as well as direct access to the Viceroy himself as he made decisions. Coupled with other local concessions, Serna successfully persuaded native leaders to form a unified front against the La Platan occupation force. La Guerilla would continue to be a thorn in Buenos Aires’ side until their eventual withdrawal in early 1822.

More than Peruvian insurgents, however, what really put a stop to the Argentinian war machine was a threat much closer to home. Portugal had long contested the Rio de la Plata region with Spain. Control of the river basin offered immense influence over events in the interior of the continent, and the basin itself provided rich farmland. In light of the Palafox Regency’s tacit consent, King John VI finally decided to act. On March 12th, 1821, Portuguese forces advanced into the Banda Oriental region, claiming the land north and east of the Rio de la Plata as a part of Brazil.

The Buenos Aires clique was not terribly surprised by this development, as the Portuguese had mulled intervention for years before finally acting. And after years of fighting Spanish and British armies and holding their own, the La Platans were confident they could best a third European power just as easily. Santiago de Liniers led 30,000 men against a comparably sized Portuguese force near the town of Bagé. To their shock, the La Platans found themselves roundly defeated.

What Liniers and his compatriots hadn’t accounted for was that in their earlier encounters with European armies, logistical constraints had precluded significant use of artillery. The Portuguese, with the luxury of months and years to prepare their attack, were not so limited, and their canister shot devastated tightly packed La Platan formations. [3] Liniers tried to form a new defensive line anchored by the river Negro, but with the ground between the river and the coast open, and the Portuguese navy free to supply assaults on his flank and rear, this was a futile effort. Only the well-prepared earthworks of Montevideo managed to put a brake on the Portuguese advance.

By now, the La Platan war engine was truly running out of steam. The ruling Junta had relied on extensive conscription to fill out its ranks, with nearly 80,000 men serving in the republic’s military over the course of nearly a decade. [4] Roughly a quarter of these men were dead or wounded by the end of 1821, with a quarter of that number perishing in the campaign against Brazil alone. The psychological toll of these losses was tremendous. Riots broke out frequently in Buenos Aires and Santiago, and it was only fear of the Portuguese that kept Montevideo quiet.

After nine years of fighting, Juan José Castelli and his comrades were finally ready to cut their losses. San Martin was recalled from Peru, and peace feelers were sent out to representatives from Portugal, Spain, and Peru for a comprehensive South American peace treaty. In the Treaty of Montevideo, a slice of the Banda Oriental was ceded to Portugal, while Chile retained nominal independence despite its pro-Buenos Aires government. Paraguay and Upper Peru would be annexed by the newly recognized Argentine Republic. With that, the fighting in Spanish America finally reached its end.

[1] This is actually a dramatic reversal of the OTL manpower dynamics. But given the intense over-mobilization that Buenos Aires has undergone ITTL, coupled with Peru’s isolation from Spain, the numbers make more sense.

[2] I had planned this twist for a while, but only noticed this irony as I was writing it. Part of my idea was to create a situation where, as monarchists and liberals fight, it’s the monarchists who are more willing to be pluralistic and reach out to Native Americans. Only because it better suits their interests, of course, but it’s a reminder that “more liberal” =/= better, sometimes.

[3] It may seem like I’d wanked the Argentineans so far, but this really is a big part of their success in previous engagements. They’d either fought landing parties, or smaller forces without significant artillery, or fought overstretched armies in mountainous terrain. Facing a pitched battle against a well-supplied European army exposes their delusions of grandeur.

[4] The Viceroyalty’s 1800 population was around 2 million, for comparison. The mobilization isn’t WWI Bulgaria or anything, but it’s a big, big strain for a population of this size, and will have severe social implications down the line.

 

[TRH]

Update time, and thankfully this time I didn't have to rush to get this out. Enjoy the wrap-up of the Spanish Revolution, and stay tuned for next chapter, when we return to the United States for the 1824 election, with a side helping of Constitutional crisis. Hooray!

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Chapter Eighteen: The Regency​

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Excerpted from The Age of Revolutions by A.F. Stoddard, 2006.​

Thomas Huxley famously observed that the Regency period in Spain was the principal reason the Spanish Empire avoided suffering the same fate as the Qing Dynasty in China. Where the latter’s stabs at modernization and liberalization were ultimately too little, too late, the former did more than simply catch up to its European and American peers in political and social change. With many of the more conservative supporters of the Bourbons having boycotted the new government, debate was dominated by more liberal voices. As a result, the Constitution put together by the Cortes General in the Autumn of 1820 was the most progressive document of its kind in the world.

Most notable among the 1820 Constitution’s provisions was its guarantee of universal male suffrage. Twelve years before the United States and nearly a century before Great Britain, the Spanish established a broad-based franchise, an essential building bloc for the sort of mass democracy that swept the world in the 20th Century. As we will see in due course, this guarantee still had its own limitations, but the general principle remained. [1]

Francisco de Goya's Allegory of the Constitution.

For as commendable as the new franchise was, the Spanish Constitution still contained several key shortcomings, as various factions tried to preserve their privileged positions within the political scene. Chief among these factions was the Regent himself - General Palafox pushed to preserve a strong role for the monarch in government, especially in foreign policy. The implementation of the Ordinance of 1820 already established a precedent for the newly empowered colonial Viceroys to be unilaterally appointed by the King (or Regent), and this power was explicitly upheld in the new Constitution. In addition, the monarch was given wide latitude to conduct diplomacy and negotiate treaties with the Cortes serving in an advisory capacity. Only the King and Cortes together could declare war, however.

Another outstanding concern was the status of citizens in the colonies. Should the franchise expand to include every man in the American colonies, then their combined weight would give the colonists a majority in the Cortes. Ironically enough, this prospect was unwelcome both to Spanish representatives and to many of the representatives representing the colonies, where the Creole elites were loathe to dilute their own influence. As a compromise, voting rights were limited to those with ancestry in Spain or its imperial possessions. This meant that although free blacks and mulattos were granted civil liberties, they could not vote.

One final irony of the new Constitution was its approach regarding federalism. Although its endorsement of the Ordinance of 1820 guaranteed autonomy overseas, the new government moved in the opposite direction at home. Spain was reorganized into provinces, as part of a campaign to roll back regional autonomy. Palafox’s personal popularity ensured that his home region of Aragon would acquiesce to the new measures, with some reluctance, but other areas, the Basque country and Catalonia in particular, proved more intractable.

This was the point at which it became clear that the Regency had overplayed its hand. Conservative elements of Spanish society, previously passive and divided in the absence of the king, now rose up to defend regional autonomy and the Church. Through much of 1821 and 1822, low-level revolts and insurgency took root in more rural and conservative areas of the country, and Palafox, who had thought himself a peacemaker, was now forced to deploy the army against these internal threats. [2]

This didn’t help his political standing in Madrid, where Palafox’s primary base of support came not from the most liberal members of the new Cortes, but the more moderate delegates, people who supported a Constitutional order, but one tempered by the monarchy. The liberals, for their part, were highly concerned by the role the Regent was taking in the new government. These dissenters labeled General Palafox a Bonapartist who fought for royal prerogatives out of personal self-interest, rather than ideological conviction or an interest in the common good.

This was the weakness at the heart of the Spanish Revolution. The current government had seized power through a military coup and the flight of the royal family, rather than through popular mobilization or proper and legal channels or reform. As a result, the warring political factions in the Cortes only had a limited respect for due process and peaceful resolution of disputes. The Regent had achieved his position by means of conspiracy, and so conspiracy was the order of the day. Both liberals yearning for a republic and conservatives fighting to restore the monarchy began plotting against the sitting leadership. [3]

And this, at least, was something Napoleon could understand and exploit. The French Emperor had been a passive observer of the Spanish Revolution in its early days, harboring the exiled Bourbons but otherwise making no moves against the Regencia Liberal. Behind the scenes, he was more active, attempting to persuade King Ferdinand and his brother Charles to abdicate the throne in exchange for French aid to their youngest brother Francisco. These efforts had stalled out in the face of the Bourbon family’s refusal to accept French terms, but with the rising counterrevolutionary turmoil in Spain, Napoleon saw an opportunity to break the deadlock.

King Ferdinand had been given free rein to write and receive letters during his exile, and naturally, some of these had been to and from his conservative supporters in Spain. Spanish authorities had allowed this, but Police Minister Vidocq strongly suspected that Ferdinand’s mail was inspected by the Spanish before it reached its intended destination. And so Napoleon devised a plan to turn this precaution to his advantage. During December of 1822, his agents dispatched a number of forged letters, bearing Ferdinand’s official seal, and addressing Spanish conservatives with vague intimations of a right-wing coup to overthrow the Regency and make way for the return of the Bourbons. For added effect, these letters spoke obliquely of “others” to approach for support when the time was right.

The Restorationist Letters, as they became known, were a carefully considered ploy on the part of the French. If their suspicions were wrong, and the letters reached their destinations unopened, then they could well become a self-fulfilling prophecy, bringing about the very counterrevolutionary action they alluded to. And if the letters were intercepted by the Regent, then his reaction would give Napoleon the necessary impetus to bring Ferdinand to heel. [4] As it turned out, the Emperor did not have long to wait to learn the truth of the matter.

On New Years’ Day 1823, the Regent announced his discovery of a plot against the Kingdom and the Constitution, and, with the permission of the moderates and liberals in the Cortes, began to take drastic action against those he suspected of being party to the conspiracy. Clerical groups were especially hard-hit, with the Jesuits banned from the Kingdom, and many members arrested. This state repression exacerbated existing tensions, which led to even more civil disorder. Spain seemed to be headed for civil war.

This crackdown was exactly what Napoleon had been waiting for. He called for a conference between the great powers of Europe to address the latest developments in Spain. On the 21st, he met with representatives from Britain, Austria and Russia in Caen to reiterate his proposal for an intervention. Tsar Alexander had been amenable to Napoleon’s suggestion to install Prince Francisco from the beginning, and Francis of Austria, previously ambivalent, was swayed by descriptions from Spain of “atrocities” against the Catholic clergy. Even Lord Eldon, who had previously supported either Ferdinand or Prince Charles for the throne, was now ready to approve Napoleon’s plan. [5]

This left Ferdinand and Charles as the sole remaining dissenters to the plan. But with violence in Spain seeming to worsen by the day, and the last of their foreign supporters abandoning them, the brothers finally folded, abdicating the Spanish throne to Prince Francisco.

Francisco I legitimized Spain as a constitutional monarchy.

With this concession in hand, Napoleon mobilized his army along the Pyrenees, proclaiming his intent to restore the rightful King of Spain to his throne. In addition, the Emperor reminded the Regent of his promise to step aside for a monarch who would respect the new Cortes and its Constitution. Under other circumstances, General Palafox would likely have found some pretext to object, and try hanging on to the Regency. As it was, however, a decade a peace had further inflated the Emperor’s already formidable reputation as an invincible opponent. And with one third of the country branding Palafox a Jacobin and another third the Spanish Bonaparte, the Regent saw little reason to postpone the inevitable any longer.

On April 14th, in exchange for a promise of clemency from the new king, General Palafox abandoned the regency, and retired to his hometown of Zaragoza. He would remain there until his eventual death in 1843. Prince Francisco took his place on the throne, with a mandate to retain the Cortes and the new civil institutions of the 1820 Constitution, while reining in more intrusive liberal excesses. And with that, the Regency period of Spanish history came to a close, although the influences of those four years would be felt for a long time to come.

[1] This stuff is largely based off of the OTL Cadiz Constitution from 1812. There are some differences, the big one being Palafox’s going to bat for royal prerogatives, but that was what I decided to use for a baseline document ITTL, warts and all.

[2] And considering Palafox first took power to try and stop the endless police actions in South America, it’s really embarrassing for him to be forced to bring the policing home like this.

[3] Conspiracy from the right and left was rife during OTL’s Trienio Liberal, from what I can tell. A Constitution imposed by way of a military coup is naturally going to be rather tenuous.

[4] And if Ferdinand complains that the letters are fake, well, that’s exactly what he’d say if they were real, too, since the “plot” is clearly bearing no fruit.

[5] Not to mention that suspicion of Ferdinand’s involvement in the Restorationist Letters makes him look even worse in the eyes of the great powers. At best, it paints him as a stubborn idiot scorning foreign aid out of hubris.

 

[TRH]

This took longer than I expected, but here we have the super-complicated Election of 1824. I hadn't really thought about what should come immediately after this update, so I think I'll put together something on Russia and Turkey next. In the meantime, enjoy!

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Chapter 19: Divisa in Partes Tres – The Election of 1824​

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Excerpted from The First American Party System by Charles Francis Adams, 1871.​

As the second term of his presidency wound down in 1823, William Crawford had cause for satisfaction and anxiety in equal measure. His Administration had navigated diplomatic disputes with its neighbors advantageously, weathered post-war economic turmoil, and laid the foundation for further territorial and economic expansion. And yet these same accomplishments further accentuated sectional differences, and so bore the seeds of dissolution for Crawford’s party. In 1824, these seeds would finally bear fruit. [1]

Indeed, many of Crawford’s greatest feats can only be fully understood in the context of the festering North-South fracture, which either forced responses from the Administration or else was further exacerbated by its actions. In the realm of foreign policy, Crawford contributed to a thaw in Anglo-American relations after their Napoleonic nadir. The London Convention contributed to the gradual demilitarization of the US-Canadian border, now fixed along the 49th parallel. [2]

As welcome as this amity may have been, it can be attributed in no small part to the aftereffects of the Compromise of 1820. The confrontation over Arkansaw and Missouri awakened Southern lawmakers to the political danger of war with Britain – with the prospect of incorporating Canada as free soil territory, success became more daunting than failure in their minds. This realization led many Congressmen who had been war hawks less than a decade previous to change their disposition towards our northern neighbor. These Southerners endorsed Zebulon Pike’s seizure of Florida for the same reasons, seeing the peninsula as a new frontier for slavery once the native Indians were dealt with.

The Crawford Administration’s push for internal improvements also proved a locus of sectional tension. As the push for roads and canals continued, Southern states became more suspicious of such enterprises, seeing them as programs to benefit the North at the South’s expense. In this regard, no project showed the intractability of this sectional question as much as the National Road. A brainchild of Albert Gallatin, Jefferson’s Treasury Secretary, the Road had been envisioned as an endeavor that would bring the states together. Traditionally, settlers moving west tended to veer to the north or south to cross the Appalachians, with northerners skirting the edge of Lake Erie, while Southerners traversed the south end of the Cumberland Plateau, through northern Alabama. By building a road straight through the mountains of western Virginia towards the Ohio river, Gallatin hoped to allow both Northerners and Southerners to follow the same path westwards, bound more tightly together by the shared journey.

Gallatin's lofty ideals were ultimately thwarted by geographic reality. The original proposed route for the Road passed through the highest mountains in the Appalachian chain, and before long the builders were forced to alter its course, building through central Ohio and Indiana rather than on their southern borders. The Road was able to be finished in this fashion, and starting in 1821, the federal government began charging tolls along the route. But Southern public opinion, previously the bedrock of support for the project under Jefferson, was now firmly opposed. Senators from South Carolina, Virginia, and Georgia denounced the Road as an affront to the rights of their states, and as another indulgence for the benefit of the North. [3]

The amended route for the National Road.

Consideration of this sectional context is necessary to understand the events of 1824, but it is not sufficient. Individual ambition and rivalry had parts to play as well, not least on the part of the sitting President. Crawford was quite conscious of the turmoil at work in the country, but clung tightly to hope for the Democratic-Republicans to endure. As such, he favored a successor who could be trusted to carry on his work. These factors taken together meant that when Crawford endorsed Vice President DeWitt Clinton, the choice faced near-immediate dissent from all corners.

For Southerners like John Calhoun, Crawford’s support of Clinton, who had challenged James Madison as a Federalist twelve years earlier, served as validation for the growing suspicion that Northern Democrats and Federalists were separated by labels alone. For other allies of the Administration such as Henry Clay and my father, the choice of Clinton was a personal slight. And for populists and opportunists like Andrew Jackson, the fiat of the Administration and its Congressional allies was an opaque and undemocratic process for choosing the next president. Each of these aggrieved parties demanded satisfaction, and would no longer be denied.

A Pro-Jackson Cartoon Mocking "King Caucus."

Calhoun was among the first to act, along with James Monroe. Both men secured the approval of their respective state legislatures to run for President as Democratic-Republicans in opposition to Clinton, the Congressionally-endorsed nominee. They were soon joined by Clay and my father, as well as Generals Andrew Jackson and Zebulon Pike. With the Federalist Party no longer fielding presidential contenders, 1824 would instead by contested by seven men, all of the same party.

The means of selection for the dueling candidates may not have worsened sectional divisions by itself, but it certainly symbolized the fractures at work. These men were chosen by the states rather than by a national party, and through the summer and fall of 1824, their campaign tactics only drew more attention to this fact. Calhoun and Jackson were the most aggressive, lambasting Clinton as a closet Federalist, intent on draining Southern coffers to enrich the Northeast. Clinton was uniquely vulnerable to these charges not only because of his own record, but also on account of his running mate, none other than Albert Gallatin. [4]

Personal attacks were also commonplace on the campaign trail, with Clinton counterstriking at Calhoun as a separatist, and at Jackson and Pike as Bonapartists. The New York Evening Post memorably branded the latter two as “Cromwell and Caesar”, an epithet that would persist for years to come. All told, the campaign produced more rancor than any contest since 1800.

With such an immense selection of candidates, there was no question of any one man securing a majority in the Electoral College. Instead, the winner would be determined in the House of Representatives. This procedure had its own weakness, however, as the Constitution requires that the House choose only from the three contenders with the most Electors behind them. In this case, Vice President Clinton narrowly bested General Pike, with Speaker Clay coming in a distant third. [5]

With these choices, the contingent election in the House resolved itself relatively easily, but in a way that was calculated to reinforce, rather than quell, the contentiousness of the campaign. As Speaker, Henry Clay managed to persuade his own colleagues to select him rather than Pike or Clinton, focusing in particular on swaying Southern delegations hostile to Clinton and Northeastern representatives suspicious of Pike. On February 9th, 1825, Clay was elected President of the United States.

Henry Clay, Sixth President of the United States.

This victory was a Pyrrhic one, however. Clay had secured a mere 42 electors during the election, and his share of the popular vote was only a fraction of what Clinton, Jackson, or my father had received. Denunciation erupted over the arcane vagaries of the contingent election and the Corrupt Bargain that had enabled the Speaker to defeat more popular opponents with the help of his fellow Congressmen. Worse, Crawford’s Democratic-Republicans had finally ruptured, with many Senators and Representatives expressing more loyalty to Calhoun, Jackson, or Pike rather than the sitting President. In winning the Presidency, Clay had lost the Congressional majorities necessary to advance his preferred agenda. This truth would haunt the President-elect for the next four years.

[1] More than the other “books” I’ve been using so far, Adams is driving at a very specific point about the gradual disintegration of the Democratic-Republicans. As a result, he’s very methodical in trying to explain all the causes and variables that resulted in this mess of an election. All of the US updates have been leading up to this, basically.

[2] From what I read on the subject, the 49th was used as a general rule of thumb by border arbitrators as early as 1807. Even in the absence of a War of 1812, it seems likely that that would remain the benchmark.

[3] I did a research paper on the National Road back in college. The terrain problems with the road were OTL, and I do think they made the original vision impractical. Maybe if they’d had northern and southern branches that met along the Ohio after crossing the Appalachians, that could have worked better, but the OTL plan was a no-go.

[4] This is OTL, too, funnily enough. Crawford, the real-life “nominee” in 1824, got saddled with Gallatin as his first running mate. For Clinton, it’s an even worse lodestone under the circumstances.

[5] Andrew Jackson didn’t fight at New Orleans ITTL, and Pike seized Florida instead of him. He’s nowhere near the giant of OTL as a result. Doesn’t mean we’ve heard the last of him, of course.